Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi, not the Ninja Turtle, was a Renaissance era Italian Sculptor. He worked in a variety of materials including stone, bronze wood and clay. It is believed he started his art training as a goldsmith. His work mostly focused on religious figures and iconography. One of his most well known sculptures is a fascinating bronze depiction of David but I have always been taken by his Magdalene.     The Penitent Magdalene is a poplar wood sculpture of Mary Magdalene. Mary Magdalene is an interesting figure in the bible. Our understanding of her is now questioned and, in my opinion, Donatello seems to humanize her in a way that many don’t. She was a “woman of sin” (prostitute) who was tremendously beautiful but possessed by demons. Jesus cast out those demons and she went on to become one of his most ardent followers. The Bible...

  I was fortunate to have a techy dad. As far back as I can remember we always had a computer. I remember inserting the big ol’ floppy disk to load MS-DOS and then loading whatever game I wanted to play. The day we upgraded to two disk drives was huge and you cannot imagine how mind blowing it was when we got our first hard drive. Anyway, I loved Frogger and Dig Dug but my favorite was a text-based dungeon crawler, Rogue. My mom and I would fight over who would get to play next. I spent hours getting slaughtered by snakes, emus and kestrels. The internet being what it is, I was able to track down a playable version of the game…   (Click Here)   I have already sunk another 3 to 4 hours into Rogue since finding it and I still get slaughtered on a regular basis. While I’m tripping down memory lane, this site brought back some memories…   (Click...

Human perception of the body is so acute and knowledgeable that the smallest hint of a body can trigger recognition. —Jenny Saville I just realized that alot of these are going to start with, “When I was in college…” but here goes. In college I hung out with a girl who was a stereotypical, 100% Artist. That was her thing. Still is actually. She went on to attend a really great grad school and she is a working artist but that is beside the point. During our time hanging out she acquired a book that was more holy to her than the Bible. It was a heavy hardcover book about the Sensations Art Exhibit. She carried that thing around with her everywhere she went. I can honestly say I never saw most of the pages because she wouldn’t let it out of her reach for more than a few minutes. The freshest, most amazing artists working at the time were featured in those pages and...