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Yayoi Kusama, Forlorn Spot, 1953, watercolor, pastel, ink on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John A. Benton and The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation, 2019.32.4
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The Lost Kusamas
Recently, archivist Anna Rimel discovered four small watercolors by Yayoi Kusama in the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Joseph Cornell Study Center. Rendered in watercolor, ink, pastel, and tempera paint, these delicate compositions were created in the mid-fifties and represent a crucial body of work that bridged Kusama’s transition from Japan to the United States.
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2019 Conservation Wins Worth Celebrating
From preserving living ovarian tissues above freezing temperatures to using eDNA to track endangered and elusive wood turtles, join the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute in celebrating their biggest conservation success stories of 2019.
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Spinner dolphins in a small inlet off the Kona coast, Hawaii. Photo: Joesph Tepper, New York.
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Demystifying the Dolphin Family Tree
Until recently, the internal family relationships of the more than 35 species of ocean dolphins have remained unresolved. After analyzing more than 3,000 genes and looking at 6.5 million DNA base pairs in dolphin tissue samples, Michael McGowen from the National Museum of Natural History and colleagues have cracked the code of ocean dolphin family relationships – and uncovered a few surprises!
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The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History has collected two costumes from Amazon Prime Video’s The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel for the national entertainment collection. For curator Ryan Lintelman, the costumes checked the whole suite of boxes for acquisition. The show, which touches on marriage, sexuality, religion, the role of women in the workplace and other topical issues, “is about what it means to be a woman in America … during the ‘50s and ‘60s,” he says. “These are all issues we’re still grappling with today.” Find out more »
Black dress worn in episode 108 of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, National Museum of American History
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Photo: Yaguará Panamá
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Hope for Jaguars
After years of catching jaguars only in camera-trap images, Ricardo Moreno, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute research associate and National Geographic Emerging Explorer, along with a team of 20 biologists and community members were able to catch a jaguar and fit it with a transmitter that will help researchers conserve these majestic cats in the wild.
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Lost at the Smithsonian with Aasif Mandvi
In a new podcast, comedian and pop culture fanatic Aasif Mandvi gets up close and personal with the most iconic artifacts at the National Museum of American History. Join Aasif and his guests as they explore how vintage clothing, ratty furniture, and mismatched shoes transformed into Fonzie's leather jacket, Archie Bunker's chair, and Dorothy's ruby slippers and became defining symbols of American culture along the way.
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Horse-racing festival in Ngaba Qiang-Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. Photo by rGyalthar and Nathaniel Sims, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives.
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Lag Zo: Making on the Tibetan Plateau
The Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage recently launched a trilingual online exhibition about the Tibetan Plateau – home to diverse artisans and makers. The exhibition explores traditions integral to the Tibetan story, capturing traditional livelihoods, as well as the various ways individuals and communities are adapting to rapid transformation.
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On Sunday, January 26, join the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art, for their sixth annual Lunar New Year celebration to ring in the Year of the Rat. Experience interactive art demonstrations, live magic and musical performances, and delicious food for sale.
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Overlay of DESI's focal plane on the night sky, Credit: Dustin Lang, Aaron Meisner, DESI Collaboration/Imagine Sky Viewer; NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA; and Legacy Surveys project
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DESI Opens Its 5,000 "Eyes"
The first test was run of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument – known as DESI. The long-awaited instrument is designed to explore the mystery of dark energy, which now makes up about 68 percent of the universe and is speeding up its expansion. The DESI collaboration, which includes the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, plans to map the distance to 35 million galaxies and 2.4 million quasars across one-third of the area of the sky.
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James Smithson, c. 1765-1829 (detail), James Roberts, 1753-c.1809, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
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Trivia: Designing the '20s
Happy New Year! While it's too early to tell what aesthetic will define the 2020s, a creative explosion in design and art during the 1920s brought about several novel and highly visible social and cultural trends. The rapid growth of American cities and architecture inspired unprecedented dynamic forms in design, and was often balanced with a vibrant colors, bold geometric forms, and the use of new materials and experimental production methods.
Which of these works from the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum's collection is NOT from the 1920s?
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