Smithsonian Magazine The Art of Memory June 2023 image 1

Artist Joseph Stella Painted Nature in Vibrant Color

Cities weren’t the only subject that fascinated this acclaimed Futurist

He famously captured industrial America—the Brooklyn Bridge, Pittsburgh’s steel mills—with his monumental canvases. But the painter Joseph Stella (1877-1946) looked to nature for respite, escaping his Manhattan studio to visit the New York Botanical Garden and to paint in southern Italy, where he grew up. “My devout wish,” the artist wrote, “[is] that my every working day might begin and end—as a good omen—with the light, gay painting of a flower.”

Anne Frank’s Childhood Friend Recalls Their Years Before the Holocaust

After fleeing her native Germany, a young Jew found companionship and community as the Nazis approached

Remote and wild, the Yukon is a river of haunting beauty and dangerous extremes – a place where the ‘call of the wild’ is still strong. In summer, it is a relentless giant, carving its way 2,000 miles across Canada and Alaska. In winter, -50C temperatures transform it into a river of ice.

Home to grizzlies, moose and great runs of salmon, the Yukon lies at the heart of a vast northern wilderness. Bears delay their winter hibernation to fish for a final salmon feast, while the frozen river provides a lifeline for lynx and a race track for intrepid dog sledders. From indigenous hunters to gold-prospectors, musk ox to caribou, the Yukon’s natural riches have long sustained people and animals and continue to do so despite its changing fortunes.