May 20, 2024

Happy Monday! Pompeii seems to yield a fascinating archaeological finding every other week, but a new PBS series intends to instead illuminate the scientific and often deeply moving behind-the-scenes process of their discovery. Scholar Sarah E. Bond reports on the first episode below.

In the news, students at the School of Visual Arts stage a performance action at the institution’s Manhattan gallery with poppies bearing the names of Gazan children killed by the Israeli military, while a report reveals that top art patrons pressured police to deploy to the student encampment at Columbia University.

Read on for more, including a guide to grantmaking geared toward artists of color and the transfixing woodblocks of Hiroshige Utagawa. Have a lovely week ahead.

— Lakshmi Rivera Amin, Associate Editor

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New Docuseries Digs Up Pompeii’s Lost Histories

Pompeii: The New Dig on PBS follows a group of archaeologists involved in the largest excavation at the ancient site in a generation. | Sarah E. Bond

Enhance Your Practice With SVA Continuing Education Courses, Workshops, Residencies

The School of Visual Arts Continuing Education in NYC offers a diverse range of more than 200 online and on-campus courses and over 10 artist residency programs.

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WHAT'S HAPPENING

Hundreds attend a historic “counter-commencement” organized by Columbia University faculty in a repudiation of leadership’s decision to send police to arrest pro-Palestine demonstrators.
School of Visual Arts students and alumni staged a moving pro-Palestine demonstration at an exhibition opening in the school’s Flatiron gallery.
A dozen Parsons students are staging an alternative BFA show in Brooklyn amid Students for Justice in Palestine’s ongoing strike against the New School.
Private chats expose how art-world stakeholders sought to influence Mayor Eric Adams and Columbia University leadership to disband pro-Palestine student protests.

ART & MORE

Why Are Hiroshige’s Woodblock Prints Still So Moving?

The artist subverts the status system of 19th-century Japan, foreshadowing the impact of modernization and industrialization. | Livia Caligor

The Bennett Prize’s Call for Entries Is Now Open

Women figurative realist painters can propel their careers by entering to win $50,000 and a traveling solo exhibition of their work. Applications are open through October 4.

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How Can Grantmakers Support Artists of Color?

Those of us in arts philanthropy need to redouble our efforts to fund artists and organizations of color and sharpen our grantmaking practices to advance racial justice. | Rocío Aranda-Alvarado and Lane Harwell

FROM THE ARCHIVE

Why We Need to Start Seeing the Classical World in Color

The equation of white marble with beauty is not an inherent truth of the universe; it’s a dangerous construct that continues to influence white supremacist ideas today. | Sarah E. Bond