Art & Artists

The Wright brothers inaugurated the aerial age with the world's first successful flights of a powered heavier-than-air flying machine.

Bringing the Wright Flyer to Life

In a movie first, curators and filmmakers collaborated to animate artifacts for Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

Jonathan Singer's Botanica Magnifica has earned a spot in the National Museum of Natural History's rare book room.

Flowers Writ Large

With his Botanica Magnifica, podiatrist-turned-photographer Jonathan Singer captures flowers on the grandest of scales

Old Pennsylvania Farm in Winter, Arthur E. Cederquist, 1934.

What’s the Deal about New Deal Art?

As the first of the New Deal acts that funded public art projects with federal money, the PWAP produced more than 15,000 works of art in just six months

Rare Halo Display: A Portrait of Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

Eunice Kennedy Shriver Portrait Unveiled

At the National Portrait Gallery, artist David Lenz pays tribute to a champion for the intellectually disabled

A Steichen photograph of two gowns by Madeleine Vionnet reflects the ease of movement for which Vionnet was known. The name of the model in white is unrecorded; Marion Morehouse, in black, was one of the photographer's favorite models.

Edward Steichen: In Vogue

A painter by training, Edward Steichen changed fashion photography forever

Abraham Lincoln's pocket watch contains an unexpected inscription from Confederate President Jeff Davis.

What's Up

Suits like these worn in 1966 by Buzz Aldrin and Jim Lovell (right) were made to resist the extreme conditions of space travel for only a short period.

After Space, Saving Suits, Boots and Gloves

The spacesuits that kept U.S. astronauts alive now owe their survival to one woman

The world's largest snake—42 feet long and weighing 2,500 pounds—turned up in a Colombian jungle.

From the Castle: Big Snakes

Scientists from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute publish their amazing find of Titanoboa, the world's largest snake

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Letters

Readers Respond to the March Issue

Owen Edwards is a freelance writer who writes the "Object at Hand" column in Smithsonian magazine.

Owen Edwards on “In Vogue”

The many colors of bell peppers.

Food and Think: Why Are There No Blue Foods?

Foods of every color carry different nutritional benefits, and even carry psychological side effects for your diet

Gerard Malanga, c. 1970s.

Celebrity Portraitist Gerard Malanga

An associate of Andy Warhol, Gerard Malanga reflects on his subjects and his career as a photographer

The Creation of Adam by Michelangelo.

The Measure of Genius: Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel at 500

Half a millennium later, the story of the painting of the Sistine Chapel is as fascinating as Michelangelo’s masterpiece itself

Using shadows and the moon, Olson determined the moment Ansel Adams photographed Autumn Moon. When conditions recurred 57 years later, Olson was ready.

Forensic Astronomer Solves Fine Arts Puzzles

Astrophysicist Don Olson breaks down the barriers between science and art by analyzing literature and paintings from the past

Ceramist Emily Rossheim uses luminescent underglazes to make her bowls shimmer.

What's Up

A juvenile tapetail in the process of becoming an adult grows a huge liver.

A Fish Tale

A curator discovers that whalefishes, bignose fishes and tapetails are all really the same kind of fish at different life stages

Fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi sat down with Smithsonian magazine to discuss the upcoming exhibition "Design for a Living World."

Q and A: Isaac Mizrahi

Fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi's salmon skin dress is on display in a new exhibit at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum

Goodman played the clarinet even "during the commercial breaks of the World Series," according to one of his daughters.

Benny Goodman's Clarinet

Late in his career, jazz musician Benny Goodman favored a Parisian “licorice stick” as his instrument of choice

Bank manager Kellie Johnson says that recording the location, species and size of trees "puts things in perspective."

Bank Executives See the Forest and the Trees

In a Maryland forest, bankers trade in their suits and ties to study the environment with Smithsonian scientists

The Smithsonian online: something for everyone, no matter how esoteric their interests.

Long Tails

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