Amy Crawford

Ann Arbor, Boston

Freelance Journalist at Freelance

Writer on cities, environment, nature & history. You'll find me on my cargo bike & my bylines in @SmithsonianMag, @AtlasObscura, @GlobeIdeas, @CityLab, etc.

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Articles

A New Exhibition Brings Fresh Recognition to a Groundbreaking But Largely Forgotten Surrealist

2 weeks ago | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

At London’s Tate Britain, a major retrospective takes a long look at the work of Margaret Ithell Colquhoun British artist and writer Margaret Ithell Colquhoun was a pioneer of Surrealist “automatism,” creating images from charcoal shavings or letting her unconscious take charge of a pen.
Two Great Empires Traded for Financial Gain and Achieved a Brilliant Cultural Exchange as Well

2 months ago | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

A new show illuminates the rich artistic wonders that arose out of the 400 years of commerce between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire For 400 years, the Eastern Mediterranean was the domain of two great powers: the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire. As rivals, they fought seven different wars, but in peacetime they eagerly pursued mutual profit.
Two Great Empires Traded for Financial Gain and Achieved a Brilliant Cultural Exchange as Well

2 months ago | flipboard.com | Amy Crawford

NowArchaeologists Found a 2,000-Year-Old Tomb That Adds a New Twist to Roman HistoryInscriptions carved in ancient marble still tell a story. Archaeologists discovered a Roman necropolis near Naples at the location of the ancient settlement of Liternum. • An inscription in the marble of a tomb indicated that it was the final resting place of a gladiator.
A Blockbuster Exhibition on Samurai Reveals How the Warriors Dressed the Part

Feb 11, 2025 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

For nearly 700 years, samurai were Japan’s social elite, skilled not only in combat but also in politics and the courtly arts. To equip these warriors in accordance with their status required an entire class of artisans, from the blacksmiths and leatherworkers who made their weapons and armor to the embroiderers who applied detailed designs to their coats and shoes.
An Astonishing, Rarely Seen Islamic Art Collection Goes on Display

Nov 21, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

At the oldest public art museum in the United States, miniatures, glassware and other intricately created works transport visitors around the world When Hamid Hemat accepted a curatorial post at Connecticut’s Wadsworth Atheneum in 2022, the refugee from Kabul, Afghanistan, was surprised by what he found. The Wadsworth is the oldest public art museum in the United States, home to a trove of European and American paintings.
The Surprising Ingenuity Behind “Goodnight Moon”

Sep 25, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

The plot could not be simpler: A young bunny says goodnight to the objects and creatures in a green-walled bedroom, drifting gradually to sleep as the lights dim and the moon glows in a big picture window. Goodnight Moon has sold more than 48 million copies since it was published in 1947. It has been translated into at least a dozen languages, from Spanish to Hmong, and countless parents around the world have read it to their sleepy children.
The Knotty Art of Printmaking

Jun 28, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

Printmaking, which dates to ancient times, was long considered a craft, useful mainly for reproducing religious illustrations. But with his intricate woodcuts and engravings, Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) elevated it to a fine art. “One cannot overstate the influence of Dürer on the history of the print,” says Naoko Takahatake, curator of a new show at the University of California, Los Angeles’ Hammer Museum, “Sum of the Parts,” which covers 500 years of printmaking.
How This Caribbean-Born Artist Became the Toast of 18th-Century France

May 13, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

A new exhibition in Massachusetts illuminates the success of Guillaume Lethière Born to a formerly enslaved mother in Guadeloupe, Guillaume Lethière (1760-1832) moved to Paris as a teen with his plantation-owner father and launched his artistic career during the tumultuous years before the French Revolution. Lethière’s talent as a painter of portraits of the rich and famous, landscapes, and scenes from history won him plum academic posts and a place at the center of Creole society.
This Artist Turned to Painting Animals in a Turbulent Historical Moment

Apr 2, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

The German Expressionist painter Franz Marc found a subject worth celebrating in the early 20th century Franz Marc came of age in the early 20th century, a period of rapid change and impending global upheaval. “The climate they were living in was quite apocalyptic,” says Natalia Sidlina, curator of a new show at London’s Tate Modern of artists associated with the journal Der Blaue Reiter (“The Blue Rider”).
Pioneering Artist Angelica Kauffman Put Women at Center Stage

Feb 15, 2024 | smithsonianmag.com | Amy Crawford

In 1768, three dozen artists established the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Among their number were two women, but despite the progressive glow the pair’s inclusion may have lent the institution, they would be excluded from its governance. More than 150 years passed before another woman was admitted. Times change, however, and this month the academy will fete one of its female founders, Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807), with a one-woman show.