Laura Jacobs

Arts Intel Report Editor at AIR MAIL

Featured in: Favicon

airmail.news Favicon

wsj.com

latimes.com Favicon

vanityfair.com Favicon

dazeddigital.com Favicon

thequietus.com Favicon

filmthreat.com Favicon

artillerymag.com Favicon

mdpi.com

tandfonline.com + 1 more

Articles

‘Roaring: Art, Fashion, and the Automobile in France, 1918-1939’ Review: An Exhibition in Forward Motion

2 weeks ago | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

A show at the Saint Louis Art Museum explores technological and artistic advancements of the interwar period. St. LouisDuring World War I, a horror that mired men in trenches, the only things that zipped were biplanes and the new tanks. The American George S. Patton was a tank commander in that war and learned its lessons.
‘Superfine: Tailoring Black Style’ Review: Fashioning an Identity

1 month ago | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

The Met Costume Institute’s spring show highlights black men’s style from the 18th century to today, with a particular focus on the meticulous, elegantly dressed figure of the dandy. The word “dandiacal” doesn’t turn up in everyday conversation. Even the word “dandy,” from which it derives, is not common currency. The dandy has always been an endangered species of male dressing, as above-it-all as an orchid, as precise as calculus, as self-possessed as a panther or python.
Ruth Asawa’s Biography Chronicles the Life of the Japanese-American Sculptor

Mar 28, 2025 | airmail.news | Laura Jacobs

“She had survived the Great Depression and World War II, slighted for her gender and interned for her race,” writes Marilyn Chase in the prologue of Everything She Touched: The Life of Ruth Asawa (2020).
‘Barbie: A Cultural Icon’ Review: A Doll Down the Decades

Jan 3, 2025 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

New YorkThere’s very little text in the exhibition “Barbie: A Cultural Icon,” at the Museum of Arts and Design. Born on March 9, 1959—when she had her debut at the New York Toy Fair—Mattel’s “Teenage Fashion Model” doll has figured in the cultural conversation ever since. And what a figure! Back in 1994, when she turned 35, there were books, articles and academic studies aplenty that took on the semiotics of bosomy Barbie.
Holiday Gift Books: Fashion

Nov 18, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

A collection is a passion, a family of objects that excites the eye and stirs the heart. It’s also a question: Why this family, and is the sum more important than the parts? Fashion as we know it consists of “collections,” those biannual searches for the self that call up forms and forces. And what of those who collect fashion? An Eye for Couture: A Collectors Exploration of 20th Century Fashion Prestel 290 pages We may earn a commission when you buy products through the links on our site.
‘Real Clothes, Real Lives: 200 Years of What Women Wore, the Smith College Historic Clothing Collection’ Review: Sensible Silhouettes at the New York Historical - WSJ

Nov 11, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

New YorkFashion exhibitions present the best and the most. They’re about aesthetics and semiotics. They hunt for metaphors and moments. Though bought and worn by real women, the designs are elevated, the work of professionals who have their own ideas about form and function. “Real Clothes, Real Lives,” at the New York Historical, offers a different kind of real.
‘The Art of Medieval Falconry’ Review: The Glory of Wing and Talon

Oct 11, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

“What’s this bird, this falcon, that everybody’s all steamed up about?” asks Humphrey Bogart as the private eye Sam Spade. The answer comes from Sydney Greenstreet, who plays Kasper Gutman, a criminal on a quest. “In 1539,” he says, “crusading knights persuaded Emperor Charles V to give them the Island of Malta. He made but one condition, that they pay him each year the tribute of a falcon in acknowledgment that Malta was still under Spain.” So far, so good.
‘Beyond Brilliance: Jewelry Highlights From the Collection’ Review: A Multifaceted Art Form at MFA Boston

Sep 13, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

BostonThe Louvre’s marble statue of the Greek goddess Nike, a signature holding that dates to 190 B.C., is known as the “Winged Victory of Samothrace.” Nine feet tall, her gown windblown, her wings lofting with air, Nike is positioned in solitary grandeur at the top of the museum’s Daru staircase. €18.99 €4/Month Includes unlimited access to The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, and MarketWatch. €9.99 €2 per month Includes unlimited access to WSJ's unrivaled journalism.
‘Modern Ritual: The Art of Mary McFadden’ Review: A Fashion Archaeologist

Aug 9, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

PhiladelphiaIn “Sleeping Beauties,” an exhibition currently on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a Fortuny “Delphos” gown is laid out behind glass, its days of gleaming life over and done. The springy vertical micropleating of the silk, so like the fluting on a classical column, or the bark of an ancient tree, or the rivulets running off a rusalka—so redolent of antiquity and myth—was the result of a secret patented process invented in 1909 by Henriette and Mariano Fortuny.
‘All the Rage’ Review: Beauty and Backlash

Aug 9, 2024 | wsj.com | Laura Jacobs

In the Arthurian fantasy film “Excalibur” (1981), there’s a scene I’ve never forgotten. Merlin finds the enchantress Morgana asleep, still dewy after decades, and wonders if she’s used up all her magic to keep herself so young. When Morgana awakens, Merlin flatters her into demonstrating her power. She chants, and when the mist clears she’s a husk.