Art History for All artwork

Art History for All

30 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 2 years ago - ★★★★★ - 146 ratings

From art lovers to art haters to art-is-just-okay-ers, Art History for All aims to get all kinds of people thinking about art and what it means to them. Each episode, Allyson Healey tackles a single work of art and its history and larger significance, always asking the question: so what? Art History for All takes you beyond the art historical canon and helps you find the way in which art speaks to you (even if it's never spoken to you before)

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Episodes

Episode 28: No Foolin’

November 02, 2021 16:02 - 35 minutes - 49.6 MB

In this episode we delve into the portrait of Don Juan de Calabazas in the Cleveland Museum of Art! Allyson talks jesters, fools, disability history,…

Episode 27: The Incredible Flying Kris

August 09, 2021 13:00 - 32 minutes - 44.8 MB

The podcast returns as sharp as ever with a discussion of an example of a Malaysian blade called a kris! Allyson talks about the transition…

Episode 26: The Case of Ingapirca

February 22, 2021 14:00 - 26 minutes - 36.3 MB

Allyson returns refreshed after a quarantine-induced slump to tell you all about Ingapirca, an Inka archaeological site whose function has been obscured by time and…

Episode 25: Aboriginal Glyph

August 31, 2020 21:26 - 24 minutes - 33.7 MB

AH4A is back with an examination of Margaret Preston’s 1958 work Aboriginal Glyph, and lots of thoughts about what it means for a white woman…

Episode 24: A Place to Rest

June 08, 2020 14:23 - 26 minutes - 36.2 MB

Lots of food for thought in this episode as Allyson discusses a Shona headrest from Zimbabwe in the Met’s collection: how do such objects come…

#podcastblackout

June 01, 2020 12:50 - 2 minutes - 3.34 MB

In protest of the epidemic of racism and police brutality that affects Black people in America daily, this episode is part of #podcastblackout, a movement…

Episode 23: Rock Steady

March 09, 2020 13:00 - 24 minutes - 33.1 MB

AH4A is back with an episode that ROCKS! Allyson discusses the rock art at Serra da Capivara National Park, Piauí, Brazil, and what its story…

Episode 22: Gilded Gingerbread

December 24, 2019 14:00 - 27 minutes - 37.1 MB

An icon of the head of John the Baptist (c. 1680) from Yaroslavl is the focus of this last episode of 2019, prompting a discussion of how Russia has been viewed across history.

Episode 21: A Paintbrush in Her Hand

November 25, 2019 14:00 - 29 minutes - 40.4 MB

Indigenous Canadian artist Daphne Odjig's painting Bathed in Sunlight (1983) and the larger story of Odjig's career prompt us to think about Native art and how it is (or isn't) included in the mainstream contemporary art world.

In Focus: Conservation Horror Stories

October 31, 2019 13:00 - 14 minutes - 19.5 MB

It's Halloween 2K19 and Allyson is sharing a very specific type of horror story--art conservation horror stories! Listen in, and then share your own tales of artsy mishaps by emailing allysonh[at]arthistoryforall.com!

Episode 20: Big Odalisque Energy

October 28, 2019 13:00 - 29 minutes - 40.3 MB

There are lots of different types of bodies in the world, but artist Fernando Botero focuses on the rounder kind--in this episode, Allyson tells you about Botero's 1998 painting L'Odalisque, and talks about how it relates to body image and ideas of the "other."

Episode 19: The Casco and the Yacht

October 01, 2019 15:40 - 29 minutes - 40.4 MB

Allyson discusses Filipina artist Anita Magsaysay-Ho’s Girls with Baskets (1966), and how colonialism, class, and global politics affect even the most sentimental of art. ©…

Episode 18: As Much Worker as Woman

August 26, 2019 18:08 - 30 minutes - 41.5 MB

Allyson discusses Myra Albert Wiggins's The Lacemaker (1899, Portland Museum of Art), workin' hard for the money, and types of labor that we might not see as labor. This one's for you, needleworkers!

Episode 17: First Lady to Travel Over Sea

June 25, 2019 17:55 - 29 minutes - 40.7 MB

Esther Mahlangu's Untitled, 2008 has simple geometry, but a complex context--Allyson talks about its connections to commerce, soccer, and... BMWs? 

Episode 16: Invasion of the Night

May 27, 2019 16:09 - 29 minutes - 39.9 MB

It's a mind-bending episode as Allyson guides you through Roberto Matta's surreal mental landscape, Invasion of the Night (1941), and explores its connections to physics and psychology.

Episode 15: Compared to Rocks and Mountains

April 29, 2019 13:00 - 29 minutes - 40.5 MB

Allyson guides you through the eleventh-century Chinese handscroll painting Summer Mountains, (北宋 傳屈鼎 夏山圖 卷) by little-known painter Qu Ding (屈鼎). © 2019 Allyson Healey…

Episode 14: Happiness and Color

March 26, 2019 22:00 - 25 minutes - 35 MB

Allyson teaches you all about québécoise painter and stained glass artist Marcelle Ferron, whose windows at the Champ-de-Mars Métro station in Montréal are a unique…

Episode 13: Namatjira’s Creek

February 28, 2019 20:03 - 29 minutes - 39.9 MB

In this episode, Allyson goes down under and discusses the life of Albert Namatjira, his watercolor painting Catherine Creek, Northern Territory (circa 1950), and the…

Episode 12: Wrecked

January 29, 2019 00:05 - 31 minutes - 44 MB

Théodore Géricault’s 1819 painting The Raft of the Medusa is part of a larger tangled web of colonialism, incompetence, and disaster. In this episode we get…

Episode 11: Suspended on a Golden Chain

December 24, 2018 14:00 - 32 minutes - 44.4 MB

Hagia Sophia has had many lives over the centuries: from church, to mosque, to secular museum, it’s always taken center stage in its city, whether…

Episode 10: A Sketch of Native American History

November 26, 2018 14:00 - 31 minutes - 43.4 MB

This episode gets a bit obscure and focuses on a single woodcut from David Cusick’s 1828 book Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Nations, the…

Episode 9: Fiends, Frankenstein, and Fuseli

October 29, 2018 13:00 - 34 minutes - 47.7 MB

We’re getting spooky in this episode and looking at Henry Fuseli’s 1781 painting The Nightmare, by far one of the eeriest paintings in Western art…

Episode 8: In Memory of Malcolm

September 24, 2018 17:23 - 30 minutes - 41.4 MB

This episode is a bit more multidimensional, mainly because we’re talking about a sculpture! Barbara Chase-Riboud’s Malcolm X #3 is titled in memory of Malcolm X, but…

Episode 7: Painting of Interest

August 27, 2018 23:11 - 30 minutes - 42.2 MB

The game is afoot as we investigate the theft of Johannes Vermeer’s The Concert–or, more accurately, investigate how that theft affects how we look at the…

Episode 6: Fly Like An Eagle

July 30, 2018 17:57 - 31 minutes - 43 MB

Get your shutter fingers ready, because in this episode we’re talking about a photograph! Specifically, Laura Aguilar’s Three Eagles Flying (1990). **This podcast contains discussions of lynching,…

Episode 5: Hip to Be Square

June 21, 2018 03:55 - 32 minutes - 33.7 MB

Brace yourselves, listeners, because in this episode Allyson gets abstract and discusses Kazimir Malevich’s Black Square, often hailed as the end of traditional painting and the…

Episode 4: Do the Wave

May 19, 2018 20:36 - 30 minutes - 30.9 MB

This episode we dip our toe into the Asian art pool and talk about Hokusai’s Great Wave, its origins, and the many many transformations it has undergone…

Episode 3: In Love with the Rococo

April 15, 2018 03:26 - 31 minutes - 32.9 MB

In a very self-indulgent episode, Allyson talks about her favorite period in art history, and one of her favorite artists: Rosalba Carriera, who did a…

Episode 2: Why Oh Wiley

March 14, 2018 03:19 - 31 minutes - 24.1 MB

In this episode, Allyson gets topical and talks about a Kehinde Wiley painting–but maybe not the one you think! You can find a transcript of…

Episode 1: For the Love of Mona Lisa

February 13, 2018 06:51 - 28.6 MB

Welcome to the inaugural episode of Art History for All! In this episode, Allyson tells you all about Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa and the impact…