#national collection of fine arts

[garadinervi]

Poster for Rauschenberg Retrospective, (offset lithograph), National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, D.C., 1976 [© Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, New York, NY]

Bibl.: Marc Gundel, Rauschenberg. Posters, With a contribution by Jürgen Döring, Prestel Verlag, München, London, New York, NY, 2001

[orcelito]

showing off the commission i got from @ruporas for my fic, In the Next Life!

i'm still so incredibly excited about this. it's been some months since the story event that caused these scars, but i wanted SO BADLY to be able to see what they'd actually Look like... & Here They Are.

ruporas rendered the scars So Well, i just cant stop Looking at them... there's a Fresh & a Healed version, which ruporas was kind enough to give me without additional charge (Thank U Again😭😭) so i get to see what it looks like at different stages.

Lichtenberg Figures. in terms of actual scarring, lightning strikes that people survive don't tend to leave permanent scars, but the lichtenberg figures that they (usually temporarily) leave behind are just So Cool... Now, what happens when you get someone who can survive an amount of electricity/lightning that would be Frankly Lethal to any normal human person?

This :]

[artemlegere]

Rinaldo and Armida

Artist: Antonio Zucchi, RA (Italian, 1726-1796)

Date: 1773

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

A classical scene from Tasso, II Canto 17 – 20, with lovers under a tree and two soldiers behind them, the reflective mirror has been casted aside. In the background are the two Danish Knights, who are about to persuade Rinaldo to quit Armida. One of a set of six over-door paintings by Antonio Zucchi, previously, erroneously, attributed to Angelica Kauffman.

A scene from Torquato Tasso's epic poem, Gerusalemme liberata (1581) and inspired by Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. The sorceress Armida has been sent to stop the Christians and is about to murder the First Crusade soldier, Rinaldo, but instead she falls in love. She creates an enchanted garden where she holds him a lovesick prisoner. Eventually two of his fellow Crusaders find him and hold a shield to his face, so he can see his image and remember who he is.

[royalty-nobility]

Teresa, or Teresia Sampsonia, Lady Shirley (1589–1668)

Artist: Sir Anthony Van Dyck (Flemish, 1599-1641)

Date: 1622

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

Teresa Sampsonia (born Sampsonia; after marriage Lady Shirley, 1589–1668) was an Iranian-English noblewoman of the Safavid Empire of Iran. She was the wife of Elizabethan English adventurer Robert Shirley, whom she accompanied on his travels and embassies across Europe in the name of the Safavid King (Shah) Abbas the Great.

Teresa was received by many of the royal houses of Europe, such as English prince Henry Frederick and Queen Anne (her child's godparents) and contemporary writers and artists such as Thomas Herbert and Anthony van Dyck. Herbert considered Robert Shirley "the greatest Traveller of his time", but admired the "undaunted Lady Teresa" even more. Following the death of her husband from dysentery in 1628, and due to impediments from grandees at the court, and the authorities, during the reign of Abbas's successor and grandson Safi (r. 1629–1642), Teresa decided to leave Iran. She lived in a convent in Rome for the rest of her life, devoting her time to charity and religion. As a pious Christian, and because of her love for her husband, Teresa had Shirley's remains transported to Rome from Isfahan and reburied; on the headstone of their mutual grave she mentions their travels and refers to her noble Circassian origins.

Thanks to her exploits, Teresa has been described as someone who subverted patriarchal gender roles common to the Muslim and Christian cultures of her time. Due to their hybrid identities and adventures, Teresa and her husband became the subject of several contemporary literary and visual works. Nevertheless, the story of Teresa as an important woman of the 17th century has been largely overshadowed and obscured by the tale of her husband Robert and his brothers.

Together they made two extended voyages across Europe. In 1611 they travelled to England where Teresa gave birth to their son, Henry. In 1613 they returned to Isfahan on an East India Company ship. The Shirleys continued to travel over the next decade to India, Portugal, Spain and Italy. They went to Rome in 1622, and this picture and the pendant portrait of Robert can be dated to Van Dyck's first visit to the city.

Van Dyck’s training with Rubens had sharpened his eye for the enriching effect offered by sumptuous garments such as those worn by Lady Shirley. Van Dyck had also recently begun to absorb the lessons of Titian and the other great Venetian colourists.

Teresa was a gifted linguist and spoke more than half a dozen languages. Historian Bernadette Andrea recounts how she saved her husband’s life on at least two occasions: ‘once as they set off on their first journey when his Persian enemies sought to kill him, which earned her the accolade "a true Amazon" and again when the couple encountered hostile Portuguese traders on their way to Goa.’ (See the entry for 'Lady Teresa Sampsonia Sherley' in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography).

After Robert’s death, Teresa was accused of the capital crime of apostasy and her property was confiscated. She became a fugitive, hiding in an Augustinian church in Isfahan and an Armenian convent just outside the Safavid capital. She received a special permit to travel, went to Istanbul for three years and then on to Rome where she settled and remained for more than three decades until her death in 1668.

[portrait-paintings]

Sir Robert Shirley (1581-1628)

Artist: Sir Anthony Van Dyck (Flemish, 1599-London)

Date: 1622

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

This fascinating portrait, dressed in Persian clothes, was painted in Rome in 1622. Robert Shirley was an adventurer, who from 1608 served as ambassador to the Persian shah Abbas the Great (1571–1629) and adopted Persian customs. Teresia Shirley was Circassian (people from the north-east shore of the Black Sea in Russia) and is shown seated demurely against a view of Rome. The painter, Sir Anthony van Dyck (1599–1641), may have been attracted to painting these sitters partly as a result of the stunning visual effect of their lavish clothes.

[allegorypaintings]

Allegory of Painting

Artist: Attributed to Charles Lucy (English, 1692 - after 1768)

Date: 1760

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

Three figures in an artist studio. A young male figure is standing, wearing a white and red smock draped in green. He is looking towards a seated young female figure and has his right arm around her shoulders. She is wearing a white and gold dress and is draped in blue. Her hair is tied up in a braid with stones. She is looking towards the male. In her left hand she is holding a paint pallet and she has a paint brush in her right hand. A putti or cherub is seated at her feet reclining on stone sculptures (a bust and a stone foot). He is holding a paintbrush and a tablet. The young man has a paintbrush in his left hand as if working on the painting of a young lady that sits on an easel to his left side. In the background is an elaborate stone carving.

[galleryofart]

An Interior with a Servant Girl

Artist: Dutch School

Date c. 1700

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

A servant girl, standing in an interior to left, is pouring water from a jug into a pewter dish.

[monkeyssalad-blog]

Thorn's Vegetable Cough Cure by National Library of Medicine Via Flickr: Publication: [United States : s.n., 18--] Language(s): English Format: Still image Subject(s): Nonprescription Drugs Genre(s): Advertisements Abstract: Advertisement for Thorn's Vegetable Cough Cure, featuring a young girl dressed for winter, standing outside in a snowstorm. Extent: 1 trade card : 15 x 9 cm. Technique: chromolithograph, color NLM Unique ID: 101442413 NLM Image ID: A028443 Permanent Link: resource.nlm.nih.gov/101442413

[mysteryshoptls]

SSR Leona Kingscholar - Platinum Jacket Voice Lines

When Summoned: What, why're you lookin' all worried? Even I know to be well-mannered in a museum.

Summon Line: What a great honor to be made a supporter for the Land of Dawning's National Museum of Art. I'll make sure to take in all their precious art.

Groooovy!!: Look at that lion cub, all spoiled and pampered by everyone around it... Surely it made for a splendid ruler.

Home: Here's my utmost respect for their 100 years of history.

Home Idle 1: Every exhibit we step into, he's gotta loudly talk about all this thoughts on each painting. Is Kalim treatin' this museum as if he were back at his family estate?

Home Idle 2: It looked like Silver was staring at the same picture for some time... But then I noticed he was just sleeping while standing. That's some skill, heh.

Home Idle 3: You can see in the details of the King of Beasts' statue the toil that all his hard work impressed on him. That's what you'd expect from a king that did everything he could for his countrymen. He's a completely different breed from any figurehead ruler.

Home Idle - Login: The Land of Dawning's National Museum of Art, huh. It's well-known for it's large collection or art, so this probably won't be a snoozefest.

Home Idle - Groovy: We're lettin' that easily-bored Floyd loose in a museum, huh. Guess this place has full confidence in their security guards.

Home Tap 1: What a warm welcome, indeed. Who would've ever thought I'd get to wear such magnificent garbs as a mere student?

Home Tap 2: I hear the Sorcerer of the Sands was constantly bent on hunting for treasure. Hey, maybe that avarice is what landed him the Vizier's position in the first place.

Home Tap 3: You're looking for Sebek? I feel like I might've seen him at the museum shop, but I'm not completely sure. Funny enough, he's actually been much quieter than usual.

Home Tap 4: The Thorn Fairy sent out all her men in search of one person, huh. Heheh, I wonder what that little human could've possibly done to deserve that.

Home Tap 5: Apparently, some painters'll substitute their fingers for paintbrushes for their final strokes. Not something a carnivore could do, though. It'd damage our nails.

Home Tap - Groovy: You really get into lookin' at art, huh. Your neck's so stretched out you look like one of 'em herbivores trying to eat leaves from a tall tree.

Duo: [LEONA]: No slacking off, Floyd. [FLOYD]: You're the last person I wanna hear that from, Sea Lion-senpai.

Birthday Login Message: ...Ugh. As I'm sure you can tell, I'm in the middle of a nap. If you need something from me, ask me later. If you just wanted to celebrate my birthday, a card woulda been plenty... But, fine. Here, hand it over. [Yuu startles] Whaddya mean, hand what over? ...Obviously, I'm talking about my gift. I'm expecting it to be something good to make up for the rude awakening.

Requested by @sakurakudo and @farfalla049.

[tangledinink]

edit: tag! fic!

ive spent a stupid amount of time recently thinking about a rottmnt au where circumstances allow splinter to figure out a way to get cloaking 'brooches' for himself and his children when they are still lil, giving him a chance to raise them as 'normal' kids. (normal kids who are genetically engineered mutant turtles, actually, and they're, like, SO good at sports, dude.)

surely nothing can break this idyllic illusion of a life that splinter has built. definitely nothing that rhymes with daron braxum.

i can only imagine this would work if the threat of both draxum and big mama were neutralized. i think in this universe, draxum's life of crime caught up to him much sooner than it does in canon, and he's imprisoned for his unethical experimentation when the turtles are still little-- raph maybe around six or seven, mikey around four or five. once splinter learns of this, he pulls every string he possibly can to 1) get cloaking crystals for himself and his family 2) cut a deal with big mama to ensure his children's safety.

after spending about a week or two in the sewers fucking drilling the cover story into the children's heads ("remember, mikey, what do you do if people start asking you too many questions?" "CRY!" "good boy!") he very nervously brings them up to the surface, armed with an elaborate story to explain his disappearance and new children and a shitton of forged documents. there was so much fucking paperwork, christ. (also, it turns out the blue one is biologically female? but he does not have the mental space to deal with that so they all just keep calling him leo, and he's totally fine with that. so.)

and he collects ALLLLLLL the royalties, babey.

(the kids are kids, and definitely slip up occasionally or do... weird shit. but, luckily, since they're small children, people pretty much just chalk it up as "oh, these kids have such wild imaginations.")

eventually, enough time passes that the brothers just kinda... forget that they were ever actually turtle mutants who lived in the sewers. coz, like, that's crazy, right? they're pretty sure they just imagined all that stuff. they weren't turtles, they were PRETENDING to be turtles... and people give them weird looks sometimes when they bring it up, so they don't.

overall, they THRIVE on the surface, to no one's surprise. they are, in fact, secretly genetically engineered super soldiers, actually. and they are crazy good at, like. so many things. especially martial arts! they compete at a national level on the regular, in addition to a shit ton of other extracurriculars (ballet, art, basketball, and cooking for mikey, swimming, basketball, gymnastics, and theatre for leo, dance, gymnastics, and swimming for donnie, not even to mention all his academic stuff, basketball, wrestling, and swimming for raph...)

they're still besties with april, obvs.

[lyratea]

Winter Legacy Challenge

You’ve always hated the heat, as a kid you dreamed of snowy mountains and chilly air. But now, as a young adult, you're finally leaving your warm hometown behind to start fresh in the cold, serene peaks of Mt. Komorebi. With nothing but the winter landscape ahead, and ready to build a new life — a legacy — in the heart of the snow. Welcome to the Winter Legacy Challenge! Expansion packs you'll need: -- Snowy Escape. If you don't have snowy escape, but have seasons, this works fine too. It's okay to play through spring considering the weather conditions BUT you'll have to remember to enable testingcheats and change it back to winter once it becomes summer with seasons.set_season 2 -- Seasons Recommend packs, but BG alternatives provided: -- Outdoor Retreat -- Life and Death -- Spa Day Not needed, but nice for gameplay: -- Island Living -- Eco Lifestyle

Rules: -- You may use freerealestate for your first house, but after please refrain from using any other cheats while playing. -- Normal or Long lifespans. -- Careers are up to you, UNLESS stated otherwise. -- You need to complete each requisite (goals, and challenges for the generation. Aspirations if stated) before that sim dies. If they die before everything is completed, their heir must pick a goal or challenge to complete in honor of them. -- If they die before producing a heir, you fail. -- If a sim dies from freezing, their heir must honor them by building a small memorial or shrine. Gen 1: Winter Dreamer Backstory: Having spent their life in the desert, this Sim dreams of snow-covered landscapes. They’ve saved enough to move to a permanent winter wonderland. Snow brings them joy, and they dedicate themselves to creating a cozy, snow-loving life. Traits: Cheerful, Loves Outdoors, Family-Oriented Aspiration: Mt. Komorebi Sightseer  Goals:

Complete your aspiration entirely. 

ALWAYS Complete the Winterfest holiday tradition (decorate the tree, cook a holiday meal, etc).

Have a Hot Tub on your plot. (OR build a pool and add decorative rocks and greenery around it)

Collect all Sammies. 

Challenge: Your Sim must spend 3+ hours outside daily, no matter the weather or their needs. (It can be making snow angels or exploring town, etc.)

Gen 2: Frostbitten Adventurer Backstory: Growing up surrounded by snow, this Sim craves adrenaline-fueled adventures. They embrace the wildness of winter, seeking thrilling experiences and surviving extreme conditions. Traits: Adventurous, Active, Self-Assured Aspiration: Extreme Sports Enthusiast Goals:

Master the Snowboarding skill.

Reach at least Rock Climbing level 5, to prepare for intense outdoor activities. 

Woo a partner during a Festival of Snow or a snowy outing.

Challenge:  Participate in at least three snowboarding, sledding, or skiing competitions—and win at least one before aging up.

Gen 3: Icy Artisan  Backstory: Born into a family of survivors and adventurers, this Sim found solace in the beauty of the winter landscape and became a renowned artist known for their winter-themed works. Traits: Creative, Loves the Outdoors, Proper Aspiration: Painter Extraordinaire Goals:

Visit a National Park (via Outdoor Retreat pack) or build a homestead filled with outdoor elements.

Paint or take 8 winter-themed works (snowy forests, ice skating, festive winter scenes).

Embrace Winterfest as their favorite holiday, decorating the tree, and hosting festive gatherings.

Challenge: To make a living, they will rely only on their art—no regular jobs allowed. No thermostat can be used to heat the home this generation, use fireplaces or space heaters instead.

Gen 4: Frozen Royalty Backstory: This Sim believes they are the ruler of a frozen kingdom. Eccentric and ambitious, they build an empire to match their icy vision, complete with loyal subjects and a grand icy palace. Traits: Ambitious, Snob, Romantic Aspiration: Mansion Baron Goals:

Host at least two grand events each winter (Winter Balls, fancy dinners, or other social gatherings). These events must include 6+ guests, top-quality food, and gold-level rewards.

Have at least one child with Father Winter.

During the winter season, go ice skating. Max the skating skill. You are allowed to put them on your plot so you don't need to travel, if you have the funds and room. (There is one located somewhere in Mt. Komorebi, if you dont have Snowy Escape, travel to Magnolia Blossom Park in Willow Creek during winter.)

Challenge: Your heir must inherit an heirloom and keep the ‘icy empire’ alive. (if you don't own life and Death, that’s okay, just pick something that stays with the heir until they die. It can be in their inventory or place somewhere in the lot.

Gen 5: The Eternal Winter Keeper? As the heir to a family built on the love for winter and it’s traditions, you’ve always known your role: to continue your ancestors’ mission of preserving the eternal frost. But as the years go on, you’ve begun to question your destiny. You long for warmth, sun, and freedom from the cold. The decision weighs heavily on your heart:

Will you stay loyal to your family and uphold their wintery legacy? Or will you break away and forge a new path, leaving snow behind for the warmth of tropical shores?

Path 1: Frozen Protector Backstory: For generations, your family has served as stewards of winter—a lineage entrusted with keeping the delicate balance between the icy season’s beauty and its unforgiving harshness. You’ve grown up knowing that, as the next heir, the title of Winter Keeper will one day fall on you. Will you prove yourself worthy of the mantle, or will winter lose its way in your hands?Traits: Loyal, Outgoing, Lovebug (If not possible, use Romantic)Aspiration: Successful Lineage Goals:

Befriend at least three Sims who are “winter aligned” (traits like Loves Outdoors, Loner, or Creative, etc) and strengthen your bond by doing winter-related activities together at least once a week with one of them. If you have Get together, make a club with outlines relating to cold or festive activities. 

Find your soulmate in a winter setting (at a snow-covered lot or during a winter festival). Woo them with romantic gestures like snowball fights, outdoor stargazing, or ice skating. Have an outside wedding with them.

Ensure your child connects with winter traditions by maxing out a related skill before they become a young adult (e.g., Violin for haunting melodies, Charisma for storytelling, or Fitness for winter sports).

Challenge: Add at least one major improvement to the family’s estate if you haven’t already: build an outdoor skating rink, a winter conservatory, or a family mausoleum for past heirs.

Path 2: The Sun Seeker Backstory: You’ve always felt like an outsider in your family, your dreams of warmth clashing with their love for snow. After years of feeling stifled by the cold, you decide to take the boldest step of all: abandoning your family’s icy traditions and embracing a life of sun, freedom, and joy. But forging a new path is never easy, especially when your roots are steeped in frost. Traits: Child Of the Ocean, Outgoing, Foodie Aspiration: Beach Life (Angling Ace if you don't own IL) Goals:

Move to a tropical destination (preferably Sulani) and embrace the warm climate fully. Marry a local Sim and raise your family in the tropical paradise!

Max out the Fishing skill

Befriend the dolphins (Island Living) or form a club of locals to celebrate your new lifestyle.

Challenge:  Abandon all winter traditions. You can never celebrate Winterfest again. You must create a new summer holiday, or host a big party every Summer.

If you decide to take part, let me know by using #TS4WinterLC in your post! I hope to start this challenge in the next few days and share my progress ^.^

If you’d like to read it on a different platform, here’s the google doc!

I hope you have fun, stay warm, and happy simming everyone! ☃️

@ts4challengehub

[r0entgen]

"Why won't Venezuelans just address the blockade?"

If you're wondering why, read below.

Let me start by saying that I wrote this after I finished work, with less than three hours of sleep and a single meal in my body, so if you find any grammar mistakes, my apologies.

This is the comment that kickstarted this post. I believe I've mentioned this before, but when you're living in a country that weaponizes propaganda and hijacks every single media outlet, you have to master the fine arts of fact checking and cross-referencing. Which is exactly what we're going to do right now, addressing the claim that 40,000 Venezuelans have been killed by the US sanctions, and why We Won't Engage with You In This Particular Argument.

*Note: click the underlined text for links and sources.

In the paper Economic Sanctions as Collective Punishment: The Case of Venezuela by Mark Weisbrot and Jeffrey Sachs (who will be referred to as WS in this post), WS mention that between the years of 2017-2019, the economic sanctions caused a 31% increase in the general mortality rate in Venezuela, a number that they calculate may be of about 40,000 deaths. While they cite ENCOVI and a UN report from 2019 as the sources of this statistic, they clarify the following in the footnotes:

The ENCOVI 2018 survey has not been made public, the mortality statistic cited here is from the UN Report (2019).

As of this date, WS has not made public the data source for this estimate, and the UN report used as a source (Venezuela: Overview of Priority Humanitarian Needs, March 2019) is not publicly available.

So let's take a look at some sources that ARE publicly available.

The World Bank Group World Development Indicators registers at least a 30% increase in the infant mortality rate in Venezuela from the dates of 2013 to 2016. Similar numbers are reported in this paper, seeing a 40% increase in the infant mortality rate in Venezuela between the dates on 2008-2016. Here's an excerpt from the paper Impact of the 2017 Sanctions on Venezuela:

While different than other overall mortality rates, increases in infant mortality rates are generally interpretable as a preventable consequence of inadequate pre- and post-natal care for otherwise healthy but vulnerable infants. Thus, infant mortality is often recognized as a good proxy measure of the quality on overall public health provision.

What this tells us is that THERE HAS BEEN an increase in general mortality rate - one that started long before the 2017 sanctions.

However, this doesn't mean that in the periods of 2017-2019 there wasn't a high death toll. Let's look at another publicly available source.

The National Hospital Survey (2019) found that between November 2018 and February 2019, 1557 people died owing to the lack of supplies in hospitals [...]. 40 patients died as a result of the power outages in March 2019.

We see the first mention of a number in the 2019 Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Something interesting this report mentions is that 40 deaths were caused by the blackout in March 2019. A blackout that lasted 7 days and affected our 23 states.

The energy crisis which caused this nationwide blackout started in 2010. The Wikipedia article is a good summary, if a bit simple, of the events that led to and took place during and after the energy crisis (which affects us Venezuelans living in the country to this day)

Back to the UN Report. Something else this report indicates is the following:

In 2018, the Government registered 5,287 such killings, while the non-governmental organization Observatorio Venezolano de la Violencia reported at least 7,523 killings under this category. Between 1 January and 19 May 2019, the Government reported 1,569 killings for resistance to authority. The Observatorio Venezolano de la Violencia reported at least 2,124 such killings between January and May 2019. Information analysed by OHCHR suggests many of these killings may constitute extrajudicial executions.

[...] Six young men executed by the Special Action Forces (SEBIN) in reprisal for their role in anti-government protests in 2019.

This means that between the dates of 2018-2019, there have been approximately 9,647 deaths in the context of security operations - which includes Venezuelans that took part of the protests in 2019. Very similar to what we have been reporting since after the elections in July 28.

2017 to 2019 was one of the most difficult periods in Venezuelan history, marked by the sanctions imposed by Trump which affected oil export, access to diesel, and food and medicine imports. Some people argue that the economic recession in Venezuela was caused by the sanctions - failing to notice the negative trends in the years prior to these.

Bahar, Bustos, Morales and Santos (who will be referred to as BBMS in this post) conclude in their paper, Impact of the 2017 Sanctions on Venezuela, that while the sanctions had a negative effect in the oil production, "it is quite impossible to attribute the fall [...] to one single event (i.e., the sanctions), when many other confounding events were happening at the same time."

Oil production: Oil prices dropped during 2015, and oil production decreased as a result of lack of maintenance and investment.

Energy crisis: By 2009, when the energy crisis was first declared, the electrical grid had already been suffering from the lack of maintenance and investment since 1998. The Chávez administration distributed million dollar contracts [...] that enriched high officials of his government and the works were never built. [1] [2] [3]

Economic decline and hyper-inflation: Actions taken by the Chávez administration such as expropriation and price control, as well as the PDVSA purge in 2002 led the country to depend almost entirely on its already declining oil industry, causing shortages and price rises in common goods, food, medical supplies and so on. By 2015, 60% of the Venezuelan population was living in poverty. [1] [2] [3] [4]

From only these three points, we can establish a negative trend starting way before the first US Sanctions. Thus, we can conclude that by the time the devastating 2017-2019 sanctions took place, Venezuela was already deep in a state of generalized crisis.

WS conclude in their paper:

[...] One of the most important impacts of the sanctions is to lock Venezuela into a downward economic spiral. [...] An economic recovery could have already begun in the absence of economic sanctions.

While Bahar, Bustos, Morales and Santos declare:

[...] Our analysis finds insufficient evidence to conclude that they [sanctions] were responsible for the worsening of the socio-economic crisis. [...] The weight of evidence seems to indicate that, rather than being a result of US-imposed sanctions, much of the suffering and devastation in Venezuela has been, in line with most accounts, inflicted by those in power.

In conclusion - both papers seem to agree that the crisis in Venezuela started before 2017, but where WS claim that it worsened due to US sanctions, BBMS place a higher blame on the deterioration caused by the Venezuelan government.

Now, you may keep whichever analysis you prefer, but one thing we know for sure: the 40,000 Venezuelans that WS claimed died due to the sanctions cannot be found in any public report, while the death toll of protests and extrajudicial killings has been extensively reported.

Why is this relevant?

Contrary to what some people on this site would say, Venezuelans generally agree on the negative impacts of US-imposed sanctions (note: this poll accounts only for Venezuelans in Florida, as polls aren't often published inside Venezuela). However, the general consensus is that US-sanctions only added up to a crisis that had been building up since Chávez rose to power, and rather than the cause, it was yet another symptom.

Yes, the US is the Big Bad, but placing the blame solely on the sanctions only takes the responsibility away from the government and diverts the attention from the poor governance, rampaging corruption, violent repression and denialism that we've grown used to in the last 25 years.

So if you ask "why don't you address the blockade?", my response is: why don't you address the 9,647 extrajudicial killings, the 40 deaths caused by the energy crisis, the energy crisis itself, the economic decline, the lack of maintenance in the infrastructure, the violent repression, the forceful abductions and the censoring?

What we want you to understand is that when you center the US as the cause of the crisis, you are actively participating in our state-funded propaganda and knowingly turning a blind eye on the suffering of all Venezuelans. You are no better than imperialists - you ARE participating in imperialism.

Remember:

Last, but not least - be careful with your sources. This Venezuelanalysis article was written by Andreína Chávez, former editor-in-chief of TeleSUR, a government-funded news channel known for spreading Maduro propaganda. One of their most recent claims: dead Venezuelans are shown as having voted in the ballots shown in resultadosconvenezuela.com. Needless to say, this is false. This news portal is what some people would call, BIASED.

For more information, please read the amazing analysis written by @systhemes HERE.

A more direct response by @achillesmonochrome HERE.

For other sources, check HERE.

*Fellow Venezuelans, feel free to include anything I might have missed.

[artemlegere]

Anacreon Sacrificing to the Three Graces

Artist: Antonio Zucchi, RA (Italian, 1726-1796)

Date: 1767

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

The Greek lyric poet Anacreon lifts a garland up to a marble statue of the Three Graces whilst a child attendant, draped in a red ribbon, stands behind him, on the right holding a golden tazza on a tray. Two more children sit at the urn base of the statue, on the left, holding more flowers.

Anacreon

Anacreon (c. 573 – c. 495 BC) was a Greek lyric poet, notable for his drinking songs and erotic poems. Later Greeks included him in the canonical list of Nine Lyric Poets. Anacreon wrote all of his poetry in the ancient Ionic dialect. Like all early lyric poetry, it was composed to be sung or recited to the accompaniment of music, usually the lyre. Anacreon's poetry touched on universal themes of love, infatuation, disappointment, revelry, parties, festivals, and the observations of everyday people and life.

[royalty-nobility]

Victoria, Duchess of Kent (1788-1861)

Artist: Richard Rothwell (Irish, 1800-1868)

Date: 1832

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: Royal Collection Trust, United Kingdom

Description

Victoria, Duchess of Kent, was born Victoria Mary Louisa, Princess of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, at Coburg on 17 August 1786. Her first marriage in 1803 was to the Prince of Leiningen, with whom she had a son, Charles, and a daughter, Feodora. He died in 1814 and Victoria then married Edward, Duke of Kent, the fourth son of George III and Queen Charlotte. They had one daughter, the future Queen Victoria.

[portrait-paintings]

Self-Portrait

Artist: Angelica Kauffman RA (Swiss, 1741-1807)

Date: c. 1764

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Trust Collections, United Kingdom

Description

Oil painting on canvas, Self-portrait (after Kauffman) by an Unknown artist after an original of Angelica Kauffman RA (Chur 1741 – Rome 1807), circa 1764. She is seated looking to the left, wearing a red dress and holding an artist's palette board and paint brush in her right hand.

[harvardfineartslib]

April is National Decoration Month.

Art et décoration was first published in 1897. The publication was suspended during the two World Wars from August 1914 – April 1919, and from 1939 through 1945. The Fine Arts Library has the original volumes if you want to see them. Request to view them in the Special Collections Study Room!

Art et décoration : revue mensuelle d'art moderne Cover title: Art et décoration et l'architecture 1936-37 Paris : Librairie Centrale des Beaux Arts, Frequency note: Monthly French HOLLIS number: 990062486850203941