Author: Ava Ash-Waichulis

The Unexpected History of Civilization’s Most Enduring Surface Few building materials have shaped human civilization as quietly or as enduringly as the ceramic tile. At first glance, a tile is simply clay hardened by fire. Yet across more than five thousand years, it has served as a canvas for power, faith, mathematics, commerce, craftsmanship, and public life. Few objects reveal the story of civilization with such surprising clarity. This article traces the history of both civilization and tile through six extraordinary tiles. We move backward through time: starting under the modern streets of New York to explore the connection with…

From Renaissance Courts to Industrial Factories Lace is a fascinating contradiction: it looks light and insubstantial, but it also carries enormous cultural weight. For centuries, lace has been associated with elegance and refinement. Its intricate patterns seem almost suspended between fabric and air. Behind its fragile surfaces lies a history shaped by royal courts, global trade, religious conflict, industrial technology, and the labor of countless women whose names rarely entered the historical record. Few textiles have moved so fluidly between luxury and exploitation, artistry and industry, intimacy and power. To follow the history of lace is to trace the changing…

The Challenge of Seeing: Authenticity and Attribution Image shown: Detail of Johannes Vermeer, The Art of Painting, c. 1666, oil on canvas, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. When two visually similar paintings are exhibited together, comparison becomes virtually unavoidable. Viewers begin to look more closely, searching for subtle differences in technique, detail, and expression in an effort to decide which work feels more convincing or more “authentic.” At Kenwood House in London, the exhibition Double Vision: Vermeer at Kenwood brought this question into focus by presenting two versions of The Guitar Player side by side. One is generally accepted as an authentic…

“I find intrigue and beauty in anything that has age and character. I enjoy searching for these unusual objects which are often the subject-matter for my artwork.” Artist Statement from Laurie’s blog, “Szilvagyi – Art on the Easel” We are deeply saddened to share with our artistic community that our beloved friend and colleague, Laurie Szilvagyi, has passed away. Laurie was a truly inspirational artist, teacher, mentor, and generous creative spirit whose life was marked by adventurous curiosity, uncommon warmth, and an enduring devotion to art. This page is offered in loving tribute to her memory: a gathering of images,…

Celebrated painter Oren Loloi is now offering live, one-on-one online mentorship sessions for developing artists. Based in Tel Aviv, Loloi brings a wide-ranging background in fine art, illustration, design, papercut work, and contemporary oil painting to a practice grounded in direct painting, imaginative realism, and psychologically charged figurative scenes. Born in Tel Aviv and shaped by years in New York, Milan, and Israel, his work often places figures within quiet, dreamlike environments where structure, atmosphere, and narrative ambiguity carry equal weight. Loloi’s background gives his mentorship a particularly broad foundation. He studied Fine Art and Humanities at Hofstra University, earned…

Striving, Not Arriving: The Practice Behind Expert Performance Image shown: Judith Leyster, Self-portrait (c. 1630). Oil on canvas, 74.6 x 65.1 cm (29.4 x 25.6 in). National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. Excellence in art rarely announces itself. It does not arrive fully formed, nor does it live only in finished works. What we recognize as colloquial mastery is often just the visible edge of a much larger process shaped by repetition, revision, and sustained attention. For a long time, art history has favored stories of talent and sudden brilliance. However, research on expertise suggests that high-level performance depends not…

Inspiration is often described as a metaphorical spark. In Inspirations: A Global Cascade of Influence From Old Souvenirs to New Voices, that spark expands into something far more enduring. It becomes a sustained pursuit of excellence, carried across time, place, and generations of artists. Presented in collaboration between the ÀNI Art Academies and the John F. Peto Studio Museum, the exhibition embodies a shared commitment to the highest standards in teaching, learning, and personal development. This definition of excellence moves beyond abstraction, becoming visible through the works themselves and the lineage of influence that connects them. At the heart of the exhibition lies a…

The Adorned World is a column about the lives of objects and the choices that shape them. My vision for this new column is to look beyond how things are made to consider how they are adorned. “Ornamentation” often conjures up superfluous decoration, enhancements, unnecessary garnish, or outright gaudy details. Ornamentation is crimeAdolf Loos, Ornament and Crime, 1908 True, ornamentation is what goes beyond structure to surface embellishment. Throughout human history, in all parts of the globe, people have taken what is necessary and carried it further. They used carving, painting, patterning, and refining the objects they live with.…

The Adorned World examines how objects are made and the choices that shape them. It explores design, fashion, craft, and material culture across architecture, interiors, decorative arts, dress, and ritual, with close attention to the details that give them meaning. Objects do more than serve a function. They reflect cultural values, express identity, and carry visual languages that can be understood across time. The chair is where we begin our journey. Beyond offering a place to sit, its proportions, materials, surfaces, and details reveal how a culture understands the body and its place in the world. A chair may suggest…

In observational drawing and painting, “respect” is often associated with subject matter, tradition, or sincerity of intent. Within the Waichulis framework, however, the more useful starting point is perceptual awareness. The central issue is not reverence for the object, but an accurate understanding of the limitations and tendencies of the visual system that mediates our experience of that object. The Waichulis Curriculum is built around the development of perceptual calibration and controlled mark-making through structured, sequenced exercises informed by vision science and skill-acquisition research. To work perceptually is to recognize that what we experience is not objective reality delivered intact…