Arts & Culture

The beauty of art, says William Kentridge in his Norton Lectures, is that it makes “a safe place for uncertainty.”

Harvard alumni started discussions about a memorial in May 1865, as the Civil War ended. By December they had chosen a design. Memorial Hall was to be an ornate Gothic Revival structure, with 5,000 square feet of stained glass, a 210-foot tower, intricate slate roofing, and gargoyles sheathed with copper.

New book documents a rising movement of likable people with offbeat ideas, who constitute a major influence on the Republican Party in this presidential election.

Violinist Adrian Anantawan was born without a right hand, but has become a renowned professional violinist. He now is enrolled in the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Arts in Education Program, with the goal of helping other disabled students in their artistic and creative development.

Before the Civil War, Harvard was a microcosm of the complex loyalties and opinions that marked the United States. During the war, it lost more than 200 of its sons.

Adrian Anantawan was born without a right hand, but with an adaptive device became a renowned professional violinist.

The musician Prince’s painful past as a child of divorce is the key to understanding what makes him tick — and what makes him an icon to Generation X, according to Touré, the cultural critic and author. Touré is presenting the Alain LeRoy Locke Lecture Series.

Scientists tell us blue light will reset body rhythms for sounder sleep and higher alertness. Blue is sky and water; eyes and stones; slumber and spring — with summer right behind.

Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences student Matthew Mugmon will be one of seven panelists convened by the New York Philharmonic for a worldwide, online discussion on Harvard alumni Leonard Bernstein’s groundbreaking tours to the former Soviet Union, Japan, Europe, and South America.

The story of 15th-century book hunter Poggio Bracciolini and his rediscovery of Lucretius’ “On the Nature of Things” was captured by Cogan University Professor Stephen Greenblatt in his National Book Award-winning account, “The Swerve: How the World Became Modern.”

A new multimedia collaboration inspired by the A.R.T. production “Wild Swans” aims to capture and spread personal stories from members of the Greater Boston community with ties to China.

Adolphus Busch Hall, once home to the Harvard Art Museums/Busch-Reisinger Museum, is amid a major renovation. Recently completed work includes restoration of two once-controversial artworks critical of fascism.

In his new book, “Guantánamo: An American History,” lecturer Jonathan Hansen uncovers the rich and controversial history of an American empire on the tip of Cuba.

Rem Koolhaas, a professor in practice of architecture and urban design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD), shared his thoughts on those and other subjects before an overflow crowd at Piper Auditorium with a presentation titled “Current Preoccupations.”

On a chilly afternoon in January, nine students watched in excited amazement as three leather-clad metalsmiths lifted a glowing crucible filled with molten bronze and poured fiery metal into sculpture molds.

Through her art and articulate explanations of her own struggle with an eating disorder, visiting artist Judith Shaw explained the internal experience of victims of anorexia to her audience at the opening reception of “Body of Work” at the Student Organization Center at Hilles.

Through studio sessions at the New England Sculpture Service, the course “Cast in Bronze: A Workshop in Exploring and Creating Bronze Sculpture” provided the opportunity not only to create bronze sculptures, but also to better understand the practice and craft of making art.

Harvard students braved the snow to welcome Lady Gaga to campus.

During a lecture that is part of a series of master classes sponsored by Harvard’s Mahindra Humanities Center, Harvard Professor Ingrid Monson explored the genius behind John Coltrane’s 1965 jazz album “A Love Supreme.”

On the tricentennial celebration of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s birth, the author and philosopher is being honored with an exhibition of his works at the Houghton Library. “Rousseau and Human Rights” continues through March 23.

A new book explores the connections among World War II scientists, the V-2 missile, and the U.S. race to the moon, led by German émigré Wernher von Braun.

A leading cultural and intellectual historian of Renaissance Europe, Princeton Professor Anthony Grafton suggests that the diligent work of 16th-century scholar Joseph Scaliger, in particular, led to the theory that the Last Supper may well have been in fact a Passover Seder.

A groundbreaking speech by Ralph Waldo Emerson at Harvard Divinity School in 1838 helped to transform faith, spur the transcendentalist movement, and change the future of Harvard.

Museum educators are using their collections to help members of the Harvard community explore salient issues like creativity and leadership in new ways.

As a liberal arts college, Harvard trains its students broadly so they can adapt nimbly to a rapidly changing world. Increasingly, appreciating and participating in music are integral parts of student life.

One of the many student-led musical groups on campus, The Nostalgics keep a Detroit sound tradition alive as Harvard’s Motown and soul band.

For his new book, Robert Sampson studied the Second City’s ups and downs for 15 years to outline patterns for many modern American cities.

Created in 2001, Mariachi Véritas de Harvard is a student-run group that focuses exclusively on the mariachi musical tradition.

Members of the Harvard community gather regularly in the basement of the Memorial Church for an informal hour of Gregorian chant singing under the guidance of Thomas Kelly, Morton B. Knafel Professor of Music.

Founded as the Pierian Sodality in March 1808 by a handful of students, today the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra is a collection of more than 100 accomplished musicians who present four major concerts each year.