All posts filed under: ART

An image of a creepy doll.

Creepy dolls, Stephen King, and the artist who brings nightmares to life

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Have you ever locked eyes with a porcelain doll on a shelf and instantly felt a chill crawl up your spine? If so, you’re not alone — and horror icon Stephen King would probably agree with you. Dolls have long been the stuff of nightmares in King’s world, from murderous clowns to animated Army men with a vendetta.

King’s fear of dolls is well-documented across his work. In “Poltergeist,” which he helped write for the screen, a young boy’s fear of a clown doll turns disturbingly real when the toy attacks. In “The X-Files,” King penned an episode centered around a haunted doll, and one of the darkest vignettes in his “Nightmares and Dreamscapes” series features actor William Hurt being hunted by vindictive toys — tiny green Army men that eventually bring about his demise.

You can plant a greeting card?

Plantable Greeting Cards: Send a message that blooms with wildflowers

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Did you know you can actually plant a greeting card and grow flowers from it? That’s right — your next heartfelt note could double as a wildflower garden, thanks to the clever, eco-conscious creations from Round Robin Press. These beautiful cards aren’t just for show; they’re embedded with real wildflower seeds that can bloom once planted in soil.

Created by artist Shannon Lowry, the cards are printed on recycled paper and feature calming, nature-inspired illustrations — primarily of birds. For Lowry, birds symbolize peace, joy, and the quiet strength of nature.

The revival of bold wallpaper.

Retro Revival: Bold wallpaper trends bring the ’70s back in style

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Remember the 1980s trend where every other house had wallpaper borders running along the tops of walls? Whether it was apples, country ducks, hunting dogs, or (yes) drunk roller-skating clowns, you couldn’t walk into a home without seeing some kind of whimsical or cheesy print staring back at you.

What you may not know is that wallpaper — and especially those quirky borders — quietly disappeared in the 1990s when sleek, modern decorators declared war on anything that wasn’t a smooth, painted wall. For years, “updated” meant stripping down to neutral colors and bare surfaces. But as with many things in design, what goes out of style always finds a way to come back.

A company called LumiGram is now making shirts, purses, pillows, table cloths, etc., out of fiberoptic material. I guess it's a step beyond glow-in-the-dark.

Glow-Up Fashion: LumiGram’s fiber optic clothing brings disco back to the future

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A French company called LumiGram is taking fashion and home décor into the future — literally — with its line of products made from fiber optic fabric.

That’s right — shirts, purses, pillows, tablecloths, and even jackets now glow with a radiant shimmer, thanks to embedded fiber optic strands that light up in the dark. Think of it as a high-tech twist on glow-in-the-dark, with a bit more flair and definitely more wattage.

The film poster for "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof."

What Is Mendacity? Watch ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ and find out

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If you’ve never heard the word mendacity before, you’ll walk away from “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” with a full understanding of what it means — and why it matters.

In this emotionally-charged drama adapted from the Tennessee Williams play, lies, half-truths, and buried secrets swirl through a wealthy Mississippi family as they prepare for the inevitable death of their patriarch.

The poster for the film "Persona."

Exploring Identity and the Mind in Bergman’s Persona

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LaReeca Rucker I rented the 1967 film “Persona” after reading multiple articles that referenced it in connection with other psychologically complex films. Since I had recently watched David Lynch’s surreal, open-ended “Mulholland Drive,” it seemed like the right time to give Ingmar Bergman’s classic a try. The two films share some intriguing similarities — most notably, their exploration of the psychological bond and blurred identities between two women. “Persona” focuses on a nurse and her patient, whose personalities begin to merge in strange and unsettling ways. It’s an intense, cerebral dive into identity, silence, and emotional trauma. If I hadn’t already seen some of Roman Polanski’s earlier films, like “Repulsion,” I might have been more shaken by “Persona.” But “Repulsion” — another raw, disturbing examination of the female psyche — had already prepped me to expect a certain level of intensity from 1960s European psychological cinema. Still, “Persona” is a strong example of how film can probe corners of the mind that most movies never attempt to reach. Its experimental feel and avant-garde cinematography are …