Stories abound of how the giant cattle of the fairy folk were sometimes our saviours — “There was once a bright-white milch-cow which travelled round the world, giving milk enough for all comers. Whoever drank of her milk immediately became wise, and was healed of whatsoever disease he had. …

Examining spiritual connections between artists and landscape in two Classical Chinese scroll paintings — Classical Chinese landscape painting began around the time of the artist and poet Wang Wei, during the first half of the eighth-century. He’s known as the innovator responsible for introducing a poetic dimension to landscapes and for originating the discipline of brush and ink painting onto handscrolls, sometimes combining elements…

Marcel Duchamp’s ‘Stoppages’ is a set of related artworks that tell the conceptual narrative of a radical creative process… — In 1913, the French artist Marcel Duchamp measured and cut a piece of string into three sections, each one metre long. He took these strings and held them horizontally one metre above a primed canvas, painted a deep dark blue, onto which he dropped each piece of string. He then…

A strict headmistress runs a secluded school for wayward girls in 19th-century France, whose students are disappearing under mysterious circumstances. —

Lisa Eurgain Taylor —

Recognised as a twentieth-century ‘design icon', the first one-piece telephone on the market embodied expectations for a brighter future — The ‘futuristic’ form of the Ericofon may conjure imagery of 1960s science fiction or, in the case of the bright orange model, 1970s Pop Art optimism. It seems to proclaim, ‘this is tomorrow’, but the concept was born during the interwar Modernist revolution. As early as 1930, the Swedish telecommunications…

A retired yakuza is caught in the middle of a growing conflict between two rival clans. —

A trio of scientists plan to create a self-replicating, immortal, hermaphrodite using the Final Programme developed by a dead, Nobel Prize-winning scientist. —