Pablo Picasso: The Life Story You May Not Know
By Ellen Wulfhorst, Stacker News
On 5/19/21 at 8:00 PM EDT
RALPH GATTI/AFP via Getty Images
Pablo Picasso was an unrivaled titan of 20th-century art. He influenced and collaborated with such fellow creative geniuses as Henri Matisse and Georges Braque, and the works of his Blue Period and his Rose Period are familiar to even the most casual museum-goer.
In politics, Picasso took an unwavering stand against fascism in his homeland. After a visit in 1934, he vowed not to return to Spain so long as the dictator General Francisco Franco was alive, and he never went home again. In joining the French Communist Party, he declared: I have always been an exile, now I am one no longer; until the time when Spain may finally receive me, the French Communist Party has opened its arms to me.
143-year-old Spanish coin makes its way to Wisconsin humane society donation box
May 5, 2021 10:58 AM Logan Rude
Photo courtesy of the Jefferson County Humane Society
JEFFERSON, Wis. A coin minted more than 140 years ago across the Atlantic Ocean has mysteriously made its way to a Wisconsin humane society’s donation box.
The coin in question? A 143-year-old Spanish five cent (centimo) piece minted under the reign of Spanish King Alfonso XII.
“We have donations canisters throughout our community to help raise support for our animals and we regularly receive Canadian coins or Euro coins that the bank gives back to us,” said Jeff Okazaki, Executive Director for the Humane Society of Jefferson County. “This is by far the oldest and most unusual coin we’ve ever gotten back. It’s quite a mystery to find out who would have a 143-year-old Spanish coin just sitting in their pocket change.”
The French army’s coup plots and the global onslaught on democratic rights
This year the day of international working class solidarity comes amid a deepening threat of far-right dictatorship. In the week before May Day, a political crisis has mounted in France over a letter by 23 retired or reservist generals in the neofascist magazine
Current Values advocating a coup. Even as the defense ministry threatens to prosecute officers supporting the letter, growing numbers of officers are signing it now over 7,000.
These statements must be taken as a warning to workers not only in France but internationally. Less than four months have passed since January 6, when then-US President Donald Trump sent thousands of his neofascist supporters to storm the Capitol in Washington D.C. to halt the certification of his loss in the presidential elections. This was clearly not a historical accident attributable to Trump’s personal recklessness, nor did the coup’s failure end the threat of fas