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Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

(Encyclopedia)Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, established in 1805, incorporated in 1806. It is supported by private endowment. The academy grew out of a proposal by Charles Willson Peale for an...

Luciano, Lucky

(Encyclopedia)Luciano, Lucky (Charles Luciano), 1896–1962, American crime boss, b. near Palermo, Sicily, as Salvatore Luciana. His family emigrated in 1906, settling in New York City, where he almost immediately ...

Langdon, Harry

(Encyclopedia)Langdon, Harry, 1884–1944, American silent film comedian and director, b. Council Bluffs, Iowa. He repeatedly ran away from home to join traveling shows and circuses as a youngster, and later develo...

Kanin, Garson

(Encyclopedia)Kanin, Garson kāˈnən [key], 1912–99, American director and writer, b. Rochester, N.Y.; grad. American Academy of Dramatic Arts, 1933. He worked as a saxophonist, comedian, and actor before becomi...

chivalry

(Encyclopedia)chivalry shĭvˈəlrē [key], system of ethical ideals that arose from feudalism and had its highest development in the 12th and 13th cent. Chivalric ethics originated chiefly in France and Spain and ...

color-field painting

(Encyclopedia)color-field painting, abstract art movement that originated in the 1960s. Coming after the abstract expressionism of the 1950s, color-field painting represents a sharp change from the earlier movement...

Andre, Carl

(Encyclopedia)Andre, Carl änˈdrā [key], 1935–, American sculptor, b. Quincy, Mass. A student of Patrick Morgan and associate of Frank Stella, Andre produces sculptures of elemental form and abstract monumental...

Freilicher, Jane

(Encyclopedia)Freilicher, Jane frīˈlĭkər [key] 1924–2014, American painter, b. Brooklyn, N.Y., as Jane Niederhoffer; studied Hans Hoffmann School (1947), Brooklyn College (B.A. 1947), Columbia (M.A. 1948). Th...

Franzen, Jonathan

(Encyclopedia)Franzen, Jonathan, 1959–, American novelist, b. Western Springs, Ill., B.A. Swarthmore College, 1981. His first two novels, The Twenty-Seventh City (1988) and Strong Motion (1992), were well receive...

Gide, André

(Encyclopedia)Gide, André äNdrāˈ zhēd [key], 1869–1951, French writer. He established a reputation as an unconventional novelist with The Immoralist (1902, tr. 1930), a partly autobiographical work in which ...