A hot Easter Sunday filled with Sahara dust has passed and today, Easter Monday, promises the opening of cafes and restaurants – albeit without music -as another step towards reclaiming our pre-pandemic life. If anything, the last six months has shown how much the little pleasures in life actually count. Hence, selfishly counting this newsletter among one of said little pleasures of life, let’s get to opening this week’s Crate without further ado.

1. Naive art provided much of the inspiration behind modernism – one need only to name the quiet tax collector Henri Rousseau – but it does not only belong to the beginning of last century. One example of it would be a former Soviet factory worker Rosa Zharkikh, who after a near-death experience at the age of 46, started her path as an artist trying to map her visions with needle and thread into intricate embroideries.

2. No matter where, we are evaluated on our output. However, as Austin Kleon (who, by the way was the main inspiration behind this very newsletter) notes in his blog – our output depends on our input.

3. Women in Ancient Greek society have been thought to have been confined to the gynaeceum and busied themselves mostly with everyday household matters – and certainly not with anything that had to do with creation. Now, however, a shift in patterns on Greek amphoras during the Early Iron Age has called that view into question.

4. After having collectively lived through it, many of us are probably prone to classifying 2020 as the worst year ever. However, things could get much much worse – as they did in 536 A.D, supposedly the worst year in the whole European history.

5. Glass is something we mostly do not connect with sensuality, but after seeing Amber Cowan’s detail-rich works, we might just change our minds about that.

6. And to finish off for this week, a little comic from Safely Endangered.

And that’s it for this time. Happy reading and until next week!

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