Pointillism is a technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are applied in patterns to form an image.  Georges Seurat and Paul Signac developed the technique in 1886, branching from Impressionism.  The term "Pointillism" was coined by art critics in the late 1880’s to ridicule the works of these artists, but is now used without its earlier pejorative connotation.  The movement Seurat began with this technique is known as Neo-impressionism.  The Divisionists used a similar technique of patterns to form images, though with larger cube-like brushstrokes.  From Wikipedia   https://www.jigidi.com/jigsaw-puzzle/tne5tqpr/get-to-the-point/

Muhmmara is a hearty walnut and roasted red pepper dip or spread that’s all sorts of savory, sweet, slightly smoky, and just enough spicy!  The word muhammara is from the Arabic word ahmar, which literally means red.  This red dip, originally from the Syrian city of Aleppo, this delicious dip made its way from the heart of the Levant to many parts of the world including Europe and the U.S.  See recipe at https://www.themediterraneandish.com/muhammara-recipe-roasted-red-pepper-dip/  Thank you, Muse reader!  

It may seem odd, but in the theater world, saying “good luck” is actually considered bad luck.  There are numerous ideas about the origin of the phrase.  One story says spirits wreak havoc on your wishes and make the opposite happen.  Another comes from ancient Greece, where the audience didn’t clap but instead stomped their feet to show appreciation.  If the audience stomped long enough, they would break a leg.  Some say the term originated during Elizabethan times when, instead of applause, the audience would bang their chairs on the ground—and if they liked it enough, the leg of the chair would break.  The most common theory refers to an actor breaking the “leg line” of the stage.  In the early days of theater, this is where ensemble actors were queued to perform.  If actors were not performing, they had to stay behind the “leg line,” which also meant they wouldn’t get paid.  If you were to tell the actor to “break a leg,” you were wishing them the opportunity to perform and get paid.  The sentiment remains the same today; the term means “good luck, give a good performance.”  https://transcendencetheatre.org/break-a-leg/ 

If someone says "don't pull my leg" they want you to stop playing a joke on them; to stop telling fibs and to tell the truth.  There is a sense of good humour about the whole concept, but it may not have always been so.  The origin is found in a Scottish rhyme in which "draw" is used in the sense of "pull" rather than the word itself.  It goes:  "He preached, and at last drew the auld body's leg, Sae the Kirk got the gatherins o' our Aunty Meg."  The suggestion in the rhyme is that Aunty Meg was hung for a crime and, at the end, the preacher pulled on her legs to ensure that she was dead.  The rather more sombre overtones of this possibility than are apparent in the British use of the phrase are mirrored in the American usage, where there is much more a feeling of trickery and deception when the saying is used.  http://jb.zebrasurf.com/Idioms/lam-limelight.html 

To be 'Sent to Coventry' is to be deliberately ignored or ostracised.  This behaviour often takes the form of pretending that the shunned person, although conspicuously present, can't be seen or heard.  The origins of this phrase aren't known beyond doubt, although it is quite probable that events in Coventry in the English Civil War in the 1640s are the source.  By 1811, the then understood meaning of the term was defined in Grose's Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue:  To send one to Coventry; a punishment inflicted by officers of the army on such of their brethren as are testy, or have been guilty of improper behaviour, not worthy the cognizance of a court martial.  The person sent to Coventry is considered as absent; no one must speak to or answer any question he asks, except relative to duty, under penalty of being also sent to the same place.  On a proper submission, the penitent is recalled, and welcomed by the mess, as just returned from a journey to Coventry.  A well-known example of someone being sent to Coventry is Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), after his falling out with the Liddell family.  Dodgson had developed a close relationship with the Liddell's daughter Alice.  In 1863, when Alice was 11, something happened to cause the family to ostracise him.  Whatever it was we can't now be sure as, although Dodgson recorded it in his diary at the time, the entry was later cut out by a Dodgson family member.  https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/sent-to-coventry.html 

Christine Smallwood’s novel The Life of the Mind—a bleak, funny tour of academia’s outer fringe—offers a lament for the state of email.  Dorothy, the book’s grad-student heroine, “used to love email, used to have long, meaningful, occasionally thrilling email correspondences that involved the testing of ideas and the exchange of videos and music links.”  Emails had been the way Dorothy and her friends “crafted personas, narrated events, made sense of their lives,” Smallwood writes.  “That way of life, alas, had ended.”  The contemporary email newsletter is not a novel form; often it amounts to a new delivery system for the same sorts of content—essays, explainers, Q&As, news roundups, advice, and lists—that have long been staples of online media.  Molly Fischer  https://www.thecut.com/2021/07/email-newsletters-new-literary-style.html 

To mark its 175th anniversary, the Smithsonian Institution is staging a massive celebration in the form of a sprawling exhibition featuring works from many museums under the Smithsonian umbrella.  To tie them all together, the organization is also commissioning site-specific art commissions from Beatriz Cortez, Nettrice Gaskins, Soo Sunny Park, Devan Shimoyama, and Tamiko Thiel and /p.  The show, titled “Futures,” will be held at the Smithsonian’s storied Arts and Industries Building, which has been largely closed to the public for two decades.  Dating to 1881, the building, which served as the first home for the U.S. National Museum, has undergone a $55 million renovation and is once again ready to welcome the public with an interdisciplinary, immersive exhibition asking them to consider how art and technology continue to shape our world.  “Futures” will be on view at the Smithsonian Institution, Arts and Industries Building, 900 Jefferson Drive, SW, National Mall, Washington, D.C., November 2021–July 2022.  Sarah Cascone  Read more and see dazzling pictures at https://news.artnet.com/art-world/smithsonian-175th-anniversary-futures-1979184  The Smithsonian’s founding donor, James Smithson, never visited the United States. 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2408  August 23, 2021