The lessons of art history are that they are lessons. That is a tautology, but an illuminating one worth elaborating upon. It is necessary to know history as personal empowerment for artists: to test the present with the often surprising facts of the past, to note how and why "official" history has often changed; second, to discover one's own personal, vital ancestry; and finally, in order to criticize and change art history.
A short Artecdote about how our time, Postmodernism, resembles and indeed IS a form of Mannerism.
A short Artecdote concerning the difficulty in teaching an overview, or intro survey to Sub-Saharan African art, plus a free art image bank to download. Image bank link: http://brandl-art-articles.blogspot.ch/2016/10/african-art-course.html
A short artecdote discussing how criticism and complaint about the moribund artworld is important, but what positive things we can do to improve the situation.
A short Artecdote illustrating how important innovation often arises in apparently unpretentious discoveries. This is exemplified by chiaroscuro, the technique in paintings of using radical light-and-dark.
Christmas time! A podcast about how Santa Claus LOOKS --- the history of his visual appearance. St. Nicholas, Thomas Nast, Fred Mizen, myths like Coca-Cola, Luther, the Orthodox Santa, "Twas the night before Christmas," and more including the Swiss Samichlaus and Schmutzli!
The question: What is the problem with Performance Art and Video Art? Are they really, as can seem, so often so bad?
Re-historicizing Pluralism in art. It is claimed to be a unique change and to reign right now, yet it is not so new and has a past. Pluralisms have occurred at least 7 times before.
The slogan of Modernism was Ezra Pound's "Make it new. " Postmodernism (supposedly) rejects this. What is its motto and what could come after that?
There were of course female artists at all times. Most simply have been ignored, or even later removed from mainstream art history. Worst of all, for most of history in the West and the East, it was illegal to instruct or train women to become professional artists at all!