20 APR 2026

Day 110

I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.

Baruch Spinoza · Tractatus Politicus

A pale magnesite standing figure of a man, 113 centimetres (3 ft 8 in) high, carved fully in the round, narrow in depth, with a calm frontal stance.

I · THE OBJECT · BRITISH MUSEUM

Statue of Ashurnasirpal II

Assyrian Empire · 9th century BC · magnesite

Carved in magnesite in the ninth century BC, this standing figure of an Assyrian king was found at Kalhu and entered the British Museum in 1851.

Enter lesson 5 MIN

II · THE IDEA · ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Dataset Distillation

data · dataset distillation · 2018 and 2020 arxiv papers

A model can be trained on a handful of synthetic images and still approach the accuracy it would reach on tens of thousands of real ones if those few are built for the purpose.

Enter lesson 6 MIN

A wide triptych in oil on panel: at left a garden with a divine figure and the first humans; at centre crowds of naked figures among oversized fruits, animals and pale structures; at right a dark realm of hybrid creatures and torment.

III · THE WORK · ART HISTORY

The Garden of Earthly Delights

Hieronymus Bosch · 15th–16th century · Oil on panel

Three hinged panels open onto Eden, a crowded garden of naked figures, and a dark punishment — painted so densely that no single reading has ever settled what Bosch meant.

Enter lesson 7 MIN