29 AUG 2026

Day 241

Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.

Marcus Aurelius · Meditations

A silver and silver-gilt penannular brooch with a ring, ornate terminals, and a long pin, shown as a freestanding dress fastener.

I · THE OBJECT · BRITISH MUSEUM

Londesborough Brooch

Early medieval Ireland · Late 8th or early 9th century · Silver-gilt; silver

A silver and silver-gilt brooch from Ireland, made in the late eighth or early ninth century, elaborate among its peers and held in London since 1888.

Enter lesson 5 MIN

II · THE IDEA · ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Synthetic Data for Data-Scarce Domains

data · synthetic examples via GANs · arXiv 1703.00573, 1812.04948

When labelled examples are few, a generative model can invent more. Whether those inventions help depends on equilibrium, diversity, and how cleanly attributes separate in latent space.

Enter lesson 7 MIN

A woman in elaborate dress reclines at full length across a wide, low canvas, her body stretched along the horizontal, set against a dark, shallow background.

III · THE WORK · ART HISTORY

The Clothed Maja

Francisco Goya · 1800 · Oil on canvas

Goya’s clothed maja stretches across a long canvas, paired with a nude he painted earlier. Who she was, and who wanted her, remain unresolved.

Enter lesson 6 MIN