Arts
Meditation
5th Millenium BC to Present
Meditation is a practice where an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state. Scholars have found meditation difficult to define, as practices vary both between traditions and within them.
Leonardo da Vinci
Apr, 1452 to Friday May 2, 1519
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (14/15 April 1452 – 2 May 1519), known as Leonardo da Vinci, was an Italian polymath of the Renaissance whose areas of interest included invention, drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, paleontology, and cartography. He has been variously called the father of palaeontology, ichnology, and architecture, and is widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time.
Mona Lisa
1500s to 1517
The Mona Lisa is a half-length portrait painting by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. It is considered an archetypal masterpiece of the Italian Renaissance, and has been described as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world." The painting's novel qualities include the subject's expression, which is frequently described as enigmatic, the monumentality of the composition, the subtle modelling of forms, and the atmospheric illusionism. The painting is likely of the Italian noblewoman Lisa Gherardini, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, and is in oil on a white Lombardy poplar panel. It had been believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506; however, Leonardo may have continued working on it as late as 1517. Recent academic work suggests that it would not have been started before 1513. It was acquired by King Francis I of France and is now the property of the French Republic itself, on permanent display at the Louvre Museum in Paris since 1797.
Johann Sebastian Bach
Saturday Mar 31, 1685 to Tuesday Jul 28, 1750
Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March [O.S. 21 March] 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations, and for vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he is generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time.
Mozart
Tuesday Jan 27, 1756 to Wednesday May 11, 1791
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791), baptised as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period.
Beethoven
Dec, 1770 to Monday Mar 26, 1827
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptized 17 December 1770 – 26 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. His works span the transition between the classical and romantic eras in classical music. His career has conventionally been divided into early, middle, and late periods. The "early" period in which he forged his craft, is typically seen to last until 1802. His "middle" period, (sometimes characterised as "heroic") shows an individual development from the "classical" styles of Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, covers the years 1802 to 1812, during which he increasingly suffered from deafness. In the "late" period from 1812 to his death in 1827, he extended his innovations in musical form and expression.
David Copperfield
1850 to Present
David Copperfield is the eighth novel by Charles Dickens. The novel's full title is The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account). It was first published as a serial in 1849–50, and as a book in 1850.
Igor Stravinsky
Saturday Jun 17, 1882 to Tuesday Apr 6, 1971
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was a Russian-born composer, pianist, and conductor. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century.
Walt Disney
Thursday Dec 5, 1901 to Thursday Dec 15, 1966
Walter Elias Disney was an American entrepreneur, animator, voice actor and film producer. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film producer, Disney holds the record for most Academy Awards earned by an individual, having won 22 Oscars from 59 nominations. He was presented with two Golden Globe Special Achievement Awards and an Emmy Award, among other honors. Several of his films are included in the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.
Salvador Dali
Wednesday May 11, 1904 to Monday Jan 23, 1989
Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, (11 May 1904 – 23 January 1989), known professionally as Salvador Dalí, was a prominent Spanish surrealist born in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain.
Anna May Wong
Tuesday Jan 3, 1905 to Friday Feb 3, 1961
Anna May Wong (born Wong Liu Tsong; January 3, 1905 – February 3, 1961) was an American actress, considered to be the first Chinese American Hollywood movie star, as well as the first Chinese American actress to gain international recognition. Her varied career spanned silent film, sound film, television, stage, and radio.
Frank Sinatra
Sunday Dec 12, 1915 to Thursday May 14, 1998
Francis Albert Sinatra was an American singer, actor and producer who was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold more than 150 million records worldwide.
Marlon Brando
Thursday Apr 3, 1924 to Thursday Jul 1, 2004
Marlon Brando Jr. (April 3, 1924 – July 1, 2004) was an American actor and film director. With a career spanning 60 years, he is well-regarded for his cultural influence on 20th-century film. Brando's Academy Award-winning performances include that of Terry Malloy in On the Waterfront (1954) and Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather (1972). Brando was an activist for many causes, notably the civil rights movement and various Native American movements. He is credited with helping to popularize the Stanislavski system of acting, having studied with Stella Adler in the 1940s. He is often regarded as one of the first actors to bring Method Acting (built from the Stanislavski system) to mainstream audiences.
Marilyn Monroe
Tuesday Jun 1, 1926 to Saturday Aug 4, 1962
Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, model, and singer. Famous for playing comic "blonde bombshell" characters, she became one of the most popular sex symbols of the 1950s and early 1960s and was emblematic of the era's changing attitudes towards sexuality. Although she was a top-billed actress for only a decade, her films grossed $200 million (equivalent to $2 billion in 2018) by the time of her unexpected death in 1962.More than half a century later, she continues to be a major popular culture icon.
Audrey Hepburn
Saturday May 4, 1929 to Wednesday Jan 20, 1993
Audrey Hepburn (born Audrey Kathleen Ruston; 4 May 1929 – 20 January 1993) was a British actress and humanitarian. Recognized as a film and fashion icon, she was ranked by the American Film Institute as the third-greatest female screen legend in Golden Age Hollywood, and was inducted into the International Best Dressed List Hall of Fame.
Bob Marley
Tuesday Feb 6, 1945 to Monday May 11, 1981
Robert Nesta Marley was a Jamaican singer, songwriter and musician. Considered one of the pioneers of reggae, his musical career was marked by blending elements of reggae, ska, and rocksteady, as well as forging a smooth and distinct vocal and songwriting style. Over the course of his career Marley became known as a Rastafari icon. He is also considered a global symbol of Jamaican culture and identity, and was controversial in his outspoken support for the legalization of marijuana, while he also advocated for Pan-Africanism. Marley's contributions to music increased the visibility of Jamaican music worldwide, and made him a global figure in popular culture.
Freddie Mercury
Thursday Sep 5, 1946 to Sunday Nov 24, 1991
Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara; 5 September 1946 – 24 November 1991) was a British singer, songwriter, record producer, and lead vocalist of the rock band Queen. Regarded as one of the greatest lead singers in the history of rock music, he was known for his flamboyant stage persona and four-octave vocal range.
Steven Spielberg
Wednesday Dec 18, 1946 to Present
Steven Allan Spielberg is an American filmmaker. He is considered one of the founding pioneers of the New Hollywood era and one of the most popular directors and producers in film history. Spielberg started in Hollywood directing television and several minor theatrical releases. He became a household name as the director of Jaws (1975), which was critically and commercially successful and is considered the first summer blockbuster. His subsequent releases focused typically on science fiction and adventure films, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), and Jurassic Park (1993) are seen as archetypes of modern Hollywood escapist filmmaking.
Robin Williams
Saturday Jul 21, 1951 to Monday Aug 11, 2014
Robin McLaurin Williams (July 21, 1951 – August 11, 2014) was an American actor and comedian. Born in Chicago, Williams began performing stand-up comedy in San Francisco and Los Angeles during the mid-1970s. After rising to fame playing the alien Mork in the sitcom Mork & Mindy, Williams established a career in both stand-up comedy and feature film acting. He was known for his improvisation skills and the wide variety of memorable character voices he created. Many critics have lauded Williams as one of the funniest comedians of all time.
James Bond
1953 to Present
The James Bond series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have written authorized Bond novels or novelisations: Kingsley Amis, Christopher Wood, John Gardner, Raymond Benson, Sebastian Faulks, Jeffery Deaver, William Boyd and Anthony Horowitz. The latest novel is Forever and a Day by Anthony Horowitz, published in May 2018. Additionally Charlie Higson wrote a series on a young James Bond, and Kate Westbrook wrote three novels based on the diaries of a recurring series character, Moneypenny.
Jackie Chan
Wednesday Apr 7, 1954 to Present
Chan Kong-sang born 7 April 1954 known professionally as Jackie Chan, is a Hong Kongese martial artist, actor, film director, producer, stuntman, and singer. He is known for his acrobatic fighting style, comic timing, use of improvised weapons, and innovative stunts, which he typically performs himself, in the cinematic world. He has trained in wushu or kungfu and hapkido, and has been acting since the 1960s, appearing in over 150 films.
The Beatles
Mar, 1957 to Sunday Dec 29, 1974
The Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The line-up of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr led them to be regarded as the most influential band of all time. With a sound rooted in skiffle, beat and 1950s rock and roll, the group were integral to the evolution of pop music into an art form, and to the development of the counterculture of the 1960s. They often incorporated elements of classical music, older pop, and unconventional recording techniques in innovative ways, and they experienced with a number of musical styles in later years, ranging from pop ballads and Indian music to psychedelia and hard rock. As they continued to draw influences from a variety of cultural sources, their musical and lyrical sophistication great, and they came to be seen as embodying the era of socio-cultural movements.
Jim Carrey
Wednesday Jan 17, 1962 to Present
James Eugene Carrey is a Canadian-American actor, comedian, impressionist, screenwriter, musician, producer, artist, painter and cartoonist. He is known for his energetic slapstick performances.
Dwayne Johnson
Tuesday May 2, 1972 to Present
Dwayne Douglas Johnson (born May 2, 1972), also known by his ring name, The Rock, is an American-Canadian actor, producer, and retired professional wrestler. Johnson was a professional wrestler for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) for eight years prior to pursuing an acting career. His films have grossed over $3.5 billion in North America and over $10.5 billion worldwide, making Johnson one of the most successful and highest-grossing box-office stars of all time.
Eminem
Tuesday Oct 17, 1972 to Present
Marshall Bruce Mathers III (born October 17, 1972), known professionally as Eminem, is an American rapper, songwriter, record producer, record executive and actor. He is one of the most successful musical artists of the 21st century. In addition to his solo career, Eminem was a member of the hip hop group D12. He is also known for collaborations with fellow Detroit-based rapper Royce da 5'9"; the two are collectively known as Bad Meets Evil.
Bart Millard
Friday Dec 1, 1972 to Present
Bart Marshall Millard (born December 1, 1972) is an American singer and songwriter who is best known as the leader of the band MercyMe. He has also released two solo albums: Hymned, No. 1 in 2005 and Hymned Again in 2008. He received a solo Grammy nomination in the category of Best Southern, Country, or Bluegrass Gospel Album for the latter album.
Shakira
Wednesday Feb 2, 1977 to Present
Shakira Isabel Mebarak is a Colombian singer, songwriter, dancer, businesswoman, and philanthropist. Born and raised in Barranquilla, her first studio albums, Magia and Peligro, failed to attain commercial success in the 1990s; however, she rose to prominence in Latin America with her major-label debut, Pies Descalzos (1996), and her fourth album, Dónde Están los Ladrones? (1998).
Ellie Goulding
Tuesday Dec 30, 1986 to Present
Elena Jane Goulding (30 December 1986) is an English singer and songwriter. Her career began when she met record producers Starsmith and Frankmusik, and she was later spotted by Jamie Lillywhite, who later became her manager and A&R. After signing to Polydor Records in July 2009, Goulding released her debut extended play, An Introduction to Ellie Goulding later that year.
Billie Eilish
Tuesday Dec 18, 2001 to Present
Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O'Connell (born December 18, 2001) is an American singer and songwriter. She first gained media attention in 2016 when she uploaded the song "Ocean Eyes" to SoundCloud, and it was subsequently released by Interscope Records subsidiary Darkroom. The song was written and produced by her brother Finneas, with whom she collaborates on music and live shows. Her debut EP, Don't Smile at Me (2017), reached the top 15 in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.
Pablo Picasso
Monday Jun 10, 2019 to Sunday Apr 8, 1973
Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France.