Organist Adds a Thrilling Layer to the Star Wars Score in a Live Performance With a Symphony

Photo: Screenshot from YouTube

The Star Wars score is one of the most epic soundtracks of all time. Throughout the years, orchestras around the world have given fans the chance to listen to it live, building on the thrill of an already powerful work. However, one musician has added an extra layer by incorporating an instrument that wasn't part of the original recordings. Organist Anna Lapwood joined the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (BSO), under the baton of Ukrainian conductor Kirill Karabits, to perform The Throne Room and End Title at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The result is marvelous.

Composer John Williams, who wrote the scores for most of the Star Wars franchise, didn't create an organ part for the original score, which was first recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra in 1977. That's why Lapwood had to write her own to join the 100 players needed to bring to life these iconic melodies. The sounds of this massive instrument enhanced the performance of the BSO's brass section. The concert was hosted by Classic FM, who described Lapwood's presentation as an extra jolt of jubilation to this starry-eyed performance.

Lapwood was able to enjoy the firework show at the end of the concert as well as the ovation she got through a mirror located atop the keyboard. The musician is a Royal Albert Hall Associate Artist and has gained traction on TikTok for sharing her early morning rehearsals and compelling organ insight. According to Classic FM, she even taught the Italian composer...

Once you pass a certain age and experience level you must realize that some jobs are just jobs, not a passion or something thats going to fulfill you as a long term career.

That said, we still expect to not despise our every day, and we also prefer to be treated well while were toiling away the hours, right?

These 17 people walked in to a new job with certain expectations, but saw things on day one that had them walking right back out with no plans to return.

17. The smart ones left.

Answered an ad in the paper (this was the mid 90s) what seemed to be an office job making sales calls when I was in college. Did a phone interview and was called back for an in person interview.

When I go to the interview Im led into a room with about 50 other people and a small stage at the front of the room. Were all somewhat confused as to what is going on.

Finally a guy gets on the stage and informs us that weve been selected for the opportunity to sell Cutco.

Me and 2/3rds of the rest stood up and walked out.

16. Two shifts, technically.

Not technically first day but second day.

When I was 20 or so I got hired to be a temporary floor member for Forever21 during the holiday season.

My training started a week before Black Friday so the store was already kind of in chaos. On my first day of training I walked in and the floor manager gave all the new hires a tour showing us the facility and layout of the store. After this I was assigned to a veteran floor member to shadow and get an idea of what my job was and what my duties would be. As soon as I was assigned the manager dipped never to be seen again.

An hour and a half into my shift my...

Listen to 385,000 Vintage 78 RPM Records for Free on The Internet Archive

Photo: CLAUDIODIVIZIA/Depositphotos

One way to understand the past is to listen to the music of the time. The Internet Archive is making that easier than ever with over 395,000 digitized records in the 78 RPM style, which dominated from 1900 to about 1950. The files are free to access, stream, and download. The collection is more than just entertaining, it is an important effort to digitize the sounds of history which have been preserved on brittle disks for almost a century.

The 78 RPM disc format became available in 1898. Made of shellac resin, they came in several sizes but were known for their 78 rotations per minute. They were recorded through a horn (later a microphone), with sound causing vibrations that engraved a pattern in the disc. The shellac material has not aged well, and some records can break from even being picked up. As such, digitizing these recordings is crucial.

The Great 78 Project, through the Internet Archive, is working towards this goal. George Blood, head of the audio-visual digitization company George Blood Audio, is a major contributor. Were currently delivering 5-6,000 sides per month, said Blood to The Vinyl Factory, and well be working to get to 20,000. The archive will be a reference collection of sound recordings from the period of approximately 1880 to 1960. This process is not easy; a record must be cleaned, conserved, and digitized. Files digitized by others can also be added.

If we didnt do this, 48,000 78s in a little library in Batavia III, Illinois, may have been lost. Same for a trove of more than 78,000 discs from a...

Archeologists Find Preserved Food at an Ancient Iraqi Tavern Site

The closest trench shows the tavern with a clay refrigerator called a zeer, an oven, and benches. (Photo: Lagash Archaeological Project)

After a hard day's work, ancient people liked to unwind at the pub just like modern folks. At least, that is what new findings on the important archeological site of Lagash in Iraq indicate. As recently announced by the University of Pennsylvania, archeologists digging at the site uncovered a tavern dating to around 2700 B.C.E. The find is complete with an oven, benches, a clay refrigerator known as a zeer, and bowls with food remnants. These findings can tell historians and archeologists a lot about daily life in a busy, ancient industrial center.

Lagash is one of the largest archeological sites in southern Mesopotamia. The city dates to the Early Dynastic period from 2900 to 2300 B.C.E. The urban center was part of a trio of cities that formed a powerful polity. Lagash was situated near fertile lands, but archeologists also believe it was an important center of craftsmen and industry. Excavations have uncovered ceramic kilns and trenches where wet clay was stored. Tables and benches nearby suggested a workroom. These workers may have lived in the domestic quarters also discovered on the site, which contained a kitchen, bowls with food, a grinding stone, and a toilet.

A surprising feature of the neighborhood was the tavern. Benches for guests, a zeer, an oven, and remnants of storage vessels containing food all suggest a thriving working-class watering hole. Its a public eating space dating to somewhere around 2700 BCE, says Professor Holly Pittman, curator of the Penn Museums Near East Section and the Lagash project director. Its partially open air, partially kitchen area.

To uncover the tavern, the team employed modern technologies. Using drone i...

Vintage Textile Patterns Are Reimagined as Intricate Laser-Cut Paper Sculptures

Vintage textiles are reimagined in paper form through stunning creations by Ibbini Studio. Based in Abu Dhabi, artist Julia Ibbini and computer scientist Stphane Noyer have merged their expertise into a unique practice that combines contemporary digital design with traditional craftsmanship. Their series of sculptural works feature ornamental motifs from an array of sources, stretching from antique Persian carpets to Japanese cloisonn vases.

Ibbini and Noyer have collaborated since 2017, resulting in a diverse portfolio of highly intricate pieces cut from thin sheet materials. Some of their most recent works are made from layers of individually cut paper. Each sheet is cut with a laser and then layered together with a complex collaging method.

Even though we use machines extensively during the production process, the pieces always start from hand-drawn elements, and the end result is always assembled by hand, which can take hundreds of hours and as much skill as the rest of the process, Ibbini explains to My Modern Met. I want the work to have that element of being craftedthat someone's hand was there. There is something quite beautiful in that.

Some of the designs feature perforations so fine and delicate that they resemble lace. Others possess a high-relief quality due to the dense layering, creating mesmerizing textures and curves that attract the eye. Our work combines contemporary digital design and traditional craftsmanship with extreme intricacy, exploring themes such as historical ornament and pattern using algorithms and new technologies, Ibbini says. A specific focus is the creation of visual complexity, either through repetition of simple motifs, elaborate geometric construction, or accumulation of ornamental detail in order to create highly intricate pieces.

To see more of Ibbini Studios remarkable work, you can visit their website or follow them on Instagram and ...

To all the dads out there, this story might give you a little bit of perspective when it comes to your daughters.maybe

Director and producer Judd Apatow is known for his many big comedy hits, including Knocked Up, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, This is 40, and many others.

 

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For years now, Hollywood star Mark Wahlberg has talked about how his Catholic faith is important to him.

And in a recent interview on the Today show, Wahlberg spoke about how be balances being a Catholic as a person in the public eye.

 

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Its always kind of stunned me that kids dont find clowns completely terrifying. The makeup, the clothes, the antics, the forced proximity and, you know, the fact that theyre not funny at all adds up to them being deeply sus.

At least to adults.

Ive wondered what it is that turns these fun-loving actors into nightmare fuel for awhile, and if you have too, good news science says they think they have answers.

Image Credit: iStock

Welsh psychological researchers Sophie Scorehy, Shakiela Davies, James Greville, and Phillip Tyson say theyve managed to quantify coulrophobia, which is the scientific name for a fear of clowns.

Their findings state that the biggest reason for coulrophobia comes from a per...

Comedian Ali Wong and her husband Justin Hakuta split up in April 2022 after 8 years of marriage.

Of course, theres nothing new about Hollywood folks getting divorced, but Wong recently opened up about her relationship with Hakuta after their divorce and it turned out to be pretty eye-opening.

 

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Theres no doubt that even though human beings are all so different and enjoy different things, we have one thing in common we really love mysteries.

Whether theyre fiction, based on reality, or totally true, we all love the idea of solving them (or maybe that theyll never be solved just as much).

Here are a few big ones that just keep people guessing and probably will for a long time.

The Indus Valley Script

There was a huge civilization in northern India and Pakistan around 3300-1300 BC. It spanned more area than any other civilization at the time.

They invented writing independently, something only done 5-6 times in history. But to this day, with all the thousands of inscriptions we have and all the documented contact with other civilizations, we havent deciphered their writing.

Theres no known Rosetta Stone, no known descendant scripts, no known documentation of the language other than what is written in the Indus Valley script.

But the biggest mystery isnt how to read the script or what it says, but the question of whether well ever be able to know.

Is it even possible to decipher a language we know absolutely nothing about?

Linear A and Linear B

In 1893, British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans purchased some ancient stones with mysterious inscriptions on them at a flea market in Athens.

On a later trip to the excavations at Knossos on the island of Crete, he recognized one of the symbols from his stones and began a study of the engraved tablets being uncovered at various sites on the island.

He discovered two different systems, which he called Linear A and Linear B. While Linear B was deciphered in the early 1950s (it turned out to represent an early form of Greek), Linear A, above, has still not been deciphered.

There is an entire culture of...

If youre a Disney fan casual or otherwise then you probably imagine working at the parks (especially in character) would be a dream come true.

Like all gigs, though, a job is just that a job. And anytime you add customers into the mix, things are bound to get weird a good portion of the time.

These 16 people lived the character-playing dream, and theyre here to tell you all of the ways it was stranger than expected.

16. Talk about a walk of shame.

I used to work at a different amusement park that featured similar costumed characters. The worst thing I ever heard was the time one of the characters was overcome by heat in 95 degree weather, and vomited inside the suit, splattering the inside of the suits head with their half-digested lunch.

They had to walk a long distance back to the dressing rooms breathing the super-heated vomit air the entire way.

15. Kids are savage.

I squeezed Goofys nose when I was little and he pretended to cry and I still live with the shame.

14. Thats assault, bro.

My ex wife was in the character department at Disney World years ago. She was always getting injured by guests. From macho men wanting to see how strong of a grip Mickey had, to grabbing hold of Donalds bill and yanking really hard. Pulling noses, beaks, ears, etc., can really hurt people.

Another person was dressed as Daisy duck and got tackled by a guest and knocked out cold. When she recovered, she pressed charges.

The worst nights for the characters were high school senior nights and the religious group nights. Bunch of unruly teens with little to no supervision. No one wanted to...

Yeasts and Fungi Are Helping Create Delicious Animal-Free Dairy To Drink and Eat

Photo: BrianAJackson/Depositphotos

Americans are eating more dairy than ever, with consumption rising each year. But this love of cheese, yogurt, and ice cream isn't just reserved for items made from cow milk. Plant-based milks are increasingly popular, as well as a new category of dairy that you may not have heard of. These animal-free dairy products aren't made from almonds or soybeans but from protein produced in a lab. An increasing number of startups are using a process called precision fermentation to create milk proteins using yeasts or fungi instead of cows.

Once harvested, these lab-grown milk proteins can be transformed into all the dairy items we are already familiar with. As a plus, these proteins don't contain lactose, and concerns about the growth hormones or antibiotics found in cow milk protein aren't a factor. An added bonus is also the environmental impact. A lot of focus has been given to the toll that raising cattle takes on the environment. In fact, eating less red meat is one important way that anyone can help reduce their carbon footprint. But consuming less dairy is also an easy way to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.

Perfect Day is at the forefront of this technology. Founded in 2014 by two vegans who were left unsatisfied by traditional dairy alternatives, the company is leading the animal-free dairy charge. Chief executive Ryan Pandya was newly vegetarian when he began looking into the issue after being underwhelmed by his experience with vegan cream cheese.

I had a bagel with vegan cream cheese that was so bad that it led me to investigate. Whats so hard about this? A lot of dairy alternatives are not made of food, he recalled.

Entrancing CGI Animation Visualizes the Lipid Theory of How Life Began

Photos: MRK

London-based CGI artist Markos Kay focuses his work on complex scientific theories and visualizations. In his latest animation titled aBioGenesis, he explores how life originated on Earth. The results are incredibly mesmerizing.

Kay explains that the primordial soup theory is one of the main ideas of how life was first created on our planet. He says it suggests that life began in a hot, swirling soup of chemicals and energy. Kays animation focuses on another theory, the lipid world theory. This theory postulates that life began as lipids, simple molecules that are insoluble in water. These molecules are said to have formed protective bilayers in the oceans, which Kay concludes, would have acted like tiny bubbles or bags, enclosing and protecting the chemical reactions that would eventually give rise to life.

The artists digital re-imagination is a captivating experience full of organic shapes and colors, which all move like the insides of a complex lava lamp. Stills from the video are available as wallpapers on Behance. But for now, scroll below to watch this incredible video and see the mesmerizing stills.

London-based CGI artist Markos Kays works focus on complex scientific theories and visualizations. In his latest animation, aBioGenesis, he explores how life originated on Earth.

Dizzying Hyperrealistic Paintings Capture the Shift Perspectives of Bustling Cities

Rue Des Saints, oil on linen, 2022

Cities like New York and Paris are so large and complex that it is hard to contain them on one canvas. Artist Nathan Walsh, however, manages to create an incredibly detailed picture of urban living in his hyperrealistic paintings. By using different vantage points and incorporating reflections, these depictions feel like snapshots of a specific place in time, and sometimes of multiple places spanning different moments.

Although always rendered in the same meticulous manner, Walsh's paintings vary slightly with the subject matter. Some of his pieces, such as Delmonico's, portray a straightforward view of a busy intersection in the rain. In other compositions, he overlaps multiple angles to create something strikingly different. This approach can be seen in Rue des Saints, which is based on a busy cafe in the 7th arrondissement of Paris. Instead of a literal view, the painting explores interior, exterior, and reflected space within its square format, he tells My Modern Met. Instead of the static nature of a photograph, the painting became a stage set where found imagery could float in and out of a real location.

In addition to combining multiple perspectives of one place, Walsh has also merged two different locations in a painting. Titled Monarchs Drift, this piece features the cityscapes of Chicago and San Francisco. The resultant painting has a hallucinatory quality which is neither here nor there' and exists as a world in transition, between fully formed states, he says. It is realist in nature but only insofar as the spaces it suggests are cogent and persuasive.

Scroll down to see more of Walsh's paintings, a...

Aerial Photos Capture the Artistry of Different Sports From a Birds Eye View

Ordinary activities are given a fresh perspective in the work of Ilanna Barkusky. The Canadian-born and now California-based photographer uses drones to capture swimming, tennis, basketball, and other sports from an overhead view in her series titled Aerial. These artful shots highlight the beauty of athletics from a less-seen angle.

Barkusky's Aerial series is a mixture of photography and moving images. The athletes are almost centered in the image and fully immersed in their location. My aerial work is inspired by how I view the world, Barkusky tells My Modern Met. The view from above feels vibrant and artfully created, which is how I like to see my surroundings. A lot of these beautiful designs are hiding in plain sight, which then open up when captured from a different perspective.

In this way, she showcases the elegance of swimmers navigating through clear pools and basketball players running across the court. I intended to take various locations (a community park, a swimming pool) and show the beauty behind the spaces that we interact with in daily life, Barkusky continues. I started with basketball courts and tracks, and the series has evolved to include much more once I realized the potential of flying above.

Scroll down to see more photos from the Aerial series, and follow Barkusky on Instagram to keep up to date with her latest projects.

California-based photographer Ilanna Barkusky captures different sports from above.

The series is titled Aerial and reveals the beauty of parks, pools, and track and field as seen from above.

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If youre a dog lover, this story might tug at your heartstrings a little bit

Or it might make you never want to adopt a dog EVER.

A dog named Ralphie who has been called the demon because of his unruly behavior is back in the dog house again after he was returned to the Niagara SPCA in Niagara Falls, New York after someone had him for only two weeks.

According to the shelters Instagram page, this is what happened with Ralphies last living situation: There were some bad choices made by both, but they parted ways amicably. He took his CDs and she kept his sweatshirt. She now understands that Ralphie IS that good-looking bad boy your mama warned you about.

 

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We all get a little bit annoyed from time to time when it comes to food service from time to time, but I think this woman took things a bit too far.

Check out this story and see if you agree with me

A woman in August, Georgia became so enraged after discovering that biscuits were missing from her order from Popeyes that she drove her SUV into an entrance to the restaurant and almost hit an 18-year-old employee who was standing near the door.

According to employees at the restaurant, even after they satisfied the womans order and gave her the missing biscuits, she was still so angry that she decided she had to take action.

Photo Credit: YouTube

Belinda Miller, 50, actually drove her car four feet into the restaurant and then fled the scene. Police tracked Miller down to her house and noticed that her car had damage to the front end. She was arrested and charged with aggravated assault and first-degree criminal damage to property.

Honesty might be the best policy when it comes to most things in life, but this career coach says that in the job-search process, that might not always be the case.

Career coach and Shift Profile founder Anna Papalia (@anna..papalia) says that while she would never advise anyone to go overboard, there are a few things that you can fib about in an interview and get away with it.

5. Your plans for the future.

Image Credit: iStock

This is especially true, she says, if you dont see yourself with the company long term.

Lie about where you see yourself in five years. Nobody wants to hear you say that you see yourself in grad school or getting married and having babies. What we want to hear you say is I see myself here at this organization.'

4. Your hobbies.

Do you remember Cats?

In case you dont, let me fill you in: the film was a big flop and was universally panned by critics. The film had a $95 million budget and only grossed $6.6 million in its opening weekend.

This was kind of surprising, considering the films cast included Judi Dench, Jennifer Hudson, Idris Elba, Taylor Swift, Ian McKellan, and Rebel Wilsonand Wilson recently broke her silence about the film.

 

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Viral TikTok Video Shows How COVID-Era High School Yearbooks Had Zoom Screenshots as School Portraits

Photo: Screenshot from TikTok

It's hard to believe that three years have passed since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic. While life has mostly returned to normal now, the challenges of those years will remain with many for a long time. TikToker @milaabandzz made a short video recording different pages of her 2021 high school yearbook, perfectly capturing how unusual the era was for students.

The clip has already received over 4 million views and a large amount of engagement from people who were amused and saddened by the glimpse into pandemic-era school years. While @milaabandzz highlights select pages from the album, she also includes the text POV: you were class of '21, which emphasizes the surrealism of the pages. For instance, in the school photos, many of the images are icons with the initial of the person's first name, similar to how users appear on Zoom calls when their camera is turned off. Similarly, on a page highlighting the Future Farmers of America club, there is a screenshot of a packed Zoom call rather than an in-person group photo.

Covid really changed everything, @milaabandzz writes. People in the comments largely agree with the statement, adding a mix of reactions to the startlingly different yearbook pages. Cue the back in my day you had to turn the camera ON for picture day,' someone jokes. Another person advises, This yearbook will be iconic in 40+ years don't ever lose it! There were many that found the images sad, particularly the emphasis on Zoom meetings: a reminder of how isolating those school years were for teenagers. Others admired the ingenuity of the design, sa...

Starting any new job can be hard and getting along with co-workers can be more difficult for some folks than othersespecially when youre introverted.

And a woman named Tesia shared two videos on TikTok where she described her experiences getting hired at a Culvers restaurant and eventually getting fired for being too much of an introvert on the job.

Take a look at what she had to say.

@tesiacovington #storytime #culvers #genz #blacklivesmatter #discrimination #mentalhealthmatters original sound TeeSuh

She posted a second video where she...

Supermassive Black Hole Speeding Through Universe Is Creating Stars

An artist's rendition of the supermassive black hole on the run through the universe. (Photo: NASA, ESA, Leah Hustak (STScI))

Black holes are famous for their gravitational power. The celestial phenomenon draws in matter with a powerful gravitational force through a process called accretion. This powerful force can even destroy stars by ripping them apart. NASA has recently discovered a surprising twist on this classic narrative. A supermassive black hole, ejected from its own galaxy, has been streaking across the universe, actually forming stars in its wake.

Yale University professor Pieter van Dokkum spotted a streak of light in a Hubble Telescope archival image. What he first thought was a cosmic ray turned out, through further research, to be a trail of newly formed, young stars. They form a trail across 200,000 light-years. Van Dokkum announced his findings in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, attributing the trail's creation to a runaway supermassive black hole. The trail leads from a compact star-forming galaxy to a bright knot. According to the paper, a mixture of star formation and fast shocks makes up the trail. The researchers postulate the supermassive blackhole may have escaped from the center of the galaxy and is now, quite literally, on the run.

The black hole is moving at a whopping 4 million mph across space. This unusual speed may contribute to the black hole forming stars rather than destroying everything it encounters. We think we're seeing a wake behind the black hole where the gas...

Since 2020, the development of effective and engaging online art and design programming for teens has been a focus of Rhode Island School of Design Continuing Education (RISD CE). In addition to online courses and certificate programs for adults, RISD CE now offers two formats of online engagement specifically designed to meet the needs and goals of teen students across the globe.

Teen artists from anywhere in the world can now participate in courses taught by academics, creative practitioners, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders who advance RISD CEs mission to provide an art and design education for everyone! Students come with unique goals and are met by instructors who provide opportunities to expand their worldview and hone critical visual communication skills applicable to any career path.

RISD CE teen online courses...

After The Wild: Contemporary Art from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Collection features works made by 47 contemporary artists between 19632023, part of a gift made to the Jewish Museum by The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation.

Barnett Newman (19051970) is among the most influential artists associated with Abstract Expressionism. After his death, his widow Annalee Newman created the foundation t...

Visit 135 Countries Aboard This Unique Cruise Ship for $30,000 a Year

Lots of people dream of traveling around the world, but the logistics and price tag make it seem like a far-fetched dream. But what if you could explore all seven continents in just one go? Life at Sea Cruises is now offering a unique opportunitya once-in-a-lifetime cruise that will visit 135 countries and 375 ports over the span of three years.

Travelers will sail around the world aboard the MV Gemini, a 30-year-old cruise ship. The vessel can accommodate up to 1,074 people in its 400 cabins. The company behind this adventure is Miray Cruises, which has three decades of experience in the cruise industry.

The MV Gemini will cover more than 130,000 miles, visiting both small ports and some of the largest cities on the planet. To make the most out of this, it will dock for up to seven nights in metropolises like Shanghai and Singapore. The route begins in South America, going down the Atlantic coast to Half Moon Island in Antarctica. It then heads north to visit Central America, Mexico, the Pacific coast of the U.S. and Canada, as well as Hawaii and Alaska.

From there, the vessel crosses the Pacific Ocean, reaching China, Japan, and South Korea before going down to Australia, the South Pacific, and Southern Asia. After some stops in India, the cruise then goes around Africa, visiting places such as Cape Town, Accra, and Casablanca. It then crosses the Strait of Gibraltar for a 177-day, 74-destination European tour.

On top of the many amenities that make a cruise trip fun while at sealike two restaurants, a caf, a pool deck, and nighttime entertainmentthe cruise also hopes to attract digital nomads with top of the line remote working facilities, including high-speed wifi and conference rooms. Professionals need connectivity, the right amenities and the functionality to perform their jobs, says Mikael Petterson, Life at Sea Cruises' managing director. There is no other cruise that offers this sort of flexibility to their customers. The cruise will also have a hospital with free medical visits, a pharmacy, and healthcare professionals that can even perform certain surgeries onbo...

Five Artworks by Yayoi Kusama Sell at Sothebys Auction for Nearly $23 Million

Yayoi Kusama wax model at Louis Vitton for 2012 collection unveiling. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0 Generic)

Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama has become a household name, and it's no wonder why. Her unique vision of immersive installations and polka-dot-covered objects cannot be mistaken for anyone else, and to this day, her exhibitions are among the most visited around the world. Recently, the 94-year-old artist made another landmark accomplishment, with five of her artworks selling for a total of $22.9 million at a Sotheby's auction in Hong Kong. These prices are among the highest paid for Kusama's art throughout her long career.

The auction took place on Wednesday, April 5, and is the first time works of these kinds were sold in a public auction in Asia. Among the purchased pieces was Pumpkin (L), a massive bronze pumpkin sculpture, embellished with Kusama's signature polka dots, which was created in 2014. This work alone went for $7.98 million to an anonymous phone bidder. Similarly, a pumpkin painting, titled A-Pumpkin, was sold for an impressive $7 million.

However, the most unusual work to be sold at this auction was My Heart is Flying to the Universe, made in 2018this is in a similar vein to her Infinity Mirror Rooms which are exhibited around the globe. It features a mirrored box with LED lighting and a small opening for viewers to peer inside. The final price for this piece was $3.29 million, and while that is impressive, it is also notable for being the first work of this kind to be sold at a public auction in Asia.

For now, Kusama's record-high auction purchase of $10.9 million for her Infinity Nets is unbroken, but we ar...