HeyJaredScience of Art
Science of Art is a newsletter written by me, Shagun Singh. I delve into the creative processes and journeys of artists.
- Indexed issues, last 90 days
- 4
- Latest publication
- Sep 11, 2026
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- Earliest in this view
- Jul 13, 2026
Latest issues
Why Familiarity Breeds Fame (opens the original)
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In 1911, a workman named Vincenzo Peruggia hid inside the Louvre overnight, lifted a painting off the wall the next morning, and walked out the staff entrance with it tucked under his coat. The painting was the Mona Lisa1. At the time, it was well-regarded but it was not yet the most famous artwork on Earth. It was one respected Renaissance portrait among many and then it vanished.For two years, the Mona Lisa‘s absence became a global media event. Newspapers ran the story on front pages<a class=
The Two-Email Rule (opens the original)
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I have spent a lot of ink on this newsletter telling you to do hard things. Stay uncomfortable. Keep the creative work alive no matter what’s happening around you or to you. That’s still true. But this week I’m writing about something smaller, and honestly more embarrassing to admit: the unsent email. The unopened letter. The task so minor it shouldn’t warrant a second thought, and yet somehow it takes up more real estate in your head than anything else you’re supposed to be doing.Here is how th
What Despair Does to Artists (opens the original)
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This piece touches on suicide and severe depression in the context of art history. If any of this is landing close to home, it’s worth talking to someone, a therapist, a doctor, or a crisis line if things feel urgent. You don’t have to sort this out alone. A Note Left in the DarkIn December 1922, the Victorian painter John William Godward turned on the gas in his London studio and ended his life. He was 61. For decades he had produced meticulous, technically flawless paintings of classical women
Finding a Home For My Art: On Discovering Where Your Art Actually Belongs (opens the original)
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For most of my career, “strategy” meant one thing: keeping a spreadsheet of open RFQs and RFPs and applying to as many as I could possibly stretch my practice to fit. If a call for artists mentioned a plaza, a library, or a lobby, I applied. So did four hundred other artists. That’s just the going rate for a decent public commission right now, and not an exaggeration. The pool of open calls is small, the pool of artists chasing them is enormous, and even a strong submission is, more often than n
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