Cleopatra, considered ancient Egypt’s great last pharaoh before that civilization fell to Roman conquest in the first century B.C., had a reputation for knowing how to present herself stunningly to outsiders. Legend has it she once sailed upriver in a gilded barge with purple sails to introduce herself to Mark Antony, the powerful Roman leader who became her new lover.  

The temptation to linger is strong at Betts House, where Barbara and David Day's gently colored pen-and-ink-drawings are on view through April 23 in the exhibition 'Vanishing Cincinnati.' Some of the scenes, like Crosley Field and the Albee Theater, already are gone, but we are prompted by the drawings to look again at those remaining. Pendleton House, built in 1870, is shown on its hilltop with the modern city behind it and City Hall appears in all its Romanesque resplendence.  

The surest cure for winter blues can be found in the West End’s Carl Solway Gallery, where Jun Kaneko's big, brash, superbly finished ceramic sculptures and his brilliantly colored paintings and drawings lift the spirit at first glance.  

Author Jim Steiner has done more than write the history of a church — he has demonstrated the flavor of a small neighborhood deeply steeped in Catholicism but divided by heritage.  

The surest cure for winter blues can be found in the West End's Carl Solway Gallery, where Jun Kaneko's big, brash, superbly finished ceramic sculptures and his brilliantly colored paintings and drawings lift the spirit at first glance. The 68-year-old artist, whose works are included in many prestigious museum collections, left his native Japan to study in California in 1963. There he trained under Peter Voulkos and other leaders of the contemporary ceramics movement.  

Cleopatra, considered ancient Egypt's great last pharaoh before that civilization fell to Roman conquest in the first century B.C., had a reputation for knowing how to present herself stunningly to outsiders. Thus, she would be thoroughly pleased with the presentation of the show that bears her name, 'Cleopatra: The Search for the Last Queen of Egypt,' at Cincinnati Museum Center now through Sept. 5.  

“Episteme” by South Korean-born Yun Jeong Hong has won the first Manifest Prize and thus is being presented in a singular show at Manifest Gallery in East Walnut Hills called One: The Manifest Prize now through Feb. 18. "Episteme" plays with the philosophical concept of French philosopher Michel Foucault's use of the term, showing us something that almost is what it seems to be but in fact is a maze of suggestions.   

Maurice Mattei's timeless photographs of a country where memories run deep are bringing people back to Iris BookCafe to look at 'Pictures from Italy' again. The Cincinnati photographer, musician and general all-round artist was born in Tuscany and, although he's lived almost all his life in the U.S., he has frequently returned there. This unpretentious exhibition includes more than 50 small format black and white prints.  

Downtown's Lloyd Library & Museum, a fascinating private nonprofit institution that collects books, journals and archival material related to natural history, botany, pharmacy, medicine and scientific history, recently faced a dilemma. How should it recognize the 350th anniversary of the birth of Hans Sloane, a pioneering scientist and physician whose name is not really on the tip of everybody's tongue?  

Downtown's Lloyd Library & Museum, a fascinating private nonprofit institution that collects books, journals and archival material related to natural history, botany, pharmacy, medicine and scientific history, recently faced a dilemma. How should it recognize the 350th anniversary of the birth of Hans Sloane, a pioneering scientist and physician whose name is not really on the tip of everybody's tongue? How about chocolate?