Merce Cunningham was one of the three most influential choreographers of the 20th century. (The other two were George Balanchine and Martha Graham.) He choreographed nearly 200 works of modern dance between 1944 and his death, in 2009, fundamentally redefining the genre of modern dance for the second half of the century. This year marks the centennial of his birth, and classic Cunningham dances are being performed all over the world. One performance stands out: the double bill of Beach Birds and Biped at the Kennedy Center, in Washington, D.C. READ ON

In 1972, Andy Warhol added a series of paintings of Chairman Mao to his ever growing gallery of icons, and his irreverent blend of mythology and mass marketing caught a big political shift. (President Nixon made his historic visit to China earlier that year.) Fourteen years later, in his final series before his death, Warhol pulled another figurehead of Communism—Vladimir Lenin—into what had become a fully fleshed-out Pop ideology. READ ON

Intersection. The word is a perfect fit for JR, the French-born photographer who started out as a teenage graffiti artist, switched to a camera, began pasting large (and largely illegal) photographs on walls all over the world, and then, inspired by Diego Rivera’s murals, developed into a roving portraitist of cities and their citizens. Working at the intersection of photography, street art, and the impromptu happening, JR pounds the pavement, collecting passersby for group portraits. When he has enough of these portraits he digitally collages them into one epic work—an intersection, you might say, of urban diversity and commonality, an open-air choir in soaring shades of gray. READ ON