Historically, the lichen Anaptypia ciliaris has played a significant role in various scientific explorations of lichen structure and physiology. Early on, the French botanist Joseph Pitton de Tournefort reportedly first observed the lichen's distinctive large, dark-coloured spores. In 1849, Holle detailed the development of hyphae from lichen spores, using A. ciliaris as the subject of his study. In 1850 and 1851, the lichen was used by the German botanist Hermann Itzigsohn to demonstrate the existence of "spermagones" (conidia). In 1853, Julius Ferdinand Speerschneider, another German botanist, reported the division of the lichen's photobiont cells (then referred to as gonidia) in moist thallus sections. He found that in humid air, hyphae decomposed within two months, while algae thrived, growing and dividing rapidly. Subsequently, small, light green structures emerged in the decomposing thallus centre, evolving into lichen primordia.
Further insights into lichen structure came when Reginald Heber Howe, Jr. presented the lichen's cortex as an exemplar of the "fibrous" cortex — a tissue type characterised by long, slender, infrequently branched hyphae growing parallel to the surface. The German bryologist Johann Hedwig, in the eighteenth century, expanded on these findings. In his 1784 work Fundamentum Historiae Naturalis Muscorum Frondosorum, he described and depicted Anaptypia ciliaris apothecia, dark septate spores, and pycnidia. He identified tiny bodies associated with the organism, measuring approximately 50 μm long and 24 μm thick, as "semina" — a term Acharius later replaced with "spores" in 1803.
In the following century, research on Anaptypia ciliaris advanced further. Pierre Augustin Dangeard, in 1894, studied the origin and development of asci in lichens, using Anaptypia ciliaris as a model. René Maire explored cellular biology by observing nuclear division in an ascospore prior to septum formation. The lichen's practical applications were also investigated. In 1825, Joseph Placide Alexandre Léorier documented Roy of Tonnerre's pioneering technique to produce alcohol from lichens, notably Anaptypia ciliaris. This innovation was remarkable because lichens, unlike fruits or grains, generally lack the abundant sugars usually used as feedstock in traditional alcohol production.
Research has uncovered various potential biological activities of Anaptychia ciliaris. Its extracts, tested for antibacterial and insecticidal effects against certain pathogenic bacteria and the Culiseta longiareolata mosquito larvae, showed moderate larvicidal properties. In tests against fish bacterial pathogens, A. ciliaris demonstrated antibacterial effects, particularly towards Aeromonas hydrophila, Streptococcus agalactiae, Enterococcus faecalis, and Lactococcus garvieae. The active metabolites in A. ciliaris, including various antioxidants, vary in presence and concentration depending on its tree substrate.


The mycobiont of Anaptychia ciliaris can be cultivated in axenic (pure) culture. More than 100 years ago, the Finnish phycologist Harry Warén described the fungal partner of A. ciliaris (then known as Physcia ciliaris) grown from spores, noting its compact mycelia and large globular cells, mistakenly believed to contain chlorophyll. Researchers can initiate spore growth by placing apothecia near an inverted petri dish, allowing mature spores to be ejected onto the growth medium and begin germinating Anaptychia ciliaris spores typically attach to the growth media as isolated units, rather than in clusters, a trait also seen in other lichen species and characteristic of certain lichen families. Anaptychia ciliaris is notable for its consistent spore release in laboratory conditions. This consistent spore release makes A. ciliaris ideal for studying lichen reproduction and development in aposymbiotic cultures. In these settings, researchers grow the fungal component separately from its algal partner, allowing for a detailed examination of the fungus's individual characteristics and behavior. On average, these spores took six to seven days to begin germination.
Anaptychia ciliaris shows variability in spore production, reflecting its heterothallic life cycle. This contributes to genetic diversity, an important factor in the species' adaptability. In the early stages of growth, the presence of carbon sources enhances the filamentous development of the mycobiont. These findings align with the lichen's characteristic slow growth rate and its ability to support apothecia of different ages on a single thallus, further contributing to genetic variation. The morphology, metabolism, and pigmentation of Anaptychia ciliaris are particularly influenced by sugars and sugar alcohols, varying significantly in different culture media.


Anaptychia ciliaris is part of a web of ecological relationships, serving as a host for various lichenicolous organisms, which are species that live on, and often parasitize, lichens. Among the fungi that parasitize A. ciliaris is Tremella anaptychiae, a species described in 2017. This fungus produces spherical or tuberculate fruit bodies, ranging in colour from cream to pinkish, brownish, or blackish, and is found in Italy, Macedonia, Spain (including the Canary Islands), Sweden, and Greece. Catillaria mediterranea, a lichen with a reduced thallus, and Monodictys anaptychiae, a rare hyphomycete, also grow on A. ciliaris. Monodictys anaptychiae may exclusively target A. ciliaris; infection leads to thallus surface damage and discolouration. In the UK, the Anaptychia ciliaris subspecies mamillata often shows tiny black dots on its lobes, a result of Stigmidium hageniae parasitism. Additionally, A. ciliaris is subject to infection by other lichenicolous fungi such as Pronectria tincta.


Angels and Demons (Autumn/Winter 2010) is the thirty-sixth and final collection made by British fashion designer Alexander McQueen for his eponymous fashion house. Aesthetically, the collection drew on religious paintings of the afterlife from the Medieval and Renaissance periods, as well as the imperial dress and art of the Byzantine Empire. It incorporated traditional tailoring and dressmaking techniques that McQueen had learned early in his career while also featuring the sophisticated digitally-engineered prints that McQueen had been experimenting with in the past few seasons. McQueen committed suicide before the collection was complete; his close collaborator Sarah Burton completed the sixteen outfits that had been in progress at the time of his death. The unofficial title is taken from a Twitter post McQueen made shortly before his death.
In lieu of a full-scale runway show, the Alexander McQueen brand showed the sixteen completed looks privately in a series of presentations to small groups of guests on 9 and 10 March 2010, at the Hôtel de Clermont-Tonnerre in Paris. The staging was deliberately kept simple, with no attempt made to emulate McQueen's bent for showmanship. Polina Kasina, McQueen's longtime fit model, wore the collection's final and most well-known ensemble, a gold feathered coat over white tulle skirt. The presentations closed with the whispered words "There is no more"; the models did not return for the traditional final walk.
Critical reception for the clothing was positive. Many reviewers noted the uncanny feeling evoked by the religious theme when juxtaposed with McQueen's suicide. Retrospective analysis has focused on the theme, with particular attention paid to whether or not it was indicative of McQueen's mental state. Ensembles from Angels and Demons are held by various museums and have appeared in exhibitions such as the McQueen retrospective Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty.


British fashion designer Alexander McQueen was known for his imaginative, sometimes controversial designs, and dramatic fashion shows. During his nearly twenty-year career, he explored a broad range of ideas and themes, including historicism, romanticism, femininity, sexuality, and death. He learned tailoring as an apprentice on Savile Row, and dressmaking as head designer at French fashion house Givenchy. Although he worked in ready-to-wear – clothing produced for retail sale – his showpiece designs featured a degree of craftsmanship that verged on haute couture.


McQueen's life had been turbulent in every sense. His upbringing was traumatic: he was a victim of childhood sexual abuse and witnessed his sisters experiencing domestic violence from their partners. McQueen felt the fashion industry was toxic and suffocating, and he was often ambivalent about continuing his career as a designer. Relentless pressure to perform contributed to his persistent depression, anxiety, and insommnia. Since the 1990s, he had abused alcohol and drugs to varying degrees to cope. In 2007, his estranged friend Isabella Blow, who had been a formative influence, committed suicide; McQueen was devastated. In the following years, his addictions escalated and he grew obsessed with death.
On 2 February 2010, McQueen's mother died at the age of seventy-five. He had been close with her all his life and was distraught at the thought of having to attend her funeral, which was scheduled for 12 February. In his grief, he isolated himself and turned to drugs and alcohol. He spent the next several days making gestures like giving away possessions and telling people he loved them that, in retrospect, have been taken as him setting his affairs in order. Some time between the evening of 10 February and the early hours of 11 February, he committed suicide; his body was discovered on the 11th.


Angels and Demons (Autumn/Winter 2010) is the thirty-sixth and final collection McQueen made for his eponymous fashion house. At the time of McQueen's suicide, the collection was unfinished, with sixteen outfits which he had cut on the mannequin. A complete collection was normally at least thirty. Sarah Burton, McQueen's head of womenswear and right-hand woman, completed the outfits with his team in his stead. The unofficial title Angels and Demons is taken from a Twitter post McQueen made on 7 February.Visually, the collection relied heavily on religious paintings of the afterlife from the Medieval and Renaissance periods, as well as the imperial dress and art of the Byzantine Empire. McQueen felt the clothing in these paintings was depicted with a particular type of luminosity, and he sought to replicate that in his designs. According to Burton, he was "looking at the art of the Dark Ages but finding light and beauty in it". He had incorporated paintings into his work before; It's a Jungle Out There (Autumn/Winter 1997) had featured prints with details taken from the paintings of Flemish and Dutch Old Masters.
McQueen's previous three collections had been focused on technological innovations. Natural Dis-tinction Un-natural Selection (Spring/Summer 2009), The Horn of Plenty (Autumn/Winter 2009), and Plato's Atlantis (Spring/Summer 2010) all made use of sophisticated digitally-engineered prints, and Plato's was the first livestreamed fashion show. For Angels and Demons, McQueen intended to shift his focus to hand-crafting, which he felt was disappearing from the fashion industry and broader culture. Many designs featured traditional techniques for pleating, embroidery, and tailoring. Despite the emphasis on tradition, McQueen continued his experiments with digital printing with Angels and Demons, creating what Burton later described as a "juxtaposition of the old and the new". Entire paintings or selected details were rendered digitally, then either printed onto or woven into fabric. The resulting textiles were then engineered into garments.
In many ways, the collection encapsulated McQueen's entire career, incorporating the tailoring and dressmaking techniques he had learned early on, as well as his tendency to experiment with shape and style. The finished collection featured elaborate showpiece designs in a palette of gold and red, with rich fabrics like brocade and silk. Shorter dresses were followed with long draped gowns. Some patterns were made to evoke the look of marble. Embroidery of tigers and lions on some items may have been drawn from traditional Tibetan art or from Byzantine culture. The shoes were elaborately sculpted with various motifs including ivy, skulls, and wings.
Angels and Demons was heavy on avian imagery, with prints of wings and birds, as well as garments embellished with gilded feathers. McQueen loved birds and had used these motifs throughout his career. In this collection, appearing alongside prints of winged angels, they took on a double meaning that reinforced the religious theme.


The first look was a long-sleeved red bodice with heavy gold embroidery, with a short pleated skirt in red satin. Look 2 was a similar style with a black and gold pattern on the sleeves paired with a black pleated skirt. The bodice of this look was printed with details portraying Hell and demons from three separate paintings by Hieronymus Bosch: The Last Judgment (c. 1482 or later), The Garden of Earthly Delights (c. 1500), and The Temptation of St Anthony (c. 1501 or later). Katherine Knox considered the use of these images on the garment to be an "unsettling rumination on the afterlife" on McQueen's part. Fashion theorist Kirstin Kennedy felt that the prints reinforced the collection's religious themes with an oblique humour. She notes that on the rear of the garment, a hellish bagpipe from The Last Judgement is positioned "at the base of the bodice, immediately above the wearer's anus".
Look 3 is a short dress in a black and gold brocade with puffs of red satin at the shoulders and hips, paired with black leather thigh-high boots. Look 4 is a belted gold brocade minidress with an asymmetrically pleated hem, worn with a statement choker and matching oversized bracelets in what appeared to be stained glass. Look 5 is a gold-toned minidress with matching glove, both printed with details from Adoration of the Magi Altarpiece (c. 1440–1442) by Stefan Lochner. The slightly asymmetrical hem reveals an underskirt of gold-painted duck feathers. On the runway, the look was paired with gold high heels embellished with beads and gemstones.


Look 6 comprised a short kimono-style coat in red silk with flared sleeves, printed with tigers. It was belted at the waist and worn over a gold mesh shirt and black thigh-high boots with gold soles. It may have been inspired by the royal mantle of Roger II of Sicily. Look 7 was a tailored pantsuit in gold brocade patterned with angels. The top had an experimental puffed silhouette. Look 8 was a short coatdress and matching cape in black with gold Asian-inspired embroidery. Look 9 was a frock coat and matching skirt in black with gold printing.
Looks 10 through 12 were long gowns in pale grey with monochrome prints. Looks 10 and 11 featured details taken from the Portinari Altarpiece (c. 1475) by Hugo van der Goes. Look 10 has a double print of the archangel Gabriel mirrored on the front of the dress, with the angel's wings wrapping around to the back of the dress, where loose folds of fabric also evoke wings. Curator Andrew Bolton found the doubling reminiscent of the closed panels of an altarpiece. The print on Look 11 was a detail of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Look 12 has a chiffon skirt under a tailored bodice with beaded embellishment on the chest and angel wings printed on the back.
Look 13 is a white full-length dress with vertically-ruched fabric down the centre, with gold embroidery on either side. Look 14 is a full-length red gown with cape, both in cardinal red and hand-embellished with embroidery and gold sequins, evoking the elaborate garments worn by Byzantine empresses. Judith Watt connected it to the Fall/Winter 1990 collection by Romeo Gigli, with whom McQueen had worked before founding his own company. She felt the rich embellishments on Look 14 echoed the "magic" of that collection. Look 15 has a black long-sleeved bodice with heavy embellishment and embroidery all over, with a long black pleated skirt.
The best-known look from the collection is the last, Look 16, a tailored long coat with high ruff collar. The entire coat is made from gilded feathers, and it is worn over a white tulle skirt with gold hem embroidery. Andrew Wilson felt it drew on the sculptural work of Grinling Gibbons, whose carvings can be found in St Paul's Cathedral, London, as well as Icarus, a figure from Greek mythology who is said to have flown too close to the sun. Knox suggested the feathers and bird imagery reflected "a sort of immortal finality". The ensemble may have been a reference to the gold and white palette of McQueen's first haute couture collection for Givenchy, The Search for the Golden Fleece (Spring/Summer 1997).


Angels and Demons was originally scheduled to be presented on 9 March 2010 at La Conciergerie in Paris, but the full-scale show was cancelled after McQueen's death. Instead, the Alexander McQueen brand showed the sixteen completed looks privately to small groups of guests on 9 and 10 March. The presentations were held in the Louis XV salon at the Hôtel de Clermont-Tonnerre on the rue François-Ier. The staging was deliberately kept simple, with no attempt made to emulate McQueen's bent for theatrical presentations. Guests were seated on boxes around the periphery of the room. Before the show, they were all given a note that read "each piece is unique, as was he". For the soundtrack, the brand used the classical music that McQueen had listened to in his studio while working on the collection: selections from the work of Ludwig van Beethoven, Joseph Haydn, and Henry Purcell.
Peter Philips and Guido Palau handled hair and make-up, respectively. The models were styled with faces powdered stark white. They wore gold head-wraps, some with gold feathers in the style of Mohican haircuts. The wraps were reminiscent of the head-coverings worn by many women in the Medieval and Renaissance paintings McQueen was referencing. They may also have been a reference to similar head-coverings worn in McQueen's Voss (Spring/Summer 2001). The Mohican-esque feathers referred to McQueen's history of referencing British punk fashion.
Proceedings were sombre, with the models entering one by one, walking slowly up and down the small room, then exiting. Polina Kasina, McQueen's longtime fit model, wore the final ensemble, the feathered coat. The shows closed with the whispered words "There is no more"; the models did not return for the traditional final walk.


Critical reception for Angels and Demons was positive. It was generally felt that the runway shows had successfully juxtaposed the memorial atmosphere with the beauty of the clothing. Sarah Mower of Vogue thought that the restrained presentation may not have been what McQueen would have chosen, but felt it allowed those who knew him a space to grieve. In her review for The Guardian, Jess Cartner-Morley wrote that McQueen "came back to life" for the fifteen minutes the show lasted. Booth Moore, for the Los Angeles Times, wondered "how so much beauty came from so much pain". Guy Trebay of The New York Times called it "a wake without a corpse".
Several critics labelled the collection as having a Gothic aesthetic. Christina Binkley of The Wall Street Journal was struck by the religious theming, finding it eerie. Others discussed the way the collection balanced historicism with modern techniques. Suzy Menkes highlighted the digital prints of old paintings as exemplifying McQueen's "exceptional reach from historic past to cyberspace future".
Several critics directly compared the collection to Plato's Atlantis. Menkes felt it was a distillation of his work on that collection. On the other hand, Cartner-Morley felt Angels and Demons was a "bittersweet contrast" to Plato's. Similarly, Cathy Horyn of The New York Times emphasised the hand-crafting in Angels and Demons as compared to the technological emphasis of Plato's.
For many critics, the collection had a sense of calm that was not always present in McQueen's work. Mower wrote that the ornateness of the clothing appeared at first to be a counter-narrative to the contemporary trend for minimalism. However, she felt that the clean silhouettes of the long dresses "suggested a calm and simplicity" in their own way. She wrote that the final outfit "encapsulated everything about McQueen: both the tailoring and the romanticism". Horyn was moved by "how personal and incredibly reassured the work was", and hoped that McQueen had been satisfied with his work.


Considering the collection several months after release, Hamish Bowles, also from Vogue, called it a "poignant coda to a career characterized by ceaseless invention, curiosity and lightning flashes of absolute brilliance". At McQueen's memorial service, Vogue's editor-in-chief Anna Wintour described the collection as "a battle between dark and light". Knox called it "a tour de force of the longevity of his talent". Fashion theorist Catherine Spooner considered the collection to be one of McQueen's Gothic collections. She labelled it "medieval Gothic Revivalism" in comparison to other collections that drew from "contemporary horror and even the comic Gothic of Harry Potter". Alexander McQueen archivist John Matheson has described Angels and Demons as a "bookend" to McQueen's career, incorporating ideas from his early years with contemporary innovations.


Much of the critical examination of Angels and Demons focuses on interpreting the religious theme. It is often seen as a reflection of McQueen's precarious emotional state, or even as a hint at his impending suicide. Viewing the unfinished collection for the first time following McQueen's death, his close friend Sebastian Pons described it as "a requiem." Several contemporary reviews make statements along these lines. Author Chloe Fox wrote that it was an "other-worldly collection, as if McQueen had indeed had one eye on the afterlife".
In contrast, textile curators Clarissa M. Esguerra and Michaela Hansen disagree that the collection was intended to telegraph anything about McQueen's mental state or suicide, arguing that it was typical of McQueen to juxtapose dichotomous ideas and explore controversial themes such as religion. References to mortality and religion had been a major part of McQueen's work throughout his career.
Fashion theorist Nathalie Khan considered the way that Angels and Demons had helped McQueen's legacy transition "from fashion to mythology" in the popular imagination. She viewed the show's simplicity as its strength. Each model appearing one by one with no theatrical flourish placed the focus on the emotional impact of the designs. References to McQueen's previous work gave the collection a "momentous quality" that made it feel like a memorial to his career. For Khan, McQueen's death, and the posthumous presentation of Angels and Demons, signalled the end of an era in which a designer's personality was "central to the way fashion establishes meaning".
Philosopher Chris McWade picked up on Khan's analysis to argue that McQueen's entire legacy was defined by the spectral – what he called "an air of ghostliness". He describes McQueen as metaphorically haunting Angels and Demons, contrasting it with his first collection, Jack the Ripper Stalks His Victims (1991), where McQueen's presence was more literal in the form of his hair sewn into the labels.
Similarly, Juliana Luna Mora and Jess Berry also considered McQueen's association with the spectral in a paper about how luxury fashion houses maintain continuity after the deaths of their founders. They saw Angels and Demons as an "example of the commodification of death and illusion of immortality", in which McQueen's suicide became part of the brand's mythology. Sarah Burton was named creative director at the Alexander McQueen brand following McQueen's death. In her Spring/Summer 2023 collection, she used digital prints and embroidery taken from Garden of Earthly Delights, resurrecting the imagery used in Angels and Demons. In this way, for Mora and Berry, she was participating in the commodification of imagery associated with McQueen's death in order to perpetuate his fashion house.


Tim Walker photographed Karlie Kloss wearing the final look for an editorial in the October 2010 issue of British Vogue. The Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) in New York City owns three ensembles from Angels and Demons: Look 1, the red and gold bodice and skirt combination, and two other unspecified looks. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London owns copies of Look 2, with the Hieronymus Bosch print; Look 5, a gold minidress; and Look 11, a light grey gown. The National Gallery of Victoria owns the dress and boots from Look 3, the dress from Look 4, and a pair of boots from the retail collection. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston owns a copy of Look 11.
Five outfits from Angels and Demons appeared in the exhibition Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty: Look 2, the dress with the Bosch prints; Look 5 with matching glove and shoes; Look 10 with shoes; Look 11; and the final look, the gold feathered coat with white underskirt. In the 2011 staging of the exhibition at the Met, they were presented behind glass in the show's first room, the Cabinet of Curiosities. Nathalie Khan felt that this transformed the items from a commercial product to a symbolic one. Three items appeared in the Met's 2018 exhibition Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination: Look 2, Look 5, and Look 11. Three items from Angels and Demons appeared in the 2022 exhibition Lee Alexander McQueen: Mythos, Mind, Muse: the top from Look 7, a retail version of the dress from Look 2, and a pair of shoes. They were placed in the Mythos section of the show, which covered the McQueen shows inspired by religion and mythology.
Fashion collector Jennifer Zuiker auctioned her McQueen collection in 2020, including two pieces from the retail collection of Angels and Demons. A dress printed with archangels adapted from Look 10 sold for a reported $3,750, while a gold minidress adapted from Look 5 sold for a reported $4,688.


Animal Well is a 2024 Metroidvania puzzle-platformer video game developed by Billy Basso as Shared Memory and published by Bigmode. The player controls an unnamed blob creature and explores an underground animal-filled labyrinth which incorporates nonlinear platforming and puzzle solving. The game is presented as an interconnected set of rooms, or flip-screens, with 2D pixel art. No plot or backstory is given, and the game world is filled with puzzles and secrets, including some puzzles that require groups of players working in collaboration or several playthroughs to solve.
Billy Basso developed Animal Well, his first solo work, over the course of seven years. He planned the game as he developed it by inventing mechanics and deriving puzzles from their interactions. The design aesthetics were inspired by gardens and urban areas around Chicago, as well as his own artwork. Basso developed the entire game himself, including the underlying engine; he partnered with Dan Adelman after four years of development to handle marketing, and partnered with Bigmode a year later as their first published game, after YouTuber Jason Gastrow (videogamedunkey) saw Animal Well at a festival.
Animal Well was released for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Windows in May 2024, and for Xbox Series X/S in October. It released to critical acclaim, especially for its aesthetics and layered puzzles, and was featured in several lists of the best games of 2024. It won Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction at the 28th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, and was nominated for numerous categories at multiple awards ceremonies, including at the Game Awards 2024, the 25th Game Developers Choice Awards, and the 21st British Academy Games Awards.


Animal Well is a 2D Metroidvania video game incorporating nonlinear platforming and puzzle solving. It is presented in low-resolution pixel art graphics. The player controls an unnamed yellow blob creature which emerges from a flower at the beginning of the game and uses it to explore; no goal, plot, or backstory is given. The game world is divided into a sixteen by sixteen grid of underground rooms, or flip-screens, with one room visible at a time. The rooms are connected together in a labyrinth with multiple obvious and hidden connections. These rooms are typically murky areas with overgrown, crumbling architecture, machines and controls, and various animals generally much larger than the player character.
The player character can walk and jump around the rooms, and can take and use items found in the game. These items are toys, including a slinky, frisbee, and bubble wand; these often have multiple uses, not all of which are immediately obvious. Portions of the game world can only be accessed by using specific items and many areas have hidden elements that require items to access. There are also firecrackers, which can be collected at points in the game and thrown to scare animals or banish ghost animals until the player leaves the room. Matches can also be found, which can be placed in specific locations to permanently banish any ghosts from that room.
Animals and ghosts may ignore the player or harm them, either passively or actively, depending on the type of creature. If the player is attacked by animals or ghosts, they lose one of their hearts. The player starts with four hearts, which can be restored by finding and eating a pink fruit. Up to four additional blue hearts can be gained by eating blue fruits. If the player loses all hearts, they reappear at the last telephone they interacted with, acting as save points throughout the game.
In four locations, colored flames are kept behind large animals, which must be defeated using the local environment for the flame to be collected. If all four are taken and brought to a central room, then a new passageway is opened to a previously inaccessible area. At the end of it is an encounter with a wraith-like manticore creature; once defeated, the credits are shown as the first ending, and the player is then free to continue to explore.
After the first ending are three more "layers" of the game, or sets of puzzles to solve. The second layer is intended for "discovery and secret-oriented players" and requires finding secret areas and collecting secret items, including all of the hidden eggs, and leads to a second showing of the credits. A third layer involves finding all hidden bunnies and introduces alternate reality game (ARG) elements, including one puzzle which requires combining partial solutions from at least fifty players to solve. A fourth layer involves items only unlockable through repeat playthrough challenges, such as speedrunning, as well as specific undocumented actions.


Billy Basso began development in 2017. Basso had previously worked for mobile developers such as Phosphor Games and NetherRealm Studios on multiplayer free-to-play games, which he described as teaching him technical skills. He also mentioned that he would rather create single player experiences that "respected the player's time." Basso's first priority when he started the game as a side project was the creation of gameplay systems, with the world crafted afterwards to justify them. To that end, he drew inspiration from games of his childhood that he saw as having similar ideas, such as Super Mario Bros. 2 (1988) and the Metroid and The Legend of Zelda series. He was also inspired by Fez (2012), The Witness (2016), and Tunic (2022), for their sense of discovery and for hiding secrets in plain sight. He soon had a 2D platformer with similar pixel graphics to the final game, along with the blob player character. Basso did not have a planned design before starting, but instead created it as he developed the game.
During the first year of development, Basso was inspired by things he saw on walks around Chicago, such as lawn ornaments or animal statues, as well as overgrown spaces. He found himself drawing animals, architectural spaces, and water and earth motifs in his personal artwork, and combined these into the game design. He knew that he did not want to have humans in the game, but felt that animals were universally relatable. A year into development, Basso named the project Animal Well due to its descriptive but ambiguous nature, as he wanted to give players the feeling of mystery and of uncovering things in familiar places. He then spent another year expanding the game; he created mechanics first and then came up with puzzles that used their interactions.
Basso did not use any existing game engine, instead building the entire project from scratch in C++ as he wanted to understand and be in control of the underlying game systems and only have elements in the code that applied to Animal Well. He set several restrictions on himself when designing the game that led to the aesthetic and gameplay design, such as a lack of standard weapons resulting in the use of non-violent tools, a limited resolution causing unique lighting aesthetics, and no cutscenes, forcing the environment to convey all information to the player. Basso did much of the game's animation using procedural animation in code rather than traditional animation techniques, which resulted in what he felt was an "unsettling" effect.
In December 2019, Basso showcased Animal Well for the first time at an International Game Developers Association event, where it received positive attention. At that point, given how much effort he was putting into it, he wanted the project to result in a completed product. He found, however, that he did not enjoy marketing the game or posting about it. In early 2021, he emailed Dan Adelman, who had handled business management and marketing for several indie titles by small teams, such as Axiom Verge 2 (2021). Adelman was surprised by how far along the project was and intrigued by it, and joined Basso to form Shared Memory. Basso moved to working on Animal Well full time; in February 2022 the game received previews from IGN and the PlayStation blog.
In June 2022, Animal Well was showcased at the Day of the Devs indie game festival; this led to an increase in attention from players, including hundreds of people joining the game's Discord server to collaboratively solve the puzzles in the announcement video. YouTuber Jason Gastrow (videogamedunkey) made a video about the event highlighting the game which drove more interest. It also led to Gastrow's wife Leah contacting Shared Memory and mentioning that the pair were planning to launch an indie game publishing company, Bigmode. Basso intended to self-publish, primarily to avoid losing any creative control, but agreed to partner with Bigmode with Animal Well as their first game after meeting the pair.
As attention on Animal Well increased, Basso increased its scope, even though Adelman suggested to him that the game was nearing a complete state. Basso was committed to not adding any additional content after release, as he wanted it to be a single artifact with a start and an end like his inspirations, and so wanted to ensure all of his ideas made it into the game before launch. He did not want parts of the world to be locked away until players found an item, which meant that players could find areas at different points in their playthroughs and each room could involve multiple game mechanics. As a result, as he added new mechanics, existing areas had to be reworked to account for them, resulting in Basso creating around three times as many rooms as were included in the final game. Adelman and the Gastrows playtested new builds of the game with little direction from Basso; he told them some secrets to ensure they were tested, but kept others a mystery. He created some puzzles to be as difficult as he could make them, as he was worried that players were already solving puzzles just from seeing preview videos, but was convinced by Adelman to make others less "evil" and obscure.
Animal Well was released for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Windows on May 9, 2024, and for Xbox Series X/S on October 17, 2024. A vinyl record of the soundtrack, along with a book on the art and development of the game, is planned for release by Lost in Cult in 2026. Upon the release of Animal Well, the game's file size, below 40 megabytes on Windows, was noted as particularly small and smaller than the game's background image on PlayStation 5. In response, Basso said that the file size was not intentional, but a consequence of the game engine and procedural graphics. Basso was surprised by the level of widespread appeal for players as he thought it would be more of a niche game. He also thought some puzzles would take players years to solve, but they were solved in the first month due to community collaboration between thousands of players.


Animal Well received "universal acclaim", according to the review aggregator Metacritic. It was ranked as the second-highest rated game of 2024 by aggregated score for Nintendo Switch, in the top 10 for Windows, and in the top 15 for PlayStation 5. Animal Well was featured in several game of the year and indie game of the year lists for 2024. Basso estimated in August 2024 that the game had sold around 650,000 copies for Windows, PlayStation 5, and Nintendo Switch.
Critics highly praised the gameplay. Christian Donlan of Eurogamer said that the game was "filled with revelation and moments of smart pleasure", and Jon Bailes of GamesRadar+ praised that the level design encouraged finding clever solutions to the puzzles. Charlie Wacholz of Game Informer said that the game "pleased, surprised, or scared me with something new at every turn" and called it a "masterclass of environmental design". Rebekah Valentine of IGN and Russ Frushtick of Polygon praised the intricate layers of secrets, and IGN and Richard Wakeling of GameSpot liked how the interconnected nature of the map allowed for moving between puzzles and areas. GameSpot praised the platforming as being precise, though noted its general lack of difficulty. IGN, Polygon, and Shaun Prescott of PC Gamer all praised the second layer of puzzles, calling it a second, larger game hidden within the first and a "puzzle-solver's and scavenger-hunter's dream". Different reviewers reported different negatives to the gameplay; Game Informer found the last section of layer one "stale", GameSpot felt that there were a few places with laborious backtracking upon death, and PC Gamer found the map difficult to use.
The aesthetics of the game were also highly praised, with Game Informer saying that it "establishes itself with a rare, masterful sense of place". They praised the variety and level of detail of the environment, which was echoed by GameSpot, IGN, and Polygon. IGN, Polygon, and PC Gamer all applauded the "meticulous" crafting of the pixel art, and GameSpot praised the interactions between the art and the animation. GamesRadar+ highlighted the lighting as the best visual feature. Eurogamer and GameSpot also praised the designs of the animals for their "dreamlike quality". IGN, PC Gamer, and Polygon noted the ambient soundtrack and noises impact on the overall atmosphere of the game, though IGN wished there was more music. Many reviewers concluded that Animal Well had a substantial depth to it that the aesthetics greatly enhanced.


Animal Well won the Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction award at the 28th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards. It was nominated for several other categories at that awards ceremony, as well as for multiple categories at other ceremonies such as the 42nd Golden Joystick Awards, The Game Awards 2024, the 25th Game Developers Choice Awards, and the 21st British Academy Games Awards. It also received honorable mentions at the 23rd Independent Games Festival Awards and Game Developers Choice Awards.


Anju and Kafei are a pair of characters in the 2000 video game The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. As a romantic couple, they are the subject of the sidequest "Testament of Love", wherein the protagonist Link is asked by Anju to find her fiancé Kafei; he had gone into hiding so he could recover a mask he was meant to give to Anju at their marriage ceremony, and he had also been turned into a child. Like all content in Majora's Mask, the quest is on a time limit and spans all three days in the game that take place before the moon crashes, destroying the world. Link can only retrieve the mask and reunite the couple on the final day, with the end of the quest taking place in the final moments.
This quest was added by the development team after going to a wedding of a staff member during a North Korean missile test, which prompted director Eiji Aonuma to discuss how strange it was to attend a wedding when missiles may strike. He also thought it would be interesting to include a wedding, since weddings were not common in games like The Legend of Zelda. He also wanted to make it more complicated for adult players, though noted that he appreciated Majora's Mask 3D making it easier to solve the quest. The couple and their quest received positive reception from players, regarded as one of the best quests in both The Legend of Zelda and video games as a whole by multiple critics. The reunion was considered rewarding in and of itself, and their romance was considered one of the best in gaming.


Anju's model is based on a character from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time called "Chicken Lady," identified by the game's development team as being a relatively normal character in the game. The wedding between Anju and Kafei was first conceived after members of the Majora's Mask development team attended a wedding of a staff member's shortly after Ocarina of Time's release. At the time, they were trying to figure out what events to include in Majora's Mask. The wedding occurred during the Taepodong-1 missile test by North Korea. Director Eiji Aonuma found the idea of attending a wedding when missiles may strike strange. The discussion eventually evolved into how such a setting would make sense for a setting with a falling moon. They also considered that a wedding is not a usual setting for a video game like The Legend of Zelda, and that it would be "really impactful" to include.
Aonuma, while discussing how complicated the sidequest was due to how hard it could be to figure out the steps, noted that he designed it this way to "age up the themes" and provide a "slightly more adult feeling drama moment here and there." He explained that they were accounting for the fact that their target audience was slightly older now, aiming it towards adults, and assumed that adults would be able to understand the quest more easily. He felt that limitations in the original Majora's Mask made this more complicated than he would have liked, and was glad to be able to make it easier in the 3DS re-release of Majora's Mask 3D.


Anju and Kafei appear in the 2000 video game The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, a game that operates on an in-game three-day time limit (54 minutes in real time) that can be looped. The actions of multiple involved characters are on a schedule, meaning that players in control of Link must complete their quest - the Testament of Love - on a schedule, and thus can fail the quest. Their quest takes place across the entire three days span of time, and is the longest quest in the game. Anju is a worker at an inn, while Kafei is the son of the mayor. They were betrothed, but the mask Kafei was going to give Anju as part of a marriage ceremony was stolen, on top of Kafei being turned into a child by the game's antagonist, Skull Kid. Ashamed, Kafei went into hiding until he could retrieve the mask from the thief. Meanwhile, Anju continued working at the inn, worried about Kafei. Link becomes involved after agreeing to help search for Kafei.
When he inquires about him to Anju, she has him return later to give him a letter to deliver to Kafei. Link has it delivered to a child wearing a Keaton mask, who he discovers is Kafei. Kafei gives the Pendant of Memories to give to Anju, which makes makes Anju decide to wait for him. Kafei goes to find his mask at the thief's hideout in Ikana Canyon; if Link assists, the two of them are able to retrieve the mask before it is lost. Shortly before the moon's fall, Kafei reunites with Anju, who recognizes him despite his form. They hug before exchanging masks, becoming a couple, with Link receiving the Couple's Mask as their witness. They stay, deciding to greet the morning together. The day after Link stops the moon from falling, Anju and Kafei have their wedding.
Anju later appears in The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap as a different incarnation of the character. Kafei was also featured as a collectible Spirit in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, collectibles that are associated with one of the game's playable characters and can be used to modify the play experience in some way.


Anju and Kafei have received generally positive reception, their quest being praised as one of the best stories in Majora's Mask. Game Informer writer Blake Woog considered it one of the most famous and "heart-wrenching" sidequests in The Legend of Zelda, while Den of Geek writer Matthew Byrd called it the best quest in the series and one of the most complicated quests in any video game. He felt that, despite it being too frustrating or convoluted for some, the reward of finally getting them back together makes it worth it, more so than something in-game would have been. RPGFan writer Nilson Carroll highlighted it among the best The Legend of Zelda side quests, calling it "legendary" and discussing how it shows love persisting in darkness. Writer Taylor Yust felt Anju and Kafei's quest was a good example of synergy between gameplay and story. They felt similarly to Byrd that the real reward was reuniting the couple, feeling that the gameplay enhanced the quest's thematic significance to the player. BuzzFeed News writer Alanna Okun called the plot between Anju and Kafei the most "poignant subplot" in video games, disappointed that there hasn't been more material made about them. GamesRadar writer Connor Sheridan similarly felt that Anju and Kafei's quest was more enjoyable than the main story, a sentiment shared by Screen Rant writer Ross Griffin.
Anju and Kafei's romance was particularly well-received, with Nintendojo writer Katharine Byrne discussed it as a quality example of romance in video games. She talked about how hopeless it could be, particularly if their quest is completed without having first awoken all four of the Giants, as it would mean that they were only reunited so that they could die together since Link cannot stop the moon and must return to the past. She called the reunion between the two of them one of the most heartfelt moment in The Legend of Zelda. Destructoid writer Daniel Starkey praised their reunion, commenting on how their love is "completely mutual and elegantly expressed." He used this as an example of the "Lover's Reunion," disagreeing with Roger Ebert's skepticism of video games as art because of the interactivity of this quest. Fellow Destructoid writer called the reunion scene particularly memorable and emotional. Nintendo World Report writer Pedro Hernandez felt that it was a standout moment in the game, saying it "pulled [his] heartstrings." He felt that the ending was the best part of their story, being "romantic and bittersweet" due to having only so little time left together.
When considering the greatest couples in Nintendo games, Game Rant writer Michael Sriqui noted that while the rest of the list had at least one major character, he had to include Anju and Kafei, calling it the best sidequest in video games. He felt it was a beautiful story, saying that it could only work in video games. The Gamer writer Bella Blondeau regarded them as her favorite romantic couple in The Legend of Zelda and a "narrative highlight" of Majora's Mask. While she considered it bleak, she saw its depiction of "love overcoming all obstacles" as hopeful, feeling like the happiness of Anju and Kafei is one of the driving forces behind Link's quest to stop the moon from crashing. A writer for Game Developer discussed how Anju's unconditional love for Kafei despite Kafei's perceived failures teaches players that if someone truly loves them, that person will come to terms.


The Antimonumento 5J is an antimonumento (anti-monument) installed in the Plaza de Armas of Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. Human rights groups erected the sculpture in front of the State Government Palace to commemorate the protests of 4, 5, and 6 June 2020, during which state police violently repressed demonstrators protesting the death of Giovanni López, who had died in police custody the previous month.
Human rights groups placed the artwork adjacent to Antimonumenta on 5 June 2023. It was never given an official name; it is known as Antimonumento 5J, Antimonumento 5 de Junio, or simply 5J. It features a red-painted number five placed above a letter "J". Hours later, at night, authorities removed the sculpture, citing that its placement was unauthorized. Although judges later ordered its reinstatement, the state government declined to comply, arguing that it posed public safety concerns. In response, human rights groups installed a smaller replica the following month, composed of LED lights and rods.


During the night of 4 May 2020, Giovanni López (c. 1990 – 4 or 5 May 2020), a bricklayer, was arrested outside his family's house in the municipality of Ixtlahuacán de los Membrillos, Jalisco. According to reports, police detained him for allegedly not wearing a face mask during the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico and for assaulting officers while resisting arrest. Giovanni's brother, Christian, recorded the arrest, capturing footage of officers verbally insulting his family as they placed Giovanni into a police van. Enrique Alfaro Ramírez, the state governor, had made the use of face masks mandatory.
The following day, Christian contacted the municipal president, Eduardo Cervantes, who instructed them to pick Giovanni up at the local police station. There, officials informed Christian that Giovanni had been transferred to the Guadalajara Civil Hospital; upon arrival, he was informed that Giovanni had died. An autopsy later determined that he had died from blunt force trauma to the head and also had a gunshot wound in one of his legs. According to the family, Cervantes offered them 200,000 Mexican pesos (US$9,136) in exchange for not releasing the video of the arrest. They stated they refused the offer and were subsequently threatened with death if the footage was made public.
On 25 May 2020, George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis, United States. His death sparked widespread protests across the U.S. and internationally, including in Mexico, where concerns over police brutality were also longstanding. Inspired by the similarities between Floyd’s case and that of his brother, Christian sent his video to the media on 1 June. The footage went viral and triggered protests on 4 June in Guadalajara, the capital city of Jalisco. Demonstrators gathered in the city's historic center, where they clashed with police and vandalized the State Government Palace. Police responded with tear gas and arrested 26 people.
Alfaro, member of the Citizens' Movement party, blamed the unrest on political adversaries in the Federal Government and Mexico City Government, both led by the ruling National Regeneration Movement party) claiming they sought to destabilize his administration. Alfaro also denied that Giovanni had been arrested for not wearing a face mask. According to the official police report, the arrest was due to an "administrative offense" because he had allegedly acted aggressively toward officers while under the influence.
The next day, demonstrators gathered to demand the release of individuals detained during the previous day's protest. During the mobilization, groups of plainclothes riot officers conducted arbitrary arrests. Witnesses reported that the officers used electric shocks and threatened to hand detainees over to cartels. While official sources reported 16 arrests, eyewitnesses estimated that at least 80 people were detained. Alfaro claimed that some agents of the Jalisco State Prosecutor's Office had acted in collusion with organized crime and had disobeyed official orders. Authorities later announced that 11 agents had been arrested in connection with the abuses committed during the protest.
On 6 June 2020, demonstrations continued in Guadalajara, with protesters demanding the release of those detained and clarification regarding the whereabouts of up to 38 individuals reported as forcibly disappeared. In response, Governor Alfaro issued a public apology and ordered the release of all detainees. However, reports emerged that some detainees had been abandoned on the outskirts of the city the previous night. The event was later dubbed the "Halconazo tapatío", referencing the 1971 massacre known as "El Halconazo", in which paramilitary groups without their uniforms arbitrarily assassinated protesters in Mexico City, combined with the regional term for "from Jalisco".


During a demonstration commemorating the "Halconazo tapatío" on 5 June 2023, various collectives placed an anti-monument in Plaza de Armas, opposite the State Government Palace, and next to the Antimonumenta, a—another anti-monument that symbolizes the demand for justice for women who suffer from violence in Mexico.
The sculpture is a red metal structure that stands 3.4 m (11 ft) tall and weighs over 300 kg (660 lb). It alludes to the 5 June protest through the inclusion of a number five above the letter "J", and it honors Giovanni and those who were repressed during the protests related to his death. At the base of the sculpture is an aluminum plaque with the following text (translated from Spanish):


Although the CNDH [National Human Rights Commission] and the FGR [Attorney General of Mexico] took over the case, the serious human rights violations have not been properly investigated, nor has the damage been repaired. We hold the government of Jalisco responsible for these events, pointing out that disappearances and state impunity persist[.]
The collectives criticized both the FGR for declaring the events outside its jurisdiction and the CNDH for concluding that there were no cases of forced disappearance or torture. The collective #5deJunioMemoria said that Giovanni's case was not an isolated incident, but rather an example of systemic and widespread police brutality in Mexico. They also reported that since the event, authorities had taken no action in response to Alfaro's claim that organized crime had infiltrated the prosecutor's office.
At 11:40 p.m. that same day, the plaza's lights were turned off, and a group of men arrived in a pickup truck. Using sledgehammers, they dismantled and removed the sculpture. The following morning, Alfaro confirmed that he and Guadalajara's municipal president, Pablo Lemus Navarro, had ordered its removal, citing the lack of official authorization for its installation. Lemus stated that the government would return the sculpture if its owners formally requested it. The collectives behind the installation condemned the removal and described it as an unprecedented act of repression. The sculpture was initially stored in a warehouse in Guadalajara and before being transferred to the Poncitlán Regional Civil Protection and Fire Department because of its dimensions.


The collectives #5deJunioMemoria and the Centro de Justicia para la Paz y el Desarrollo filed a complaint with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the removal of the anti-monument and other acts of repression carried out by the state authorities. They also filed a complaint before the First Collegiate Court in Administrative Matters of Jalisco. In July 2023, a judge issued an order for the suculpture's reinstallation. Additionally, the state's branch of the National Institute of Anthropology and History indicated that reinstalling the artwork would not pose any risks to historical heritage.
Lemus stated that because there had been no official request for the anti-monument to be returned to its owner, the state would not release it. He added that once the application for reinstallation was submitted, consultations with state civil protection would determine whether it was safe to place the monument. Days later, the Director of the State Unit of Civil Protection and Firefighters rejected the idea of reinstalling the sculpture. He raised concerns that there were no technical studies ensuring public safety, that the sculpture's foundation could pose a problem, and that, being made of steel, it could cause electrical issues due to the proximity of the Urban Electric Train System under the square. As of July 2023, the authorities have yet to comply with the reinstatement orders.
On 5 July 2023, the collectives installed a light replica; it is made of rods and LED lights. It stands one meter (3 ft 3 in) shorter than the original, weighs less, and is designed to be removable. The installation was part of their efforts to maintain the anti-monument's presence while dealing with the authorities' refusal to reinstall the original sculpture.


António Corea (fl. late 16th and 17th centuries) or António Korea was a Korean slave who was taken to Italy. He is possibly the first Korean to have set foot in Europe. Little is known about Corea's life; he is attested to only briefly in a travelogue by his Italian master Francesco Carletti. Corea was enslaved during the 1592–1598 Imjin War and taken to Nagasaki, Japan. There, he was purchased by Carletti around 1597. They left Japan and arrived in the Netherlands around 7 July 1602. Later, Carletti wrote that Corea had settled in Rome.
In the 20th century, Corea's story drew significant attention in South Korea, where popular media such as books and plays have been produced about him. Concurrently, a number of theories proliferated about Corea that are not known to be supported by evidence. It has been theorized that Corea has living descendents in the Italian village of Albi, Calabria. Recent genetic tests and surname analyses suggest this is unlikely but still possible. It has been theorized that Corea is the subject of a famous c. 1617 sketch by Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens dubbed Man in Korean Costume. But in 2016, two historians published a paper expressing doubt on this theory.


Relatively few Koreans left the Korean peninsula before the late 19th century. However, during the 1592–1598 Japanese invasions of Korea, tens of thousands of Koreans were enslaved and taken to Japan, with the first shipment in October 1592. From there, they were exported primarily to other parts of Asia.


António Corea (his European name) was a Korean who was captured during the Japanese invasions and taken to Nagasaki, Japan as a slave. In 1597, Carletti arrived in Nagasaki, where he eventually purchased Corea and four other Koreans. Carletti had his Korean slaves convert to Christianity and took them to Goa in India, whereupon he set them free. He departed Goa for Europe with Corea and several others. During the journey, Carletti and Corea were taken hostage by Dutch sailors at the island of Saint Helena. According to Carletti, Corea managed to trick the Dutch into not leaving him behind on Saint Helena by portraying his relatively worthless copper necklace as valuable, and thus enticing them into taking him aboard. Carletti and Corea arrived in Middelburg, Zeeland, Netherlands on either 6 July or 7 July 1602. According to Carletti, Corea then eventually settled in Rome.


Carletti wrote of Corea in his travelogue My Voyage Around the World:Out of [the more maritime provinces of Korea,] they brought an infinite number of men and women, boys and girls, of every age, and they all were sold as slaves at the very lowest prices. I bought five of them for little more than twelve scudos. Having had them baptized, I took them with me to Goa in India, and there set them free. I brought one of them with me to Florence, and I think that today he is to be found in Rome, where he is known as António.


Since the early 20th century, a number of theories about Corea have been repeated by media and academic sources. However, these are now considered unsupported by the known sparse evidence on Corea. The proliferation and persistence of these theories can be attributed to the exciting nature of Corea's story, as well as insufficient factchecking by both the media and by several academics.


Rome-based South Korean reporter Kim Seong-u (Korean: 김성우) claimed that Corea was from the city of Namwon, and this claim was repeated for decades, but there is no known evidence for this. A 1965 history book compiled by the Chin-Tan Society has an article by historian Lee Sang-baek, in which Lee claims Corea was a child at the time of his enslavement. This claim was then repeated for decades afterwards by both historians and reporters. However, there was reportedly no evidence provided for it. Another theory has it that Corea became part of the Catholic clergy in Italy, but there is again no known evidence for this.


In 1932, Japanese historian Yamaguchi Masayuki (山口正之) claimed that Corea's descendants had settled near the settlement Catanzaro in the Italian region of Calabria as early as 1620, on the basis that a village called Albi had more than 500 people with that surname. Kim Seong-u published a popular article in 1979 that explored this theory, and further theorized that Corea had married an Italian woman. Another South Korean scholar Kwak Cha-seop (곽차섭) wrote in 2004 about being unsure of these claims. The surname "Corea" also exists in Spain, which has led some to speculate that these people may descend from Corea as well, perhaps from when Albi went under Spanish rule around 1505.
In 1989, the mayor of Albi installed a monument in the town's Corea Square, which was dedicated to the supposed meeting of Corea and his Italian wife. In early November 1992, the South Korean Ministry of Culture invited some of Corea's supposed descendants (including one man also named António Corea, who was head of a Korean cultural society in Italy), as well as the mayor of Albi, to visit Korea. On 30 September 1993, South Korean broadcaster MBC published a documentary entitled António Corea (안토니오 꼬레아), in which it was mentioned that genetic studies on people in Albi did not significantly suggest Korean ancestry. It also argued that hundreds of years had passed since Corea's lifetime, and that it may be difficult to detect Korean descendancy now. South Korean scholar Kwak Cha-seop published a book in 2004 entitled Joseon Youth António Corea Meets Reubens (조선청년 안토니오 코레아, 루벤스를 만나다), in which he states it is very unlikely that António is the forefather of Europeans of the surname Corea. He argues this on the basis of the genetic tests and the possibility that the surname "Corea" was descended from or related to the surname "Curia".


In 1934 or 1935, British art historian Claire Stuart Wortley theorized that a Korean had been the subject of a c. 1617 sketch, informally named Man in Korean Costume or Korean Man, by Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens. The subject's identity and even ethnicity are not known. Wortley proposed that the subject's clothing is distinctly Korean and not Chinese. If the portrait is of a Korean, it is possibly the first known depiction of a Korean by a Western artist. The portrait drew significant attention; in 1983 it was sold at a Christie's auction for £324,000, which was the highest ever sum paid for such a sketch.
Kwak Cha-seop supported this theory in his 2004 book on the basis of his own analysis of the subject's clothing. He also argued it was possible (but still uncertain) that Corea had met with Rubens in Rome around July 1606 to October 1608. In 2015, South Korean art historian Noh Seong-du (노성두) challenged these claims. He argued that the clothes looked more Chinese (based on a forensic reconstruction of the cut-off top and bottom portions of the portrait), and also argued that the 1606–1608 dates conflicted with the general consensus that the portrait was from 1617.
A 2016 paper by art historians Weststeijn and Gesterkamp drew international attention for proposing an alternate theory about the subject. The scholars found a very similar drawing from a book that is believed to predate Rubens' drawing. They proposed that Rubens had based his sketch on that original drawing. Accompanying text described the subject of the drawing as a Chinese merchant named Yppong. Corea arrived in the Netherlands a little over a year after Yppong's departure back to Asia.


After Kim Seong-u's 1979 article, Corea's story captured the imagination of the South Korean public. Interest in Corea reached a climax by 1992: the 400th anniversary of the beginning of the Japanese invasions. That year, a musical entitled The Everlasting Flute (불멸의 피리), which was reportedly inspired by Corea's story, was produced. In 1993, author O Se-yeong (오세영) published a novel inspired by Corea's story entitled The Merchant of Venice (베니스의 개성상인). The book was a bestseller, and sold more than two million copies by 1994. Around this time, another novel entitled António Corea (안토니오 꼬레아) was also published. In 2015, South Korean president Park Geun-hye visited the J. Paul Getty Museum, where the Man in Korean Costume portrait is held.


"Apex" is a fossilized specimen of an unknown species in the genus Stegosaurus, discovered in Colorado's Morrison Formation in 2022. Dated to the Late Jurassic epoch, it is the largest known Stegosaurus fossil, preserving skin impressions and throat ossicles alongside a mostly complete skeleton. On July 17, 2024, the specimen was sold at Sotheby's for $44.6 million to hedge fund billionaire Kenneth C. Griffin, making it the highest-priced fossil ever sold at auction. The sale sparked debate among paleontologists regarding the purchase by private individuals of specimens with high scientific value.
In December 2024, the fossil was loaned to the American Museum of Natural History, and is planned to be exhibited there for four years. Researchers aim to identify Apex's species, and study its growth pattern.


Apex is the largest and most complete known Stegosaurus skeleton as of 2024, with 254 bones preserved out of approximately 319. It measures 3.4 meters (11 ft) in height and 8.2 meters (27 ft) in length. The specimen is 150 million years old, dating to the Late Jurassic epoch. The exact species it belongs to is not known.
It has been compared to the Stegosaurus stenops specimen Sophie, which was at the time of Apex's sale the most complete Stegosaurus skeleton on public display, although Apex has been described as being 30% larger. The proportions of the specimen have been described as unusual, having comparatively long legs and square-bottom plates.
Alongside the skeleton, three ossicles from the stegosaur's throat armor were preserved. Skin impressions from the neck have also been preserved, although the lack of impressions from the lower body means that its sex cannot be deduced. The specimen was found in a death pose, with its tail curled under its body.


The animal to which it belonged was elderly, as attested by signs of rheumatoid arthritis such as the fusion of the sacral bones. No traces of injuries caused by combat or predation, or of post-mortem scavenging, are present on the fossil. According to Sotheby's head of science and popular culture Cassandra Hatton, the specimen likely died of old age. Bubbles have been found in bones in the pelvic area, understood to have been caused by mating-related infections.


Apex was discovered in May 2022 by commercial paleontologist Jason Cooper in Moffat County, Colorado, on private land near the town of Dinosaur. The fossil was found encased in hard sandstone. No other fossils were found nearby, although the area is part of the larger Morrison Formation. Excavation of the specimen lasted until October 2023.
The New York broker Sotheby's, which would later put the fossil to auction, claimed to have worked alongside Jason Cooper since the discovery in order to bring the fossil to the market, documenting the process along the way. Several explanations for the name "Apex" have been provided. According to Sotheby's, the name was given to highlight the importance of the specimen within Stegosaurus, owing to its high degree of preservation. Robb Report stated that the name referred to the preeminent position of Stegosaurus in the Late Jurassic ecosystem, while Smithsonian described it as referring to the specimen's size.


Apex was put to auction at Sotheby's in New York on July 17, 2024, with a pre-sale estimate of between $4 million and $6 million. Seven bidders took part in the auction, which began at $3 million. After 15 minutes, the specimen was sold to an anonymous buyer for $44.6 million, or 11 times its lower pre-sale estimate. It was stated by Sotheby's to be the highest-priced fossil ever sold at auction, as well as the first Stegosaurus to be put to auction. At the time of the auction, the fossil was mounted on a steel armature, and positioned in an attacking stance. The missing bones were replaced by sculpted and 3D-printed replicas, including mirrored versions of existing material. The auction lot also included 3D scans of the fossil, with a license to use the scan data.
On July 18, the buyer was revealed to be billionaire Kenneth C. Griffin, founder and CEO of the hedge fund Citadel LLC. Griffin intended to put the specimen on loan to an American institution, claiming after the auction that "Apex was born in America and is going to stay in America!"


The announcement of Apex's auctioning to private bidders gave rise to concern from paleontologists, with Society of Vertebrate Paleontology vice-president Stuart Sumida criticizing the trend of major specimens being purchased by private individuals rather than research institutions. In May 2024, Steve Brusatte commented that Stegosaurus fossils were comparatively rarer than other dinosaur genera such as Triceratops or Tyrannosaurus. Brusatte argued that the skeleton should be displayed in a museum, making it accessible for both scientific and educational purposes, rather than be kept in a private collection, expressing his hopes that the buyer would donate the specimen to a museum for public display. Both Brusatte and University of Adelaide professor Diego C. García-Bellido stated that scientific institutions were unable to keep up with private buyers at auctions. The pre-sale estimate of $6 million was described as being already out of range for most museums by García-Bellido, who also added that many of them might not have the necessary infrastructure to display the skeleton. The given price range has been described by paleontologist Cary Woodruff as arbitrary given the scientific value of the specimen.
The display was also criticized, with Sumida commenting that the reconstruction and mounting required artistic choices, which would lessen the scientific and educational value of the specimen. In a Chicago Tribune opinion, paleontologist Nathan D. Smith suggested that the skeleton be displayed as a centerpiece in the context of the Morrison Formation rather than as a standalone specimen, comparing it to the exhibit of the Tyrannosaurus specimen Sue at the Field Museum of Natural History.
Both discoverer Jason Cooper and Sotheby's science department head Cassandra Hatton stated that they hoped for the specimen to be acquired by a scientific institution. In May 2024, Cooper stated that the future owner would be able to collect contextual information on the discovery site. Hatton stated that, despite widespread concerns, she had not seen fossils be lost to private collections, with buyers usually donating them to museums instead.


In December 2024, it was announced that Apex was loaned to the American Museum of Natural History, who had contacted Kenneth Griffin during the summer. The specimen was revealed on December 5 to an excited crowd of schoolchildren. Since December 8, the fossil is on public display, and is intended to be replaced by a cast after four years. It debuted in the Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation, where it is stationed in an atrium near the entrance, and is planned to be moved in late 2025 to the fossil halls on the fourth floor. The choice of museum was described as surprising, given Griffin's previous ties to the Field Museum in Chicago. While Griffin had already donated once to the American Museum of Natural History, he had never previously worked with their paleontology department.
A three-year postdoctoral fellowship was funded by Griffin to identify Apex's species and study its growth pattern. Researchers plan to analyze a 10 centimeters (3.9 in) wedge from the femur, in order to produce the first growth curve of Stegosaurus, and to create digital models using CT scans. According to museum curator Roger Benson, the possibility of sharing the three-dimensional scans with researchers was a necessary condition for the loan.
As the specimen might not be accessible in the future, concerns have been raised over conducting research on a privately owned, loaned fossil. The matter was described by Stuart Sumida as "a new gray area", with the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology's ethics committee due to provide a recommendation in early 2025.


Aquilegia chaplinei, also known as Chaplin's columbine, is a species of flowering plant in the family Ranunculaceae native to the arid Guadalupe and Sacramento Mountains of West Texas and southeastern New Mexico in the West South Central United States. A perennial plant with an average height of 40 centimeters (16 in), A. chaplinei is characterized as a dwarf version of its close relative Aquilegia chrysantha and is sometimes considered a variant of this species under the name Aquilegia chrysantha var. chaplinei.
A. chaplinei's leaves are in a basal arrangement (sprouting from base of the shoot) and give the plant a fern-like appearance when not flowering. Its flowers are pale yellow. It is named for William Ridgley Chapline, the first person to collect the plant and who collected the holotype from Sitting Bull Falls in New Mexico in 1916.
The plant has been the subject of conservation protections, including a New Mexican law prohibiting the collection of seeds from wild examples. In 2017, a consortium of state and federal agencies determined the species was "effectively conserved".


Aquilegia chaplinei is a perennial plant with a height from 20 centimeters (7.9 in) to 50 centimeters (20 in), averaging 40 centimeters (16 in) tall. This is somewhat shorter than the closely related Aquilegia chrysantha, which can reach up to 120 centimeters (47 in) tall. A. chaplinei's type locality at an altitude of 1,650 meters (5,410 ft) suggests that it is better adapted than A. chrysantha to arid environments. A. chaplinei has a slender stem that is glabrous (smooth) with the exception of the inflorescence.
Possessing leaves in a basal arrangement (sprouting from base of the shoot), A. chaplinei has leaves which extend on slender petioles that are 7 centimeters (2.8 in) to 10 centimeters (3.9 in) long. The leaves themselves range from bi- to barely triternately compound. A. chaplinei has a fern-like appearance when not flowering. The leaves are semi-evergreen.
It has pale yellow flowers. Its spurs range from 30 millimeters (1.2 in) to 40 millimeters (1.6 in) and can be slender, straight, or slightly spreading. The short spurs and sepals under 2 centimeters long – between 13 millimeters (0.51 in) and 16 millimeters (0.63 in) – are the primary distinguishing features that separate A. chaplinei from A. chrysantha. A. chaplinei has yellow sepals. The flowers bloom between April and November, with greatest reliability in June and July.
Breeding is performed through its unisexual flowers, meaning that individual flowers exclusively possess either stamen or carpels, making it monoecious. Its seeds are nearly 2 millimeters (0.079 in) long.


Aquilegia chaplinei is within the Aquilegia (columbine) genus. The plant, including its holotype, was first collected by William Ridgely Chapline from Sitting Bull Falls in Eddy County, New Mexico, on May 25, 1916. Chapline was a rangeland management scientist who was employed by the United States Department of Agriculture and later served as the chief of forest conservation within the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.
The plant was formally described by the binomial Aquilegia chaplinei in 1918 within Edwin Blake Payson's "The North American Species of Aquilegia", published in Contributions from the United States National Herbarium. Payson credited Paul Carpenter Standley with the initial description. The holotype is now in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History.


In 1985, Emily J. Lott proposed reclassifying the plant as Aquilegia chrysantha var. chaplinei in the journal Phytologia. Lott's proposal came out of her study of plants in the Chihuahuan Desert, stemming from her 1979 unpublished master's thesis on Aquilegia in the Trans-Pecos region of Texas. The renaming as a variant of A. chrysantha proposed by Lott was not broadly accepted outside of Texas but remains in use within that state. The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center of the University of Texas at Austin utilizes the name proposed by Lott for the plant, while the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) uses A. chaplinei.


The word columbine derives from the Latin word columbinus, meaning "dove", a reference to the flowers' appearance of a group of doves. The genus name Aquilegia may come from the Latin word for "eagle", aquila, in reference to the petals' resemblance to eagle talons. Aquilegia may also derive from aquam legere, which is Latin for "to collect water", or aquilegium, a Latin word for a container of water.
The species is named for Chapline. Common names for the species include Chaplin's columbine, Chaplin's yellow columbine, Chaplin's golden columbine, Chapline columbine, and Guadalupe Mountain columbine.


The species is endemic to the Guadalupe Mountains of West Texas and southeastern New Mexico in the West South Central United States. It is also native to the New Mexican Sacramento Mountains, though this population of yellow columbines is distinct from others in the region In 1984, the Sacramento Mountains population was described as "somewhat intermediary between A. chaplinei and A. chrysantha" by the New Mexico Native Plant Advisory Committee. The New Mexican range of A. chaplinei extends across the counties of Eddy and Otero.
The Guadalupe Mountains are an extremely arid environment, and A. chaplinei is found where the ground is moist such as along streams, canyons, and at the base of rocks. The TPWD identifies the species's preferred habitats as "[p]erennially moist to wet limestone canyon walls; moist leaf litter and humus among boulders in wooded mesic canyons".
The species can be found in Lincoln National Forest in south-central New Mexico. Within the Guadalupe District, the southernmost division of the national forest, A. chaplinei congregates in seeps at the bottom of limestone cliffs. In McKittrick Canyon, the species blooms between early spring and mid-fall, with particular lushness in September.


A. chaplinei is considered a rare plant within its natural range. The Flora of North America lists the species as of conservation concern. The University of New Mexico's Rare New Mexico Plants provides an assessment that A. chaplinei is "effectively conserved" and identifies human water management as a threat to the species. The plant's NatureServe conservation status is S2 in both New Mexico and Texas and G2, meaning both the individual state and global populations of the species are considered "imperiled".
The Bureau of Land Management categorizes the plant as a "sensitive" species. As of 1998, A. chaplinei was conserved under the New Mexico Endangered Plant Species Act, legally prohibiting unauthorized seed collection. By 2017, the plant was deemed "effectively conserved" by the New Mexico Rare Plant Conservation Strategy, a consortium of the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department, Bureau of Land Management, and United States Forest Service. The plant does not have a listed conservation status from the federal or Texas governments but was included in the TPWD's "Species of Greatest Conservation Need" as of 2024.


In 1946, American botanist Philip A. Munz wrote that he was unaware of A. chaplinei being available for sale. As of 2003, both seeds and plants were sometimes available, particularly from native plant nurseries in the region of A. chaplinei's native range.
The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center identified fully shaded or partially shaded locations as good locations for planting to prevent stressing the plant and curling in the leaves. A. chaplinei requires both moisture and drainage. In particularly hot and arid settings, the plant becomes susceptible to aphids and spider mites. Aquilegia species hybridize easily, so spacing between different species and varieties is necessary to prevent cross pollination. Plants reach maturity in between two and five years.


The Apache people considered the plant medicinal. Apaches utilized boiled roots as a remedy for bruises. In order to tone their bodies, they made a tea with the plant. The medicinal qualities of the plant's seed were considered especially significant and were further believed to be an aphrodisiac. Ingestion of the plant may result in stomach irritation.


Arcara v. Cloud Books, Inc., 478 U.S. 697 (1986), was a United States Supreme Court case about the First Amendment and whether freedom of speech was violated by shutting down a bookstore because of illicit sexual activities occurring there. The court held that the closure was aimed at nonexpressive activity and its incidental burden on speech was not subject to any First Amendment scrutiny.
In reaching its decision, the 6–3 majority identified two conditions when it would apply the First Amendment to incidental effects on speech: when the enforcement action is aimed at significantly expressive conduct, or when the law inevitably affects speech disproportionately. Neither condition was applicable to the case. This distinguished Arcara from the draft card burning case United States v. O'Brien (1968) and other precedents.


Cloud Books operated an adult bookstore in Kenmore, New York. The bookstore sold sexually explicit books and magazines and showed sexually explicit movies. (Whether these were obscene was not at issue in the case.) An undercover deputy sheriff investigated the store and allegedly witnessed sexual activity and solicitation of prostitution on multiple occasions.
New York public health law defined a place used for "lewdness, assignation, or prostitution" as a nuisance. Once a place was determined to be such a nuisance, the law required closure of the premises for one year, among other forms of relief. District Attorney Richard Arcara brought a civil suit against Cloud Books, seeking enforcement.
The defendant argued that the forced closure of the bookstore would violate their First Amendment right to sell books and other materials, which are protected speech. Separately, the defendant argued that the statute only applied to establishments primarily for prostitution and not to bookstores. The trial court and the Appellate Division ruled against these arguments. The state's highest court, the New York Court of Appeals, also sided with the government on the statutory question, but ruled in favor of the defendant on the First Amendment question. According to the New York Court of Appeals, closing the bookstore would have an effect on speech which was greater than necessary for the statute's purpose. The government petitioned to the Supreme Court, which agreed to hear the case.


The Supreme Court decided the case in favor of Arcara, reversing the lower court by a 6–3 vote.


In an opinion by Chief Justice Warren Burger for a six-justice majority, the court held that no First Amendment scrutiny applied. The prohibited sexual activities were nonexpressive conduct, and the incidental burden on speech did not implicate the First Amendment. The court said that "neither the press nor booksellers may claim special protection from governmental regulations of general applicability simply by virtue of their First Amendment protected activities." Otherwise, the bookseller's argument would be too far-reaching, because "every civil and criminal remedy imposes some conceivable burden on First Amendment protected activities." In addition, the court saw the burden on speech as limited, since the company could still sell books anywhere other than the location to be closed.
The court would only apply heightened scrutiny to restrictions on conduct when "it was conduct with a significant expressive element that drew the legal remedy in the first place" or when the restriction "has the inevitable effect of singling out those engaged in expressive activity". This distinguished two earlier cases: United States v. O'Brien (1968) and Minneapolis Star & Tribune Co. v. Minnesota Commissioner of Revenue (1983), respectively.
In O'Brien, the defendant had burned his draft card as an expression of protest. The First Amendment was implicated, because the conduct was expressive. The court also cited Clark v. Community for Creative Non-Violence (1984) as a precedent similar to O'Brien; Clark was about sleeping in a park to protest the situation of the homeless. In Arcara, on the other hand, the prohibited sexual activity was not expressive, so court held that the O'Brien test was not relevant.
Another earlier case, Minneapolis Star, was about a tax on ink and paper in large quantities. Even though the tax was not on expressive activity, the tax violated the freedom of the press because it was effectively imposed only on newspapers. The court in Arcara found that, unlike Minneapolis Star, the effect of the statute was not to single out First Amendment protected activities.


Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote a one-paragraph concurrence, joined by Stevens. Both justices also joined the majority opinion. She analogized the case to a newscaster arrested for a traffic violation. The traffic law could be enforced, she argued, without First Amendment analysis for the effect on the newscaster's speech. The concurrence added that First Amendment concerns would apply if the nuisance statute were used as a pretext to stop the sale of indecent books, but nothing in the case suggested that the statute was used pretextually.


Justice Harry Blackmun dissented, joined by Brennan and Marshall. Blackmun began with the idea the First Amendment "protects against all laws 'abridging the freedom of speech'—not just those specifically directed at expressive activity." He argued that heightened scrutiny was appropriate: "when a State directly and substantially impairs First Amendment activities, such as by shutting down a bookstore, I believe that the State must show, at a minimum, that it has chosen the least restrictive means of pursuing its legitimate objectives." Because the government had not shown that other means of stopping lewd activity were inadequate, the dissent concluded that closing the store unnecessarily restricted the bookseller's First Amendment rights.


The Arcara court was concerned that virtually every law could incidentally restrict speech in certain situations, a concern which First Amendment scholarship has widely acknowledged. The court sought to avoid imposing First Amendment analysis on virtually every law. Constitutional law scholar Wesley Jud Campbell wrote that, since Arcara, "the Court has mostly stopped applying First Amendment scrutiny to general (i.e., nontargeted) regulations of nonexpressive conduct". In a later case, Alexander v. United States (1993), the court relied on Arcara to uphold the forfeiture of all assets of book and film businesses as punishment for obscenity, even though the obscenity may have been expressive.
Arcara is recognized for its analysis of circumstances when incidental effects do receive First Amendment scrutiny. Lower courts and scholars have seen this analysis as incomplete, proposing several additional exceptions. In particular, scholars found it difficult to reconcile the Arcara test with United States v. Albertini (1985). Albertini was an earlier First Amendment case about a man who had been banned from entering a military base and later reentered the base where he participated in a protest. The court applied First Amendment review under O'Brien. Arguably, however, Albertini was punished for the nonexpressive reentry to the base and not for his subsequent protest. Arcara would imply that O'Brien analysis was not applicable. In First Amendment scholar Geoffrey R. Stone's view, Albertini meant either that the two exceptions listed in Arcara were not exhaustive, or that "expressive" activity could be very broad. A law review article by Sri Srinivasan (who later became a D.C. Circuit judge) interpreted Albertini as an exception to Arcara. Campbell argued that the Arcara majority "failed to mention their significant departure from earlier reasoning" and that "Albertini simply does not reflect current doctrine following Arcara."
Scholars looked for explanations beyond the Arcara rule to understand the court's case law about content-neutral and incidental restrictions on speech. In law professor Michael C. Dorf's analysis, "free speech doctrine treats substantial incidental burdens as raising a bona fide constitutional problem and ignores most other incidental burdens", even though the court had never stated such a principle. Stone similarly found that a "significant effect" on speech made the court apply First Amendment scrutiny. Other scholars saw motive as an underlying concern. Then-professor Elena Kagan surmised that "the Court's decision to apply intermediate review to certain incidental restrictions may result not so much from use of the Arcara test as from a visceral sense that an illicit factor entered into a governmental decision". According to Campbell, Arcara represented a doctrinal shift toward an "anti-targeting" principle. Srinivasan argued that "speech-suppressive administrative motive rather than the degree of speech-restrictive effect" was the Supreme Court's main concern in the cases.


After being reversed by the U.S. Supreme Court, the New York Court of Appeals again held that closing the bookstore violated freedom of expression, this time under the New York State Constitution rather than the U.S. Constitution. Federal First Amendment rights were the minimum nationwide standards, but state constitutions could independently have greater protections. Chief Judge Sol Wachtler's unanimous opinion justified greater protection by referencing New York's "long history and tradition of fostering freedom of expression". Based on Court of Appeals precedents, then, an incidental burden on expression could be "no broader than needed to achieve its purpose". When assessing incidental effects, "the test, in traditional terms, is not who is aimed at but who is hit". Rather than closing the bookstore, less restrictive means could include arresting offenders or an injunction.


Mirtha Natividad Arce Camacho (born 25 December 1963) is a Bolivian academic, lawyer, and politician who served as senator for Tarija from 2015 to 2020.
Arce got her political start in student leadership before developing her career in academia and women's rights activism. She held multiple executive positions in women's rights–related organizations in Tarija, including presiding over the Association of Women Lawyers and the Association of Women University Professionals. Between 2002 and 2008, she held law-related public service roles at local and departmental levels, including serving as legal director of the Departmental Road Service of Tarija.
In 2009, Arce was elected to the Chamber of Deputies, accompanying Adrián Oliva as his substitute from 2010 to 2014 when she resigned to launch a successful bid for a seat in the Senate. Though elected as part of the Democratic Unity coalition, Arce became estranged from the bloc partway through her term and operated as an independent from then on. In 2021, she contested the Tarija governorship, becoming the first woman nominee in the department's electoral history. However, she came in a distant fourth place at the ballot box.


Mirtha Arce was born on 25 December 1963 in Tarija, to Rosandel Arce Gonzales and Ana Camacho Gallardo. Arce completed her secondary schooling at the Santa Ana School, where she served as class president. She went on to attend the Marshal Sucre Normal School as well as Juan Misael Saracho University (UAJMS), where she graduated as a lawyer and teacher, completing two master's degrees in crime science and higher education and five postgraduate degrees in the fields of educational research and university teaching.
During her time in university, Arce continued to be active in student leadership, serving for two terms as executive of the UAJMS Law Student Center, where she was its first female head. From there, she went on to form part of her Local University Federation and the Bolivian University Confederation and was named executive of the Bermejo Teachers Federation.
Arce developed much of her career in academia, starting out as a university professor at UAJMS and the Bolivian Catholic University's Tarija campus. She was a founding member and president of the Association of Women Lawyers and the Association of Women University Professionals, served as vice president of the Tarija Women's Civic Committee, and composed part of the directorate of the National Confederation of Women's Institutes of Bolivia. Starting in 2002, Arce began a career in public service, serving as deputy prosecutor for controlled substances until 2005, when she joined the Cercado Province as its chief legal advisor. In 2006, she joined the administration of Mario Cossío, Tarija's first popularly elected prefect, serving as legal director of the Departmental Road Service until 2008.


Arce's political ideology has been described as "liberal in economics" but "conservative in morals". She was an early supporter of departmental autonomy, a political system heavily pushed by the country's lowland departments in the early 2000s. Despite her lack of party affiliation, Arce's adherence to decentralization and prominence in women's rights organizations contributed to her nomination for a seat in the Chamber of Deputies in 2009. She accompanied Adrián Oliva as his substitute, topping the National Convergence alliance's electoral list in the department.


In parliament, Arce accompanied Oliva during his four terms on the lower chamber's Energy and Hydrocarbons Committee between 2010 and 2014, in addition to spending a few months on the Planning, Economic Policy, and Finance Commission in her final year.[§] The majority of her tenure, however, reflected that of many substitute parliamentarians, focusing less on legislating from the capital and more on fostering local connections in her home department.


Planning, Economic Policy, and Finance Commission
Budget, Tax Policy, and Comptroller's Office Committee (2014)
Plural Economy, Production, and Industry Commission
Energy and Hydrocarbons Committee (2010–2014)


Nearing the end of her term in the Chamber of Deputies, Arce resigned from office to contest a seat in the Senate. She aligned herself with Samuel Doria Medina's Democratic Unity coalition, a bloc that recycled much of National Convergence's previous electoral list in a bid to guarantee a high degree of parliamentary representation. Benefitting from a favorable position at the top of her alliance's electoral list, Arce won the seat, becoming Democratic Unity's only senator in the department.


Sworn in the following January, Arce spent her first year heading the Senate's Electoral System, Human Rights, and Social Equity Committee. Even as she exercised leadership over a key parliamentary post in the field of women's rights, Arce often found herself contending with machista currents within her own caucus, an issue that ultimately led to her estrangement from the opposition alliance. These internal divisions culminated in 2016 when Arce refused to chair a committee her caucus had assigned to her, opting instead to seek a position on the Senate's powerful Ethics Commission. With the supporting votes of legislators from the ruling Movement for Socialism, Arce obtained the post, beating out the candidate nominated by the rest of the Democratic Unity caucus. The following year, Arce officialized her break from the alliance with which she was elected. For the duration of her term, she operated as an independent, unaffiliated with any of the Senate's three parliamentary caucuses.


Constitution, Human Rights, Legislation, and Electoral System Commission
Electoral System, Human Rights, and Social Equity Committee (Secretary: 2015–2017)
Plural Justice, Prosecutor's Office, and Legal Defense of the State Commission
Prosecutor's Office and Legal Defense of the State Committee (Secretary: 2018–2019)
Territorial Organization of the State and Autonomies Commission (President: 2017–2018, 2019–2020)
Ethics and Transparency Commission (2016–2017)


Soon after the conclusion of her senatorial term, Arce jumped onto the campaign trail, announcing a bid for the Tarija governorship. Though initially invited to be the Christian Democratic Party's nominee, Arce instead registered her candidacy with a local party: Integration, Security, and Autonomy. Of the candidates contesting the governorship in Tarija, Arce stood out as the only woman, making her the first woman to do so in the department's electoral history, as well as one of just seven women nationwide nominated to run in gubernatorial elections that cycle. Of the participating parties, Arce's campaign represented the most conservative segments of Tarija society, a fact she did little to disguise or grow past. According to journalist Miguel V. de Torres, this factor—in addition to her campaign's comparatively low budget—made it difficult for her to "find any space in which to fish for votes that are not [already] hers". Arce found herself unable to gain significant traction, and she ultimately lost the election, finishing in a distant fourth place.