A powerful bitter sweet As race continues to dominate the news, it seems like perfect timing for artist Kara Walker’s latest piece, her first large-scale installation, housed in the shell of the old Domino Sugar Factory in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Shown above, the piece has a grand title: At the behest of Creative Time Kara E. Walker has conf...

Young Guru, best known for producing Jay-Z’s albums, may be on tour in Europe. But he couldn’t resist the opportunity to remix the teenage singers, MCs and thinkers who contributed their vocals at TEDYouth. At the event on November 17, World Up -- a non-profit dedicated to making the world smaller through hip hop, technology and education --...

Afghan-born artist Behnaz Babazadeh hopes to spark a conversation about the burka ... by wrapping herself in candy. When Behnaz Babazadeh was young, her family moved from Afghanistan to the US. She loved almost everything about her new home -- especially America’s amazing selection of candy -- but she also loved wearing her familiar pink-flower...

Artist Janne Willems has collected more than 11,000 drawings in 30 countries from strangers showing the moments we remember and treasure. Artist Janne Willems (TEDxGroningen Talk: Discovering a world of happiness) spends almost every day doing the exact same thing. But don’t pity her; instead, envy her for her view into people’s hearts and soul...

“It is great to be back in Mississippi — yes it is,” said Kermit the Frog on the TEDxJackson stage in 2014. “I have deep roots here.” The Muppet was alluding to the fact that his creator, Jim Henson, was from the area. Kermit spoke about his humble southern upbringing in a swamp not too far from Jackson’s Capri Theater, where the event wa...

If you've seen Pierre Thiam's TED Talk about fonio, then you saw that part when he actually handed food out to the audience, yes? For those who didn't know to sit in the front rows to receive that blessing (or couldn't be there in the first place), and don't mind rolling up their sleeves in the kitchen, Pierre has shared the recipe and cooki...

  $1.26 million in change is tossed into Rome’s Trevi Fountain each year. Legend has it that throwing a penny into the fountain guarantees the visitor a return trip to Rome. The city council donates the funds to Caritas, a major Catholic charity. [via Chicago Tribune] 1 ice cream shop serves all of Rwanda. Its name: Sweet Dreams. Swe...

This short, sweet explainer from BlinkTower tells you just what you need to know about TED and TEDx -- and might inspire you to start your own event! Via TEDxSeaPoint, in Cape Town, South Africa.

TED playlists are collections of talks around a topic, built for you in a thoughtful sequence to illuminate ideas in context. This weekend, two new playlists are available: Spoken-word fireworks and That's absurd! That's absurd! 5 quirky talks remind us that life is funny, weird, sweet, absurd. Watch talks by Improv Everywhere's Charlie Todd...

Photos: James Duncan Davidson "I'm so nervous," says a very sweet Raghu Dixit as he takes the TEDGlobal stage. The former microbiologist tells us that he quit his career 15 years ago "to become a rockstar." Whereas one might usually scoff at such half-baked plans, TEDGlobal turns out to be the place where it's actually paid off. As such, ...

Take a step back and consider the exquisite network of systems that sustain life on Planet Earth. The air we breathe, the food we eat and the ground we walk on are all carefully regulated by natural systems in an intertwined dance -- which means that any change we make in our environment can set off a chain of unexpected reactions. In this week’...

At TED2011, chefs Homaro Cantu and Ben Roche of the Chicago restaurant Moto showed us the unique alchemy that kept diners in their restaurant chuckling as they ate: "champagne" grapes, maki rolls printed on paper, a Cuban cigar that tastes like a Cuban sandwich, nachos that are actually dessert. Bouncing with enthusiasm, Cantu sold us on the...

(TED is on its annual two-week vacation. During the break, we’re posting playlists from the TEDTalks archive. We’ll be back with new talks Monday!) The wonderful thing about the universe is not just how big it is, but how every time we look into it we find something new and extraordinary. Here are four talks about the vastness of space, a...

You think your food tastes good, but food inventor Barb Stuckey thinks you could be doing better. In her book, Taste What You've Been Missing, Stuckey explores the science of what, exactly, what makes food taste good -- and what doesn't. Which brings us today to: Uuuuumami! (That's oo-ma-mee.) What is umami? That rich, brothy flavor witho...

The few days before a holiday are brutal. It doesn’t matter if you have a lot of work on your plate or have midterms to study for -- your mind just wants to be distracted from it all. And so, we bring you the best TED Talks for procrastinating, so you don’t have to feel completely guilty for not doing what you are supposed to be doing. After all...

As the TED team travels around the world hosting salons in 14 cities, we're collecting great local stories. Here's a quick report from TED@Johannesburg, held May 3, 2012, at MIAGI Centre for Music, and locally hosted by the team at TEDxSoweto. Start with taking a look at the event through the TEDxSoweto Flickr collection here. Then rel...

The day was February 12, 1809. The place was Shrewsbury, England. The person born there: Charles Darwin. With the publication of his classic, On the Origins of Species, Darwin set the wheels in motion for a dramatic transformation of the way human beings understand the world and how we came to exist in it . Here, seven speakers who’ve discus...

“I date younger men,” Cindy Gallop boldly proclaimed at TED2009. “When I have sex with younger men, I encounter very directly and personally the real ramifications of the creeping ubiquity of hardcore pornography in our culture. … There is an entire generation growing up that believes that what you see in hardcore pornography is the way that you...

Twitter was ablaze yesterday with some interesting news: Kermit the Frog had just become the first frog (albeit puppet) to give a TEDx Talk. On Thursday afternoon, the green superstar hopped on over to Jackson, Mississippi, to give a standing-ovation-grabbing talk at TEDxJackson. Kermit was a natural fit for the event, as The Muppets creator...

Today, we remember the 11 million lives taken during the Holocaust -- a catastrophe that thoroughly transformed our world. As we take time to honor lives lost, we look towards people like Viktor Frankl, who gave this talk "Why to believe in others." A Holocaust survivor and renowned author, in this rare clip, Frankl discusses the importanc...

Horses, parrots and mosquitos: oh my! TED2013 will commence in just nine days, and the TED Blog is gearing up for our live, minute-by-minute, coverage. One thing we can’t wait to see: which speaker will bring an animal onstage with them? (Our money is on ornithologist Kees Moeliker.) Sometimes, speakers arrive with a live animal, other times ...

The TED team is eagerly watching our content partner conference, TEDMED, happening now in California. (Look for TEDMED video fresh from stage in the coming weeks!) TED's own Nafissa, is reporting from the conference; this morning, she caught a few minutes with TEDTalks favorite Charles Limb, who studies what creativity looks like in the brai...

TEDx is now 4 years old! This past Saturday, March 23, TEDx celebrated this milestone with a global birthday party, convened by TEDx organizers, volunteers and fans worldwide. There were cakes, candles, wishes and even a kite or two -- all paired with enough enthusiasm to last another four years and beyond. With 6,417 events in 149 countr...

Homaro Cantu and Ben Roche can only be described as the mad scientists of food. These two pioneer unique food delivery systems -- think maki rolls printed on flavored paper, a dessert disguised as nachos  and a bleeding veggie burger -- at their Chicago restaurants, Moto and iNG. At TED 2011, the pair spoke about their science-lab approach t...

Every week at TED’s New York office, one media team staffer shares 5 things on the web that intrigued, shocked or amused them. We call it: Previously on the Internet. Here are this week's finds, from Haley Hoffman, TED’s product team consultant. Let’s agree to call them InstaGrahams The online sweet shop Baking for Good has pioneered a w...

Marina Abramović (TED Talk: An art made of trust, vulnerability and connection) is talking about the role of humor in her life and work. Now, that’s not necessarily a topic you might expect to chat about with the grande dame of the performance art world. Her work is powerful, austere, often overwhelming … but funny? “People know my work and the...

There are a lot of great jobs at TED, but Colette Lynch and her Vancouver-based team might just have the best. They lead “food and beverage curation” for our conferences and, like our program curators, spend all year researching and prepping: sifting through food blogs, visiting farmers markets, meeting with culinary visionaries and, of cour...

Yo-yo champion BLACK does, in fact, wear a special costume -- all black, with a red sash. But he has not always been a superhero. In his very sweet talk from TED2013, BLACK reveals that as a young teenager he struggled with feelings of worthlessness -- and that it was dedicating himself to the yo-yo that pulled him through it. Again as an adul...

In her 20s, Meg Jay saw her first psychotherapy client, Alex, who was there to talk about her guy problems. Jay didn't take the sessions all too seriously at first. But then her supervisor gave her a wakeup call. While Jay said, "Sure she's dating down and sleeping with a knucklehead. But she's not gonna marry the guy." Her supervisor respon...

Photo: James Duncan Davidson Jennifer Pahlka is the founder and executive director of Code for America, an organization she describes as being like Peace Corps for geeks, "only instead of sending people to the third world, we send them to the wilds of City Hall." The fellows' mission, should they choose to accept it, is to show governm...