Arts & Life

Update at 9:05 p.m. ET Michelle Obama's Dress

NBC News is reporting that the first lady is wearing a custom Jason Wu ruby-colored chiffon and velvet gown, Jimmy Choo shoes and a ring by Kimberly McDonald to the Commander in Chief Ball. The White House said that the outfit and accompanying accessories will go to the National Archives at the end of the inaugural events.

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Those who don’t go beyond the first floor of the McColl Center for Visual art might just think it’s a gallery. But the top floors hold the real machinery of the organization - the artist-in-residence studios.

The McColl hosts the city’s only artist-in-residence program.

The Center provides artists with studio space, art materials, a stipend, and housing for its residents that are increasingly moving out of the studio and into the community.

In his new book, The Double V: How Wars, Protest and Harry Truman Desegregated America's Military, author Rawn James Jr. argues that if one wants to understand the story of race in the United States, one must understand the history of African-Americans in the country's military. Since the country was founded, he tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies, the military "has continually been forced to confront what it means to segregate individuals according to race."

Eric Weiner's latest book is Man Seeks God: My Flirtations with the Divine.