Archives for October 2008

Ganesha Stele, 11th century (Pala period), India, newly acquired by Portland Art MuseumRemember the Association of Art Museum Directors' objectless Objects Registry, created last June to disclose (to the public and potential claimants) new acquisitions by member institutions of "archaeological material and ancient art lacking complete provenance after November 1970"?It has, at … [Read more...] about Portland’s Incomplete-Provenance Stele: First Entry on AAMD’s Antiquities Registry

Jennifer Stockman, Guggenheim president and art-market player Carol Vogel's detailed revelations (in her "Arts & Leisure" piece for this Sunday's NY Times) about the wheeling-and-dealing leading up to next month's big Impressionist/modern and contemporary auctions make for some riveting reading. Her report is packed with juicy details, including information on the … [Read more...] about Conflicts of Interest: Museum Trustees Play the Market

New meaning for the Global Guggenheim? Frank Lloyd Wright's curves serve as backdrop in online trailer for a shoot-'em-up bank-conspiracy movie, coming to a theater near you.Is this any way to treat an art museum?Below are some moments from the online trailer (which you can view in full here) for "The International," a film opening in February, starring Clive Owen and Naomi … [Read more...] about Murder and Mayhem at the Guggenheim (Hollywood Style)

For sale at $50 million: the purported Pollock of the film, "Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock?"Who the "#$&%" needs Sotheby's or Christie's, when you've got Gallery Delisle?The six-month-old Toronto gallery, more accustomed to offering works by Canadian artists who sell in the four-figure range, next month will be offering the purported Jackson Pollock that an American … [Read more...] about Toronto Gallery Offers the “#$&%” Pollock for $50 Million

Memo to the Presidential Candidates:It's time to put the artists back into the National Endowment for the Arts.Specifically, it's time we put the culture wars of the 1990s behind us. We need to resume providing grants to the people who matter most to the our national cultural life---those who create the art. Like Christo's "The Gates" that finally got installed in Central Park … [Read more...] about Cultural Policy Memo to the New President: Revive Artist Fellowships

Picasso, "Arlequin," 1909, precipitously withdrawn from Sotheby's Impressionist/modern sale in New York At least the Dow went up 889 points yesterday.That may have softened the blow of yet another art-market confidence-killer, as chronicled in yesterday's NY Times by Carol Vogel: An important Cubist Picasso painting of a harlequin (above), which for 50 years had been owned by … [Read more...] about Withdrawn Picasso: Any Bailouts for the Art Market?

Farnworth House after the September 14 floodThe Farnsworth House Blog reports (here and here) that the Mies van der Rohe masterpiece in Plano, IL, flooded by severe rainstorms on Sept. 14, reopened for tours earlier this month. Original post-flood plans had called for it to be closed for the remainder of the 2008 season. Tours will now run on select days through Nov. 26. … [Read more...] about Flood-Damaged Farnsworth House Reopens for Tours (to benefit restoration)

Philippe de Montebello, addressing the press at his eponymous exhibition.There's no point quarreling with the organizing principle behind the Metropolitan Museum's The Philippe de Montebello Years, the tribute exhibition honoring its long-time director.Arranging by order of acquisition some 300 objects acquired on Philippe's watch by the museum's 17 curatorial departments may … [Read more...] about The Eye of Philippe de Montebello: Let’s Go to the Audio Tape

Steve Wynn's "Le Rêve," right, on the original catalogue cover from MoMA's landmark 2003 showHolland Cotter, whose art criticism I generally esteem, owns the front page of today's "Fine Arts" section in the NY Times, with reviews of both Acquavella's Picasso show (which I discussed here) and the Metropolitan Museum's "The Philippe de Montebello Years," which opens today (and … [Read more...] about Holland Cotter’s Bad-News Day: Off-Base Times Reviews of Philippe and Picasso Shows

Beneath the Brooklyn Bridge, one of the four Eliasson waterfalls at duskThe New York City government's number crunchers are at it again, trying to quantify the "economic impact" of a public art project whose chief value was not monetary but aesthetic and experiential---Olafur Eliasson's "Waterfalls." In announcing that "Waterfalls" had "an estimated economic impact of $69 … [Read more...] about “Waterfalls” Trickle-Down Theory: Did Eliasson Really Generate $69 Million for the City?

Robert Irwin's garden at the Getty Center last winter The very real dangers of fire and earthquake have always made the Getty Center a risky venue for masterpieces. This morning, for the first time that I can remember, the threat, temporarily, became frighteningly real: Andrew Blankstein, Ari Bloomekatz and Jia-Rui Chong of the LA Times report: Firefighters have … [Read more...] about Getty Closed Today Due to Nearby Blaze, Now Extinguished

"Ancient Egyptian Dog Collar," $85 at the Tut Show in PhiladelphiaHe's baa-a-a-ack!The controversial and sometimes downright tacky King Tut extravaganza is the zombie that refuses to die: The de Young museum, San Francisco, recently announced that the bells-and-whistles blockbuster will pack 'em in next year at the de Young Museum, San Francisco, from June 27, 2009 through Mar. … [Read more...] about Golden Boy to Golden Gate Park: King Tut to Visit San Francisco

November ARTnewsHow will the Global Guggenheim change under the directorship of Richard Armstrong, who replaces Tom Krens as director on Nov. 4?According to executive editor Robin Cembalest's piece for the November issue of ARTnews (now online):The vision now is of a kinder, gentler globalism, focused not so much on building multimillion-dollar megastructures by starchitects … [Read more...] about ARTnews on Armstrong-ing the Guggenheim

I'm not exactly sure how to deal with this: Posted Sunday on a general-interest news and blog site was an excerpt from an about-to-be-published book ostensibly dealing with a serious subject that I frequently blog about. But the only subject that this long excerpt concerns itself with is the allegedly lurid side of personal lives (in the past, if not the present) at a major … [Read more...] about Prurient Publication: Do We Care About the Sex Lives of Museum Staffers?

Steve Wynn's restored Picasso, "Le Rêve, at Acquavella Galleries, New York, with Steve Cohen's Picasso, "Femme Nu Couchée," on right  After I wrote harshly about museums' lending works to commercial gallery shows in general and to Acquavella's just-opened Picasso show in particular, the gallery's diplomatic director, Michael Findlay, graciously invited me to peruse the … [Read more...] about Acquavella Displays Wynn’s Restored “Le Rêve” and Two Picassos that Steve Cohen DID Buy