The fire, caused by an electrical short-circuit, destroyed about 85% of its archive of 20m artefacts. Losses included Egyptian and Greco-Roman relics acquired by the Brazilian imperial family, a large dinosaur named Dinoprata, and invaluable records of Indigenous life and culture in pre-colonial times. - The Guardian
Heavy rains brought by climate change have caused serious damage to the 14th-century rammed-earth monasteries and temples of Lo Manthang in far northern Nepal. With the help of Western art conservators, Lobas have relearned traditional crafts and restored wall paintings, statues and even roofs. - BBC
Dogged by debt, over-optimistic financial forecasting, leadership turnover and overreliance on a small group of funders, the museum patched holes by creating new ones. - Seattle Times
"Museums have historically maintained strict, narrow ranges of temperatures and relative humidity since the British Museum created the standards around 100 years ago. New research and international art conservation guidelines suggest that a wider range of climate controls can be safe for artwork (while cutting) energy use." - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)
"Dr. Carina Popovici, a specialist in authenticating artwork, said she applied cutting-edge artificial intelligence technology to pictures advertised on the online platform and was shocked to discover that many had a 'high probability' of being 'not authentic'." One fake Monet was being offered for $599,000. - The Guardian
Around 50 people sounded the alarm to the institution after coming across an imitation website purporting to sell tickets to see Van Gogh’s greatest works—but was actually harvesting bank details. - The Art Newspaper
Kirsha Kaechele's installation Ladies Lounge at the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) in Tasmania will be made into an actual ladies' lounge with the addition of a (luxurious) toilet. A church will be added as well; both churches and washrooms are exempt from anti-discrimination regulations. - BBC
These aren't climate-protesting art vandals, exactly; they're anti-inequality and agriculture protesters from the group Riposte Alimentaire (Food Counterattack). They threw orange-colored clay powder around the Hall of Mirrors to call for "universal, democratic and sustainable food." - Artnet
In the past year or so, the British Museum has been wrestling—often in public, and often to its considerable embarrassment—with what might be characterized as the twin legacies of Townley and Elgin. - The New Yorker
Plenty of art today shows us how terrible the world is, and we eat it up. Maurizio Cattelan knows this, and will gladly take the opportunity to play sadist. Case in point: - ARTnews
The stunt at the Pompidou Center Metz was organized by performance artist Deborah de Robertis (the one who was arrested in 2018 for getting naked at the Lourdes pilgrimage site). Ironically, the Metz show includes a photo of de Robertis displaying her own vulva under the one painted by Courbet. - France 24
"(The Madrid museum) said in a statement the work, titled Ecce Homo (Latin for 'Behold the Man') by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio will go on display from May 27 until October as a special one-piece exhibition following an agreement with its new owner, who has not been identified." - AP
Nicholson Baker is a professional writer who has become an amateur artist. It is hard to get good at one art form, harder still to make a living from it and hardest of all to get good at another. - The Wall Street Journal
What is most striking is the symbolic incorporation of the statue into the wider messaging of the protest... The students have dressed up Washington like the school mascot, adding new political symbols to existing ones. - Washington Post
