The American Museum of Natural History will close two major halls exhibiting Native American objects, its leaders said on Friday, in a dramatic response to new federal regulations that require museums to obtain consent from tribes before displaying or performing research on cultural items. - The New York Times
"Under the (three-year) deal, 17 objects from the V&A and 15 from the British Museum will go on show later this year at the Manhyia Palace Museum in Kumasi, the capital of Asante region. Many of the items have not been seen in Ghana for 150 years." - The Guardian
"Portrait of Fräulein Lieser belonged to a Jewish family in Austria and was last seen in public in 1925. Its fate after that is unclear but the family of the current owners have had it since the 1960s. (One) auction house estimates the painting's value at more than $54 million." - BBC
Leading digital artists have claimed that some of the most popular commercial immersive experiences, particularly those based on the work of deceased artists, such as Van Gogh and Dalí, are a money grab that provide little reward to visitors beyond Instagrammable moments. - The Guardian
The drastic phase of the pandemic, with its restrictions, may have receded. But the landscape left in its wake is a panorama of compounding crises — and for artists, like everyone else, a period of high uncertainty and anxiety with the U.S. election looming. - The New York Times
"'Kathmandu valley was an open museum,' says Rohit Ranjitkar, director of the Kathmandu Valley Preservation Trust. 'There were centuries-old treasures. I think local people did not value it or there was less awareness. So many things were knowingly or unknowingly gifted or thrown out or sold by local people.'" - The Guardian
"The workers had allegedly provided potential visitors with insider information on how to get limited tickets to the exhibition. One employee even allegedly embezzled a box of (van Gogh-style) Pokémon cards produced for the show." (Those cards were withdrawn after people literally rioted to get them.) - ARTnews
News that Wanda Nanibush, the first Canadian and Indigenous art curator at the AGO, was leaving the institution shocked the Canadian art world. The news was linked to a leaked letter accusing her of “posting inflammatory, inaccurate rants against Israel”. - The Art Newspaper
More than 4,000 items were destroyed and only about 150 pieces survived in the blaze that broke out early Sunday morning. Abkhazia broke away from the Republic of Georgia during the post-Soviet civil war of 1992-93 and is propped up by Russia, which maintains thousands of troops there. - CNN
Architecture has been hit by a new sobriety. Tradition, apparently, is back. The reaction against ultramodern architecture arrived slowly at first, but accelerated with the financial crash of 2008, as the world economy and many political systems became increasingly unsteady. - Aeon
"Created between 1989 and 1996, Mary Miss's Greenwood Pond: Double Site is one of the very few environmental installations in the collection of any American museum." It has since deteriorated so badly that repairing it would cost $27 million, which the museum does not have. - The New York Times
The museum simply used me to avoid the scandal that would result if the public learned that many works said to be by Hopper and thus—if authentic—willed to the museum, were making their way not to the museum but to the market. - New Criterion
DMAC says dismantling is cheaper than repairing. Greenwood Pond: Double Site "is considered to be the first urban wetland project in the country. Its imminent demolition has angered landscape architecture advocates and upset Miss." - The New York Times
"The policy, announced on January 3, allowed Alaska Native visitors to self-identity at the museum’s ticket counter; no proof of tribal enrollment was required to receive complementary admission." A non-Native Anchorage resident claimed discrimination. - ARTnews
The trail of evidence sounds strong. "Italy’s art theft police that they believe that the painting reported stolen from the castle in Piedmont and the painting Mr. Sgarbi exhibited are one and the same." There's a former friend, a theft, a restorer ... and a torch. - The New York Times
