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The San Diego Museum Is Selling Buildings. What About The Art?

The sale of the downtown facility will dramatically alter perceptions of the museum’s long-standing binational mandate, aimed at artists and audiences in the border area of San Diego and Tijuana. Closure also raises difficult questions about the fate of several works of art in the permanent collection. - Los Angeles Times

One Of America’s Leading Public Art Programs, Mural Arts Philadelphia, May Lose $1 Million A Year In City Funding

"The long-running arts organization, which specializes in project-based community programming, currently has more than $3.68 million in funding for the year. However, (Mayor Cherelle Parker's) new financial plan could reduce the total to $2.68 million per year for the next five years." - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)

What Does It Mean To Be An Artist In The Era Of Everyone-Has-A-Camera-At-All-Times?

How much skill does it actually take to be a photographer? Is photography really and truly an art? These questions about photography  – what it is, what it does – have been with us since the first photographic images were produced in the early 19th century. - The Easel

For The First Time In 450 Years, Eight Panels Of Piero Della Francesca’s Augustinian Altarpiece Are Reunited

"Museums have tried and failed in the past to assemble the (surviving) eight panels, spread among five museums in Europe and the United States, of the original 30-piece polyptych." The paintings are currently being exhibited at the Poldi Pezzoli in Milan. - AP

Three Rubens Works, Allegedly Looted By Nazis, Must Remain At London Museum

"A trio of paintings by Peter Paul Rubens will remain with their current owner, the Courtauld Gallery in London, the UK Parliament’s spoliation advisory panel ruled. … The panel, which determines the rightful ownership of contested artworks, rejected three separate claims for the Rubens works." - ARTnews

Banksy Tree Mural Defaced With White Paint Days After It Appeared

Despite being surrounded by a protective metal fence, white paint was thrown onto the artwork and discovered by local residents on the morning of March 20. - ARTnews

The Artworld Hoax That Fooled Virginia Woolf

For most of their adult lives, the two women employed an elaborate hoax in which Hepworth’s paintings were exhibited and sold under Preece’s name. Their trick was particularly successful in the 1920s and ’30s, when they fooled not only Woolf and Bell, but other major art-world figures. - Hyperallergic

The 18th-Century Engineers Who Saved Michelangelo’s Dome At St. Peter’s From Collapsing

"When Pope Benedict XIV sent a team of three mathematicians to inspect the dome in 1742, they found, as Benedict suspected they might, a cataclysm waiting to happen." They worked out calculations to get the dome in balance, and, in the process, invented modern engineering. - The American Scholar

Reconstruction Of Notre-Dame In Paris Is Headed Toward Conclusion

"The iconic medieval monument immortalized in history, film and literature has been gradually rebuilt over the past five years, through challenges that have included delays during the pandemic and the loss of the project’s leader. … Here is a timeline of events in the restoration." - AP

New Zealand’s Museums Are In Crisis

What the research revealed was an overworked workforce overly reliant on volunteers, snowballing costs and shrinking funding. Small museums and galleries in the provinces and rural communities are barely being propped up by community goodwill. - The Big Idea

Warhol Museum Director To Step Down

Patrick Moore joined the Warhol Museum as the director of development in 2011, and assumed other leading administrative roles at the museum before being appointed director in 2017. - Hyperallergic

Report: Many Of World’s Biggest Museums Have Recovered To Pre-COVID Visitor Numbers

The number of people visiting the most-visited 100 museums fell from 230 million in 2019 to just 54m in 2020. Although the total number of visitors to the top 100 museums was 176 million in 2023, our survey shows that many of the world’s largest museums are now close to their 2019 visitor numbers. - Art Newspaper

British Museum Had Record Number Of Visitors In 2023

Figures showed the South Kensington attraction had its best-ever year, with a 22% increase in visitors to 5,688,786. The most-visited outdoor attraction was Windsor Great Park, which is managed by the Crown Estate, with 5,487,856 visitors, which was a 3% decline on 2022 figures. - BBC

Putin Has Sent His FSB To Go After Russian Artists

"The (secret police) have reportedly searched at least 30 artists’ homes and studios across at least eight cities. … Among those targeted were members of feminist punk collective Pussy Riot, members of the art activist project Party of the Dead, Yav Art Group members, and renowned conceptual artist Anatoly Osmolovsky." - Artnet

Even 34 Years Later, Tips Still Come In About The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Robbery

"About 20 tips (were) reported to the museum over the past year from people who thought they saw one of the two most recognizable stolen paintings, (Rembrandt's) “The Storm” or Vermeer’s “The Concert,” in homes across the country that were staged for ... real estate listings." - The Boston Globe (MSN)

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