"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
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
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
"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
"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
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
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
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
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
"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
"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)
The legacy of the heist is always apparent to museum visitors who, decades later, still confront vacant frames on the gallery walls where paintings once hung. - The New York Times
"The artist, John Hock, said he thought it was a theft and reported it to the Chisago County Sheriff's Office.” (The Franconia Sculpture Park, unsurprisingly, has a different story.) - Minnesota Public Radio
Actually, that’s spelled Everywoman, a sculpture that will adorn London’s public art playground. The deputy mayor: "The sculpture prize has entertained and brought out the art critic in everybody for 25 years, and I have no doubt these two very different pieces will continue that fine tradition." - The Guardian (UK)
One curator said, "This surging interest and recognition is in large part because of the incredible force of Takaezu’s extended network so deeply committed to her and her legacy,” and another said, "She knew she was ahead of her time.” Now her time seems to have arrived. - The New York Times
