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The Metropolitan Museum's Recognition for Its Controversial Benefactor During his visit last month to New York, Italian Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli not only said he had reached an antiquities repatriation agreement with Princeton University (which Princeton still says has not been finalized), but also, as I then reported, "enigmatically mentioned that he hopes for … [Read more...] about Has Italy Struck an Agreement with Shelby White?

Object of Contention: "Victorious Youth," Greek, 300 - 100 B.C., J. Paul Getty Museum After a quiet period, The Great Repatriator is on the warpath against the J. Paul Getty Museum again. The Associated Press has the story here. But a much more illuminating account comes from ANSA, the Italian news agency, which reports: [Italian Culture Minister] Francesco Rutelli reiterated a … [Read more...] about Italy’s Rutelli Threatens Getty With Sanctions

Bob Shannon, back in the day Be still, my Motown soul! At last, I've got a radio station to act as the perfect antidote to too much classical seriousness: WCBS-FM is coming back with its oldies format (and with the great Bob Shannon (above) as one of its deejays)! I wrote about the temporary demise of that great New York City cultural resource here. And my daughter will be … [Read more...] about Broadcast Bozos, Repentant: Oldies Return to NYC!

Installation View of Damien Hirst's "The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living," Kunsthaus Bregenz Last October in the NY Times, Carol Vogel wrote this about Damien Hirst's "replacement" shark, owned by megacollector Steve Cohen: Rumors have circulated in the art world that Mr. Cohen has promised the work ["The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind … [Read more...] about Shark Alert at the Met!

Were you sorry you didn't grill NY Times culture editor Sam Sifton last time he opened himself up to online questions? Here's you second chance! … [Read more...] about Sam Sifts Through More NY Times Readers’ Questions

In what seems like a breach of faith with Dutch contemporary artists, the Netherlands Institute for Cultural Heritage, a government agency, will gradually sell on eBay some 1,000 works, many of which were previously purchased for the national art collection as part of the government's program for subsidizing the output of professional artists. Another 300 works, considered of … [Read more...] about The Netherlands Dumps Government-Subsidized Art

Robie House during exterior restoration. Collection of Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust In an article about the restoration of Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater that I wrote for the Wall Street Journal four years ago, I mentioned that its gift shop was selling pricey jewelry "containing authentic construction debris" from the iconic Mill Run, PA, house. Now Wright's … [Read more...] about Own a Robie House Brick; Sleep in a Wright Prefab

Second House, 2003. Interior view. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. © Richard Prince The Guggenheim has been having a bizarrely off-kilter year: First, the theft of a Goya from a truck that was transporting it from the Toledo Museum in Ohio to the Guggenheim's blockbuster Spanish paintings show. The painting was subsequently recovered, but neither the name of the shipper nor any … [Read more...] about Lightning Devastates Guggenheim-Acquired “Second House” by Richard Prince

The Met's New Acquisition, ex-Albright Knox The Metropolitan Museum paid a stiff price to reclaim one of the Albright-Knox Gallery's deaccessions for the public domain. Exceeded in price only by "Artemis and the Stag" at the Buffalo museum's antiquities sell-off at Sotheby's on June 7 was the Elamite (southeastern Iran) copper figure of a horned hero (above), ca. 3000-2800 … [Read more...] about Met Pays the Ransom for an Albright-Knox Antiquity

Gerhard Richter's Design for South Transept Window of Cologne Cathedral During my recent Rhine journey, I saw workers behind a scrim, completing work on a monumental new Gerhard Richter south transept window, replacing one that had been destroyed during World War II. The new window is scheduled to be unveiled to the public on Aug. 25. According to our tour guide, the window … [Read more...] about Fine on the Rhine: Richter’s Cologne Cathedral Window Unveiled Next Month

Born on the Third of July: Another Arts Blogger Not to be undone by the NY Times' arrhythmic ArtsBeat, the Philadelphia Inquirer yesterday launched ArtsWatch, but this one appears to be a one-man band: Its sole pundit is veteran culture writer Peter Dobrin (above), whose specialty is classical music (subject of his first two posts). The blog does bill itself as "who's making … [Read more...] about New Newspaper Blog: Philly’s “ArtsWatch”

Digital Fly-Through of the New Acropolis Museum I saw the above video four years ago in New York, when it was presented by the Greek Culture Ministry as part of a larger exhibition on Athens' planned New Acropolis Museum. (For more on that exhibition, go here and click on "03.06.03.) Since then, much progress has been made. Kathimerini, Greece's English-language newspaper, … [Read more...] about Not a Good Time to Visit the Acropolis: Marbles Taken Off View

Last week, in a post about a new organization to train curators for museum directorships, I speculated that one of that group's advisors, the Metropolitan Museum's veteran director Philippe de Montebello, might worried about who will be chosen as his own successor. In that connection, I've learned from a highly place Met source that each year the museum's chairman, James … [Read more...] about Who Should Succeed Philippe at the Met? The Chairman’s Got a Little List

Thomas Eakins, "Portrait of Professor William S. Forbes," 1905 Another story I missed while I was in Europe was the sale of the third and last remaining Thomas Eakins (above) from Thomas Jefferson University's collection. The Philadelphia Inquirer story had no information about the buyer, so I contacted the usual suspect, Alice Walton's voracious Crystal Bridges Museum of … [Read more...] about Eakins and “Fakins”: Thomas Jefferson University’s Rehang

Okay, I lied. The press release on the new Center for Curatorial Leadership, designed to prepare curators to assume museum directorships, seemed significant enough to force me to break my self-imposed, summer-fun gag order. CCL is funded by former MoMA president Agnes Gund and directed by former Brooklyn Museum European paintings chair Elizabeth Easton. The expenses-paid (by … [Read more...] about New Directorial Training Program to Give Curators Administrative Acumen