“Because of sexually explicit content” in the exhibition “Pop Life,” from the Tate Modern, “visitors who wish to enter two of the exhibit halls will be asked to show identification to prove that they are over 18. The gallery has restricted parts of exhibits in the past but officials who were questioned Wednesday could not remember entire rooms being blocked off.”
Category: visual
EU Rules For Dali Family, Against Spain In Royalties Case
Dali “left all of his intellectual property rights to the Spanish government when he died in 1989,” so “[a] group set up to collect royalties for Spain sued its French counterpart in 2005 to reclaim some resale royalties paid to Dali’s heirs” for sales of his paintings in France. The European Court of Justice sided with France.
400-Year-Old Graffiti (Occult Designs, No Less) In The Tower Of London
“Hew Draper was a 16th-century Bristol innkeeper who got sent to the Tower for attempted sorcery. He claimed that although he had been interested in magic, he had burnt all his magical books – but his engravings, cut into the very stone of the Salt Tower, reveal he knew plenty about the occult.”
Deal: De Young Museum Will Keep Most Of Its Oceanic Art
But 29 pieces “will be sold to help settle a cross-country legal drama that involved sweeping philanthropy, a bitter internecine spat over money, and a $25 million loan from Sotheby’s that helped amass what is considered the world’s most important private collection of tribal objects from Papua New Guinea.”
MIT, Frank Gehry Settle 2007 Suit Over University Building
“Among the alleged problems: leaks throughout the building, mold growing on its brick exterior, and poor drainage in the center’s amphitheater.” Last month, “the MIT student newspaper … quietly reported that the university has settled its suit against Gehry and the builders of the Stata Center.”
Stripped Bare, The Guggenheim Is A Revelation
“I’ve always considered the Guggenheim a tug of war between architecture and whatever was on display, with the latter often losing. But being in the freshly painted interior–not stark white, which Wright hated, but a kind of soft ivory–reminded me what a remarkable gift he left us.”
Experts Tussle Over ‘Recently Discovered’ Degas Casts
“[A] controversy is swirling among Degas experts the world over about 74 ‘recently discovered’ plaster casts of his sculptures that were purportedly made during his lifetime,” notably “a plaster cast of the Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans (Little Dancer Aged 14).” The unconvinced “have started mobilizing in opposition.”
Italian Renaissance Scholar: Met Canvas Is A Michelangelo
Everett Fahy, “who retired in March as John Pope-Hennessy Chairman of European Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,” says “that Saint John the Baptist Bearing Witness, a painting that was attributed to ‘the close circle of Francesco Granacci’ when the museum acquired it in 1970, is actually by Granacci’s good friend Michelangelo.”
Banksy Wants You To Know That He’s Serious
“Banksy, the pseudonymous British street artist, has built his reputation on stunts – like inserting his own work among the masters’ in museums – that taunted the market in which his pieces sold for millions. But with his latest project, the documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop, he is laboring to convince audiences that he’s playing it straight.”
They Found The Gardner’s Stolen Paintings! (Mr. Burns Did It)
In last weekend’s episode of The Simpsons, “Homer, Carl and Lenny were loudly partying down in billionaire misanthrope Burns’ mansion – long story – and Burns called the cops. But when Springfield’s finest arrived,” they recognized Vermeer’s The Concert and several other canvases stolen from Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990. (Click through for Mr. Burns’s self-justification.)