Category: visual

In 1963, Modernist architect Paul Rudolph had such a success with his Art and Architecture building at Yale that no less than Time magazine pronounced him a boy wonder of his profession. Within a couple of decades, his style was considered outmoded; his buildings, deemed obsolete due to the requirements of ever-advancing technology, began succumbing to the wrecking ball. Is it time for a museum retrospective to revive Rudolph’s reputation?

“The saga of Donald Fisher’s quest to build a museum in the Presidio took quite a turn last week: Park officials said they want the museum to be reduced in size and moved a block from Fisher’s desired site, and the Gap founder indicated he’s willing to give it a try. … Ten of our most creative architectural firms are displaying their own schemes for the Contemporary Art Museum at the Presidio that the Fisher family wants to build and endow.”

Art Basel Miami Beach wasn’t the scene this year that it was in the past, and sales were down. But a strange thing happened: People found themselves paying attention to the art.

“The long-rumoured appointment of Marc Mayer as director of Ottawa’s National Gallery of Canada has been officially approved by the Department of Heritage and the Prime Minister’s Office, according to NGC board member Donald Sobey.”

Upstairs at Madame Tussauds New York, “above the waxy mugs of Picasso and Sinatra, is a gruesome human body shop of sorts, a grisly place where unmouthed teeth and disembodied heads are strewn across the tables and the floor. It is Madame Tussauds’ repair room, the E.R. for the tallow set: the waxed immortals on display downstairs are brought here for their tuneups after being ravaged by the crowds.”

“A group of Spanish architects and art world types has savagely denounced the continuing work to complete Gaudí’s religious masterpiece the Sagrada Familia. Should work on this vast church – often mistaken, with good reason, for Barcelona’s cathedral – have been carried on, after his death in 1926 left it unfinished? The grumpy intellectuals say no. Gaudí, they complain, is being banalised in the name of tourism.”

“Two American museums designed by one world-famous architect have evoked two very different reactions from visitors and critics alike. The Denver Art Museum and San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum were both designed by Daniel Libeskind. … Both Libeskind museums are seen as architectural standouts. But in buildings designed to showcase art, can form impede function?”

The kid has been making collages that incorporate Hiost images. He sells them for £65 on the internet. Now Hirst has “reportedly demanded that Cartrain not only remove the works from sale but ‘deliver up’ originals, along with any profit made on those sold, or face legal action.”

UK arts enthusiasts have until Dec. 31 to secure the first £50 million (about $74 million) — enough to buy Diana and Actaeon. With less than a month to go in the worst economic climate in years, the museums say they are nonetheless cautiously optimistic.

“Imagine the museum as a gravely ill relative deeply loved by an enormous squabbling family. Does that family really want to come together for the first time at the funeral, especially knowing that the patient could, with cooler heads, have been saved? No.”