Category: visual

Toronto’s Nuit Blanche art festival is a unique event, and the people behind it are interesting characters, themselves, “shadowy figures… whose imprint on the dusk-to-dawn art prowl will be noticed everywhere.”

“Greek archaeologists have discovered two Roman-era sculptures built into a sunken ancient harbor wall on the Aegean Sea island of Kythnos. A statement from the Culture Ministry said Thursday that the stone torso of a man in armor and the head of a bearded man were found during an underwater survey in September at Mandraki, on western Kythnos.”

“Banks will fail, as we’ve been reminded a little too often lately. But their buildings can still go on to lead long and productive lives,” as is the case with the neoclassical home of Philadelphia’s new Chemical Heritage Foundation Museum. Peter “Saylor, who has become something of a museum doctor for Philadelphia’s dusty exhibit halls, has given the battered bank a glistening new interior that is so ethereal and restrained, it virtually dissolves into [architect John] McArthur’s granite walls.”

“Some artists are happy enough just having their work shown at the Whitney Museum of American Art, but 37-year-old Corin Hewitt is actually moving in. For three months starting Friday, visitors will be able to observe him working every Friday, Saturday and Sunday in the small gallery just off the Whitney’s lobby. There he has created his own universe, an environment that is part kitchen, part office, part garage and part garden.”

“Hong Kong’s top art show attracted more galleries this year — and none dropped out — a sign Asia’s art market can weather the financial slump, the organizer said. Andy Hei, antique-furniture dealer and organizer of the Hong Kong International Arts and Antiques Fair, said the region’s market saw worse during the 1998 Asian crisis and the 2003 SARS virus outbreak.”

“Fourteen stolen portrait miniatures were inadvertently sold in Christie’s King Street saleroom [in London] on 10 June, because their loss from a UK public gallery had not been publicised.”

“While the Shanghai Biennale… [is] looking at urban growth and migration and their social and cultural consequences, and the Yokohama Triennial has… [chosen] to highlight the performative time-based aspects of current art practice, the Singapore Biennale has opted for the theme of ‘Wonder’.”

“A Vancouver artist who has drawn on Neil Young and the Beastie Boys for inspiration has been handed this year’s $50,000 Sobey Art Award… Using video, photography, sculpture and text, [winning artist Tim Lee] inserts himself into his work — referencing and recreating pop cultural and historical icons such as Johann Sebastian Bach, Steve Martin and Public Enemy.”

“The D.C. Public Libraries have hired one of London’s busiest and most prominent young architects to design replacement buildings for two of the most distressed branches of its system… The choice of [David Adjaye], which came through a competitive process involving library officials and neighborhood representatives, is a remarkable statement of architectural ambition.”

“The Sotheby’s art auction house has repeatedly inflated prices by failing to make full disclosures when it has an ownership stake in some of the works it sells, according to a federal suit brought Wednesday.” The plaintiff is CNet founder Halsey Minor, who was sued by Sotheby’s for failure to pay for three paintings he had bid for in spring auctions.