Category: visual

“The American economy is in the dumpster. Disposable income is harder to find than Maple Leafs tickets. But the bad news simply could not be better for the ninth annual Toronto International Art Fair… The really good news for the 100 or so galleries at TIAF comes, surprisingly enough, from signs of a troubled economy. Art has emerged as an even more golden commodity than, er, gold.”

“The Corcoran Gallery of Art plans to sell 10 paintings from its permanent collection at a public auction in December as a first step toward refining the museum’s focus and providing funds for purchasing future works. The sale is an extremely rare move for a Washington museum, but not surprising for the Corcoran, which has grappled with its direction and finances for several years.”

The critics aren’t pulling any punches with the controversial redesign of 2 Columbus Circle in New York. “This is not the bold architectural statement that might have justified the destruction of an important piece of New York history. Poorly detailed and lacking in confidence, the project is a victory only for people who favor the safe and inoffensive and have always been squeamish about the frictions that give this city its vitality.”

“One of the most important works by artist Pablo Picasso is to be sold at auction in New York. Picasso’s Arlequin was last seen in public 45 years ago and is expected to fetch over $30m (£16.3m) when it goes under the hammer in November.”

Notorious forger John Myatt reveals the secret to creating a convincing fake masterpiece: “You ‘hypnotise’ the original painting, look at the canvas, the thickness of the paint, the way it’s presented. The rule applies to anyone from Rembrandt to Picasso, just learn to look at the original, stand in front of it… Then I’ve got into my car with my mental file of it in my head, so I can get home and start working on it.”

“A well-known British artist is exhibiting collage portraits of President Bush and Paris Hilton he made out of porn magazine images.” (And who bought the Paris collage? None other than Damien Hirst.)

The crystal-laden fixture, dating back to the opera house’s opening in 1857, is blazing once again following a 13-month, $1.7 million project to restore its original appearance.

Mark Feeney has a contrary take on the legendary portrait photographer:
“Karsh’s very real if amorphous achievement belongs not to the world of art but celebrity. He wasn’t so much a photographer as a brand name. Karsh of Ottawa was a label on a conspicuously worn luxury good.”

“Three weeks after Damien Hirst’s £111.5 million ($206 million) auction at Sotheby’s, the artist will open a shop next door to the auction house in London.”

“If you put aside the city’s early grounding in Barbizon painting, it’s hard to say why Boston should have been such fertile ground for impressionism. But early critics were quick to make links between the ‘pure eye’ of Monet and a term coined by Ralph Waldo Emerson: the ‘transparent eyeball’.”