Category: visual

A man has been arrested trying to steal silver from the Hermitage. “An unknown man broke a glass showcase in the Hermitage’s applied arts hall to steal a 19th-century silver chalice, setting off an alarm. The alarm went off, and the Hermitage’s security service detained the offender.”

Boston’s Insitute for Contemporary Art is the first new Boston museum in 100 years. “Conceived as a machine for looking — and, at the same time, and loftily enough, as a place for thinking about the idea of looking — the building reflects the architects’ interest in exploring seemingly every intersection new museums have to steer through these days.”

James Wood: “I’m not looking to make business decisions first. It’s really starting with the impact of the works of art–through conservation, through research, through grants. We have these different areas, but no matter how much money you’ve got, it depends on focus whether you make good use of the money. My focus is really starting with the work of art itself.”

“Culture Minister Giorgos Voulgarakis and museum director Michael Brand said they had ‘reached an agreement in principle on the return’ of a gold wreath and a marble bust. A formal agreement will be signed soon, they said in a joint announcement.”

“When artistic director Michael Tilson Thomas raises his baton to inaugurate the New World Symphony’s $200 million new home in Miami Beach, it will be within a diminutive, Frank Gehry-designed concert hall whose versatility and Internet outreach could resuscitate a languishing concert form.”

As Boston’s new Institute of Contemporary Art building was unveiled to the public, “What people were saying was that they couldn’t believe a building so audacious, so venturesome, could be built in — of all places — Boston. They were asking whether the ICA marked a watershed in the history of local architectural taste. Boston has been widely known, for a generation or more, as a conservative town architecturally, despite its liberal politics. To understand why, you have to know some history.” Robert Campbell explains.

“After nearly a year of negotiations, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles has agreed in principle to return a rare fourth-century B.C. gold funerary wreath to Greece that cultural officials there contend was illegally removed from Greek soil, an expert briefed on the talks said today.”

“Public art projects are usually intended to beautify. But artwork commissioned this summer by the city of Cambridge, Mass., has a more utilitarian goal: reducing traffic speeds at a busy intersection.”

“Seventy years after the Nazis stole their property, a new wave of Jewish families is winning back valuable artefacts in Germany and Austria. What was once a trickle of successful claims has become a flood. But now there is a backlash. German politicians and museum directors are expressing fears about the break-up of key collections and, after years of recognising the moral rights of claimants, are questioning the motives of those pursuing the claims.”

“Unlike London, where the major museums are setting their exhibition clocks to Frieze Art Fair time, or New York, where the art machine is big enough to swallow almost any art fair whole, Miami offers what might be called a level playing field for different viewing circumstances: i.e., fairs, museums, the private collector/alternative spaces and a few other ventures. All contribute equally to the flow of information.”