Category: visual

Roberta Smith says that the overwhelming success of London’s Tate Modern ought to give New Yorkers, who ponied up close to a billion dollars to build the new Museum of Modern Art, pause. “That MoMA could have spent so much money on a design that seems so unaccommodating — and already feels too small — for its growing audience is a travesty… The lessons of Tate Modern challenge a lot of conventional wisdom, at least that expressed in many American museums these days. Most important, Tate Modern’s huge building proves that being big is not the same as being corporate: it is possible to have a large institution feel personal to its visitors.”

New York’s Lincoln Center complex has tapped husband-and-wife team Billie Tsien and Tod Williams to design the new indoor atrium that officials hope will lead to higher ticket sales and the emergence of the center as a public gathering space. “Their early ideas for the atrium include a stone platform that could serve both as a bench and as a stage for free performances by Juilliard students. They want to incorporate some of Lincoln Center’s signature materials, like bronze detailing and travertine.”

Thieves have been pillaging art from Italy’s churches. “The thieves have turned to plundering churches for religious artefacts since a clampdown on the pillaging of ancient sites. Accords reached with many international museums have seen the return to Italy of illegally exported antiquities and thieves are looking elsewhere to find items to sell to collectors.”

A former curator at Frederickton’s Beaverbrook Gallery surprised a court hearing when he alleged that gallery records had been tampered with. The hearing is to determine ownership of the gallery’s collection. “Among the paintings in dispute are J.M.W. Turner’s Fountain of Indolence, estimated to be worth as much as $25 million, and Hotel Bedroom by Lucien Freud, which could be worth as much as $8 million.”

“Apparently, even a tycoon like Ronald Lauder has to make choices sometimes. Four months ago, Mr. Lauder paid a reported $135 million to bring Gustav Klimt’s ‘Adele Bloch-Bauer I’ (1907) to the Neue Galerie, the museum of German and Austrian art he founded. Now, the museum is selling three works by Egon Schiele at Christie’s on November 8 to help defray the cost.”

“A bullring that was the only building ever designed by Pablo Picasso may be built in the artist’s home town, a close friend of the Spanish artist said last week. … Malaga-born Picasso had wanted the bullring built in Madrid, but that idea was vetoed by military dictator Francisco Franco, who was in power at the time. Picasso died in 1973; Franco, in 1975.”

“The museum won its struggle to have the city approve a tower designed by the architect Renzo Piano. But after weighing the pros and cons, those familiar with the process say, the Whitney has determined that the Piano project may not get the museum sufficient additional space for the money. The museum has instead set its sights on a location downtown at the entrance to the High Line, an abandoned elevated railway that is to become a landscaped esplanade.”

“Next Tuesday, construction work begins on the new Centre Pompidou-Metz, designed by the Japanese architect Shigeru Ban. Situated around 200 miles east of Paris and close to the borders of Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg, the city of Metz will be graced with the Pompidou’s first outpost and another extraordinary architectural emblem.”

“High-rent shows, which even the Met is now organizing, perniciously up the ante for museum loans everywhere. These days, loan shows increasingly come not only with reasonable costs but also with kickbacks.”

“Saatchi, who helped make international stars of British artists Tracey Emin and Damien Hirst, e-mailed Catriona Millar several months ago after viewing her website. He asked permission to upload images of eight paintings to his own website, which led to six of them being sold within weeks.”