Category: visual

“It seemed like a good idea at the time. Bringing hundreds of Australian artists together in [an inland, non-state-capital] city for a large arts festival could turbo-charge Ballarat’s creative industries, and bring thousands of tourists to the city.” The event did take place, ending in November, but many artists and vendors haven’t been paid, and the organizers owe creditors about ten times the assets on hand. – The Guardian

“A physical form of prayer and symbol of protection, a daily exercise, and a moment of intense concentration and meditation, drawing kolam is an important household ritual that has a lot more to it than may first meet the eye. Two very different women living in Chennai explain their shared passion for kolam, and their involvement in the local kolam competition.” (video) – Yahoo! (BBC)

Completed in 1962, the year after Saarinen died, the Flight Center was considered a triumph of architecture and engineering. But it proved impractical as planes got bigger and airport security tighter. It was abandoned in 2001 and robbed of some of its autonomy a few years later, when JetBlue built a large new terminal behind it. – Architectural Record

“Bulldozers are already scraping clear millions of tonnes of earth in Chinchero, a picturesque Inca town about 3,800 metres above sea level that is the gateway to the Sacred Valley.” Says one Peruvian art historian, “This is a built landscape; there are terraces and routes which were designed by the Incas. Putting an airport here would destroy it.'” – The Guardian

Sold for $91.1 million, “Rabbit, a stainless steel casting of an inflatable rabbit, was the star of [Christie’s] spring sale and overtook the previous record set by British painter David Hockney’s Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), which sold last November at Christie’s for $90.3 million.” – Yahoo! (AFP)

“The moves reflect the growing outrage over the role the Sacklers may have played in the opioid crisis, as well as an energized activist movement that is starting to force museums to reckon with where some of their money comes from.” – The New York Times

Linda Yablonsky: “Considerate” and “pleasant” are not words I ever expected to apply to a show that carries outrage and upset in its historical baggage. With works by 75 participants, this biennial is an airy installation of refined art as free of bombast as it is of new ideas. It doesn’t preen. It doesn’t strut. Strangely, for an exhibition that aligns with the politics of resistance, it doesn’t ruffle many feathers, either.” – The Art Newspaper

The project was commissioned by conservationist Richard Leakey, whose fossil discoveries have helped reveal how humankind has evolved. “The museum — titled ‘ngaren’ — will be the first center of its kind to present research, discovery, and exploration of more than two million years of human history and the origins of our universe from evolution, biodiversity, and overpopulation, to war, disease, and climate change.” – DesignBoom

Artist Christoph Büchel managed to get possession of the actual fishing boat in which hundreds of migrants drowned while trying to get from Libya to Italy in 2015 — and he entered it as is, with no identifying text, in this year’s Biennale as an artwork titled Barca nostra (Our Boat). Reactions to the piece have been strong, ranging from somber admiration to appalled denunciation. – The Art Newspaper

As if there weren’t enough issues with the damn thing already. As Christopher Knight writes, you could hang paintings on wires coming down from a high rail. (Bad idea in an earthquake zone.) Or you could drill holes in the wall, which is loud, expensive, and weakens the concrete. And LACMA want to rotate the collection constantly, so there would be a lot of rehanging. What were these people thinking? – Los Angeles Times