Category: visual

A few years ago Washington DC got uglier, littered with hideous concrete barriers put in place to protect buildings from terrorist attack. But new designs incorporating security are proving that security can be attractive. “Ingeniously, the architects combined benches with that tired staple of curbside security, the heavy flower pot, to make the basic, repeating unit of their design. Measuring about 9 feet long by 4 feet wide by 3 1/2 feet high, this clean-lined unit looks very solid. Yet it is unquestionably attractive.”

“Some of the oldest highways in Britain, built over 5,000 years ago to guide Bronze Age man across the treacherous wetlands of the Somerset Levels, have been completely destroyed by modern agriculture.”

“Last week the long-running debate contrasting Jack Vettriano’s lack of critical acclaim with his public popularity was reignited by the revelation that The Singing Butler was, in fact, inspired by a £16.99 artists’ reference manual. Long derided by critics, Vettriano has fought artistic battles before. The art establishment is distinctly sniffy about his work. Despite his huge popular appeal, no national gallery shows his paintings. Reference works either ignore him or grant passing mention, but there is a voracious public appetite for both his romantic early paintings and later works which focus more on the highly charged sexual atmosphere of human relationships.”

The Freedom Center at the site of the World Trade Center was a controversial project from the start. But the way New York Governor George Pataki killed it arbitrarily has some people wondering if the whole process for building at Ground Zero is just a sham.

A major exhibition at the Tampa, Florida-based Museum of Science and Industry consisting of 20 Chinese corpses, split open to reveal muscles and organs and manipulated into jaunty poses, has been attracting interest and controversy in roughly equal parts since its opening in August. “The corpses are, depending on whom you ask, magnificent figures created in the spirit of education or an insulting mockery created in the service of greed… The bodies are displayed in various states of simulated animation alongside placards that dryly explain basic elements of anatomy.” Florida’s anatomical board, which regulates the importation and treatment of corpses, is objecting vociferously, but the museum insists that it is acting responsibly.

Hedge-fund billionaire Steven A. Cohen recently purchased two major works of art from Las Vegas casino owner Stephen Wynn, according to reports. “The paintings are van Gogh’s ‘Peasant Woman Against a Background of Wheat’ (1890) and Gauguin’s ‘Bathers’ (1902), and they once hung in the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art in Las Vegas, which was founded by Mr. Wynn, and were included in a 1999 catalog of the gallery’s holdings.” The estimated purchase price for the two works was well over $100 million.

“The finest collection of 20th-century Western art outside Europe and America has been gathering dust in storage. Why? Because it’s owned by the Islamic Republic of Iran,” where artistic freedom is unheard of and heavy censorship is a way of life. In fact, the collection was very nearly sold off after Iran became an Islamic theocracy in 1979 and Western culture became the enemy of the state. “The art was saved, probably for commercial reasons, but it remained mostly unseen, while the museum put on edifying shows of religious and revolutionary art.” But now, the complete collection is on display at Tehran’s national museum for the first time since the revolution that brought the mullahs to power.

Representatives of two companies attempting to evict collector Charles Saatchi’s gallery from its South Bank premises have testified in court that the enigmatic collector flew into a rage over the use of a disabled toilet in one of the complex’s common areas. The companies “allege the gallery consistently encroached on communal areas not within its leased area,” and further accuse Saatchi himself of using “intimidatory tactics.”

“Sotheby’s is selling more than 20,000 items from the royal House of Hanover at the Marienburg Castle near Hanover, in northern Germany. Divided into about 4,700 lots, many of royal provenance, the sale includes glass and porcelain, silver, arms and armor, old master paintings, uniforms and textiles belonging to the kings and princes of England and Hanover from the 15th through the 19th centuries.”

“One of the world’s largest collections of contemporary British art goes on show today, showcasing work from the likes of Henry Moore, David Hockney and Tracey Emin – and the venue is just a click of the mouse away. The British Council’s new online database… provides details of the 8,000 works in its permanent collection, 80% of which is on tour at any one time.”