Category: visual

The latest blockbuster exhibitions to hit London museums are drawing thousands of visitors who are apparently willing to spend hours waiting in the kind of lines one generally associates with Disney World. “Once inside, having paid £7.50 to see 16 paintings (or 47p a painting) visitors will share their view of each canvas with, on average, eight others. It is not, perhaps, the atmosphere of contemplative isolation that many regard as the ideal conditions under which to observe these masterpieces.” Still, most museum-goers seem to have anticipated the delays and overcrowding, and few are complaining.

“Architects grab more attention with their imposing skyscrapers. But landscape architects are emerging as the heroes of modern urban existence. They reclaim the wastelands,” of which there are certainly no shortage in America’s big cities, and turn them into, well, whatever you like, really. “After 53 years, mountains of garbage piled 225 feet high on New York’s Staten Island have begun a slow transition to parkland… In Duisburg, Germany, a derelict iron mill was reborn three years ago as a sort of theme park of the Industrial Age… In Beirut, a Garden of Forgiveness (Hadiqat As-Samah) is being constructed on a 5.7-acre site that was reduced to rubble by Lebanon’s 16-year civil war.”

Three of the four bronze sculptures making up a Philip Pavia sculpture known as ‘The Ides of March’ have been stolen from the New York City office building in which they were being temporarily housed while awaiting transfer to Hofstra University. The theft cannot have been easy, as the three stolen pieces weigh 600 pounds apiece. ‘The Ides’ was originally commissioned by the New York Hilton hotel, which displayed it at its entrance for more than a quarter-century.

The room at the Louvre that is home to the Mona Lisa is to be renovated, and for the first time in three decades, the painting will skip a day on show. “Now she is having her room renovated, to handle an average of more than 1,500 visitors an hour. She’ll be off display for one day on April 4 while curators install her in the upgraded digs. The Louvre fears irate crowds if Japanese and American visitors turn up to find an apology hanging from Lisa’s empty spot on the wall. While Rembrandts, Titians and El Grecos can all spend weeks in restoration, under study or on tour, the Mona Lisa has always remained on display.”

The Barnes Collection has asked the court to expedite an appeal hearing on a decision that would allow the Barnes to move to Philadelphia. “The foundation’s court petition said the Barnes could find itself short of funds by the end of 2005 because the appeal has delayed pledges from donors, and because the three foundations backing the move of its multibillion-dollar art gallery from Lower Merion to Philadelphia have stopped paying part of its operating expenses.”

“A $28.5 million plan to double the size of the Queens Museum of Art in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park is back on track. The city has announced Grimshaw Architects as the new architect for the museum’s expansion and renovation.”

Christie’s says auction sales were up 13 percent. “Worldwide sales totaled 1.4 billion pounds ($2.5 billion), up from 1.2 billion pounds in 2003, London-based Christie’s said in a statement. Public auctions raised 1.3 billion pounds, and private transactions totaled 83 million pounds, Christie’s said.”

“The Salvador Dalí exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is off to a flying start. During the show’s first 34 days ending Sunday, the museum sold 195,624 tickets.” The exhibit is scheduled to run through mid-May, with Philadelphia being the only North American stop.

Choosing one’s battles is always a difficult proposition for a preservationist, and by and large, most advocates for old buildings have not bothered to be too terribly vocal in their support for the Modernist structures of the mid-20th century. For one thing, Modernist architecture doesn’t tend to be terribly eye-catching, which means that any attempt to preserve it inevitably embroils one in a debate of aesthetics vs. historical significance, an argument which can be seen as a lose-lose proposition for preservationists. But two ongoing battles in New York suggest that a movement may be afoot to start protecting important examples of Modernist architecture before they are all replaced by newer, more attractive buildings.

The 16-year-old Canadian girl was arrested on Sunday in Athens “while posing for a snapshot at the 2,500-year-old temple at the Acropolis. Guards reacted as fast as Hermes, the messenger of the Greek gods,” when they saw her handle a shard of the Acropolis. She was charged with theft of an antiquity, her lawyer in Athens said.