Category: visual

What happened to grand marble arch created by sculptor Henry Moore that used to reside in London’s Kensington Garden’s area? “A note in the guidebook Buildings and Monuments in the Royal Parks says that the Arch (as the sculpture is officially called) has been “temporarily removed and dismantled for repair”. But it has been broken up for nearly a decade. Nor is there much prospect that this grand piece, made in 1980 by Britain’s most famous sculptor for the people of London, will be repaired – or indeed seen by the public again.”

It seems like every museum in America has expanded in the past few years. But is all this growing sustainable? Is it warranted? Eric Gibson: “Every business sector goes through cycles, and there’s no reason to believe museums are an exception. Instead of continuing to assume visitorship will grow indefinitely and that they should build accordingly, their officers should begin to imagine a future where demand slackens, as people find other ways to replenish themselves. It may already be here.”

Minneapolis’s Walker Art Center is about to unveil its huge expansion, turning the city’s modern art showcase into an even more prominent local landmark than it already was. But a few blocks away, the more tradition-bound Minneapolis Institute of Arts is preparing to open 27 new galleries, and it, too, will be putting the focus on recent art. “Officials at both the Walker and the MIA dismiss the notion of a rivalry, even though they clearly are fishing for donors in the same relatively small pool of big-time Twin Cities area art collectors.”

“Day after day the crowds flock to the National Gallery’s ‘Caravaggio: The Final Years’ exhibition, fascinated in equal measures by the artist’s debauched lifestyle and the power of his paintings… But what the crowds are unlikely to appreciate is that the acclaimed exhibition was made possible thanks to the generous donation of a reclusive US millionaire who bankrolled a fundamentalist religious movement founded by a man who endorsed the execution of homosexuals and adulterers.”

The Arts & Crafts movement began as a flat-out rebellion against an increasingly commercial world, and grew into one of the 20th century’s most successful arts philosophies. But even as the movement became an international phenomenon, it didn’t always work out the way its founders intended. “The sheer goodness of the movement, bound as it is to folk art and the quest for national authenticity, made it vulnerable to nationalistic exploitation.”

“Although there are some very good things being made, the craft world at the moment is set up to preserve something that can’t look after itself… Craft has lost its way and become precious; self-consciousness is one of its great cankers. Sometimes there are peevish voices in the craft world demanding respect from the contemporary art world. It is a bit like an Englishman in France shouting in English. If you want to be accepted in the contemporary art world, you have to accept its culture and speak its language.”

The Central Park “Gates” are gone now, attracting upwards of 3 million people. “Give the artists credit for creating a spectacular public event. Yet as the 7,500 orange panels began to come down Monday, I couldn’t help but wonder: Does public art now have to be bad to be effective, accepted, even loved? Because as art, the big-footed, 16-foot-tall “gates” – gallowslike frames hung with pleated fabric panels that arched over 23 miles of park walkways – defined banality. Yet the $20 million installation inspired what amounted to a worldwide pilgrimage to see the latest creation by the world’s most famous wrappers of buildings and girders of islands.”

“Despite all the hyperbole accompanying its Olympic bid, London remains dirty, inefficient and congested. It is aesthetically and architecturally incoherent, and, unlike Manhattan, Barcelona or Paris, essentially suburban. It is also, however, hugely successful and consistently fashionable. So why has London got such useless public space – and will it, indeed should it, ever change?”

Jean-Pierre Lehmann has won a $1.7 million judgment against a New York gallery he said refused to sell him art. “Mr Lehmann lent $75,000 to the gallery in February 2001 with no interest and no due date, receiving in exchange the right of first choice and price discounts on future purchases. Mr Lehmann sued the gallery in March 2004, claiming it had violated his contract by selling about 40 paintings by the Ethiopian-born US artist Julie Mehretu to just about everybody but him.”

“Architects and conservators say the Spanish government has caused irreparable damage to the Catalan architect’s Güell crypt. They describe the cleaning of the building as “brutal” and say that it was carried out with abrasive materials abandoned years ago by the conservation industry. They also say that a staircase which provided access to the roof has been removed and they say that the restorers have placed a large stone plinth commemorating their restoration inside the chapel. This distracts visitors and disrupts the circulation within the chapel intended by Gaudí. The restorers also cut down an old pine tree near the building, which Gaudí had deliberately left standing and which he had incorporated in his design for the chapel.”