Category: visual

California artist Clinton Fein is used to getting flak for his blatantly political and often shocking artworks. But this past week, Fein found himself on the receiving end of a protest from an unlikely source: the printer he had hired to produce his giant prints. The online printing company Zazzle rejected two of the pieces Fein submitted, claiming that their ultra-provocative content violated their standards. Fein is accusing the company of censorship; Zazzle says it’s a perfectly understandable business decision.

Authorities searching for Edvard Munch’s stolen masterpiece, The Scream, may finally have a solid lead. The getaway car used in the robbery has been exhaustively examined, and police say that they now have knowledge of “persons with connections to criminal circles in eastern Norway” who are known to have used the car after it was seen parked on a farm last year.

“London is one of the dominant forces in the world’s contemporary art market, second only to New York. At least that’s the conclusion suggested by the success of the Frieze art fair, which opened in the capital yesterday. At last year’s inaugural event, dealers sold art works worth up to £20m, according to the organiser, Matthew Slotover. The number of exhibitors this year has risen from 125 to 150, and hopes are that business will be better still.”

A new reality TV show in the UK will ask viewers to help determine which hideous example of architecture gone awry is the country’s “worst building.” Viewer nominations will be accepted, and then a panel of experts will decide on the winning – or is that losing? – structure. The building will then be demolished on live TV. Somewhat surprisingly, the program is supported by the Royal Institute of British Architects.

Actress Elizabeth Taylor is the defendant in a new lawsuit over the ownership of a Van Gogh painting seized by Nazis in World War II. “The South African and Canadian descendants of a Jewish woman who fled Germany in the late 1930s say the actress should have known when she bought the painting for $US257,600 in 1963 that it had been stolen by the Nazis.”

A previously unknown painting by Raphael has been discovered in a church in Umbria, where it had been hidden behind another work. The work’s authenticity has been verified beyond doubt, and London’s National Gallery is considering making a request to display it alongside a similar work it currently has on view. The painting “was only re-examined in the course of a survey of diocesan art works ordered by the present bishop of Gubbio, Pietro Bottaccioli. Restorers discovered the banner had been painted over, and decided to remove the later work, millimetre by millimetre, with scalpels.”

Baseball stadium designer Joseph E. Spear is a National Design Awards architecture nominee. “The other nominees are Rick Joy, Polshek Partnership and Rafael Viñoly. While Mr. Spear’s buildings are no doubt seen by more people than those of his rivals, his stadiums are far less celebrated in the architectural world, a fact that may change, given the exposure and respect generated by the nomination.”

“When the 54th Carnegie International opened last Friday, the festivities served as a reunion for 57 people whose generosity funded nearly one quarter of the exhibit’s cost. Known as Friends of the 2004 Carnegie International, these 57 affluent donors contributed more than $700,000 to the $3 million exhibit once it became clear that no single local corporation would serve as lead sponsor.” It was the first time in recent history that a corporation failed to fill that role.

“In a forthcoming biography of the colorful Hollywood artist, bon vivant, and art forger John Decker, Stephen Jordan includes an account of how Decker and his friend Will Fowler forged a Rembrandt ‘Bust of Christ’ for actor (‘Stagecoach,’ ‘Gone With the Wind,’ ‘Lost Horizon’) Thomas Mitchell, an amateur art collector. ‘Not long after Mitchell passed away,’ Jordan writes, ‘the painting fetched $35,000 as an early Rembrandt. Today, the painting hangs at Harvard University’s prestigious Fogg Art Museum — hailed as a true Rembrandt.'”

Australia’s National Portrait Gallery has been short on exhibition space for a long time, but this year, “arguing that 90 per cent of its 1000-plus collection was acquired without government money, the gallery successfully lobbied the Howard Government for a campaign promise of $56.5 million to build a new place to show them. At its current home in the former parliamentary library in Old Parliament House, the NPG can display only about 100 works in its permanent hang.” The new building will likely be near Australia’s High Court building in Canberra.