Category: visual

The new Mori Museum of contemporary art opens in Tokyo in two weeks. It is being touted as the most significant art development in years in the capital. “The museum will act as an interface between contemporary art, which is in a constant state of change, and a broad audience. The mission is to introduce things to people with which they are not yet familiar and to make the unfamiliar seem attractive. It is a challenge.”

“The recent unveiling of a new Web site listing artworks that may have been looted by the Nazis had at least two unintended consequences, experts say. First, it underscored how much stolen art falls outside the purview of the new venture — the vast majority. Second, it reminded Holocaust survivors who are trying to reclaim stolen art how far the issue of property restitution has fallen from public consciousness and political discourse.”

The National Gallery’s I.M. Pei-designed East Building turns 25 this year. “Pei has staked his career on bold visions and controversial stands. Architects have voted the building one of the 10 best in America. Pei has just admitted to ‘great affection’ for his creation, as well he should. The East Building’s extraordinary geometries and modern spirit established Pei as a 20th-century master. Success here also propelled him on to the challenge of his career, the historic remaking of France’s grand Louvre museum.”

New York is unquestionably better off as a city than it was a quarter-century ago. But with the urban revitalization of Gotham has come a devotion to to glittering development and expensive cultural monuments that threatens to bury forever the city’s rich history of populist art. The graffiti that covered the city’s subway trains in the dismal 1970s may have been a symbol of blighted urbanity, but it was also the mark of a populace that had art flowing in its veins. And if there is any good to be found in America’s extended economic slump, it may be that New York is beginning to rediscover some of its old city grit.

“There is another side to I.M Pei’s work in the capital. By the time he received the National Gallery commission in 1968, Pei’s name already was attached to seven Washington buildings, with another two on the way. This early work is altogether a mixed legacy, yet it is too good or too interesting to be lightly dismissed. Dismissal or even denial, however, is more or less the architect’s own attitude.”

A new Picasso Museum is about to open in Malaga, Spain. “Christine Ruiz-Picasso, the widow of Picasso’s eldest son Paulo, has donated 133 works to the museum and her son Bernard has given another 22. Another 49 works are on loan from other relatives for 10 years.”

The status of Raphael’s “Madonna of the pinks” is growing increasingly murky. The Getty Museum has offered £35 million for the painting, and would export it to the US. But if the painting was valued at £20 million plus taxes for the owner and the money were forthcoming in the UK, the painting would stay in England. But should it be valued at £20 million? And the taxes?

The visual arts programmer for Glasgow’s Tramway arts space has been fired. The center has been under fire lately becasue of a plan for Scottish Ballet to take over the space. “We are not attacking the ballet – we support all art forms – but why should it be at the expense of such an important arts space? To pit two communities against each other in the arts world seems ridiculous.”

A survey in the UK showed that art literacy is very low. Okay, so it’s easy to ridicule the high percentage of know-nothings who took the survey. But how would you do? The Guardian put together its own art test… your AJ editor scored 75 percent (six of eight) … and you?

“The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has added 100 works by 45 artists to its already sweeping photography collection. The pictures, valued at more than $6 million, come as promised and fractional gifts from museum trustee Carla Emil and her husband, Rich Silverstein, co-founder of the Bay Area advertising firm Goodby, Silverstein and Partners.”