Category: visual

“It may have only a single official Unesco listing but, with 1,000 acknowledged archaeological sites, Iraq is one huge world heritage zone. And on to this in the past few days have poured 740 Tomahawk cruise missiles, 8,000 smart bombs and an unknown number of stupid ones. One of the first acts of the war was an attack on the museum in Saddam’s home town of Tikrit. To an Iraqi regime eager for ammunition for propaganda, this was proof of American and British barbarism. The allies preferred to see it as a symbolic strike at the personality cult of Saddam.”

Despite impassioned protests, surrealist Andre Breton’s flat in Paris has been emptied and its contents organized for auction. “Thousands of paintings, documents, photographs and personal souvenirs were carried away to warehouses, destroying what was seen as a surrealist work of art in itself.”

Is Charles Saatchi struck in the 90s? Some think so, after seeing his new gallery in London. “Art has moved on, declared Philip Dodd, director of the Institute for Contemporary Art, to internet sites that allow angry Iraqis in Baghdad to virtually bomb Washington and London, moaning one-eyed mummies, and performance artists who sew balsawood soles to their feet. I think Saatchi was about a time and a place. His gallery is a monument to the 90s, and a museum in some ways to a time when he dominated the scene.”

Artists known as the Chapman brothers have “drawn demonic clown and puppy heads on each of the victims” on a rare set of prints of Goya’s apocalyptic “Disasters of War”. “Some experts believe that what the brothers call their ‘rectification’ of the prints is a fresh spin for the Manga generation. Others do not. Robert Hughes: Goya “will obviously survive these twerps, whose names will be forgotten a few years from now … Maybe it’s time they put Mickey Mouse heads on the Sistine Chapel.”

“Two years ago, the Chapmans bought a complete set of what has become the most revered series of prints in existence, Goya’s Disasters of War. It is a first-rate, mint condition set of 80 etchings printed from the artist’s plates. In terms of print connoisseurship, in terms of art history, in any terms, this is a treasure – and they have vandalised it.”

Art Deco was one of the most pervasive styles of the modern era. “But what is art deco? It is easier to say what it isn’t, for there was never any coherent theory, principle or aesthetic to it, nor any clear and particular source. Art deco, if anything, was simply the celebration of eclecticism as a virtue and stylistic opportunism as a principle. It scoured the world and the ages for its sources, from tribal Africa to Japan, and ancient Egypt to Peru, and then looked to contemporary high art, to cubism, futurism and the Ballets Russes for present excitements and stimulation.”

The British Museum reports that visits to its Iraqi exhibitions have tripled since the war on Iraq began. The British Museum has the greatest collection of Mesopotamian art outside Iraq. A spokeswoman confirmed that visits to its Mesopotamian and Assyrian galleries had risen significantly. ‘It’s just general curiosity from what’s going on (with the war). Members of the public are coming from all over the world.”

After two years, Sotheby’s has caught up with rival Christie’s in art sales. “Annual turnover figures published this month show that in the year ending 31 December 2002, Sotheby’s sold $1.77 billion (£1.11 billion) worth of art, while Christie’s announced sales of $1.9 billion (£1.3 billion). But the Christie’s figure included private treaty sales of $120 million, so for auction sales the two companies are about even.”

An exhibition of paintings taken from a German castle by Soviet troops after World War II went on display in Moscow this weekend. “A campaign by mainly Communist members of Russia’s parliament has kept the 364 works in the country, though many Liberals back the idea of returning them to Germany. Returning war booty has long been a sensitive issue in Russia, where memories remain keen of more than 20 million Soviet war dead during a four-year campaign against the Nazis. The Moscow Museum of Architecture has held the 362 drawings and two paintings – which include works by Rubens, Degas, Delacroix and Goya – in safekeeping for 43 years.”

Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum celebrated the painter’s 150th birthday Sunday as thousands of fan came to pay their respects.