Category: visual

It was to be an ordinary auction in Tokyo, until a work for sale was revealed as a forgotten Van Gogh. “The ensuing media frenzy in Japan ensured that the auction in Ginza was mobbed. Over 500 buyers registered and those who couldn’t squeeze into the main auction room had to be seated on another floor, connected to the action by a television screen. When the Van Gogh portrait now known as “Peasant Woman” appeared, bidding was frenzied.”

London’s National Gallery has a new Boticelli. Well, not new exactly. The museum has reattributed a picture that had previously been attributed to one of the master’s followers. “The picture, ‘St Francis with Musical Angels’, is extremely unusual for a mid-15th century Florentine painting in its patterned, stamped gold background. The painting was purchased (as a Filippino Lippi) by the the National Gallery’s greatest director, Sir Charles Eastlake in 1858 from the Costabili collection.”

Sources indicate that Daniel Libeskind will shortly be named the winner of the competition to design a replacement for the World Trade Center towers in New York, but some elements of his design will be scrapped in the building process. Governor George Pataki and Mayor Michael Bloomberg both favor the Libeskind design, and his “plans have also gained favour with the New York port authority, which owns the World Trade Centre site, and the Lower Manhattan development corporation (LMDC), which is overseeing the rebuilding.” The announcement could come as early as this week.

“For today’s artists there’s no shame in being market-savvy. In the post-Warhol era, licensing agreements, movie deals and publicity campaigns are increasingly regarded as legitimate extensions of the art-making process. But one corner of the art world still embraces the ideal of art uncorrupted by commerce. In the field of outsider art, creators who show too much interest in marketing are likely to find their work devalued, if not shunned altogether.”

“The Elgin marbles will never be returned to Greece, even on loan, the director of the British Museum has told The Telegraph. In a ruling which will infuriate the Greek authorities, Neil MacGregor – who took over as director of the museum last August – said that the marbles could ‘do most good’ in their current home, where they are seen in a broader historical context… Mr MacGregor’s decision ends any hopes that the marbles could be loaned to the Greeks for the Athens Olympics next year and will outrage campaigners who hoped that his appointment marked a change in the museum’s attitude to ownership of the friezes.”

An architecturally significant house in Chicago designed by Frank Lloyd Wright is being threatened. By a baby. The house’s owners are about to see their family expand, and have been looking to sell the four-bedroom home so that they can move to a larger place. But so far, only one bid has come close to the asking price, and that was from a man who wants to tear the home down and erect his own newfangled mansion on the property. The owner rejected the offer, and says he wants to preserve the house, but time is running out, and it appears that unless a more preservation-minded buyer comes forward soon, the house could be demolished by this summer.

“Vivendi Universal has chosen two New York auction houses to sell its modern art and photography collection – valued at about $15 million – this spring as part of an effort to decrease the Paris-based entertainment conglomerate’s multibillion-dollar debt. Christie’s will offer the modern art holding, which includes works by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miro and Mark Rothko, at an auction that has yet to be scheduled. Phillips, de Pury and Luxembourg will put the collection of photographs on the block April 25-26.”

“Facing a revenue shortfall and a bleak economy, the Detroit Institute of Arts will eliminate 55 jobs – 13 percent of its 416-member workforce – and close both its satellite mall shops in moves designed to cut costs and restructure operations. The layoffs, which will go into effect in the next two weeks, will result in an immediate saving of $1 million.”

A small collection of watercolors by William Blake has fetched £5 million at auction in the UK, the most money ever paid for a work by the British poet and artist. The paintings were commissioned to accompany Robert Blair’s poem “The Grave,” and while the fact of their existence was known to scholars, they had been missing since 1836. Two Yorkshire dealers discovered the paintings in a Glasgow bookshop last year, and acquired them without telling the bookstore of their significance. A bit of legal wrangling followed, and the upshot is that this week’s auction will leave both the dealers and the shop quite a bit richer.

Britain is losing some its important art to foreign buyers, the the current laws only delay export, not keep it permanently in the country. “The objects that have been temporarily kept here, but then exported, invariably through lack of funds, greatly outnumber those that have been saved. Several important pieces of art currently under temporary export ban are expected to end up overseas.”