Category: visual

Daniel Terra amassed a large art collection and found a storefront on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue to show it. The museum has assets worth more than $423 million, including more than 700 works by such artists as Winslow Homer, Georgia O’Keeffe and Edward Hopper, but is not well-attended. Four years after Terra’s death, “internal documents obtained by The Associated Press show that a nasty battle over the Terra Museum of American Art has left board members at odds with one another as they decide whether its collection will stay in Chicago.” – Nando Times

The Smithsonian has chosen Paul Warwick Thompson, director of London’s Design Museum, to lead the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York.” – Washington Post

Jim Shaw’s collection of cheap thrift store paintings are dreadful. Therein lies the fascination with them. “The paintings are awful, indefensible, crapulous. They are inept, stomach-turning and banal. These people can’t draw, can’t paint; these people should never be left alone with a paintbrush. Each has a story to tell, but I’m not sure I want to hear it.” – The Guardian

The new Scottish Parliament building, currently under construction, is now “mired in controversy and openly mocked as ‘Donald’s Dome’. From the original £50 million budget set by Scotland’s first minister, Donald Dewar, estimated costs have spiralled to a minimum of £195 million (plus a further £14 million for landscaping and roadworks). As always, it is the architect who catches the blame.” (But he died.) – The Times (UK)

Museum dedicated to the history and accomplishments of women opens in Dallas. “The heart of the Women’s Museum is its exhibits, two dozen in all, ranging from an elaborate time line of women’s achievements to a short film about female comedians and portraits of female artists and athletes.” – Dallas Morning News

• WHY A WOMEN’S MUSEUM? “Fewer than 5 percent of the nation’s historic landmarks focus on women’s achievements, the organizers point out. Fewer than 2 percent of textbooks are about women’s history. In cities known for their veneration of the past, such as Boston and Washington, few monuments to women exist.” – Washington Post

“In a collective outbreak of sanity, the two major auction houses have decided to move the evening sales of Impressionist, modern and contemporary art, held in London in December, to late January and early February. This should bring in more business for the London salerooms after years of drift across the Atlantic to New York.” – The Telegraph (UK)

Canada’s museums and galleries are having a rough time. “The rapid shift in funding patterns has caused tremendous stresses within the traditional values and structures of the art museum. In Canada, where in the past such institutions were majorly funded through government support, the new environment presents special challenges and opportunities. But institutions are slow to change, and in my opinion there is evidence that all is not well and happy in our galleries – at least not in my experience.” – CBC

What, exactly qualifies as “Australian” architecture? Is there such a thing as a regional identity in building design any more? Or has it all become a faceless international style? – The Age (Melbourne)

After repeatedly defending the Millennium Dome since it opened earlier this year, British Prime Minister Tony Blair finally concedes that the Dome is a dud. “We acknowledge that it has not been the runaway success that people had hoped for.” – The Telegraph (UK)

The lines between fashion photography and art are blurring. “Those worlds are increasingly entwined: not only because museums and galleries are choosing to exhibit fashion photography, but also because contemporary artists have engaged so directly with fashion. It’s not just that you see them at fashion shows and parties wearing the latest Versace, Prada and Vivienne Westwood. Their involvement goes far beyond that.” – The Telegraph (UK)