Category: visual

New Zealand’s big state-owned company ECNZ is going out of business. So what’s to become of the company’s publicly-owned  “highly discriminating corporate art collection” of some of the country’s best artists? By law, the collection has to be displayed for the public, but… – New Zealand Herald

A University of Toronto professor of psychology says that paying close attention to the blind may tell us a whole lot about art. “Over three decades of experiments, the Irish-born scientist has shown that the blind can make and understand pictures in ways that no one had imagined. And that fact forces us to rethink many of our preconceptions about representational art in general.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

This week the Guggenheim shows New York the Frank Gehry building it wants to build in Lower Manhattan. Will the project really get built? Hard to say, but “like other sideshows that have kept New York in denial about the mediocrity of the buildings it puts up, the feasibility question distracts from the challenge presented by the design. This is the top form architecture comes in these days. Want some?” – New York Times

Russia’s Pushkin Museum has put the controversial Gold of Troy on permanent display. The Troy collection was secretly taken from Germany by Soviet troops at the end of World War II, and was believed lost until the Russian government revealed, in the early 1990s, that the collection was in Moscow. Germany and Russia are arguing over the return of artwork captured in World War II. – The Art Newspaper

How old do you have to be before you’re not a YBA (Young British Artist) anymore? In any case, the YBA’s have new shows up, including an effort at the new White Cube branch office. – The Times (UK)

New York’s Whitney Museum has its Biennial stocked with 97 artists; across town P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center has its “Greater New York” show, a “spirited affair that rounds up enough youngish artists (146 in all) to start a day camp. The latest art-world trend is untrendy artists. Which show does it better? – New York Times

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is suing the heirs of a local collector for $18 million for refusing to come to an agreement about the sale of a Picasso painting. “On one side you have SFMOMA, furious that its generous offer — $3 million more than the family realized at auction — was rejected. On the other, you have the family, furious that its right to dispose of its inheritance as it sees fit is being questioned. How do you explain SFMOMA’s lawsuit, which, even if it is won by the museum, might jeopardize its relationship with many potential donors?” – San Francisco Examiner

A Detroit sculptor sees a picture of a sculpture on the pages of the Detroit Free Press that was stolen from him last fall and goes out to claim it. – Detroit Free Press

• Police have recovered 16 paintings stolen from St. Petersburg’s Academy of Arts last year, and two suspects have been detained. Last December thieves broke into the second floor of the museum and took the paintings, most of which dated from the 19th century. “One of the burglars pretended to be an art historian and obtained false documents allowing him to visit the academy’s library for [a period of] nearly two months. He repeatedly cut the alarm system in several places, so that people got used to it sounding constantly and became less attentive, making it easier to steal the paintings.” – St. Petersburg Times (Russia)

Last fall a series of watercolors attributed to Georgia O’Keeffe owned by the Kemper Museum was thrown into dispute when experts cast doubt on their authenticity. The controversy was heightened because other experts from the National Gallery in Washington had previously praised the work and recommended them. The Santa Fe New Mexican delves into the tangled story behind the art transactions. – Santa Fe New Mexican