Category: visual

“It is all rich vindication for the once-mocked activity of making contemporary art, which has moved in only a couple of generations from marginal status in a philistine, insular culture, via such famous scandals as Carl André’s bricks and the Turner Prize dust-ups, to become the most glamorous, honky-tonky wriggle and pout in today’s self-consciously globalist Britain.” – The Observer (UK)

Designing a major new museum has become the price of admission into the architectural big league. Now it’s happening for Herzog & de Meuron. – The Observer (UK)

A painting depicting a pope with an eye patch has been replaced in an Oklahoma  state capitol exhibition after a conservative lawmaker called it anti-Christian. – Washington Post

Producer Arthur Cohn has gone to Israel to talk about the inclusion of  forensic photographs of Israeli athletes killed at the 1972 Munich Olympics in his Academy Award-winning  documentary “One Day in September.” Relatives of the slain athletes want the footage removed. – Jerusalem Post

A few weeks ago Christie’s proposed to auction a stolen 10th-Century Chinese wall panel. Then American customs agents stepped in to block the sale. “At best, the auction house’s willingness to cooperate can be described as an exercise in damage limitation in a case that raises serious questions about Christie’s thoroughness in examining the provenance of the works of art it offers for sale.” – The Art Newspaper

Prosecutors in the federal antitrust investigation of Sotheby’s and Christie’s have evidence that the chairmen of both auction houses personally set in motion a price-fixing scheme to limit competition. Both men deny the accusations, but “the allegation that a conspiracy was devised at the very top of the venerable auction houses raises the stakes in the investigation, which has already roiled the world of art collectors.” – New York Times

Christie’s will auction German diamond baron Sir Julius Wernher’s extravagant collection of antique silver and Old Master paintings. “We haven’t had a sale of this quality since World War II,” said Harry Williams-Bulkeley, head of Christie’s silver department. – The Times of India (AP)

Germany will publish a list of several thousand works of art stolen from museums and individuals across Europe in an effort to restore some of it with its rightful owners. – Financial Times

“In many ways, Frank O. Gehry is to architecture what Jimi Hendrix was to rock music – a wild, original, creative genius with a giddy, international appeal.” So he was the logical choice to design Seattle’s new interactive music museum, the Experience Music Project, which opens to the public in June. Gehry’s colorful, free-form design pays homage to Hendrix, and rock music in general, and was inspired in part by the look and style of electric guitars “which he cut up and used as the basis for the design.” (Story includes timeline of Gehry’s best-known buildings.) – The Guardian

In the past five years attendance at the Vancouver Art Museum has doubled. Then suddenly last week, the museum’s director resigned. Why? Some say it was over a dispute with the board of directors over whether the gallery should exhibit photography by rock star Bryan Adams as part of a fund-raising venture for the museum. But from behind the scenes emerges a story of turmoil. – Vancouver Sun