“The crisis into which the auction world is now plunged was bound to break out sooner or later. The occasion was the U.S. antitrust investigation of Sotheby’s and Christie’s for possible collusion in setting commissions for buyers and sellers. But the fundamental reason is the need for revenue, caused by the rising costs of competition as art-market supplies inexorably diminish.” – Artnewsroom.com
Reform of the French auction market is near, and the auction houses are jockeying. Among them, Christie’s, opening a lavish new Paris headquarters this week. – The Telegraph (UK)
Budget for the new Scottish parliament has taken wing. Now there has to be blame. “But the problem with the Parliament building in Edinburgh is far from being a lack of ideas about its content. In fact, a lot of the extra costs have arisen because absolutely everybody had an idea of what the Parliament should be.” – The Observer (UK)
The new wave of plans approved for Sydney “are mediocre at best, and often simply ugly. Instead of ‘living’ they are creating a rather ‘dead’ city, endorsing undesirable development, particularly on small blocks. Rising like smoke stacks through the city fabric, they diminish the order and clarity of Sydney streets as enunciated in city council urban policy. Some show an ignorance of the most elementary textbook design principles, such as continuation of facades, cornices, roofscapes, consistency of fenestration, and pattern use of compatible materials. – Sydney Morning Herald
Student at the San Francisco Art Institute staged a sexually-explicit performance with a volunteer that shocked this normally adventurous cutting-edge institution. “It is considered a serious violation for you or any individual to participate in any activity, sexual or not, which involves exposing yourself or others to any bodily fluids or excretions including but not limited to feces, urine, semen, saliva and blood,” reads a letter from the Institute’s vice president and dean of academic affairs. – Washington Post
— to close in Taipei. A sensation when it opened in 1995, the crowds have melted away since then. – China Times (Taiwan)
As Britain’s museums and galleries try to apply new consciousness about buying and owning art possibly stolen by Nazis in WWII, auction houses refuse to give guarantees about the provenance of the art they sell. – The Independent (UK)
LA’s Getty Museum collects the old and established. But a new show invites in a group of contemporary L.A. artists to create work inspired by whatever part of the Getty holdings might interest them. The project invites artists and audience to consider the Getty’s traditional holdings in new ways. – Los Angeles Times
Archaeological treasures in Afghanistan have been massively damaged and destroyed after years of civil war, reports a historian and archaeologist who has returned from the region. – The Art Newspaper
Former Lenin Museum in the heart of the Siberian gulag reinvents itself as a museum showing contemporary art. – MSNBC
