Category: visual

The halls of the United Nations are filled with valuable art. But curating the collection is an art in itself. “The greatest problem facing the arts committee is preventing the United Nations from becoming a curiosity shop.” – Los Angeles Times

On the whole, last month’s conference on the cleaning of the Elgin marbles in the 1930s was pretty decorous, despite the controversies. Until the last few minutes, of course, when “the Greek press attaché was ordered to shut up, author William St Clair was ‘disinvited’ from the closing dinner and for a moment it seemed as if scuffles might break out among the warring academics.” – The Art Newspaper

— was not insured. The news underlines concern that many British museums are seriously underinsured. – The Art Newspaper

— New Year’s show has to go to Paris’s Eiffel Tower. How’d it happen? “It took five months for a crew of 20 mountaineers and rock climbers to string the 20,000 screw-in bulbs on the 110-year-old tower and an additional month for 47 more climbers and technicians to set 4,800 pyrotechnic launches on 80 specially created tower decks.” – Philadelphia Inquirer

At the beginning of the 20th Century the future held excitement and allure. At the beginning of the 21st, we seem to be looking back a lot. Particularly in our housing. “Today’s domestic architecture has got stuck in something quaint. It’s like reading and rereading contemporary versions of Chekhov or Dickens without ever considering the merits of Margaret Atwood or Raymond Carver.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

Adding to a growing international chorus asking Britain to return Elgin marbles to Greece. – Sydney Morning Herald

British writer has new theory about the deaths of the Brontë sisters – and it’s poisonous. – CBC

Nobel novelist Seamus Heaney wins lit award for translation of “Beowulf” – BBC

London’s Millennium Dome “turns out to be the biggest fake orgasm in the history of passionate pretence. It must also be the only symbolic monument to be erected without anyone having a clue what it is meant to symbolize. Hence the banal shape, all too indicative of its hackneyed exhibition, every old broiler of an idea in the world of arts and entertainment come home to roost.” – The Telegraph (UK)

• MAYBE NOT: Here’s another critic, a self-confessed cynic who kinda sorta gets into the spirit of the Dome. – London Evening Standard