Category: visual

Millions Of Text Messages Use Emojis To Beg SFMOMA For Art

Wow, 2017, you do have some pleasant surprises: “It’s far more popular than the museum ever imagined, with people indulging in a long back-and-forth, binge texting. And it’s also revealed something surprising about its users — about how, and when, they want to interact with art, and how much they crave a personal connection with cultural authority.”

Truly Looking At Boyle Heights, The L.A. Neighborhood That Protested Gentrification By Galleries

Artist Star Montana: “I want people to understand the narrative of Boyle Heights. A lot of these people, they are trying to navigate how to exist in these neighborhoods. These people represent communities and neighborhoods. They exist. And they are individuals. And their stories — each one of them — their narrative is important, too. It’s important for me to sit down with them, even if it’s just for a minute.”

Why Is Andrew Wyeth’s Reputation So Fragile?

“On July 12, Wyeth would have turned 100. Over the course of his life and into his death, his reputation has weathered a whiplash of ups and downs and polarized opinion. In 1977, when the art historian Robert Rosenblum was asked to name the most overrated and underrated American artists, he nominated Andrew Wyeth for both categories. How can we explain these dramatic shifts? And what do they say about how critics and artistic movements influence an artist’s legacy?”

How A New Mexico 140-Member Artist Collective Made $6 Million In Its First Year

Since the Santa Fe-based art collective Meow Wolf opened its permanent installation, the House of Eternal Return, in March 2016, the project has been an unmitigated success in terms of viewership and profits. Housed in a 20,000-square-foot former bowling alley, the sprawling interactive artwork welcomed 400,000 visitors in its first year—nearly four times as many as expected—and brought in $6 million in revenue for the collective’s more than 100 members.

The IRA Was Behind The Isabella Stewart Gardner Heist, Insists Investigator

“The 13 stolen masterpieces valued at around half-a-billion dollars included a Rembrandt and a Vermeer … ‘I’m 100 percent sure that they are in Ireland. Hundred percent sure. No doubt in my mind,’ art investigator Arthur Brand said. He’s described as the Indiana Jones of the art world. It’s an audacious claim to make after nearly three decades. But Brand alleges his leads point to the Irish Republican Army.”

V&A Museum’s New Director Is Not, In Fact, Against Digitization (Despite What You May Have Read)

“‘Museums are rethinking the rush to digitise their collections amid concerns that such projects are costly and of little value,’ wrote the Times [of London] newspaper, in a report on [Tristram] Hunt‘s comments at the Hay Festival in Wales. … Responding to a question from the audience about the V&A’s use of digital technology to widen access in the regions, Hunt actually said that the museum is ‘involved in a massive programme of digitising [its] collections’ and is ‘very passionate about it’.”

SoCal Museum, Shuttered Temporarily Last Year, Will Close For Good By August Without New Funding Model

“The Museum of Ventura County, which temporarily shut its doors last year to take inventory, revamp some things and figure out its future, has not been able to raise enough money to get back on its feet. Unless the institution can get money from a new source, officials said, it will close by the end of the month. To Elena Brokaw, who since last summer has been the museum’s interim executive director, the answer lies in creating a public-private partnership.”