Category: visual

“Let’s push aside the notion of it as art straight off. It’s more in the company of the evolving gutter press of 18th-century England. … No Balls has little affinity with great political art, past or present.”

The seed of the problem is a tiny imperfection in the statue’s design. The center of gravity in the base doesn’t align with the center of gravity in the figure itself; when the base is level, in other words, the David’s body is slightly off-balance. There is, as the article nicely puts it, “an eccentricity of the loads.”

“Monroe was chosen to create the likeness of the “monstrous” presidential candidate because of his experience designing monsters for horror movies and haunted houses, including serving as the director for Eli Roth’s now defunct “Goretorium” in Las Vegas.”

Instead of the traditional towers, “ninety-six hand-painted gold lanterns encrust the roof of the Australian Islamic Centre in Newport. Fitted into each lantern is a different coloured glass that filters light into the mosque through triangular shaped skylights. As the sun moves through the day, the lanterns illuminate a different colour. In the morning yellow streams in, representing paradise. Through the middle of the day, blues (symbolising sky) and greens (nature) filter in. In the afternoon the lanterns draw in red (blood for strength).”

“Members of the anarchist collective INDECLINE … unveiled life-size statues of Trump in the nude Thursday morning in public spaces in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Cleveland and Seattle.” (The New York City Parks Dept. removed the statue in Union Square, saying in a statement, “NYC Parks stands firmly against any unpermitted erection in city parks, no matter how small.”)

The museum, by way of explanation, says: “Once the exhibition installation was complete, and the text was seen in context, it became clear that it did not reflect the voice of the museum, nor did it reflect the experience of the work.” The ROM also pointed out that the original quote “was provided as part of the exhibition text,” which had been featured in several other museums before arriving here.

“There has never been a painter quite like Jheronimus van Aken, the Flemish master who signed his works as Jheronimus Bosch. His imagination ranged from a place beyond the spheres of Heaven to the uttermost depths of Hell, but for many of his earliest admirers the most striking aspect of his art was what they described as its ‘truth to nature.'”

“The 36-foot-long, 13-feet-wide work cements scenes from one public stadium in colorful stone, featuring four chariots each pulled by springing horses of various hues and commandeered by assertive drivers.”

“A judge in US District Court in California has dismissed a claim by an heir to the Dutch dealer and collector Jacques Goudstikker to recover Lucas Cranach’s Adam and Eve (around 1530), two paintings now at the Norton Simon Museum. The 15 August ruling in the decade-long case holds that the paintings became the property of the Dutch government after the Second World War.”

“Critics say that little of the Corcoran has been sustained. Most of the collection remains homeless, and repairs to the iconic Ernest Flagg building on 17th Street have only just begun. Just a third of the faculty who taught at the Corcoran are now employed by GWU, and student enrollment in the Corcoran program is down. Because the deal contains no timeline and little outside oversight, critics say the public can only watch its decline.”