“From the left, Saint Francis of Assisi decked on his Franciscan order habit clutches a crucifix with a hand bloody with stigmata; from the right, Saint Francis of Paola holds a paper that reads ‘Charitas.’ And looking straight on, there’s a weeping Saint Peter looking up at a blue sky where his airy halo mingles with the clouds.” The trick is an effect called anamorphosis.
Category: visual
An Outsider Artist’s Disneyland-In-Detroit
“[Dmytro] Szylak’s installation is hardly noticeable from the sidewalk in front of his former home, but if one approaches from the alley and garages of Klinger and Sobieski Streets, Hamtramck Disneyland looms like a Cubist carnival.”
Frederick Law Olmsted Changed The Way We Think About Parks. But His Ideas Apply On A Much Bigger Scale
“Every square inch of land on Earth has been altered by our presence. Yet in the process we have failed to follow Olmsted’s conclusions to their logical end. If his theories about public greenswards could be applied to towns and cities, why shouldn’t they be applied to the planet as a whole?”
In Weirdest Art Case Of The Year, Painter Says He Didn’t Paint This Work, But Owner Insists He Did And Sues Him For Lying About It
“The artist Peter Doig took the stand here Monday in an odd federal court case in which the owner of a landscape painting is accusing Mr. Doig of falsely denying that he created the work while a young man in Canada.”
Battle Cry In Birmingham: ‘Save Our Brutalism!’
“The Brutiful Birmingham Action Group (see what they did there?) is fighting an uphill struggle to preserve the city’s best examples of 1950s and ’60s concrete and glass minimalism.”
Increasingly We’re Using Technology To Do Art History. But It Has Limitations
“One of the beautiful but frustrating things about art history is that it can never be an exact science. Whatever forensic examination becomes available must be interpreted by human beings. Just as the introduction of DNA evidence has permitted huge strides forward in criminal investigations, but has not proven definitive in courtrooms, so too, digital art-historical discoveries have offered ‘eureka moments’ that have led to duelling opinions rather than resolutions.”
Chutzpah: 90-Year-Old Woman Sees Art Depicting Crossword Puzzle, Fills In Answers, Claims Copyright On Vandalized Work
“The 1977 creation by the 20th-century artist Arthur Köpcke was lent to Nuremberg’s Neues Museum by a private collector, and is said to be worth around £68,000. The retired German dentist … said that she started filling in the artwork’s crossword puzzle because it bore the phrases ‘Insert words’ and ‘so it suits.’ … [Her attorney] says that far from harming the work in question, his client has increased its value.”
Uncovering The Secrets Of A Hidden Degas Portrait – With A Particle Accelerator
“For decades, a mysterious black stain has been spreading across the face of an anonymous woman in Australia. She is the subject of a painting by Edgar Degas, the French Impressionist painter, and since the 1920s, the oil paints in her portrait have gradually faded, revealing the hints of another, hidden portrait underneath.”
Finally, We’re Getting A Better Idea Of What Peter Zumthor’s New LACMA Building Will Look Like
“The Swiss architect has been working with LACMA Director and Chief Executive Michael Govan for years on an ambitious and controversial new building to hold the museum’s permanent collection. But details – architectural and financial alike – have been hard to come by” – until now. Christopher Hawthorne has a look.
New York Is About To Get A Shape-Shifting Buidling
Movable walls that raise up like garage doors and slide open allow the building to essentially become one big Tetris puzzle in which the users can slot in stadium seating for up to 1,250 people—or leave open for a standing audience of 3,000.