Category: visual

“Universities across the country are having productive conversations about race and representation, but what happens when campus public art is caught in the crossfire between a desire to preserve history and cultural sensitivity?”

“The appointment of a new director to South Korea’s National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) last week has extenuated the concerns of the country’s art community over issues of government and institutional censorship, with hundreds of arts professionals signing a statement pressuring the museum to publicly declare internal policy reforms.”

“The Whitney is serving as a physical example of a way to cater to the ever-growing crowds that come to museums while also providing calm, useful, pleasurable space to view art. MoMA’s de-installing a whole floor to do the Picasso show perhaps signals that this institution is prepared at last to do whatever it can to serve the art in its collection.”

“‘Few people have the guts to say that art and propaganda are the same thing,’ George Orwell famously wrote in 1936. He later tempered that caustic view, which was typical of his pugilistic style in standing up on behalf of the little guy. But there is truth to it. Certainly art and propaganda have a long history together in various trenches.”

“The social media site has deleted pics of artworks by people like Kate Durbin and Erika Ordosgoitto. It has blocked users like Frédéric Durand-Baïssas for sharing paintings including Gustave Courbet’s ‘L’Origine du Monde.’ And though some people have protested by creating Facebook groups like Artists Against Art Censorship, recording every instance of censorship — let alone fighting back — is next to impossible.”

“The woman would issue temporary membership cards to people who bought memberships as they entered the museum, DeThorne said, and then not turn in the cash. ‘She would get cash, make a temporary ID card and not enter (the cash) into the file,’ he said.”

“In the city of Calais he created a parody version of Théodore Géricault’s painting ‘The Raft of the Medusa.’ Banksy’s version shows immigrants crowded onto a raft, reaching out to a passing cruise ship.”

“For a long time I felt like going to protests was the same as — you know, when people go to church but they don’t really believe in God? But they think, oh, better just hedge my bets. I don’t necessarily think this is going to do any good, but I really ought to do it anyway. It’s the right thing to do.”

They wanted more than $5 million for the 24 classic paintings taken from the Westfries Museum. The counter-offer: 1 percent of that. So they’re looking to sell elsewhere.

“Today, travelers rushing through an airport or pausing at a roadside rest stop barely notice the standard symbols that direct the flow of human traffic. The little rounded man indicating the restroom and his female partner with her triangular dress are too familiar to think twice about. The same goes for the ubiquitous No Smoking logo and the knife and fork symbol that point towards dinner.” Their origin goes back to the U.S. Bicentennial celebrations in 1976.