To encourage private collectors in the West to repatriate such pieces, Shindika Dokolo hopes to set up a war chest funded by Angolan businesses, including the State oil firm Sonangol, to reimburse buyers who purchased such items in good faith. “I want to organise a business club around the idea of heritage and start buying it back. I want to create an instrument that is effective,” Dokolo says.
Category: visual
Freer And Sackler Galleries Put Images Of All Their Art Online (Here’s Why)
“The technology pushes the boundaries of what it means to be a museum because it allows for unrestricted study and enjoyment of the collection. Next month’s release will include at least one image of each work — the majority in high-resolution — and the collection will be searchable and largely downloadable for non-commercial use.”
“Scandalous Desecration”: Restorers Paint Walls Of Chartres Cathedral; Architecture Critic Flips Out
“Looking upward we then saw panels of blue faux marbre, high above them gilded column capitals and bosses (the ornamental knobs where vault ribs intersect), and, nearby, floor-to-ceiling piers covered in glossy yellow trompe l’oeil marbling, like some funeral parlor in Little Italy. How could this be happening, and why had we heard nothing about it before?”
Remember That Old Lady’s Botched Fresco Restoration in Spain? Best Thing That Ever Happened To That Town
“Grief [at the damaged painting] has turned to gratitude for divine intervention – the blessing of free publicity – that has made Borja, a town of just 5,000, a magnet for thousands of curious tourists eager to see her[the hapless restorer’s] handiwork, resurrecting the local economy.”
This Museum Sold Off Art Works For Years And Replaced It With Fakes
“Between 1999 and 2014, museum workers replaced several original works by Russian and Soviet avant-garde artists, including Alexander Nikolayev, Richard-Karl Sommer and Victor Ufimtsev, who had lived and worked in Uzbekistan last century.”
If You Don’t Buy This Art Today, We’ll Burn It
“We’ll get a nice old-timey metal trash can . . . (the art) will be up until midnight, then we’ll take down all the works that are going to be destroyed.”
University Of Iowa Removes An Anti-Hate-Speech Art Work For Being “Offensive”
“Created by Serhat Tanyolacar, a UI visiting professor and printmaking fellow, the klansman sculpture was decoupaged in newspaper coverage of racial tension and violence throughout the past 100 years. The piece was meant to highlight how America’s history of race-based violence isn’t really history and “facilitate a dialgoue,” as Tanyolacar told university paper The Gazette.”
How Architecture Became Disconnected From The People Who Use It
“The question is, at what point does architecture’s potential to improve human life become lost because of its inability to connect with actual humans?”
Indianapolis Museum Of Art To Drop Free Admission
“The Indianapolis Museum of Art, which hasn’t charged an admission fee since 2007, will begin charging adults $18 for entry to the museum and gardens starting in April … The museum briefly imposed a $7 adult admission fee in 2006, but dropped the policy a year later” after attendance fell.
Pow! Right In The Canvas! This Video Game Lets You Punch A Monet
“Last week, IRL Monet-puncher Andrew Shannon was sentenced to six years in prison for his actions in 2012 (don’t worry, it has since been restored). As you take your anger out on the Impressionist masterpiece in the digital version, you can see the dollars’ worth of damage add up at the top of the screen – without the repercussions.”