Category: visual

“The house was intended as some kind of remedy but exacerbated the ills it was supposed to cure. The frenetic accumulation of motifs can be seen as a way of covering a void. In which case, Larry and Lynda would be very far from the first people to imagine that homebuilding can fix relationships and be proved wrong.”

“He’s got the bucks; she’s got the walls.” But with a new building (or buildings) at stake, the Vancouver, B.C.-based art collector Bob Rennie and Vancouver Art Gallery director Kathleen Bartels aren’t talking to one another.

The corporation that runs Bryant Park picked four artists who are being paid to paint, in public, for a couple of weeks apiece. Why? “”The public loves to watch painters.”

“Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad hasn’t made scheduled payments to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles because the institution has $2.1 million in grants it hasn’t put toward exhibitions. … The missed payments come at a time when concerns over finances at the museum have resurfaced after four prominent artists quit MoCA’s board last month.”

“Undoubtedly, when work is commissioned, it comes with the highest hopes for its appeal, and longevity. But for those works that do not receive all the love, why is there no process for their removal? And I think we can take this line of thought further. Why not allow for the replacement or rotation of tired or ‘orphaned’ works, relocating sculptures to new public homes, where they might receive new attention and focus?”

“This process will have to put very clearly the objectives so that it showcases the best of the artists in the region. I think it should be something that engages the local community and also artists that might have been from here and then gone on to international recognition.”

“In a surprise move, an exhibition focusing on human rights abuses is due to open at the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art next month. The show, dedicated to the German sculptor and kinetic artist Günther Uecker, includes … the series ‘The Human Abused: 14 Pacified Implements’, … [which is] based on the Stations of the Cross.”

“The costume collection, as it was known, was once consigned to the basement, geared unabashedly to the ladies, and relatively straightforward in its approach to designers and periods. Now, it has burst the constraints of its form and mutated into dramatic, surreal spectacles. Why is this and what does this mean?”

“Nude Woman in a Red Armchair was advertising the Picasso and Modern British Art exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. However, the airport decided to cover the image after several complaints from passengers in international departures. After gallery chiefs branded the move “bizarre”, the airport has backed down and removed the cover.”

“Portrait of Mademoiselle Claus” was sold to a private foreign buyer last year, but the British government blocked the sale under rules that allow public institutions the chance to buy works “of outstanding cultural importance” at knock-down prices.