Arts news

• Private sale believed to be one of contemporary artwork's largest ever

  18-02-2016 23:47
  
  Brett Gorvy, head of postwar art at Christie’s, said paintings by Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock had been bought for combined total of $500mA private sale of contemporary paintings is thought to have been one of the largest art deals ever, after two pictures by Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock were bought for a total of $500m (£349m). Related: Jackson Pollock's secret prize-winning recipe for apple pie discoveredRelated: 'Fake Rothko' trial reduces tragic art to farceCont
  
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• 'Dear New Yorkers, tear down those walls': Tania Bruguera to stage public vote on immigration

  18-02-2016 23:31
  
  “A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” Pope Francis told a reporter on Wednesday, 17 February, in regard to Donald Trump and his call for a border wall between the United States and Mexico. The Cuban artist and activist Tania Bruguera—the first artist-in-residence for the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs in New York—will publicly gauge how other New Yorkers feel about immigration when sh
  
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• Curries, Stews, and an Abramovic Aphrodisiac: Admir Jahic and Comenius Roethlisberger’s Discuss Their Book of Artists’ Recipes

  18-02-2016 23:30 via artnews.com
  A few weeks ago, the Swiss Institute finally managed to buy grasshoppers for an upcoming event. The following night, the New York institution was going to host the United States book launch of Swiss artists Admir Jahic and Comenius Roethlisberger’s Artists’ Recipes, and … Read More
  
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• Curries, Stews, and an Abramovic Aphrodisiac: Admir Jahic and Comenius Roethlisberger Discuss Their Book of Artists’ Recipes

  18-02-2016 23:30 via artnews.com
  A few weeks ago, the Swiss Institute finally managed to buy grasshoppers for an upcoming event. The following night, the New York institution was going to host the United States book launch of Swiss artists Admir Jahic and Comenius Roethlisberger’s Artists’ Recipes, and … Read More
  
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• The Kids Used To Be Rebels. Today’s Youth? Not So Much

  18-02-2016 23:27 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Their values can seem either too extreme or frighteningly bland. Or both at once: They have astoundingly authoritarian ideas about free speech, and they love bubble gum pop. They never believe exactly what we want them to believe.”
  
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• Xavier Cha at MOCA Cleveland

  18-02-2016 23:25 via artnews.com
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• X-ray exhibition marks artist's return to health after serious illness

  18-02-2016 23:25
  
  Boo Beaumont hopes the exhibition will inspire her to start creating art once again after three years largely bed-ridden
  
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• No accident: Maria Hassabi falls down gracefully at MoMA

  18-02-2016 22:58
  
  If you see someone sprawled across a staircase at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) next week, do not panic. It is all part of a work by the New York-based, Cyprus-born choreographer and artist Maria Hassabi. Plastic, which comes to MoMA from the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, features a rotating cast of eight dancers moving at a glacial pace through the museum’s atrium and two stairwells. The work, which the artist describes as a “liv
  
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• LACMA Just Acquired An Important Piece Of Los Angeles Architecture

  18-02-2016 22:35 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “For the most part, the important local examples of modern residential architecture that have been preserved as house museums, such as the Eames House in the Pacific Palisades or the Schindler House on Kings Road in West Hollywood, are fixed and unchanging examples of a particular design era. Goldstein’s house is something different, an example of the modern residence in flux.”
  
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• Why Hasn’t Science Been Able To Explain Morality?

  18-02-2016 22:03 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “I’m talking about the failure of the social sciences to develop a satisfactory theory of ethical life. A theory that could explain why humans are constantly judging and evaluating, and why we care about other people and what they think of us. A theory that could explain something so trivial as the fact that social scientists care about data fudging.”
  
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• Pots are for plebs: why vases were cheap in Ancient Greece

  18-02-2016 22:00
  
  “If it’s full of Theory and jargon, put it in the bin”, said the books editor. The trouble with Jeffrey Hurwit’s Artists and Signatures in Ancient Greece is that there is not enough theory, or rather that the theoretical basis for at least some of his analysis is deeply flawed. In the absence, for good reason, of any reference to “vase-painting” in ancient written sources, for example, many beautiful myths have been invented around the supposed careers of the
  
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• A brilliant impersonator of himself: Terry Eagleton on Oscar Wilde

  18-02-2016 22:00
  
  This year marks the 125th anniversary of the publication of Oscar Wilde's Intentions, a book of essays and dialogues on aesthetics that included one of his most celebrated works, The Critic as Artist. To mark the anniversary, we are republishing the literary critic Terry Eagleton's review of The House Beautiful: Oscar Wilde and the Aesthetic Interior (by Charlotte Gere with Lesley Hoskins, published by Lund Humphries), which originally appeared in The Art Newspaper's July/August 2000 issue.The
  
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• Broadway 1602 to Open Harlem Space, Further Heating Up a Burgeoning Gallery District

  18-02-2016 21:48 via artnews.com
  Broadway 1602, the gallery that was a pioneer in the Flower District when it opened on West 28th Street and Broadway in 2005, is now once again opening a space in an on-the-rise neighborhood: Harlem. In May, it will open … Read More
  
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• Jill Soloway Is Developing a Pilot About Chris Kraus’s Novel ‘I Love Dick’

  18-02-2016 21:37 via artnews.com
  Jill Soloway, the creator of the Amazon series Transparent, is developing a new pilot for the network, this one based on Chris Kraus’s 1997 novel I Love Dick. The news was first reported by Deadline Hollywood.Kraus is a novelist, essayist, … Read More
  
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• Kenneth Turan: Inside The Roiling Firestorm Around Hollywood Diversity

  18-02-2016 21:34 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Stirred into almost immediate action by all the hullabaloo, the Oscar folks upended their old established order. “The academy is going to lead and not wait for the industry to catch up,” Boone Isaacs memorably said. But once the academy revealed its strong new rules, it both quieted the uproar and created a backlash of its own.
  
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• Ken Griffin spends reported $500m on two Abstract Expressionist paintings

  18-02-2016 21:01
  
  The billionaire hedge-funder Ken Griffin has bought two Abstract Expressionist paintings for around $500m fr om the business magnate David Geffen’s foundation, according to Bloomberg Businessweek.
  Griffin purchased Willem de Kooning’s Interchange (1955) for around $300m and Jackson Pollock's Number 17A (1948) for around $200m in a deal reportedly completed last Fall. The paintings were both on view last September at the Art Institute of Chicago, wh ere Griffin is a trustee.The sale
  
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• All The Things It Takes To Get A Broadway Show To Opening Night

  18-02-2016 21:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “On one recent Tuesday, we spent an hour each with a dozen upcoming Broadway shows as they worked under looming deadlines.” From finding an actor who can embody Steve Jobs to singing and dancing American Psycho, “here’s how the steps and stories, the stitches and salesmanship come together.”
  
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• Scientists Suggest Machines Could Learn Human Values By Reading Books

  18-02-2016 20:26 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Another way of saying this is that the stories are surrogate memories for an AI that cannot ‘grow up’ immersed in a society the way people are and must quickly immerse itself in a society by reading about [it].”
  
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• Mark Bradford Wins the 2016 David C. Driskell Prize

  18-02-2016 20:02 via artnews.com
  Los Angeles–based artist Mark Bradford has been awarded the High Museum of Art’s David C. Driskell Prize, named in honor of the eponymous African American scholar and artist. Founded in 2005, the Driskell Prize was the first national award to … Read More
  
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• The Rise Of The Platonic Rom-Com

  18-02-2016 20:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Broad City does more than simply portray – more even than simply celebrate – its central friendship. It is instead taking a cue from a culture in which Tina Fey and Amy Poehler joke (and also totally don’t joke) about their status as ‘life partners.’ … What that amounts to is a culture that is not only recognizing the primacy of friendship, but trying to carve a space for it.”
  
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• Russia’s Top Art Prize Canceled After Dissident Artist Is Nominated

  18-02-2016 19:44 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Director Mikhail Mindlin has released a statement explaining that Pyotr Pavlensky’s nomination has been rejected as it involved “breaches of the law and caused material damage.” He added that nominating this performance “to a competition which is held by a state organisation and under the aegis and with the support of the culture ministry seems impermissible to us.”
  
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• Can Meditation Change Your Brain? Science Weighs In

  18-02-2016 19:28 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “There was more activity, or communication, among the portions of their brains that process stress-related reactions and other areas related to focus and calm.”
  
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• Global Phenom: Festivals That Light Up Cities Are Magnets For Tourists

  18-02-2016 19:22 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Many of these free light festivals include interactive displays that turn spectators into participants who can change colors or patterns by moving or playing a game. The events are also tourism magnets, attracting locals and out-of-towners alike to waterfronts, historic districts and other neighborhoods on dark winter nights and other periods when tourist activity may be low.”
  
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• Zero Gravity – Choreography’s Final Frontier?

  18-02-2016 19:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “This time, it’s not a modern dance company that’s pushing the limits of choreography. It’s the quirky pop band OK Go … For their newest video, ‘Upside Down & Inside Out,’ the band performs an intricately-choreographed dance, using the fact that they are literally weightless to try unthinkable physical feats.” (includes video)
  
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• Christo and Jeanne-Claude at Galerie Gmurzynska

  18-02-2016 18:55 via artnews.com
  Pictures at an Exhibition presents images of one notable show every weekday Read More
  
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• Rannva Kunoy, painter: 'I keep reining the paint in, to prevent it from being overly luxurious'

  18-02-2016 18:31
  
  Karen wright meets the artist at her studio in Stoke Newington, north London
  
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• Arizona Gets A New Conductor

  18-02-2016 18:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Jose Luis Gomez will be the new music director of the Tucson Symphony. He “has been an in-demand guest conductor around the world following his 2010 first-place award at the prestigious International Conductors’ Competition Sir Georg Solti in Germany.”
  
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• Image Processors: Networks, the Internet, and Pictures at ‘Co-Workers’ in Paris

  18-02-2016 18:06 via artnews.com
  For Nøne Futbol Club’s Work nº2B: La tonsure (after Marcel Duchamp), 2015, the French artist duo convinced retired soccer star Djibril Cissé, famous online for his coifs—an electric-blue landing strip, a mohawk tied into little bobbles, a bleached buzz cut … Read More
  
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• How Your Online Avatar Influences Your Offline Behavior

  18-02-2016 18:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “You know your thoughts and feelings affect your body language – but this works the other way around, too. Happiness causes us to smile, of course, but smiling also causes us to feel happy. Experimental research suggests that this concept also applies to the virtual space, and that the physical traits of your avatar can change the way you behave in real life.”
  
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• What’s Happened To Italian Opera Singers? They’ve Gone MIA

  18-02-2016 17:35 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  The fierce new competition seems to have caught Italians by surprise. “There are good voices in Italy but many of them think a good voice is enough and don’t want to learn the other aspects such as acting.”
  
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• Maccarone Gallery Was on ‘Broad City’ Last Night

  18-02-2016 17:19 via artnews.com
  The excellent Comedy Central series Broad City had the premiere of its third season last night, and the episode culminated with stars Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer paying a visit to an opening at an unnamed gallery. “That gallery looks awfully … Read More
  
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• Got $13M To Save The Birthplace Of Dada?

  18-02-2016 17:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “That’s the reserve price that has been slapped on Cabaret Voltaire in a bid to secure Dada’s future during its centenary year. Now it is just a question of finding a deep-pocketed art lover who can envisage the unassuming building, nestled among cobbled side streets in Zurich’s old town, as a sculpture or oil painting.”
  
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• Dada’s 100 Years Old Now – Isn’t It Kind Of Over?

  18-02-2016 16:55 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  After all, at this point the most widely-seen Dada artwork is on the Swiss 50-franc bill. On the contrary, argues Swissinfo, the legacy of Dada is everywhere. (And it’s the first worldwide movement to originate in Switzerland since Calvinism.)
  
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• Norma, Coliseum, London, review: Bellini's classic remade as a brilliant parable of economic colonialism

  18-02-2016 16:01
  
  Christopher Alden's production updates things to an Amish enclave in nineteenth-century America
  
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• Soap Sculptures and Swimming Pools: Miami’s Nicolas Lobo Takes Over Red Bull Studios In Chelsea

  18-02-2016 16:00 via artnews.com
  The day I interviewed the Miami-based artist Nicolas Lobo—who, alongside Hayden Dunham comprises one half of BIO:DIP, a two-floor, two-person show opening Friday at Red Bull Studios New York in Chelsea—signs of water seemed to be everywhere. I walked through … Read More
  
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• Andrzej Żuławski, ‘Poland’s Answer To David Cronenberg,’ Dead At 75

  18-02-2016 16:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “‘The vision of the world portrayed in his films has been described as tragic, shocking and hysterical,’ with ‘explosions of violence, sexuality, and despair’; his methods yielded from actresses including Romy Schneider, Isabelle Adjani and Sophie Marceau some of the best performances of their careers.”
  
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• Actor George Gaynes, 98

  18-02-2016 15:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “With his baritone voice, chiseled good looks and versatility as a character actor and singer, Mr. Gaynes appeared in hundreds of episodes of sitcoms and dramas on television” – most famously, Punky Brewster – “35 Hollywood and made-for-TV films [including Tootsie and the Police Academy franchise], and many plays, musical comedies and operas.”
  
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• Here’s Why The Axe Is Over English National Opera, Explains England’s Arts Funding Chief

  18-02-2016 15:15 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Those who know me understand that I have a personal commitment to classical music of all types, but they also know I will squeeze every ounce of value out of taxpayers’ cash. … [ENO] has been bailed out over the years by the Arts Council to the tune of millions of pounds. … Although we are seeing clear signs of improvement, as stewards of public money we cannot ignore its track record.”
  
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• Angry Prado Explains Why It’s Yanking Two No-Longer-Bosches From Big Bosch 500 Show

  18-02-2016 15:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The [Bosch Project’s] (at the very least) unprofessional manner of proceeding when offering its conclusions … not only contravenes the contractual conditions of the loan but also suggests that the Museo del Prado accepts and authorizes the proposed attributions.”
  
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• Morning Links: Damien Hirst’s Restaurant Edition

  18-02-2016 14:45 via artnews.com
  Must-read stories from around the art world Read More
  
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• Fired Buffalo Philharmonic Oboist Loses Federal Court Appeal

  18-02-2016 14:45 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “[A Federal judge] refused to overturn an arbitrator’s decision that upheld the July 2012 firing of Pierre Roy, who had been the orchestra’s principal oboist for more than 15 years.” Roy had been fired from the BPO once before, in 2010.
  
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• Eugène Delacroix’s long reach laid bare in National Gallery show

  18-02-2016 14:44
  
  Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863) was perhaps the most remarkable artist of 19th-century France. If that seems a bold claim in the face of other powerful competitors, Delacroix and the Rise of Modern Art at London’s National Gallery (until 22 May) makes a strong case for it.
  It is undeniably extraordinary that the artist, who largely taught himself to paint from his observations of Flemish Baroque artists, Rubens above all, was at the time of his death in 1863 the most revered artist of
  
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• New York’s Next Big Battle Over What Deserves To Be A Landmark

  18-02-2016 14:30 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission is about to decide the fate of 95 properties that have been languishing, some of them for decades, on its calendar.” Michael Kimmelman looks at the issues involved – and at some of the buildings he’d like to see saved.
  
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• See Jupiter – by balloon! Nasa's retro space holiday posters – in pictures

  18-02-2016 14:27
  
  Mars, Venus, 51 Pegasi: which will you visit? Nasa has imagined far-off planets as resorts in Visions of the Future, a series of free-to-download vintage-style posters Continue reading...
  
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• They Read It For The Articles: Playboy’s First Nudity-Free Issue, Reviewed

  18-02-2016 14:15 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “Playboy doing away with naked women … might sound like Vogue doing away with fashion, or Cat Fancy doing away with cats, or, frankly, Vanity Fair doing away with movie stars and badly behaving rich people. … Now that the ‘the articles’ are, indeed, the only reason to read Playboy, the question is raised: Are they, in fact, any good?”
  
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• Met To Present First Opera By A Woman In 113 Years – And It’ll Be Conducted By A Woman

  18-02-2016 14:00 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  The first and only time before now the Metropolitan Opera has produced an opera by a female composer was in 1903 (Ethel Smyth’s Der Wald).
  
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• Performance Artist Who Nailed Scrotum To Red Square Dropped From Russia’s Top Art Prize

  18-02-2016 13:45 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  Pyotr Pavlensky wasn’t nominated for that particular piece, his most notorious. He was in the running for the Innovation Prize for last November’s Threat: Lubyanka’s Burning Door, in which he did exactly that to the headquarters of the FSB (the successor to the KGB). (The Innovation Prize is government-sponsored.)
  
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• The Weird Plagiarism Lawsuit Between Two Giants Of Young Adult Fantasy

  18-02-2016 13:31 via feedproxy.google.com
  
  “At issue, to the puzzlement of many observers, isn’t word-for-word plagiarism, but what looks like [Sherrilyn] Kenyon’s attempt to claim ownership of some of the most archetypal themes in popular culture… And egging Kenyon on is a legion of implacable Cassandra Clare detractors who have had it in for the YA phenom since her apprenticeship years in the notoriously toxic subculture of Harry Potter fandom.”
  
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• Readers suggest the 10 best love paintings

  18-02-2016 13:00
  
  Last week, for Valentine’s Day, Laura Cumming selected her top 10 paintings about love. Now you suggest the brushwork that fills you with passion Continue reading...
  
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• Peace for Paris: meet the artist who designed the symbol that went viral – video

  18-02-2016 13:00
  
  Artist Jean Jullien designed the Peace for Paris symbol after the terror attacks last year. The image, combining the Eiffel Tower with the traditional peace symbol, quickly spread across social media as a way of showing solidarity with France. Three months after the terrorist attacks in the French capital, Jullien designs a new image of hope out of the tears of the past Continue reading...
  
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