Arts news

• ‘We go after them like pitbulls’ – the art detective who hunts stolen Picassos and lost Matisses

  05-05-2021 13:18 via theguardian.com
  
  Christopher Marinello has spent three decades finding missing masterpieces, recovering half a billion dollars’ worth of art. He talks about threats from mobsters, tricky negotiations – and bungling thievesOne summer morning in 2008, Christopher Marinello was waiting on 72nd Street in Manhattan, New York. The traffic was busy, but after a few minutes he saw what he was waiting for: a gold Mercedes with blacked-out windows drew near. As it pulled up to the kerb, a man in the passenger
  
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• Documenta’s Next Edition Moves Forward—Without a Code of Conduct for Its Next Leader

  08-05-2024 21:28 via artnews.com
  
  Even as it faces renewed scrutiny, Documenta, the famed German art festival, will continue onward with its next edition—but it will crucially not adopt a code of conduct for its next artistic director, as was initially expected.A code of conduct for the next artistic director was among the recommendations laid out last year by a expert advisory panel appointed by Documenta’s supervisory board. At the time, Documenta, which occurs every five years in Kassel, was still reeling from an
  
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• RISD Students Stage Sit-In for Gaza, Call for University Divestment from Israel

  08-05-2024 19:59 via artnews.com
  
  Students at the Rhode Island School of Design have staged a sit-in at several buildings in downtown Providence, joining the wave of pro-Palestine protests sweeping American college campuses. The action is led by the RISD Students for Justice in Palestine (RSJP), who have called for the university to divest from Israel in response to its escalating military campaign in Gaza. Citing Columbia University’s Gaza solidarity encampment as inspiration, 22 students and one non-student mem
  
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• Stone with Ancient Writing Discovered in England by Geography Teacher

  08-05-2024 19:02 via artnews.com
  
  A 1,600-year-old rock inscribed with early Irish writing was found by a teacher at his home in Coventry, England. The rare artifact offers insight into earlier forms of the Irish language.Geography teacher Graham Senior was gardening when he found the sandstone inscribed in ogham, an alphabet for writing in the Irish language that dates to the early Medieval period.The ogham writing system, comprised of groups of parallel lines typically found on such materials as stone, was used by the Irish be
  
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• Website Posing as Van Gogh Museum Shut Down After Selling Fake Tickets

  08-05-2024 18:54 via artnews.com
  
  A website claiming to be affiliated with the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam was found to be harvesting credit card information from people who were trying to buy tickets to the institution, according to the Art Newspaper.Around 50 people, the website, vangoghshop.pro, had offered tickets for dates that were unavailable on the museum’s official website. The museum issued a warning on its website: “Beware of scammers, buy your tickets at tickets.vangoghmuseum.com.” Moreov
  
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• A cheaper way to join the National Trust if you’re over 60 | Brief letters

  08-05-2024 17:45 via theguardian.com
  
  National Trust for Scotland | Voting ID | Gallery behaviour| True lies | Swiss army knifeI enjoyed your article on discounts for the over-60s (Money hacks, 7 May), but there’s an even better National Trust discount than the one included. Any UK resident can join the National Trust for Scotland and get the same benefits, but cheaper. It has a joint senior membership that comes in at £99.60 annually, and does not require being a member for the previous three years. It’s vali
  
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• Hurrah for the Courbet vandals: defacing the vulva painting is basic feminism

  08-05-2024 17:43 via theguardian.com
  
  The performer who wrote ‘MeToo’ on Gustave Courbet’s The Origin of the World is right to think the painting is misogynistic: the model doesn’t even have a face!On Monday afternoon, a group of feminist artist-activists tagged “MeToo” in red paint on Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du Monde. Currently on loan to the Centre Pompidou-Metz for an exhibition dedicated to the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, the painting is a notoriously tight close-up of an unna
  
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• Legacy Russell’s ‘Black Meme’ Critiques Representations of Black Culture—But Doesn’t Chart a Way Forward

  08-05-2024 17:07 via artnews.com
  
  Who gets to profit from the TikTok-famous Renegade Dance? Or the viral catchphrase “on fleek”? When memes are by their very nature hyper-transmitted and endlessly remixed, is there any opportunity to “own” one’s innovations in the online cultural field? The problem of how to compensate digital labor and goods has animated scholars and popular thinkers for more than two decades now. Meanwhile, questions of appropriation as they relate to Black creators and subjects h
  
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• Insight! Sensitivity! Genius! Our critic picks the top five masterpieces in the National Gallery

  08-05-2024 17:05 via theguardian.com
  
  It started from scratch – and became one of the world’s greatest collections. As the National Gallery celebrates its 200th birthday, we pick five sublime works – from a serene statesman to Van Gogh’s blazing bloomsThe National Gallery in London is 200 years old on Friday, but what makes it so special? Founded in 1824 when public museums of fine art were in their infancy, it was different from rivals such as the Louvre (founded 1793) and the Prado (1819) because they inher
  
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• Scammers Target Van Gogh Museum, Artifacts Stolen from UK Museum, AI Identifies Fake Art Online, and More: Morning Links for May 8, 2024

  08-05-2024 14:49 via artnews.com
  
  To receive Morning Links in your inbox every weekday, sign up for our Breakfast with ARTnews newsletter.THE HEADLINESSNATCHED. Bronze Age gold artifacts were stolen from the UK’s Ely Museum on Tuesday. They include the museum’s most prized holding, a gold torc valued at about $275,000, acquired in 2017 thanks to grants and public donations, as well as a gold bracelet. Both ancient objects were found in East Cambridgeshire by metal detectorists, while the 3,00
  
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• Fake Monet and Renoir on eBay among 40 counterfeits identified using AI

  08-05-2024 06:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Paintings identified as fake using cutting-edge technology are ‘tip of the iceberg’ specialist Dr Carina Popovici saysA “Monet” and a “Renoir” are among up to 40 fake paintings that are being offered for sale on eBay, according to research by a leading expert.Dr Carina Popovici, a specialist in authenticating artwork, said she applied cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) technology to pictures advertised on the online platform and was shocked to discover
  
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• Highlights from the Hammer Museum Gala

  07-05-2024 22:56 via artnews.com
  
  On Saturday, the Hammer Museum hosted its annual Gala in the Garden. This year, however, honored director Ann Philbin who is set to retire after 25 years at the helm.
  Under her direction, the university art museum affiliated with the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) has transformed into a contemporary art destination, with quadrupled attendance, an expanded collection and facilities, and a biennial, along with a stacked advisory board of collectors and artists alike. Philbin has crea
  
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• Controversial Demolition of Mary Miss Installation Reaches ‘Unsatisfying Status Quo’ After Court Ruling

  07-05-2024 22:55 via artnews.com
  
  The fate of an outdoor installation by artist Mary Miss installed at the Des Moines Art Center (DMAC) is still undecided, even after a preliminary injunction blocking its demolition was issued by an Iowa court on Friday.Judge Stephen Locher of the US District Court for the Southern District of Iowa concurred with the artist’s claim that, as outlined in her contract with the museum, her Land artwork Greenwood Pond: Double Site (1996) cannot be demolished without her permission. Locher, howe
  
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• Artist and Protestors Tag Gustave Courbet’s ‘Origin of the World’ with the Words ‘Me Too’

  07-05-2024 22:54 via artnews.com
  
  Gustave Courbet’s infamous nude painting L’Origine du monde (The Origin of the World) was targeted over the weekend by protesters who tagged it with the words “Me Too.” The 1886 painting is on display at the Centre Pompidou-Metz in northern France in the show “Lacan, The Exhibition: When Art Meets Pscyhoanalysis” (through May 27), which examines theories of the unconscious proposed by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, who once owned L
  
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• Artist and Protesters Tag Gustave Courbet’s ‘Origin of the World’ with the Words ‘Me Too’

  07-05-2024 22:54 via artnews.com
  
  Gustave Courbet’s infamous nude painting L’Origine du monde (The Origin of the World) was targeted over the weekend by protesters who tagged it with the words “Me Too.” The 1886 painting is on display at the Centre Pompidou-Metz in northern France in the show “Lacan, the exhibition. When art meets psychoanalysis” (through May 27), which examines theories of the unconscious proposed by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, who once owned L
  
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• Frank Stella’s Greatest Legacy Was as a Master Sadist

  07-05-2024 20:54 via artnews.com
  
  Was Frank Stella a sadist? More than once, I’ve wondered that while standing before his 1959 painting Die Fahne hoch!, a rectangular abstraction that features four black forms, each of which are demarcated by unpainted lines of white that pulsate toward the center. The painting, for all its austerity, contains a bizarre kind of beauty. It also hides a secret: its title refers to a Nazi marching anthem.Stella is one of those artists who is constantly linked to a one-liner he once spoke. His
  
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• Australian Museum Plans to Installs Toilet in Women-Only Exhibition to Circumvent Anti-Discrimination Ruling

  07-05-2024 19:24 via artnews.com
  
  An exhibition at the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) in Tasmania, Australia by the American artist Kirsha Kaechele titled “Ladies Lounge” is installing a toilet in the gallery, the BBC reported Tuesday.The exhibition, which was previously accessible only to those who identify as a woman, was closed on Monday after a man sued the museum after being denied entry.The show, which opened in 2020, is a lushly decorated area of the museum with chic black and white floors and green velvet d
  
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• Goodbye to gallery audio guides at last | Brief letters

  07-05-2024 18:02 via theguardian.com
  
  Castle Howard exhibition | John Cleese and racism | Hidden cost of coffee in Italy | Fair toilet provisionThree cheers for Sir Tony Cragg (‘They look sad’: Tony Cragg scraps audio guides for Castle Howard exhibition, 2 May). For years I have waited patiently at exhibitions behind someone with headphones listening to three minutes of talk about a picture, usually followed by three seconds looking at that picture. Paintings are visual art, to be looked at. Background information and go
  
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• Standing stones, urban hellscapes and male nudes: Derek Jarman’s glorious Super 8 short films

  07-05-2024 16:42 via theguardian.com
  
  The easy freedom of this medium allowed the artist to range over subjects as diverse as tarot, male nudes at Fire Island and a friend’s flat – and offer clues to his more public feature filmsThirty years after his death in February 1994, it is perhaps unexpected that Derek Jarman – multi-faceted artist, activist, film-maker, socialiser – is probably now most widely known as a gardener. The patch of beautifully arranged salt-resistant vegetation he built around a windswept
  
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• Palais de Tokyo Patron Pulls Support Over Exhibition About Palestine

  07-05-2024 15:33 via artnews.com
  
  Sandra Hegedüs, a longtime patron of the Palais de Tokyo, said she would no longer provide financial support to Paris’s foremost contemporary art museum after it mounted an exhibition dealing with the history of Palestine.On Sunday, Hegedüs said on Instagram that she was leaving the Amis du Palais de Tokyo, a group of benefactors where she formerly served as vice president. In an extended message to the museum’s leadership, she said that her values were no longer aligned wi
  
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• Courbet’s ‘Origin of the World’ Tagged, Stalemate in Mary Miss Land Art Dispute, Gaza Protest at the Met Gala, and More: Morning Links for May 7, 2024

  07-05-2024 15:03 via artnews.com
  
  To receive Morning Links in your inbox every weekday, sign up for our Breakfast with ARTnews newsletter.THE HEADLINESPROTEST/ART. Gustave Courbet’s The Origin of the World (1866) and other artworks were tagged with the red-painted words, “MeToo,” and an embroidered art piece by Annette Messager was snatched in plain sight at the Centre Pompidou-Metz yesterday. The provocative Courbet painting of a vulva, on loan from the Musée d’Orsay, was
  
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• Canaletto masterpiece returns to Wales 80 years after it was hidden in slate mine

  07-05-2024 13:44 via theguardian.com
  
  The Stonemason’s Yard, moved for safekeeping during WW2, is going on display at National Library of WalesDuring the second world war, the painting was transported 250 miles from central London to north Wales to be hidden in a slate mine, tucked away from the perils of Nazi invasion and Luftwaffe bombings.Eighty years on, there has been a sort of homecoming for Canaletto’s masterpiece, The Stonemason’s Yard, as it returns to form the centrepiece of a show opening this week at th
  
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• Blood, blood, everywhere: how Frank Lebon turned a gory obsession into lyrical photographs

  07-05-2024 12:56 via theguardian.com
  
  The cult artist became so fixated with blood tests that he ended up teaching a doctor how to do them. He saw this as a sign and it infused One Blood, a project drawing on intimate moments from his lifeFrank Lebon is fascinated by blood. It’s the connecting theme that flows through his first art book, One Blood, a photographic project that takes us through the Covid-19 pandemic, a type 1 diabetes diagnosis, and love, family and friendship.“I’m always collecting some sort of imag
  
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• Guernica-style battle of Orgreave painting stars in miners’ strikes exhibition

  07-05-2024 07:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Bob Olley’s unsettling vision of clash between miners and police is part of 40th anniversary show in Bishop AucklandBob Olley was there 40 years ago at the “battle of Orgreave”. “I saw the violence,” he said, shaking his head. “I thought I was in a foreign country when I saw what the police did. It is hard to believe it happened in this country.”The brutality he and others witnessed on 18 June 1984 as striking miners met 6,000 police officers on horses o
  
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• Painting of vulva by French artist Gustave Courbet sprayed with ‘MeToo’ graffiti

  07-05-2024 05:18 via theguardian.com
  
  French-Luxembourgish performance artist Deborah de Robertis says she organised the stunt, after which two people were arrestedTwo women have sprayed the words “MeToo” on a 19th-century painting of a woman’s vulva by French artist Gustave Courbet in a stunt by a performance artist, a museum and the artist said.“The Origin of the World”, a nude painted from 1866, was protected by a “glass pane” and the police were on site to assess the damage, the Centre P
  
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• Painting of vagina by French artist Gustave Courbet sprayed with ‘MeToo’ graffiti

  07-05-2024 05:18 via theguardian.com
  
  French-Luxembourgish performance artist Deborah de Robertis says she organised the stunt, after which two people were arrestedTwo women have sprayed the words “MeToo” on a 19th-century painting of a woman’s vagina by French artist Gustave Courbet in a stunt by a performance artist, a museum and the artist said.“The Origin of the World”, a nude painted from 1866, was protected by a “glass pane” and the police were on site to assess the damage, the Centre
  
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• Unmissable Looks from the Met Gala 2024

  07-05-2024 04:00 via artnews.com
  
  “Florals, for spring? Groundbreaking.” The infamous line so sarcastically delivered by Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly in the 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada is certainly apt for this year’s Met Gala. This year’s theme for the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute Benefit centers around the exhibition, “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,” which boasts roughly 250 rare pieces spanning 400 years of fashion history from the institute&r
  
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• Everything to Know about the 2024 Met Gala

  06-05-2024 21:09 via artnews.com
  
  A-list celebrities, fashion world icons, and the art world come together tonight at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art for the annual Met Gala.The museum hosts the art-and-fashion ball each year on the first Monday of May to support its Costume Institute, which holds around 33,000 objects across seven centuries of fashion history. Guests are invited to the gala by invitation and a single ticket can cost up to $50,000. Despite the price may seem steep, there are expected t
  
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• Newly Discovered Caravaggio will be Unveiled at the Prado in Madrid This Month

  06-05-2024 20:57 via artnews.com
  
  A painting that nearly sold at auction three years ago for $1,600 has been revealed to be a missing masterwork by the by the Italian Baroque painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio. It will go on public view for the first time at the Prado in Spain on May 27, according to the Associated Press.The painting, which depicts Jesus Christ being present to the masses just before his crucifixion, is titled Ecce Homo and is one of only 60 works in existence known to have been p
  
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