Arts news

• Sylvia Jukes Morris, Biographer of Clare Boothe Luce, Dies at 84

  15-01-2020 23:44 via nytimes.com
  
  She spent 33 years on the two-volume biography, examining 460,000 items at the Library of Congress that stretched 319 linear feet.
  
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• $700 M. Macklowe Art Collection Could Head to Auction in Spring 2020: Report

  15-01-2020 23:07 via artnews.com
  
  During divorce proceedings in 2018, New York judge Laura Drager ordered collectors Harry and Linda Macklowe to sell 65 artworks from their holdings, which are collectively worth around $700 million, and to split the proceeds. Now, according to a report by Bloomberg, three leading auction houses—Sotheby’s, Christie’s, and Phillips—have been invited to offer proposals to sell the billionaire couple’s collection.
  A date for the auction of works from the Macklowe collec
  
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• Toshio Saeki, Legendary Erotic Illustrator of the Tokyo Underground, Is Dead at 74

  15-01-2020 22:59 via artnews.com
  
  Toshio Saeki, the illustrator, painter, and “Godfather of Japanese Erotica,” has died at the age of 74. His death was confirmed in an Instagram post by his Tokyo-based gallery Nanzuka. The cause of death was not stated.
  Saeki was a legendary figure of Japan’s postwar underground scene, having built a fervent cult following through erotic illustrations that blended gore, humor, and Japanese folklore. As Tokyo was subject to social revolution in the 1970s, Saeki’s drawings&
  
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• Record-Setting Tamara de Lempicka Portrait Returns in Rising Market for Artist’s Work

  15-01-2020 22:20 via artnews.com
  
  In November, the market for Art Deco artist Tamara de Lempicka took a somewhat unexpected upward turn when Sotheby’s sold La Tunique Rose for $13.36 million above a $6 million low estimate. A favorite artist among celebrities, with Jack Nicholson, Barbra Streisand, and Madonna all owning her work, the Polish painter’s work appears at auction with some regularity, but in 2009 four works were sold, mostly from the collection of designer Wolfgang Joop, for a combined price of more than
  
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• Some Collectors Take a D.I.Y. Approach; Others Call in the Pros

  15-01-2020 21:26 via nytimes.com
  
  In this case, the art-lovers own storage and shipping centers that meet all their needs to rotate, hang and pack away their pieces.
  
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• Pete Davidson’s ‘King of Staten Island’ Will Open South by Southwest 2020

  15-01-2020 21:00 via nytimes.com
  
  Directed by Judd Apatow, the comedy will premiere at the Austin festival on March 13.
  
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• Michelle Dorrance Will Turn Jacob’s Pillow Into a Forest of Tappers

  15-01-2020 21:00 via nytimes.com
  
  For the 2020 festival, Dorrance Dance will be featured in performances and pop up interventions all over the campus.
  
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• ‘Dolittle’ Review: Baa, Humbug

  15-01-2020 20:42 via nytimes.com
  
  Robert Downey Jr. plays the doctor turned animal whisperer in this dreary and misbegotten adventure.
  
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• Hugh Scott-Douglas’s “Trade Winds” Paintings and the Vagaries of Art’s Financialization

  15-01-2020 20:34 via artnews.com
  
  Is it ironic, or simply appropriate, that Hugh Scott-Douglas, an artist whose work has often taken up the flows of twenty-first-century capital as its theme, is the poster child for the vagaries of art’s financialization? In 2014, dealer Niels Kantor paid $100,000 for one of Scott-Douglas’s “Cyanotype” paintings—hazy blue-and-white grids made by exposing film printed with algorithmically generated patterns onto canvas—intending to flip the twentysomething arti
  
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• Review: David Attenborough Is Back, and He Brought the Walruses

  15-01-2020 19:56 via nytimes.com
  
  “Seven Worlds, One Planet,” the latest nature documentary extravaganza from the BBC Natural History Unit, offers spectacular footage and a sense of déjà vu.
  
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• Review: Staging a Movie Melodrama in ‘The Conversationalists’

  15-01-2020 19:37 via nytimes.com
  
  Music (and eventually emotion) cuts through the alienating layers of abstraction in this new work by the musician-storytellers James & Jerome.
  
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• Judge: Rudolf Stingel Painting in Inigo Philbrick Lawsuit Must Remain with Christie’s for Now

  15-01-2020 19:30 via artnews.com
  
  While its ownership title is being contested by multiple parties, an untitled Rudolf Stingel painting of a photograph of Pablo Picasso must remain in the hands of Christie’s auction house, a judge said in a new legal filing.
  In a filing on Monday in the Supreme Court of New York, Justice Joel M. Cohen ordered that the Stingel work be kept at the auction house’s New York location for the time being. A lawsuit was filed against the painting by Guzzini Properties, Ltd., a company that c
  
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• The Five-Way Race for Best Picture Begins

  15-01-2020 19:25 via nytimes.com
  
  When it comes to Oscar’s top prize, this is the most wide-open competition in years. Which film has the right factors to go all the way?
  
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• Gustavo Dudamel Extends Contract With Los Angeles Philharmonic

  15-01-2020 19:00 via nytimes.com
  
  The star conductor cemented his commitment to the orchestra after a period of administrative upheaval.
  
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• Powerhouse Collector François Pinault Appoints Former Centre Pompidou Leader as Director of Private Museums in Venice

  15-01-2020 18:23 via artnews.com
  
  ARTnews Top 200 collector François Pinault has a big year ahead of him—in June, his long-awaited private museum in Paris, the Bourse de Commerce, will finally open. But moves are taking place at his Venice museums—the Palazzo Grassi and the Punta della Dogana—as well, and today the collector named a new leader for both institutions.
  Bruno Racine will be the next director of the Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana in Venice. He succeeds Martin Bethenod, who will oversee
  
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• Claire Oliver Gallery Becomes Latest Enterprise to Depart New York’s Chelsea District

  15-01-2020 16:43 via artnews.com
  
  Amid rising rents and declining foot traffic, various galleries, including P.P.O.W, Andrew Kreps Gallery, and James Cohan Gallery, have left New York’s Chelsea neighborhood for other districts, such as Tribeca and the Lower East Side. The latest to do so is Claire Oliver Gallery, which has plans to leave the neighborhood it has called home for nearly two decades for a new space in Harlem.
  The 1,000-square-foot ground floor of Claire Oliver Gallery’s new home, located on Adam Clayton
  
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• In Democratic Debate, the Candidates Mostly Kept the Gloves On

  15-01-2020 15:15 via nytimes.com
  
  TV assumes that the biggest fights make the best debates. Tuesday’s outing on CNN suggested: What if they don’t?
  
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• In Afghanistan, Being an Artist Is a Dangerous Job

  15-01-2020 15:01 via nytimes.com
  
  Despite the perils, Afghan artists have consistently portrayed their country and its many facets.
  
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• Yusaka Maezawa Gets a Reality TV Show, Stan Douglas to Represent Canada at 2021 Venice Biennale, and More: Morning Links from January 15, 2020

  15-01-2020 15:00 via artnews.com
  
  To receive Morning Links in your inbox every weekday, sign up for our Breakfast with ARTnews newsletter.
  Controversies
  More than three dozen artists have signed an open letter to leadership at the Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1, urging the institutions to divest themselves from board members who receive funds from potentially problematic sources. [ARTnews]
  After Joshua Helmer, the former Erie Art Museum director, was accused of harassment, staff members at the Philade
  
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• Bill Fay Was a Hidden Gem. One Musician Made Finding Him a Mission.

  15-01-2020 15:00 via nytimes.com
  
  The English singer and songwriter, now 76, has made as many studio albums this decade as in the previous six combined after a producer named Joshua Henry tracked him down.
  
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• George Condo, Painter of Picasso-Inspired Tableaux, Is Now Represented by Hauser & Wirth

  15-01-2020 14:15 via artnews.com
  
  In December, ARTnews reported that George Condo, a juggernaut of contemporary painting, was in talks to join the roster of one of the biggest galleries. Now, the news is confirmed.
  Hauser & Wirth has officially taken on Condo, in a sign of increased market fervor for the artist, who is known for his Picasso-like images of humans with mismatched body parts. He had previously shown with Skarstedt gallery (of New York and London), Sprüth Magers (Berlin, London, and Los Angeles), and Simon
  
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• Whitney Houston and Nine Inch Nails Make the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

  15-01-2020 14:05 via nytimes.com
  
  The 2020 class includes the Notorious B.I.G., Depeche Mode, the Doobie Brothers and T-Rex. Dave Matthews Band, Motörhead and Pat Benatar did not make the cut.
  
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• 2020 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Adds Whitney Houston and Nine Inch Nails

  15-01-2020 14:05 via nytimes.com
  
  The 2020 class includes the Notorious B.I.G., Depeche Mode, the Doobie Brothers and T-Rex. Dave Matthews Band, Motörhead and Pat Benatar did not make the cut.
  
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• Art Basel Hong Kong Unveils ‘Encounters’ Projects for Forthcoming Fair in March

  15-01-2020 14:00 via artnews.com
  
  As protests continue to put Hong Kong on edge, Art Basel is scheduled to go on as planned from March 19 to March 21 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. Having announced in December that it would offer galleries some flexibility in terms of booth and withdrawal fees, the fair has now revealed the 12 artists who will present works in its “Encounters” sector for large-scale installations.
  Curated by Alexie Glass-Kantor, the executive director of Artspace in Sydney, this y
  
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• Stan Douglas, Leading Video Artist with an Eye Toward the Marginalized, Will Represent Canada at 2021 Venice Biennale

  15-01-2020 12:00 via artnews.com
  
  Though it’s still a year and a half away, the 2021 Venice Biennale is beginning to take form. Last week, the Biennale announced that Cecilia Alemani would serve as artistic director for the main exhibition, and slowly but surely, countries have started revealing who will represent them at the Italian art festival. Wednesday brought news of yet another country’s pavilion.
  Stan Douglas will represent Canada at the 2021 Venice Biennale, with the National Gallery of Canada in Ontario as
  
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• When Pina Bausch Made Tanz Into Tanztheater

  15-01-2020 11:00 via nytimes.com
  
  Bausch’s pivotal 1977 work “Bluebeard,” with its relentless gender battles and powerful drama, returns to the stage after a long gap.
  
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• Podcast Groups Aren’t Just About Podcasts

  15-01-2020 11:00 via nytimes.com
  
  Fans of popular shows are converging on Facebook to talk about what they hear, and pretty much everything else too.
  
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• Mark Hamill, a ‘Star Wars’ Star, Gets His Record Back

  15-01-2020 11:00 via nytimes.com
  
  An Arizona bookstore found and returned an original vinyl record that had been inscribed by the composer John Williams and addressed to the actor.
  
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• Ed Ruscha: He Up and Went Home

  15-01-2020 11:00 via nytimes.com
  
  The artist on the Oklahoma roots of his new show, that $52.5 million painting, and meeting Walt Disney.
  
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• Late Night Takes On the Warren-Sanders War of Words

  15-01-2020 08:46 via nytimes.com
  
  “In his defense, back in 1919, Bernie Sanders was one of the first senators to support a woman’s right to vote,” Jimmy Kimmel joked.
  
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• What’s on TV Wednesday: An Adventure Series and ‘68 Whiskey’

  15-01-2020 07:00 via nytimes.com
  
  “Expedition With Steve Backshall” kicks off on PBS. And a war comedy-drama debuts on Paramount Network.
  
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• Ken Jennings Wins ‘Greatest of All Time’ Title on ‘Jeopardy!’

  15-01-2020 05:22 via nytimes.com
  
  Jennings survived a tough match against James Holzhauer to win his third match and with it, the tournament.
  
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• Museum Director Forced OutAmid Harassment Complaints

  15-01-2020 04:23 via nytimes.com
  
  Joshua Helmer was removed at the Erie Art Museum after a New York Times article about complaints during his tenure at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
  
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• Greatest of All Time on ‘Jeopardy!’: Who Won Game 4?

  15-01-2020 03:00 via nytimes.com
  
  Ken Jennings had one more match to win to claim the $1 million prize. Did he pull it off?
  
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• In Open Letter, Artists Urge MoMA, PS1 to Divest from Board Members Who Support ‘Suffering of Others’

  15-01-2020 00:55 via artnews.com
  
  Last week, 37 artists involved in MoMA PS1’s “Theater of Operations: The Gulf War 1991-2011” sent an open letter to the exhibition’s curators, Ruba Katrib and Peter Eleey. The letter echoed what has become a refrain for the Museum of Modern Art’s sister institution in recent months: that MoMA divest from two board members with potentially problematic sources of funding that could tie the museum to what the signees called “the suffering of others.”
  The mu
  
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