| | The First Art Newspaper on the Net | | Established in 1996 | Tuesday, November 9, 2021 |
| | | Inside the UN headquarters, a treasure trove of art | |
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Werner Schmidt of the United Nations discusses artworks at The United Nations on November 3, 2021 in New York. Chagall, Moore, Léger: in nearly eight decades, the United Nations headquarters in New York has accumulated valuable works of art, from states and individuals, making the compound another attractive tourist stop in the Big Apple. In this heart of world diplomacy, which hosts crucial crisis meetings for the world, history and geopolitics are also explored through some 400 works, offered by 150 of the 193 member countries. Bryan R. Smith / AFP.
by Ana Fernandez
NEW YORK, NY (AFP).- Marc Chagall, Henry Moore and Fernand Leger. In almost eight decades, the UN headquarters in New York has accumulated numerous artworks, making it home to a little-known but precious collection. The crises that nations deal with inside the centre of international diplomacy are expressed through some of the 400 works, which have been donated by 150 of the 193 member countries. "We have an art collection that would be the envy of many museums in the world. And we are not a museum," says Werner Schmidt, who oversees the collection that tourists could partially visit before the pandemic but which currently remains closed to the public. The artworks represent historical moments, artistic trends and the particularities of donor countries, some of which have ceased to exist, such as East Germany, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Among the most spectacular is "War and Peace" by Brazilian artist Candido Portinari. The two murals frame the entrance ... More |
The Best Photos of the Day Alexander Palace, outside of St. Petersburg, Russia, Aug. 13, 2021. The final home of Russiaâs last czar has been returned to its early-20th-century glory, before World War II and Soviet remodeling led to its deterioration, and opened to the public as a museum. (Mary Gelman/The New York Times).
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| Amy Winehouse's last concert dress sells for $243,200 | | New York's in-person art auctions return with world's most expensive collection | | Antarctica was once a land of fire and not ice |
The dress worn by the late Amy Winehouse during her final performance on display at Julien's Auctions on November 01, 2021 in Beverly Hills, California. Kevin Winter/Getty Images/AFP.
LOS ANGELES, CA (AFP).- The dress singer Amy Winehouse wore for her final performance sold Sunday for $243,200, 16 times its estimated value, as part of a trove of memorabilia from the late diva's life auctioned in California. Winehouse wore the green and black bamboo print dress at a concert in Belgrade in 2011. A month later, on July 23, she died from acute alcohol poisoning. She was 27. Her death was the culmination of a lengthy -- and often very public -- struggle with alcohol and drugs. The dress was the highlight of an 800-item collection of personal effects, ranging from bras and DVDs to books and make-up that were sold by Winehouse's parents, Mitch and Janis. The entire collection brought in $4 million, twice the original forecast, according to auction house Julien's, which managed the sale that ran from Saturday to Sunday. ... More | |
Highlights of the auction season include the sale of Mark Rothko's minimalist painting 'No. 7', estimated to be worth $70-90 million. Angela Weiss / AFP.
NEW YORK, NY (AFP).- After more than a year, in-person auctions return to New York this week with the sale of the Macklowe collection -- the world's most expensive to hit the market. At auction houses Christie's and Sotheby's, the message is the same: the art market is thriving. With sales starting November 15 estimated to bring in more than $1 billion in a week, "this is our largest sale season... since 2015," a record year, said Brooke Lampley at Sotheby's. "Throughout the pandemic, there was great demand from our buyers, who weren't experiencing the same level of supply as they were accustomed to," she told AFP. Experts say the pandemic has not negatively impacted the funds nor appetite of potential buyers, who are increasingly in Asia and younger than their predecessors. For the first half of 2021, when it saw sales increase by 13 percent compared to 2019, Christie's noted that 30 percent ... More | |
In an undated image provided by Flaviana Jorge de Lima, Polar Research 2021, a piece of Cretaceous charcoal recovered from Antarctica, next to a Brazilian real for scale. Flaviana Jorge de Lima, Polar Research 2021 via The New York Times.
by Emily Cataneo
NEW YORK, NY.- Imagine the forests of Chilean Patagonia: wet and cold, dense with monkey puzzle trees and other hardy conifers. Now imagine it with dinosaurs walking around. And on fire. This is what Antarctica was like 75 million years ago during the Cretaceous period, an era known by researchers as a super fire world. A paper published last month in Polar Research by Flaviana Jorge de Lima of the Federal University of Pernambuco and other scientists in Brazil proves that these conflagrations did not spare any continent, even one that is today notorious for its dry, inhospitable climate and largely vegetation-free landscape. Although research on prehistoric wildfires properly called paleofires ... More |
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| Tampa Museum of Art announces $68 million expansion following significant renovation | | New publication celebrates Frick Madison with stunning photography and fresh insights | | Series of four Rosalba Carriera pastels reunited after over half a century on view at the Wadsworth Atheneum |
Tampa Museum of Art Expansion Site Redevelopment - Auditorium and People on Riverwalk.
TAMPA, FLA.- The Tampa Museum of Art this morning announced a transformative expansion plan for its downtown Tampa campus that will add a crystalline, four-story structure to the waterfront, significantly enhancing the visitor experience and expanding the Museums education and event spaces. When completed in 2024, the expansion will include a site redevelopment and add approximately 51,000 square feet of new space along the Hillsborough River to its 25,000 square foot renovation currently underway to double its exhibition spaces and triple its education spaces. The Museum announced that New York-based WEISS/MANFREDI Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism is designing the expansion and current renovation of the existing museum building. Weiss/Manfredi is an award-winning global design firm responsible for such iconic cultural landmarks ... More | |
Frick Madison: The Frick Collection at the Breuer Building. Photo: Joseph Coscia Jr., 2021.
NEW YORK, NY.- One of the most distinctive and keenly awaited events of New Yorks cultural recovery this year was the opening of Frick Madison, the temporary residence of The Frick Collection in the Marcel Breuerdesigned building (formerly occupied by the Whitney and the Met Breuer). With its home under renovation, the Frick has taken advantage of this strikingly different, unlikely setting to present a fresh take on its holdings. The Frick Madison installation, which received rave reviews upon debuting in March, is the subject of a newly released book: Frick Madison: The Frick Collection at the Breuer Building. The lavishly illustrated volume commemorates this singular moment in the museums history through texts and stunning photography. Included are more than 130 images by the museums photographer, Joseph Coscia Jr., who captures the reframing ... More | |
The Muse Calliope (A Sibyl?).
HARTFORD, CONN.- An important series of four pastels by Rosalba Carriera has been reunited for the first time in over half a century and is on view at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, in Hartford, Connecticut in the exhibition By Her Hand: Artemisia Gentileschi and Italian Women Artists, 1500-1800. This is the first time that a complete series of pastels by Rosalba Carriera has been presented in the United States. The series is on view in By Her Hand through January 9, 2022. Rosalba Carriera quickly rose to fame during her lifetime, thanks in large part to her brilliant pastels. A visit to the Wadsworth Atheneum is the only opportunity to see this significant set of four pastels, said Oliver Tostmann, Susan Morse Hilles Curator of European Art at the Wadsworth. The sets striking luminosity, rare freshness, and intricate subject matter constitutes a highpoint in Carrieras career. Their timely reunification is a ... More |
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| Nigeria takes early steps into international art world | | Stanley Spencer Gallery opens Mind and Mortality: Stanley Spencer's final portraits | | 'Elizabeth and Mary: Royal Cousins, Rival Queens' opens at the British Library |
Ayoola Gbolahan, an artist represented by Kanbi projects, was one of those showing at the fair. Benson Ibeabuchi AFP.
by Camille Malplat
LAGOS (AFP).- Nigeria's elite sipped champagne and splashed thousands of dollars on contemporary paintings at a fair in Lagos this week, an early step into the international art world for Africa's most populous nation. In front of major players from cinema, fashion and finance, about 30 art galleries from across the African continent -- but also from Paris, London and Barcelona -- showed off their best pieces at the ArtX fair. "Nigeria's art collectors are not well known globally, and when we arrived here we didn't realise the potential," said Lea Perier Loko from the Paris-based gallery Septieme. "When collectors fall for something, they don't hesitate to spend!" The pieces they sold first were two gigantic blue paintings by Kenyan artist Kaloki Nyamai that represent "a part of history that isn't found in books". ... More | |
Stanley Spencer, Self-Portrait, oil on canvas, 1959. Courtesy: Stanley Spencer Gallery.
COOKHAM.- Stanley Spencer Gallery presents Mind and Mortality: Stanley Spencers Final Portraits. Comprised of 26 works, the exhibition spans fifty years from 1909 until the artists death on the eve of the 1960s and reveals not only the importance of portraiture to Spencers artistic practice, but also the intimacy and unflinching candour he brought to it. Mind and Mortality, which includes works in oil, drawings, pen and inks and a single lithograph, is formed of three parts: Self-Portraits, Mind, Body and Spirit, and The People and Portraits of Spencers Final Years. The cornerstone of the exhibition is Spencers two final self-portraits, made when he was dying of cancer, displayed side by side for the first time. The first is a drawing in red conté which was recently acquired by Stanley Spencer Gallery. The other, on loan from Tate, London, is Spencers final self-portrait in oil paint. They were commissioned ... More | |
Elizabeth and Mary: Royal Cousins, Rival Queens at the British Library. Photography by Justine Trickett (c) British Library.
LONDON.- Elizabeth and Mary: Royal Cousins, Rival Queens (8 October 2021 20 February 2022) is the first major exhibition to consider Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots together, putting them both centre stage and giving them equal billing. The exhibition takes a fresh and revealing look at the infamous story of two powerful queens bound together by their shared Tudor heritage, whose turbulent relationship dominated English and Scottish politics for thirty years. From amicable beginnings to distrust and betrayal, the exhibition explores the complex relationship between Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots through their own words. Despite their fates being intertwined, the queens never met and their relationship was played out at a distance, much of it by letter. This exhibition offers a rare opportunity to see their original correspondence. Drawing on the ... More |
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| World Monuments Fund receives grants from U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation | | Slotin Folk Art Auction announces Fall Self-Taught Art Masterpiece Sale | | Florence Griswold Museum presents 'Revisiting America: The Prints of Currier & Ives' |
The interior dome of Sheikh al-Gulshanis mausoleum, Matjaz Kacicnik 2017, Cairo, Egypt. Image courtesy: World Monuments Fund.
NEW YORK, NY.- World Monuments Fund announced that it has received three major grants totaling more than one million dollars from the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP) for projects at Takiyyat Al-Gulshani in Cairo, Egypt; Cerro SechÃn in Ancash, Peru; and Old Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The Ambassador's Fund is a highly competitive program that receives proposals from cultural museums, ministries of culture, NGOs, and other organizations around the world for a limited number of sponsorships. This year marks the AFCPs twentieth anniversary and a 13-year-long partnership between the AFCP and WMF. Since 2008, the Ambassadors Fund has supported 33 World Monuments Fund-led projects with 46 grants totaling $17 million. Physical conservation and local capacity building are core to each of these World Monuments Fund-led projects. At Takiyyat al-Gulshani ... More | |
Nellie Mae Rowe (1900-1982), Dog on Roof With Blue and Green Birds. 1981. Signed and dated. Paint, crayon, colored pencil and graphite on paper. Image is 18"w x 23.5"h. Frame is 25"w x 30"h. Est. $15,000-20,000.
BUFORD, GA.- A changing of the guard among folk art collectors is responsible for making an array of early, museum-worthy works available for the first time at auction. Thats readily apparent in page after page of the printed catalog and online flipbook for Slotin Folk Art Auctions Fall Self-Taught Art Masterpiece Sale, to be held November 13-14, 2021. Steve Slotin explains that the quality vintage works going on the block are the result of older collectors now reaching the age where they are willing to let go of art that they purchased in the 1970s and 1980s, often directly from self-taught artists. These are wonderful examples, the Slotin Folk Art Auction co-owner says. What were seeing is very early collectors reaching the point where theyre ready for the next generation to take the torch and to represent the very best of self-taught ... More | |
Louis Maurer, The American Fireman: Always Ready, 1858, Lithograph. Joslyn Art Museum, Gift of Conagra Brands, 2016.20.335
OLD LYME, CONN.- The Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Connecticut, presents Revisiting America: The Prints of Currier & Ives, on view through January 23, 2022. Currier & Ives was a prolific printmaking firm based in New York City in the nineteenth century. Founded by Nathaniel Currier in 1834 and expanded by partner James Merritt Ives in 1856, the firm produced millions of affordable copies of over seven thousand lithographs, gaining it the title, the Grand Central Depot for Cheap and Popular Prints. Revisiting America comes from the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, boasting a collection of nearly six hundred Currier & Ives prints donated by Conagra Brands. Currier & Ives perpetuated Victorian ideals in its depictions of family, history, politics, and urban and suburban lifeconcepts that persist today partly as a result of the wide distribution of their images. Revisiting America offers an opportunity for viewers to contemplate the ... More |
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The Alpine World of Giovanni Giacometti
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Singing the praises of RBG style
NEW YORK, NY (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- The legacy of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has inspired all sorts of cultural paeons since her death in September 2020. They have included an exhibition of the justices mementos at the New-York Historical Society, an upcoming childrens picture book, and an off-Broadway play written by Dianne Nora. But the latest tribute, a new work from the Washington National Opera, may be the most apropos yet. Come Home: A Celebration of Return, which runs Nov. 6-14 at the Kennedy Center, involves marquee opera singers like David Butt Phillip and Isabel Leonard performing songs that play on themes loosely related to Ginsburgs life and work: freedom, equality, perseverance. It will be the first in-person production staged by the Washington National Opera since the early COVID-19 lockdowns, and feature not only songs from ... More
Another landmark lost, this time on Astor Row in Harlem
NEW YORK, NY (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Many New Yorkers assume that a historic building, once the city designates it a landmark or includes it in a historic district, is protected from demolition. But that idealized notion of preservation has been smashed in recent weeks, as if by a wrecking ball, from Harlem to the meatpacking district. On Astor Row in Harlem a celebrated strip comprising 28 brick homes that were individually declared landmarks an 1883 house at 28 W. 130th St. was unceremoniously razed last month. The landmarks demise was the culmination of decades of neglect and months of missed opportunities involving an acrimonious tangle of players. And downtown, at Ninth Avenue and 14th Street, nine 1840s pitched-roof row houses in the Gansevoort Market Historic District are being partially demolished under an emergency order from the Department ... More
Important Jack Bush painting, previously owned by singer Andy Williams, up for auction
TORONTO.- As the Canadian art market continues to experience overwhelming interest and activity, with the highest level of collector engagement in more than a decade, art auction house Cowley Abbott is returning to a live, in-person auction event, the first in more than a year due to the pandemic. Cowley Abbotts Fall Live Auction of Important Canadian Art takes place on Monday, November 22 at 7pm ET at the Four Seasons Hotel, 60 Yorkville Avenue, Toronto, and offers a hybrid of in-person, absentee, and real-time online and phone bidding. In June, Cowley Abbotts Spring Live Auction of Important Canadian Art saw a staggering 96 per cent of artworks sold, with two-thirds of the works exceeding the high-end of pre-auction expectation with active global bidding participation welcomed via absentee, telephone and real-time online bidding. The upcoming fall auction is also ... More
The price of living in 'paradise' is higher than ever
NEW YORK, NY (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Hawaii has long been a dream destination for wealthy homebuyers from the United States mainland. But that has probably never been more true than now. From the second half of 2020, into 2021, luxury sales volume in the state of Hawaii grew at a frenetic pace, said Matthew Beall, CEO of Hawaii Life, a real estate firm. The state saw triple-digit growth in transactions, he added, noting that his firm alone had experienced 307% growth in total dollar value. Neal Norman, a director at Hawaii Life, said the influx of buyers from Silicon Valley had been helping to drive the market in Hawaii, which has surged, in part, because of the pandemic. People have realized that they can more readily work remotely and if they have to go back to the office, they are only a 5 1/2-hour plane ride from paradise. Oceanfront property in particular in Hawaii ... More
Rhino horn NFT going on auction in South Africa
JOHANNESBURG (AFP).- The world's first rhino horn NFT goes on auction in South Africa this week to raise funding for conservation efforts, the company that created the digital replica said Monday. Organisers are hoping that wealthy collectors will be willing to open their wallets for a virtual rhino horn designed to finance efforts to protect real rhinos. It's legal to trade in real rhino horns within South Africa, but the auction Thursday in Cape Town will sell a digital replica of a horn that's locked away for safekeeping. Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have made a huge splash among art collectors who have spent millions of dollars on digital drawings, animation, piece of music, photo, or video. An NFT's authenticity is certified by block-chain technology, which is considered immutable, making the digital objects something that can be bought and sold. "We came up with an idea. ... More
Russell Shorto named Executive Director of Diamonstein-Spielvogel Institute at New-York Historical Society
NEW YORK, NY.- The New-York Historical Society announced that Russell Shorto has been appointed executive director of the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Institute for New York City History, Politics, and Community Activism. In this role, Shorto will also lead an advisory board chaired by Dr. Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, whose members include Joy Bivins, Carroll Bogert, Douglas Brinkley, Pamela Rubin Carter, Thomas Dyja, Adam Gopnik, Adam Hochschild, Agnes Hsu-Tang, Michael Keogh, Tarky Lombardi, Kica Matos, Robert Odawi Porter, Luc Santé, Stacy Schiff, and Brent Staples. The Institute, initiated and funded by the Diamonstein-Spielvogel Foundation, aims to create a new historical archive, collecting relevant materials that relate to 20th and 21st-century local history, including the civil rights movement, womens rights, climate concerns, the drive for LBGTQ+ rights ... More
What's in a name? For the Koreans of Sakhalin, an anguished history.
SAKHALIN ISLAND (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- On remote Sakhalin Island, near Russias eastern edge, tales of longing and splintered identity are embedded in peoples very names. Some people here have three different names Russian, Korean and Japanese each representing a different chapter of the islands centurylong history of forced resettlement and war. Taeko Nisio got her name from Japanese authorities in 1939 after she arrived on Sakhalin, at 8 years old, when it was a part of Japans empire. The Soviets captured the island at the end of World War II, and her new Russian friends started calling her Tanya. But in the beginning, Nisios name was Jeon Chae-ryeon, and after eight decades, she is finally making plans to return to where she was born South Korea. Mom, Nisios daughter Kim Geum-hee recalls exclaiming when the South Korean Consulate ... More
Miller & Miller announces online-only watches & jewels auction
NEW HAMBURG.- Miller & Miller Auctions bi-annual Watches & Jewels sale returns on Saturday, November 20th, starting at 9 am Eastern time, with a high-impact offering of luxury watches and fine jewelry, featuring rare and desirable vintage and collectible wristwatches from names such as Rolex, Tudor, Omega, Patek Philippe, Corum and Panerai. This will be an online-only auction, with no in-person event to attend, but bidders can tune in to the live webcast on November 20th at www.MillerandMillerAuctions.com to watch the lots close in real time. Internet bidding will be provided by the Miller & Miller website, as well as the popular platform LiveAuctioneers.com. Telephone and absentee bids will also be accepted. In all, 215 lots will be sold. They will include wristwatches, pocket watches, rings, necklaces, bracelets, earrings and pins. An expected top lot is the Cartier Pasha minute repeater ... More
COP26 host city of Glasgow unveils multi-site public art installation by British designer Steuart Padwick
GLASGOW.- To mark the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), Glasgow the events host city unveiled a newly commissioned public art installation by British designer Steuart Padwick. Reflecting on the imperatives of the ongoing climate crisis, the Hope Sculptures are a gift from over 50 companies to Glasgow and an extraordinary feat of collaboration. Padwicks designs are the result of conversations and collaborative efforts between engineers, environmentalists, writers, the construction industry, historians, scientists, mental health professionals, local community groups, urban planners, and filmmakers. The Sculptures are now visible across three different historically significant locations and visitors are encouraged to access the sculptures via a walking and cycling route that connects the pieces. This ambitious project serves as a beacon of hope ... More
Archive relating to the unknown heroes of the Easter Rising known as "The Gorgeous Wrecks" to be sold at Dix Noonan Webb
LONDON.- A fascinating and unpublished Archive that celebrates the The Gorgeous Wrecks a group of over-military age men who defended Dublins Beggars Bush Barracks during the Easter Rising of 1916 is to be offered by Dix Noonan Webb in their auction of Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria on Wednesday, November 10, 2021. It is estimated to fetch £8,000-12,000. Included will be the important and unique inter-War C.B.E. (Civil), 1916 Easter Rising - Defence of Beggars Bush Barracks D.S.O., Great War O.B.E. (Military) group of eight awarded to Major and Adjutant George Arthur Harris of Dublin University Officer Training Corps, Territorial Force, who led his poorly armed column of above age military reservists - The Gorgeous Wrecks - in ... More
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PhotoGalleries
RIBA
The Kingâs Animals
DOMENICO GNOLI
Karlo Kacharava
Flashback On a day like today, Swiss photographer Robert Frank was born November 09, 1924. Robert Frank (November 9, 1924 - September 9, 2019) was a Swiss photographer and documentary filmmaker, who became an American binational. His most notable work, the 1958 book titled The Americans, earned Frank comparisons to a modern-day de Tocqueville for his fresh and nuanced outsider's view of American society. Critic Sean O'Hagan, writing in The Guardian in 2014, said The Americans "changed the nature of photography, what it could say and how it could say it. [ ... ] it remains perhaps the most influential photography book of the 20th century." Frank later expanded into film and video and experimented with manipulating photographs and photomontage.
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