Previous Posts: January 2022
Florence's Anger at Corporate Projections
January 13 2022
Picture: ansa.it
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
News from Florence that many citizens and officials have been left outraged after projections of corporate sponsors have been disfiguring the facades of some of the city's most famous buildings.
The projections were a part of the so-called 'F Light Festival' organised through the Palazzo Vecchio by an organisation called Muse per Natale. Public anger became particularly pronounced when photos were circulated of sponsors logos being plastered all of the Hospital of the Innocents (pictured), one of the historical and architectural highlights of the city. It turns out that many of the projections, including onto parts of the Uffizi, were never given the authority to do so.
Florence's superintendent Antonio Pessina has been quoted saying:
Monuments are not advertising posters.
Henry Moore Pond Transformed into Paddling Pool
January 13 2022
Picture: AHN Reader
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
While the world has been obsessing over the travel blunders of an international tennis star, a reader has been in touch with another very strange happening in Australia.
The National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne have recently transformed their reflecting pond, centred on Henry Moore's Figure of a Draped Seated Woman, into a pink paddling pool. This is part of the gallery's Summer Nights 'DJ, Dining, Bar and French Cinema' experience.
Our reader writes:
This summer, the director, in his ongoing efforts to turn the gallery into a theme-park/selfie zone/childcare centre, has had the water coloured pink and designated it a wading pool. Which reduces the Moore sculpture to an oversized garden ornament.
The gallery have explained the 'installation' as the following:
Referencing Sir Roy Grounds’s open-air courtyards in the original design of NGV International, this architecture and landscape installation comprises two key design elements: a body of indigenous plants and a body of water. The body of water is coloured pink, making direct reference to the many inland salt lakes in Victoria and highlighting the scarcity, importance and political implications of water as a natural resource.
...
Envisioned as a space that becomes part the NGV garden rather than a separate architectural object, pond[er] invites audiences to move through a series of interconnected walkways and accessible platforms. Visitors can immerse themselves within and explore the spaces of flora and water and can even step down and wade through the pink pond.
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Right.
One can't help but hope that someone will save this fine Henry Moore from the pink sludge. Of course, galleries should be places where visitors can have fun. But, if pink paddling pools are the best way to achieve it, then surely the gallery should consider turning itself into a Leisure Centre.
Master Drawings New York 2022
January 13 2022
Picture: Master Drawings
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Master Drawings New York opens next week on Friday 21st January 2022. As usual, it seems like there will be a great deal of interesting talks, events and online materials to enjoy and sift through.
The Louvre Conserves Delacroix's Femmes d'Alger
January 13 2022
Picture: Louvre
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The Louvre in Paris has had Eugene Delacroix's Femmes d'Alger dans leur appartement conserved. The 1834 work was presented to the Museum in 1874 and hadn't been restored in many decades. The work was undertaken by Bénédicte Trémolières and Luc Hurter in the workshop of the Centre de recherche et de restauration des musées de France (C2RMF) using funds from the patronage of Mme Ealet.
Soane Drawing Collection on Display in March
January 12 2022
Picture: Soane Museum
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Ever wanted to peer inside the many albums of drawings held by the Sir John Soane's Museum? The museum will be opening a new exhibition of masterpieces from the drawings collection of Sir John Soane in March 2022.
According to their website:
Sir John Soane, one of the leading architects in Georgian Britain, compiled what was probably the first comprehensive collection of architectural drawings in the world. By his death in 1837 it numbered 30,000 sheets, including works by the most prominent architects: Thorpe, Wren, Talman, Hawksmoor, Vanburgh, Gibbs, Kent, Chambers, Piranesi, Adam, Clérisseau, Pêcheux, Wyatt, Playfair and, of course, Soane himself. The collection, which includes illuminated manuscripts, Italian Renaissance drawings, and volumes of exquisite Indian and Persian miniatures, demonstrates the range of Soane’s interests and his extraordinary connoisseurship. It remains one of the most important graphic resources in the world and is widely referenced by architects and architectural historians.
The quality of Soane’s collection of drawings is rarely paralleled elsewhere. Because of their fragility, these items are rarely seen by the public. This exhibition, and its associated book, offer visitors a unique opportunity to see some of the highlights of the collection, bringing together a selection of the most beautiful and important works from among the Soane Museum’s drawings collection. Moreover, it offers a glimpse into the ways in which this collection supported Soane’s activities as an architect and teacher.
The exhibition will run from 9th March 2022 until 5th June 2022.
Major Cezanne Exhibition in Chicago
January 11 2022
Picture: Art Institute of Chicago
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The Art Institute of Chicago have released more details about their major upcoming exhibition on Cezanne. The show will run between the 15th May 2022 until 5th September 2022.
According to their website:
This exhibition is the first major retrospective of the artist’s work in the United States in more than 25 years and the first exhibition on Cezanne organized by the Art Institute of Chicago in more than 70 years. Planned in coordination with Tate Modern, the ambitious project explores Cezanne’s work across media and genres with 90 oil paintings, 40 watercolors and drawings, and two complete sketchbooks. This outstanding array encompasses the range of Cezanne’s signature subjects and series—little-known early allegorical paintings, Impressionist landscapes, paintings of Montagne Sainte Victoire, portraits, and bather scenes—and includes both well-known works and rarely seen compositions from public and private collections in North and South America, Europe, and Asia.
MFA Boston acquires a Wright of Derby
January 11 2022
Picture: @libson_yarker
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Dealers Libson & Yarker have shared yet another interesting piece of news that the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston have acquired Joseph Wright of Derby's The Rev. Dr Thomas Wilson and his adopted daughter Miss Catherine Sophia Macaulay. The work, dated to 1776, was undertaken whilst the artist was in Bath.
According to their catalogue note:
Painted for the distinguished clergyman Dr Thomas Wilson, it depicts Wilson and his adopted daughter, Catherine Sophia, the daughter of the radical republican historian Catherine Macaulay. The widowed Macaulay, a celebrated historian and polemicist, was in the midst of writing her unprecedented eight volume History of England; whilst she is not included in the portrait, both sitters are shown pointing at a volume of the History of England. As such, this portrait stands as a monument to one of the most progressive female historians of the eighteenth century and her unconventional relationship with Wilson. The painting is also a tour de force of Wright’s mature work as a portraitist.
The British Museum's Turners to get the NFT treatment
January 11 2022
Picture: The British Museum
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
There have been several stories in the press that The British Museum will be offering a selection of their Turners to be purchased as NFTs. The works will be part of a group of twenty paintings transformed into NFTs from the Robert Wylie Lloyd collection. Lloyd (d.1958), a former chairman of Christie's, put rather stringent rules on the bequest including the fact that they may never be loaned out.
What exactly do you get if you buy one of these NFTs? My favourite quotation from the The Times article is as follows:
A selection of JMW Turner’s paintings is being sold by the museum as non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which act like digital certificates of ownership for physical or virtual assets and are purchased with cryptocurrencies.
However, the owners of these certificates will have no ownership of the physical artworks, nor be allowed to touch them.
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Of course, you can always just right click on Google images to have your very own high defition JPEG of Turner's Messieurs les voyageurs on their return from Italy (pictured).
The current obsession with digital currencies and NFTs recently brought to mind Hogarth's famous depiction of The South Sea Scheme. I wonder which of these digital artists will capture the inevitable downfall that this curious speculation will surely bring.
Web Conference: Rembrandt seen through Jewish Eyes
January 10 2022
Picture: Rijksmuseum
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
CODART have drawn attention to a web conference organised by the Jewish Museum in Moscow on the subject of Rembrandt Seen Through Jewish Eyes. The conference, with a keynote by Simon Scharma, will be spread across four dates between 24th January - 14th February 2022.
Topics included within the conference are:
Jews and Judaism in Rembrandt’s Own World
Spiritual Values that United and Divided Rembrandt and the Jews
Jews in the Art World and Rembrandt
Rembrandt in Russia
The sessions are free to attend, however, prior registration is required.
Musée des Beaux-Arts Marseille Conserve and Redisplay Plague Scenes
January 10 2022
Picture: @marseille
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Apologies for missing this late last year. The Musée des Beaux-Arts Marseille have conserved and redisplayed their masterpiece Le chevalier Roze à la Tourette in a special exhibition at the museum. Curators have brought together a set of canvases which depict various scenes around the town during the plague of 1720 (pictured).
The display will run until 28th February 2022.
Potteries Museum to make Drastic Cuts
January 10 2022
Picture: tripadvisor.com
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Sad news to report from Staffordshire. The Potteries Museum and Art Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent are making drastic cuts in an effort to save money. The council run museum will be sacking 19 members of staff, including their curators, in an effort to save £560,000 between 2022-23. This nationally important collection, due to Stoke's glorious heritage in the design and production of ceramics, will replace its curators with one new position described as 'curator - contemporary collecting'. The museum will also reduce its open hours to five days a week.
A petition to save the museum from cuts has already received over 15,000 signatures.
Sotheby's New York Master Paintings Part II
January 9 2022
Picture: Sotheby's
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Sotheby's New York have uploaded their Master Paintings Part II (the equivalent to the old 'day sale') to their website. This online sale will take place between 18th - 28th January 2022.
As usual, there are many intriguing paintings with tempting estimates on offer. The catalogue note and literature references for lot 311 (pictured) makes for especially interesting reading, however, I won't spoil any more of the fun!
How many Baroque Beheadings can you fit into one room?
January 7 2022
Picture: finestresullarte
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
It seems that the Palazzo Barberini may have managed to set a record for the amount of Baroque Beheadings in one room. I was bemused to see this press photo for the aforementioned The Challenge of Judith exhibition in Rome. This temporary collection of Judiths by the likes of Caravaggio, Artemisia, Fontana and others looks rather impressive (or terrifying) indeed.
The show will run until 27th March 2022.
Bernhard Strigel Angel up for Sale
January 7 2022
Video: Eric Turquin Expertise
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
A few members of the art press have been pointing out a rare painted angel by Bernhard Strigel (1460–1528) that is coming up for sale in early February. The work dated to c.1520, rediscovered by Eric Turquin, relates to another angel by Strigel purchased by the Louvre Abu Dhabi at auction in 2008 for €1.1m. It is believed the panel might have been part of an altarpiece that was dismantled during the Reformation.
The work will be sold at the auction house Artpaugée, Paris, on 4th February 2022 carrying an estimate of €600k - €800k. No prizes for guessing where it might end up...
YouTuber Smuggles his own Painting into the Louvre (?)
January 7 2022
Video: Niko Omilana
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The YouTuber and pranker Niko Omilana, a chap who has no less than 4.35m subscribers on the platform, has filmed himself sneaking in a portrait of himself onto the walls of the Louvre. The painting, an amusing remake of the Mona Lisa (of course), was hung by Niko onto the walls using sticky tape. Members of staff eventually 'cotton on' to his scheme and remove him from the premises. The video has been watched over 3,800,000 times.
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All fun and games and I suppose. Personally, I can't see how the Louvre weren't in on it. Security at such museums isn't as lax as the video makes out, especially if the presenter was actively drawing attention to the 'fake' he had placed there.
Medici Icons' new home in the Pitti Palace
January 7 2022
Picture: arnet.com
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Artnet.com have published news that the Medici collection of Russian icons have found a new home in the Pitti Palace, Florence. The collection, numbering 78 works acquired since the seventeenth century, will be housed in a set of newly rennovated rooms. Some of these religious artworks owned by the Uffizi haven't been on display for centuries.
According to the article:
The exhibition “responds to today’s need to expand the cultural offer for an increasingly heterogeneous audience eager to explore lesser-known contexts,” said Uffizi curator Daniela Parenti.
Thought to be the oldest collection of its kind outside of Russia, the group of paintings was assembled, initially, by the grand dukes of the Medici, appearing for the first time in an inventory of the family’s possessions in the early 1600s. The next time the collection appeared on record was in 1761, by which time the senior branch of the Medici family had died out and the House of Lorraine had assumed control of Tuscany, and the Palazzo Pitti.
It was during this later stage that the majority of the artworks entered the collection, largely thanks to Emperor Francis I. The paintings haven’t been on public display since the 18th century, kept, instead, in storage—largely due to the sheer size of the Uffizi’s collection.
Sotheby's are Hiring!
January 7 2022
Picture: Sotheby's
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
Sotheby's Old Master Paintings Department in London are hiring a Cataloguer.
The key objectives are the job are as follows:
To catalogue, organise, plan and lead on the mid-season and online sales; to catalogue and research Old Master paintings in the Day and Evening sales; to assist and in certain cases lead valuations and in due course to gather business for the above sales at New Bond Street.
No salary is indicated and neither is a deadline date set for applications. You'll have to have a BA or MA in art history as per the requirements of the role.
Good luck if you're applying!
Pen to Brush at the Courtauld
January 6 2022
Picture: Courtauld Gallery
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
I've forgotten to mention that the Courtauld Gallery have a temporary exhibition of works on paper which runs until 27th February 2022. Pen to Brush: British Drawings and Watercolours features highlights from the gallery's collection including works by Sir Peter Lely (pictured), JMW Turner, John Constable and Edward Dayes.
The gallery have also uploaded a free virtual tour of the exhibition which is accessible online.
Leonardo Outbid on Leonardo Ripoff
January 6 2022
Picture: pagesix.com
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
An amusing story from the world of celebrity gossip this week. Hollywood actor Leonardo di Caprio was supposedly outbid on a painting known as "Mona Lisa Bull Fighter" by at a UNICEF gala in St Barts a few days ago. The $1m work, clearly a rip-off by another famous Leonardo, was produced by Domingo Zapata, an artist whose works di Caprio is said to collect.
Cincinnati Art Museum Acquires a Kauffman
January 6 2022
Picture: Libson & Yarker
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The London art dealers Libson & Yarker have shared news that they sold a painting by Angelica Kauffman to the Cincinnati Art Museum last year. Abraham driving out Hagar and Ishmael (pictured) was painted in 1792 after Kauffman had returned to Italy from London. The painting was commissioned by Marchesa Polissena Turinetti di Priero and had remained in the family's hands until the 1960s.
