| | The First Art Newspaper on the Net |   | Established in 1996 | Thursday, June 18, 2020 |
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| | DNA of 'Irish Pharaoh' sheds light on ancient tomb builders | |
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A photo provided by Ken Williams shows the central underground chamber of Newgrange, a 5,000-year-old Irish tomb in the valley of the River Boyne, near Dublin. At sunrise during the winter solstice, a beam of light illuminates the chamber. Ken Williams via The New York Times.
by James Gorman
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- The vast Stone Age tomb mounds in the valley of the River Boyne, about 25 miles north of Dublin, are so impressive that the area has been called the Irish Valley of the Kings. And a new analysis of ancient human DNA from Newgrange, the most famous of the mounds in Ireland, suggests that the ancient Irish may have had more than monumental grave markers in common with the pharaohs. A team of Irish geneticists and archaeologists reported Wednesday that a man whose cremated remains were interred at the heart of Newgrange was the product of a first-degree incestuous union, either between parent and child or brother and sister. The finding, combined with other genetic and archaeological evidence, suggests that the people who built these mounds lived in a hierarchical society with a ruling elite that considered themselves so close to divine that, like the Egyptian pharaohs, they could break the ultimate taboos. In Ireland, more than 5,000 years ... More |
The Best Photos of the Day Homage to Christo. H.R.H. Sissowath Tesso discovers Guillaume Levy-Lambert's "Le Secret Sacré" at Art Porters Gallery in Singapore, on 11 February 2020. Click here for the full story, click here for the catalogue, click here for the song. On 12 June 2020, both the recently departed Christo and his wife Jeanne-Claude would have turned 85.
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 | | Case cracked: Mystery Antarctica fossil is massive prehistoric egg | | How did the old masters make their ultramarine? | | Paris Pompidou Centre to reopen with focus on racism | 
Now, analysis has revealed that the mystery fossil is in fact a soft-shelled egg, the largest ever found, laid some 68 million years ago, possibly by a type of extinct sea snake or lizard.
TOKYO (AFP).- Scientists had nicknamed it "The Thing" -- a mysterious football-sized fossil discovered in Antarctica that sat in a Chilean museum awaiting someone who could work out just what it was. Now, analysis has revealed that the mystery fossil is in fact a soft-shelled egg, the largest ever found, laid some 68 million years ago, possibly by a type of extinct sea snake or lizard. The revelation ends nearly a decade of speculation about the fossil, and could change thinking about the lives of marine creatures in this era, said Lucas Legendre, lead author of a paper detailing the findings, published Wednesday in the journal Nature. "It is very rare to find fossil soft-shelled eggs that are that well-preserved," Legendre, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Texas at Austin, told AFP. "This new egg is by far the largest soft-shelled egg ever discovered. We did not know that these eggs ... More | | 
Atomic structure of the blue lazurite mineral, the actual ultramarine. The sulfur atoms are in the middle, coloured yellow. Image: chemicalstructure.net
AMSTERDAM.- Researchers at the Rijksmuseum, the University of Amsterdam, VU Amsterdam and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) have developed a method that reveals how the costly pigment ultramarine was prepared from the semi-precious stone lapis lazuli. Thanks to X-ray examinations of paint samples, they can now look back more than four hundred years to determine whether the blue stones were brought to a red heat during the pigment extraction process. The results, recently published in the leading journal Science Advances, also help to cast light on the disastrous ultramarine disease. The costly pigment ultramarine blue during the 17th century, it was more expensive than gold is made from the blue semi-precious stone lapis lazuli. Its blue colour is due to the mineral lazurite, but more than half of lapis lazuli is comprised of all sorts of other ... More | | 
Serge Lasvignes, president of the Centre Georges Pompidou modern art museum, currently closed to the public, poses at the museum on June 15, 2020 in Paris. Anne-Christine POUJOULAT / AFP.
PARIS (AFP).- The Pompidou Centre in Paris, home to Europe's biggest collection of modern art, will reopen on July 1 with debates about racial discrimination and a major show called "Global(e) Resistance". The museum said Wednesday that its summer programme will be focused on the global south, with its flagship show opening at the end of the month featuring artists from Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America. With the Black Lives Matter movement shaking many corners of the globe, the museum said a series of debates involving artists and academics will begin the very next day "to cast light on the burning issue of discrimination". The "Global(e) Resistance" exhibition will also look back on work created as old certainties were tested and shaken by decolonisation and the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989. The Grand Palais exhibition hall will also reopen on July 1, with the Louvre ... More |
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| | Sotheby's Hong Kong Fine Classical Chinese Paintings Spring Sale to be held on 9 July | | Sotheby's to offer the first shoes handmade by Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman to appear at auction | | Miró, Chagall, Hodler, de Chirico and Warhol lead Koller's July auctions | 
Zhu Da (Bada Shanren; 1626 - 1705), Rock, Bamboo and Ducks. Ink on silk, hanging scroll, 97.2 x 77.3 cm. Est: HK$1,000,000 1,500,000 / US$129,000 193,000. Courtesy Sotheby's.
HONG KONG.- Sothebys Hong Kong Fine Classical Chinese Paintings Spring Sale on 9 July 2020 will present over one hundred paintings and calligraphy from the masters of the Song, Yuan, Ming andQing dynasties. Highlights include Bamboos, a rare work by Xia Chang, the leading ink bamboo master from the Ming dynasty, as well as Stele Inscription in Running Script, a widely published calligraphy work with impeccable provenance by Dong Qichang. The sale also boasts some of the finest and rarest works from various important private collections, including Ming Dynasty Fan Leaves Collection, Treasure from the Palace An Important Private Asian Collection, The Buddhist Painting & Calligraphy, among others. Steven Zuo, Head of Classical Chinese Paintings, Sothebys Asia, commented: Headlining this seasons sale ... More | | 
Bill Bowerman Handmade Waffle Spike Shoes, early 1970s. Estimate: $130/150,000. Courtesy Sotheby's.
NEW YORK, NY.- Sothebys announced Nike Origins | Bowerman Built a special single-lot online auction for a pair of waffle spike shoes handmade in the early 1970s by Bill Bowerman, the co-founder of Nike and legendary University of Oregon track coach. Bowerman created the Handmade Waffle Spike Shoes exclusively for John Mays, a runner on Bowermans University of Oregon track team, and have remained in Mays possession ever since. One of only a handful of pairs known to exist, these shoes mark the first and only pair hand-crafted by Bill Bowerman ever to appear at auction. Another known pair of Bowerman shoes are in the Special Collections and University Archives of the Knight Library at the University of Oregon. The legendary Oregon runner, Phil Knight, and Bill Bowerman partnered together and started Blue Ribbon Sports in 1964, which was rebranded as Nike in 1971. Bowerman crafted the present shoes in the early ... More | | 
Marc Chagall (Liozna 18871985 Saint-Paul-de-Vence), La veste rouge. 1961. Oil, gouache and ink on paper. 66 Ã 50.5 cm. Estimate: CHF 300 000 / 450 000 | ( 263 160 / 394 740).
ZURICH.- Three works by Joan Miró will be offered in the 3 July Impressionist & Modern Art auction, including the panoramic-format oil on canvas simply entitled "Painting", 1953 (lot 3530, CHF 480 000/550 000). Along with "Solitude II/III" and "Tête 1" (lots 3527 and 3533, CHF 320 000/380 000 and 180 000/240 000), these works illustrate the master's complex use of numerical and alphabetic signs, and his very particular brand of lyrical abstraction. The deserted city square painted by Giorgio de Chirico in "Piazza d'Italia", 1945-49, is by now a familiar sight for most of us, but it was a recurring theme for de Chirico throughout his long career (lot 3553, CHF 100 000/150 000). Another theme which has been in the foreground in recent weeks is the private garden, and several works in the 3 July auction depict artists' gardens, including ... More |
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| | Important Chicago collections offered in Hindman's auction | | White glove sale & records: Triumph for the first online sale of pocket watches at Sotheby's | | 'If I was Martha, what would I do?' For one, stay upright | 
John Ashbery, The Poems. Tiber Press, [1960]. Estimate: $6,000.00 - $8,000.00.
CHICAGO, IL.- On June 23, Hindmans Books and Manuscripts department will present their spring Fine Books and Manuscripts including Americana auction in their Chicago saleroom. The sale will offer 294 lots of books, manuscripts, Americana, prints, and maps representing a variety of collecting categories including: fine bindings, artists books, literature, medicine, travel and exploration, signed books, and natural history. Following 2019, the departments most successful year since the firms founding in 1982, this sale kicks off what is expected to be another strong year for Director and Senior Specialist Gretchen Hause and her team. Hindman will offer as part of this auction, the collection of Rhoda Hertzberg Clark and the Monastery Hill Bindery. Clark, a collector and businesswoman, became the fourth generation of her family, and the first woman, to helm Monastery Hill when she became President of the firm in 1974. ... More | | 
The Dent Ultra Complication from 1904 - One of the most sophisticated watches ever made - Doubles its estimate to reach USD 832,240. Courtesy Sotheby's.
GENEVA.- Earlier today, the first online sale ever dedicated to pocket watches concluded with 100% of the lots sold. The top lot of the sale was the Dent Ultra Complication, one of the most sophisticated watches ever made, which eclipsed its pre-sale estimate to sell for USD 832,240 / CHF 800,000 (Lot 34, est. CHF 300,000-500,000) and set both a world auction record for a watch sold in an online sale and a record for a pocket watch sold online. The sale, which had been open for bidding since 3rd June, was the third instalment of the landmark collection Masterworks of Time which had already set a swathe of records last year*. Today, the 125 lots on offer totalled USD 4.5 million (CHF 4.4 million), far surpassing the pre-sale expectations (est. CHF 2-3.1m). This result brings the total achieved so far by the collection to over $20.3 million, approaching the high estimate for the entire ... More | | 
A 1937 photo by Robert Fraser of Martha Graham performing her solo Immediate Tragedy, a companion piece to another dance Deep Song, which were both inspired by the Spanish Civil War and rise of fascism in Europe. Robert Fraser, via Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance, Inc. via The New York Times.
by Gia Kourlas
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Choreographer Martha Graham had been in a valley of despair. It was 1937 when Graham, worried about the Spanish Civil War and the rise of fascism in Europe, confessed her state of mind in a letter to composer Henry Cowell. Whether the desperation lies in Spain, she wrote, or in a memory in our own hearts, it is the same. The result was her solo Immediate Tragedy, a companion piece to another dance inspired by the war, Deep Song. Both featured music by Cowell; both were explorations of harrowing events. In Immediate Tragedy, Graham told him, ... More |
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| | First comprehensive show in London of Peter Schuyff's work on view at White Cube | | Summers Place Auctions announces a major auction of Zimbabwe's leading sculptors | | Spain's Alhambra Palace reopens to visitors | 
'Peter Schuyff', White Cube Mason's Yard, 13 March 8 August 2020 © the artist. Photo © White Cube (Theo Christelis).
LONDON.- White Cube Masons Yard presenting an exhibition of work by Peter Schuyff. His first comprehensive show in London, it features large-scale acrylic paintings produced during the 1980s: a prolific period for the artist that saw the exploration and refinement of his abstract visual language. Born in Holland, Schuyff moved to Vancouver at an early age, attending the Vancouver School of Art before moving to New York in the 1980s. At a time of burgeoning artistic experimentation in the city, Schuyff soon became a central figure in the East Village scene, working for a period at Studio 54, sitting for Andy Warhol and living in the historic Chelsea Hotel. Associating with other contemporary painters including Philip Taaffe, George Condo and Peter Halley, he showed at the experimental, highly influential Pat Hearn gallery from 1983 onwards. During this period, Schuyffs artistic language evolved from loose ... More | | 
Victor Matafi, Whirlpool Centre, Springstone, 225cm high, 70cm wide, 46cm deep, Estimate: £8000 - £10,000.
BILLINGSHURST.- Summers Place Auctions is holding its first sealed bid auction of sculpture from Zimbabwe. It is the first auction of its kind in the UK exclusively focusing on this African countrys artistic output. A percentage of the sale will go towards a school project in the heart of sculptor communities in MaShonaland. Whilst most of the traditional African tribal artefacts were crafted in less durable materials such as wood, Zimbabwean sculptors are unique in having access to various local stone mines over the centuries. In fact the countrys name means Houses of Stone in the Karanga dialect of Shona and the bird on its flag was inspired by the stone-carved birds found at the heritage site Great Zimbabwe, a ruined city which was constructed in the 11th century until it was abandoned in the 15th century. This tradition of sculpture was re-established when the director of the National Gallery in Zimbabwe, S ... More | | 
Tourists visit the Alhambra in Granada on June 17, 2020, on the day it reopens to the public after three months of closure due to the coronavirus pandemic. JORGE GUERRERO / AFP.
GRANADA (AFP).- One Spain's most visited monuments, Alhambra Palace in the southern Spain reopened its doors on Wednesday after a three-month closure due to the virus. Under a pristine blue sky with the Sierra Nevada mountains in the background, the historic Moorish palace -- and Europe's jewel of Muslim architecture -- was once again opened to visitors, although with strict health and security regulations in place. "I feel very proud to be here and to be the first visitor allowed into the Alhambra," said Mariana Castro Mendoza, a 36-year-old Mexican living in Granada, where the Alhambra is located. To mark the occasion, she was allowed to ring the bell in the Torre de la Vela watchtower which dominates the site, saying it gave her "a great sense of pride" with the bell "a symbol of hope for everyone". With travel regulations still in place until June 21, only locals were able to visit the ... More |
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Visit of "Le Secret Sacré" by Guillaume Levy-Lambert
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| | More News |
 London Churchill statue to be uncovered before Macron visitLONDON (AF).- The London statue of British wartime leader Winston Churchill that was controversially boxed up after anti-racism protests will be uncovered for a visit by French President Emmanuel Macron, the mayor's office said Wednesday. "The covering around the Winston Churchill statue will be removed for the visit of President Macron to London," said a spokesman for mayor Sadiq Khan. Other monuments to Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi, and the Cenotaph war memorial were covered up in the wake of protests at the death of George Floyd during a police arrest in the United States. The protection was put in place before a counter-demonstration last weekend, which saw far-right protesters fight running battles with the police. Churchill's statue became a target when it was daubed with graffiti branding him a racist because of his policies ... More Germany pledges 120 million euros to Auschwitz fundWARSAW (AFP).- Germany has doubled its share of a fund to preserve the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp to 120 million euros ($135 million), Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said Tuesday. The death camp, which is located in Poland, was where Nazi officials murdered 1.1 million people, a million of whom were European Jews, from 1940 to 1945. Around 80,000 Poles, 25,000 Roma and 20,000 Soviet soldiers also perished there before the Red Army arrived in January 1945. More than a decade ago, Poland sought contributions to establish a permanent fund to preserve the site. Maas was quoted in a statement issued by the Auschwitz museum as saying that Germany would keep doing what "it has done for years within the context of its historical responsibility. "We want to support this work and preserve the memory because German ... More De Gaulle statue vandalised in northern FranceLILLE (AFP).- A bust of France's wartime resistance leader and later president Charles de Gaulle has been vandalised in northern France, local officials said Monday, prompting outrage from right-wing politicians. The bust of de Gaulle in the northern town of Hautmont near the Belgian border was splashed with bright orange paint and the back of its pedestal daubed with the slogan "slaver". The act comes as statues are being toppled and removed globally amid worldwide anti-racism protests in the wake of the death in US police custody of George Floyd. President Emmanuel Macron said in an address to the nation on Sunday that France would not erase "a trace" of its history and vowed it would not remove statues of its historical figures. De Gaulle is seen as a national hero in France for resisting the Nazi occupation while in exile before himself ... More French composer Jarre to perform world's first 'Matrix avatar' concert PARIS (AFP).- French electronic music legend Jean-Michel Jarre told AFP Wednesday that he is going to perform the world's first "avatar" concert -- "like in the Matrix". The veteran star will play live on Sunday in a virtual universe created for the French midsummer Festival of Music where he will be joined by "the audience as avatars who will be totally immersed" in his musical world. Jarre said the concert will be one step beyond the lockdown concert performed by the US rapper Travis Scott inside the shooter game Fortnite in April, which was watched by more than 12 million players. "Everything will be done live," Jarre told AFP, whereas with "Fortnite it was pre-recorded in a universe that already existed. "Here it will be total immersion in a space that we will be creating live, like in 'The Matrix'," he said, referring to the cult 1999 sci-fi film. The ... More Clars Auction Gallery has record-breaking June 14th sale led by Andy WarholOAKLAND, CA.- Clars Auction Gallery hosted the most successful one-day online only sale in the companys history with just over $3,000,000 in total sales. After recently being purchased by a private investment group in August of this year, the company is seeing record growth, with an increase in exceptional property being offered. An Andy Warhol (American, 1928-1987), Mick Jagger, complete portfolio of ten (10) screenprints was the highlight of Clars June 14th Auction selling for an impressive and record breaking $817,000. This price realized soared above the preceding record by 56% (previously the record at auction was $461,000 from 2014) [7242]. Clars is proud to have achieved a record-breaking price on a rare suite of ten Warhol screen prints of Mick Jagger, said Cristina Campion, Associate Director of 20th Century Design at Clars. We ... More German government seeks ban on big events until at least end-OctoberBERLIN (AFP).- Germany will ban most large events until the end of October to prevent a new wave of coronavirus transmission, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Wednesday. Social distancing rules and masks will continue to be required in shops and public transport, Merkel said after a meeting with premiers of Germany's 16 states. But schools are expected to return to normal operations after the summer holidays. "As long as there is no vaccine and no medicine available we must maintain basic measures to protect ourselves," said Merkel. The ban on large events could affect shows such as the Frankfurt book fair, although Bavarian state premier Markus Soeder opened the door to exceptions, saying some states may "show flexibility while others take a stricter interpretation" on the issue. Organisers of the Frankfurt book fair, which draws around ... More 'Recovered' French star Catherine Deneuve to return to filmingPARIS (AFP).- French film icon Catherine Deneuve will return to work next month after suffering a minor stroke on set last year, a spokeswoman for the actress told AFP. The 76-year-old was ironically in a hospital shooting a scene for the movie "De son vivant" ("In His Lifetime") in November when she fell ill. Her spokeswoman said Deneuve, who has been France's biggest screen star since the 1960s, has "perfectly recovered" from a "very limited" ischemic stroke. "She was very lucky that she was treated very quickly as they were shooting in a hospital," she added. Since then the star of "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg", "Belle de Jour" and "Indochine" -- for which she was nominated for an Oscar -- has "reacted well to treatment and has got some rest". Shooting will restart on the delayed film directed by Emmanuelle Bercot, which was halted by Deneuve's illness, ... More The next stage: UK theatres adapt to social distancingLONDON (AFP).- London's West End has traditionally drawn people from all over the world to see its shows but theatres have been forced to reinvent themselves because of the coronavirus outbreak. Fifteen million tickets are sold each year for performances including top attractions such as "The Phantom of the Opera", "Les Miserables" and Agatha Christie's "The Mousetrap", a play that has been performed since 1952. But the pandemic brought the curtain down on venues in March, leaving theatres facing an uncertain future where continued social distancing measures threaten their existence. Louis Hartshorn and Brian Hook, co-founders of Hartshorn-Hook Productions, are among the first to adapt to the new reality, announcing the reopening of an immersive adaptation of "The Great Gatsby" to open in October. "The show ... More From Columbus to Confederates, anger about statues boils overNEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- The boiling anger that exploded in the days after George Floyd gasped his final breaths is now fueling a national movement to topple perceived symbols of racism and oppression in the United States, as protests over police brutality against African Americans expand to include demands for a more honest accounting of all American history. In Portland, Oregon, demonstrators protesting against police killings turned their ire to Thomas Jefferson, toppling a statue of the Founding Father who also enslaved more than 600 people. In Richmond, Virginia, a statue of Italian navigator and colonizer Christopher Columbus was spray-painted, set on fire and thrown into a lake. And in Albuquerque, New Mexico, tensions over a statue of Juan de Oñate, a 16th-century colonial governor exiled from New ... More Kristin Linklater, who made actors their vocal best, dies at 84NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Kristin Linklater, a vocal coach renowned for helping actors free their inner voices, died on June 5 at her home in the Orkney Islands of Scotland. She was 84. Her son, actor Hamish Linklater, said the cause was a heart attack. For more than a half-century, Linklater taught vocal technique to A-list stars like Patrick Stewart, Donald Sutherland and Sigourney Weaver; to students at New York University, Emerson College and Columbia University; and to people far removed from the performing arts who simply wanted to be less timid vocally. Most recently her teaching had been at the Kristin Linklater Voice Center in Sandwick, Orkney, which she established in 2014 after retiring from Columbia. Since her death, the centers Facebook page has filled with hundreds of comments from those who benefited from her instruction ... More Historic and rare 1823/2 quarter worth six figures headed to auctionSANTA ANA, CA.- Stacks Bowers Galleries, the numismatic auction powerhouse, will be featuring an extremely rare 1823/2 Capped Bust quarter worth $100,000 at its June 2020 Santa Ana auction. Few American rarities have been so carefully documented and studied for provenance as the 1823/2 Capped Bust quarters. In fact, it is posited that the four rarest U.S. silver coins are the 1802 half dime, the quarters of 1823 (all of which are 1823/2) and 1827, and the 1804 dollar, helping to contextualize the truly elusive nature of this issue. The reason for the 1823/2 date is because the mint used an 1822 die and simply superimposed a 3 over the 2 in the fourth position. If you look closely, you can still see the 2 beneath the 3. While the Smithsonian and the Durham Western Heritage Museum in Omaha both own well-worn specimens, ... More |
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Flashback On a day like today, Flemish painter Rogier van der Weyden died June 18, 1464. Rogier van der Weyden (1399 or 1400 - 18 June 1464) was an Early Netherlandish painter whose surviving works consist mainly of religious triptychs, altarpieces and commissioned single and diptych portraits. He was highly successful and internationally famous in his lifetime; his paintings were exported - or taken - to Italy and Spain, and he received commissions from, amongst others, Philip the Good, Netherlandish nobility, and foreign princes. In this image: Rogier van der Weyden, Werkstatt, Kreuzigung Christi (Abegg-Triptychon), um 1445, Eichenholz, Mitteltafel: 103,5 x 72,4 cm, Flügel: je 103,5 x 32,8 cm. Riggisberg bei Bern, Abegg-Stiftung. © Riggisberg, Abegg-Stiftung, Christoph von Virà g, 1999.
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