| | The First Art Newspaper on the Net |   | Established in 1996 | Thursday, March 19, 2020 |
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| | Met Museum prepares for $100 million loss and closure till July | |
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Visitors outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, March 12, 2020. In a powerful sign that casualties of the coronavirus outbreak include even the countryÂs strongest cultural institutions, the Met is projecting a total shortfall of close to $100 million for the near future and expects to be closed until July, according to a letter the museum sent to its department heads on Wednesday. Karsten Moran/The New York Times.
by Robin Pogrebin
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- In a powerful sign that casualties of the coronavirus outbreak include even the countryÂs strongest cultural institutions, the Metropolitan Museum of Art is projecting a total shortfall of close to $100 million for the near future and expects to be closed until July, according to a letter the museum sent to its department heads Wednesday. ÂThis is an extraordinarily challenging time for us all, said the letter, signed by the MetÂs top executives, Daniel H. Weiss, the president and chief executive, and Max Hollein, the director. ÂAs staff members of The Met, we all have a profound responsibility to protect and preserve the treasured institution we inherited. The Met is an important canary in the coal mine for arts institutions all over the country; when the museum announced March 12 that it was closing, others followed close behind. If even a behemoth like the Met  with an operating budget of $320 million and an endowment of $3.6 billion  is anticipating such a steep financial hit, ... More |
The Best Photos of the Day The ceramics exhibition at Joan B Mirviss Ltd., Restraint and Flamboyance, Masterworks of Mino, focuses on the celebrated glazing traditions that originated in 16th century Momoyama Japan. Numerous types of shino, Oribe, and Seto wares were created for the newly emerging arts of tea ceremony, flower arranging and food presentation.
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 | | Reframing the Prado | | Lifetime retrospective of Jasper Johns's work to open simultaneously in New York and Philadelphia | | Taschen reprints 'Les diners de Gala' | 
Image of The Spinners by Velázquez in the galleries. © Museo Nacional del Prado.
MADRID.- American Express Foundation sponsors American Friends of the Prado Museum making possible a new initiative to improve the Prado Museums permanent collection exhibition and incorporate new preventative conservation measures. The Spinners by Velázquez, one of the masterpieces of European art, will be the first painting to benefit from the project. Its new frame will cover the historic additions to the canvas from view allowing the visitor to better understand the original composition as intended by the great master. The Reframing the Prado project aims to provide the optimum presentation of the Prado Museums permanent collection through improving framing or creating innovative solutions for particular cases, such as The Spinners. The new project, supported by American Friends of the Prado Museum thanks to the sponsorship of American Express Foundation, will begin with an innovative installation to brin ... More | | 
Jasper Johns, Savarin, 1982. Lithograph and monotype: sheet, 50 à 38 in. (127 à 96.5 cm); image, 40 1/4 à 33 1/4 in. (102.2 à 84.5 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of The American Contemporary Art Foundation, Inc., Leonard A. Lauder, President 2002.228 m © Jasper Johns/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY.
NEW YORK, NY.- The most ambitious retrospective to date of the work of Jasper Johns, organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, will be presented simultaneously in New York and Philadelphia this fall. A single exhibition in two venues, this unprecedented collaboration, Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror, will be the artists first major museum retrospective on the East Coast in nearly a quarter century. It opens concurrently in Philadelphia and in New York on October 28, 2020. Filling almost 30,000 combined square feet across the two venues, the exhibition will contain nearly 500 works. It is the most comprehensive exhibition ever devoted to Johns, creating an opportunity to highlight not only his well-known ... More | | 
This must-have reprint of Les diners de Gala reveals the exotic flavors and elaborate imaginings behind the legendary dinner parties of Salvador and Gala DalÃ.
NEW YORK, NY.- Les diners de Gala is uniquely devoted to the pleasures of taste
If you are a disciple of one of those calorie-counters who turn the joys of eating into a form of punishment, close this book at once; it is too lively, too aggressive, and far too impertinent for you.Salvador Dalà Food and surrealism make perfect bedfellows: sex and lobsters, collage and cannibalism, the meeting of a swan and a toothbrush on a pastry case. The opulent dinner parties thrown by Salvador Dalà (19041989) and his wife and muse, Gala (18941982) were the stuff of legend. Luckily for us, Dalà published a cookbook in 1973, Les diners de Gala, which reveals some of the sensual, imaginative, and exotic elements that made up their notorious gatherings. This reprint features all 136 recipes over 12 chapters, specially illustrated by DalÃ, and organized by meal courses, including aphrodisiacs. The illustrations ... More |
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| | Paul Holberton Publishing releases new book featuring 18th century drawings from The Crocker Art Museum | | Rare comics, original comic art, Star Wars figures and political items make a strong showing at Hake's $1.5M auction | | Coronavirus: Swiss art tech company offers solution for highly affected art industry | 
The Splendour of Germany: Eighteenth-century Drawings from The Crocker Art Museum By William Breazeale and Anke Fröhlich-Schauseil
LONDON.- The Crocker Art Museum has one of the finest and earliest German drawings collections in the United States. Featuring artists such as Johann Wolfgang Baumgartner, Anton Raphael Mengs and Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, The Splendor of Germany examines the major developments in German draughtsmanship over the course of the eighteenth century. Published to coincide with the collections 150th anniversary. In the 21st century, the collecting and study of 18th-century German drawings has become a major focus for American museums. One of the finest collections of them, however, has been in California for 150 years. The superb drawings at the Crocker Art Museum, from a Baroque altarpiece design by Johann Georg Bergmüller to a Neoclassical mythology by Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, provide a panorama of German draughtsmen and draughtsmanship throughout the century. Many of the drawings are remarkable for their modernity. A self-portrait by Johann Gottlieb ... More | | 
Showcase #4, Sept./Oct. 1956, CGC-graded 8.0 VF, featured origin and first appearance of the Silver Age Flash (Barry Allen). Sold for $75,284. Image courtesy of Hakes Auctions.
YORK, PA.- Hakes first pop culture memorabilia auction of the new decade scored a solid $1.5 million, bolstered by sales of key comic books, rare original comic art, Star Wars action figures, political memorabilia, and other prized collectibles. The March 11-12 sale boasted more than 1,600 comic books, including 300+ issues that were certified (mostly by CGC). The selection was led by Showcase #4 CGC 8.0, a coveted title that introduces the Silver Age Flash, one of several superheroes DC Comics reinvented in the post-WWII era. It landed within its estimate range at $75,284. Comic books continued their impressive run with Incredible Hulk #1, CGC 5.5, with the Hulks origin and first appearance, powering its way to $19,275. A CGC 6.0 example of Fantastic Four #1, Signature Series Stan Lee, introducing Marvels first superhero team, commanded $17,700. The auction included very rare original comic art by the legendary cart ... More | | 
iazzu's newly developed online channel provides a user-friendly tool for presenting works of art to a worldwide network of galleries and exhibition organizers.
BIEL / BIENNE.- iazzu, the Swiss digital company specializing in the art industry, supports galleries and art fairs worldwide affected by the coronavirus with a user-friendly smartphone solution. At a time of canceled events and declining numbers of visitors, iazzu's solution transforms any exhibition quickly and easily into a professional and exclusive digital experience. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, travel restrictions and the public's fear of infection have affected art events around the world. The result is a significant decline in visitors and closings. Our response to the greatly increased interest in online art viewing is a solution that offers quick implementation and an exclusive digital presence," says Nico Kunz, co-founder of iazzu. Larry Gagosian, David Zwirner and, more recently, Art Basel have already successfully implemented online viewing rooms. iazzu's newly developed online channel provides a user-friendly tool for pr ... More |
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| | MIA Photo Fair 2020 postponed to September | | Historic 1858 Proof Liberty Eagle gold coin offered at Heritage Auctions | | The Kinkade Family Foundation announces emergency grant for curators | 
Rankin, Pink Lips - Orange and Navy, 2018, Archival Colour C-Type Lambda Print, 51x61 cm., courtesy 29 ARTS IN PROGRESS gallery.
MILAN.- MIA Photo Fair, the most important photography art fair in Italy, is moving the 2020 edition to September. The new dates are from THURSDAY 10th TO SUNDAY 13rd SEPTEMBER 2020, at The Mall, in the Porta Nuova district in Milan, alongside the Milan ArtWeek. Thursday 19th March, on MIA PHOTO FAIR website (www.miafair.it) you will have the opportunity to admire a preview of the tenth edition. Since we understood that the coronavirus emergency would not have been resolved in a short time, together with my daughter Lorenza - says Fabio Castelli, founder of MIA Photo Fair we have made every effort to define new dates that would allow us to defend the event, ensure the presence of our exhibitors and continue to consolidate the results achieved in the past 10 years of work together. To support ... More | | 
1858 $10 PR64 Ultra Cameo NGC. CAC. JD-1, High R.7. Ex: Trompeter.
DALLAS, TX.- An 1858 Liberty Eagle, one of the most historic U.S. gold coins ever minted and the only specimen known outside of museums, will headline Heritage Auctions U.S. coins offerings during the Central States Numismatic Society auctions, April 22-25 in Dallas. Heritage is honored to have been selected to offer this historically important coin to its clients, said Greg Rohan, President of Heritage Auctions. It may be decades before this coin becomes available again and the proof gold specialist will find no adequate substitute for this unique-in-private-hands example. Experts agree no more than four to six 1858 proof Liberty eagles were produced, the coin offered here, graded PR64 Ultra Cameo NGC., CAC. JD-1, High R.7, is one of four examples that have been reliably reported; three of those coins are included in institutional collections at the Smithsonian ... More | | 
Thomas Kinkade's easel in its current state.
LOS ANGELES, CA.- The Kinkade Family Foundation administers a new Emergency Grant for curators who are developing projects that promote artwork of contemporary and experimental nature. The Emergency Grant provides funding for a curatorial project that sheds light on the world during this time of darkness. Priority will be given to curators who have a venue secured for their project and are greatly impacted by the challenges we are facing due to COVID-19. The program will provide one-time grants of up to $5,000 for unexpected emergencies related to the COVID-19 epidemic. The grant is available to curators who are U.S. citizens or permanent residents in the United States, District of Columbia, or U.S. Territories. If you arent sure if your discipline fits within these guidelines, please contact the grants administrator. Applicants must be living in the United States or U.S. territories and have a U. ... More |
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| | As Studio 54 boogies to Brooklyn, its denizens look back in wonder | | Modern American & European printmakers lead Prints & Drawings auction at Swann | | It was their big debut. Then a pandemic hit. | 
Abdiel Jacobsen & Kristine Bendul show their disco dancing moves at the Studio 54: Night Magic exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum. TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP.
by Guy Trebay and Ruth La Ferla
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- The diamond dust was swept up long ago, yet the memory endures of a moment in the late 1970s when a flash of brilliance glittered from the rubble of a bankrupt city. That moment was called Studio 54 and, even after more than four decades, the aura of the clubs specific magic persists. Opening during a tumultuous party in April 1977 by Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager two slick but inspired promoters Studio 54 was an Aladdins cave tucked amid the porn palaces of midtown. By transforming an old theater into a disco, the two men also recast the nightscape of the city, creating a club that magnetized the famous and the merely fabulous equally. If nothing before quite resembled Studio 54 where real diamond dust was often set adrift from the ceiling to fall on the dancers below like intergalactic ... More | | 
Mary Cassatt, Gathering Fruit, drypoint, circa 1893. Sold for $35,000.
NEW YORK, NY.- Swann Galleries Thursday, March 5 sale of 19th & 20th Century Prints & Drawings saw success: With more internet bidding, particularly via the Swann App, than any previous sale in the 19th & 20th Century Prints & Drawings category at Swann, with action from across the United States, Europe and Asia, and nearly 20% of buyers new to Swann. The most robust sections of the auction were the American prints and modern European prints and drawings, noted Todd Weyman, the houses director of prints and drawings. The American offering included Martin Lewis 1933 drypoint Circus Night garnering a record for the image at $22,500. Further drypoints by Lewis included Rainy Day, Queens, 1931 ($23,700), and Rain on Murray Hill, 1928 ($16,250). Additional American highlights featured Gustave Baumann with a 1917 color woodcut, Provincetown, and John Steuart Currys 1932 lithograph The Tornado, which each earned ... More | | 
Lorenzo Diggins Jr., a self-taught illustrator and zine publisher, at his home in Los Angeles on March 15, 2020. Artists, actors, dancers and authors search for a silver lining as openings are disrupted by the coronavirus outbreak. Brian Guido/The New York Times.
by Max Lakin
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- The mood was muted late Saturday afternoon at Ulterior Gallery, a narrow storefront space on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. It was meant to be the opening of Mamie Tinklers first solo show in New York, a joyous occasion that was canceled Friday morning. Instead, Tinkler and Takako Tanabe, the gallerys director, decided on a lower key, staggered event, with friends drifting in throughout the afternoon. (The gallery is now open by appointment and remotely.) Most of New Yorks culture system and indeed the countrys shut down all at once last week. The impact of indefinite closures to the public or by-appointment hours wont be fully understood for ... More |
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Historians Piece Together the Rise of the Tower of Babel
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| | More News |
 Pixar pioneers win $1 million Turing AwardSAN FRANCISCO (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Pat Hanrahan was a young biophysics student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the 1980s when he decided to give up his work with microscopic insects and join a small group of computer scientists in their quest to make a movie. The group was led by Ed Catmull, a computer graphics pioneer who had become the chief technology officer at a new company called Pixar. The movie was Toy Story, the landmark animated feature released in fall of 1995. On Wednesday, the Association for Computing Machinery, the worlds largest society of computing professionals, said Hanrahan and Catmull would receive this years Turing Award for their work on three-dimensional computer graphics. Often called the Nobel Prize of computing, the Turing Award comes with a $1 million prize, which will be split by the two ... More Meem Gallery opens third edition of its Modern Masters exhibition seriesDUBLIN.- Spanning over half a century, works by many of the most influential Modernists of the Arab-speaking world are being showcased in Meem Gallery's third edition of its Modern Masters exhibition series, this March. Including Dia al-Azzawi, Ahmed Cherkaoui, Saliba Douaihy, Shakir Hassan Al Said, Mahmoud Said, Chafic Abboud, Faiq Hassan, Ibrahim Salahi, Ismail Fattah, Jewad Selim, Kadhim Hayder, Kamal Boullata, Mahmoud Sabri and Marwan, this exhibition offers a rare opportunity to view a collection of some of the best examples of 20th century Arab art. Through their artistic practices, Iraqi artists including Jewad Selim, Faiq Hassan, Ismail Fattah and Dia al-Azzawi became critical figures in the rise of a post-colonial, national Iraqi identity. Despite Incorporating certain stylistic elements of Modern, Western art movements, such as ... More African music legend Dibango in hospital with coronavirusPARIS (AFP).- Veteran Afro jazz star Manu Dibango has been admitted to hospital suffering from the coronavirus, his official Facebook page said Wednesday. The 86-year-old Cameroonian star, best known for the 1972 hit "Soul Makossa", is being treated in a French hospital, according to reports. "Manu Dibango is resting well and calmly recovering," a statement on his Facebook page said. "He kindly asks to respect his privacy. He can't wait to meet you again soon, and in these troubled times we all go through, wants you to take very good care of yourselves," it added. The saxophonist was one of the pioneers of Afro jazz, with his own style also fusing funk with traditional Cameroonian music. His biggest hit was the B side of a song to support the Cameroon football team in the African Cup of Nations but was picked up and popularised by New ... More Belgrade: Leading institution damaged by local politicsBARCELONA.- The CIMAM community is taking action resulting from a deep concern of the evolving developments surrounding the Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade (MoCAB), the first and still one of the leading art institutions from the West Balkan region. After a 10-year long restoration process, MoCAB re-opened on October 20, 2017, to an enthusiastic crowd that stood witness to the cultural and also emotional importance of this institution for Serbia and the former Yugoslavia region. While acting director at the time, Slobodan Nakarada, urged the Ministry of Culture to open the call for a new director right away, it took until January 2019 to adjust the Statutes of MoCAB in such a way that permitted any professionals with five years experience in their fields of expertise to enter the open call. With a mandate limited to the analysis ... More Maria Fernanda Cardoso awarded 2020 NSW Visual Arts Established FellowSYDNEY.- Maria Fernanda Cardoso has been named the recipient of the 2019/20 New Dimensions: NSW Visual Arts (Established) Fellowship, developed in partnership with Create NSW and Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA). The partnership between Create NSW and MCA is in its second year and supports the ongoing professional practice of visual arts practitioners in New South Wales with a grant valued up to $50,000. Colombian-born, long-time Sydney resident Maria Fernanda Cardoso is internationally renowned for her practice using unconventional and organic materials to explore ideas around nature and its links to culture and science. Maria Fernanda Cardoso has exhibited widely across Australia and abroad with a diverse practice encompassing sculpture, installation, performance and photography. Cardoso will receive $30,000 in ... More Complete archive of award-winning novelist Andrea Levy acquired for the nationLONDON.- The British Library has announced that the archive of award-winning novelist Andrea Levy (1956 2019), has been acquired for the nation, spanning Levys literary career from the creative writing workshops she first attended in 1989 to her death in 2019. Andrea Levy was an internationally bestselling author whose work explored the connected histories of Britain and Jamaica. After earning a degree in textile design and working in graphics, Levy began writing in her mid-thirties, examining the intimate history between Britain and the Caribbean and reflecting the experiences of her own family as the daughter of Windrush generation migrants who came to Britain in the post-war period. Central to the archive is a rich series of working drafts for her five published novels, including Small Island (2004), which won the Orange Prize, the Whitbread ... More Stuart Whitman, leading man on big and small Screens, dies at 92NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Stuart Whitman, a ruggedly handsome actor who appeared in countless films and television shows over 50 years, earning an Oscar nomination for his role as a convicted child molester in the 1961 movie The Mark died on Monday at his home in Montecito, California. He was 92. His son Scott confirmed the death. In a career that began in the early 1950s, Whitman went from bit player to dependable leading man. He was known for his studied portrayals of complex characters, whether heroes or rogues. Television viewers in the 1960s knew Whitman best as the brusque, gravel-voiced Marshal Jim Crown on Cimarron Strip, a CBS Western series set in the 1880s in what would later become the Oklahoma Panhandle. Armed with a .44-caliber Colt revolver, Marshal Crown worked to maintain order among ... More Disconcerted: A music critic's empty nightsNEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Empty rooms. Empty stages. Empty seats. Empty dance floors. And not far away, empty lobbies, empty dressing rooms, empty back rooms, empty bar areas, empty kitchens, empty lounges, empty sound booths, empty loading zones. These were places animated by live music, with entire backstage workdays dedicated to presenting just a few hours of intangible sound gigs, shows, concerts for the audiences that gathered there, often with great anticipation and at significant cost. I already miss them dearly. Concerts have been shut down by the COVID-19 pandemic; schedules and calendars, at least in the short run and possibly for much longer, are empty, too. As a longtime music critic, that makes my nights empty, as well. Ive been going to concerts constantly since the 1970s, two or three a week and often more. The ... More Paris, a Magnet for the World, Becomes a Ghost City After a Lockdown Takes EffectPARIS (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- An exodus from Paris at the Gare Montparnasse train station. A postal worker warning of the plague, the apocalypse and repentance, with the Eiffel Tower behind him. Fear in peoples eyes, and tense moments, in a long line outside a supermarket. But also Parisians out jogging on deserted streets. Or walking their dogs, or trying to connect their children to their teachers on home laptops. And a California couple savoring, for now at least, their first trip to the City of Lights. As France was put on lockdown on Tuesday to contain the spread of the coronavirus, Paris, one of the worlds most visited cities, turned into a ghost town. At noon sharp, police officers patrolling the Champs-Ãlysées, near the Arc de Triomphe, began enforcing new rules of confinement across the capital and the rest of France, one of the hardest-hit countries ... More Rick Atkinson wins American History Book PrizeNEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Rick Atkinson, the author of The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777, has been named the winner of the New-York Historical Societys Barbara and David Zalaznick Book Prize, awarded each year to the best work in the field of U.S. history and biography. The 800-page doorstop, published last year by Henry Holt, starts with the early skirmishes and continues past the Declaration of Independence, with an intent of dispelling settled, sentimental clichés that have accumulated around public understanding of the Revolution. Historian Joseph Ellis, writing in The New York Times Book Review, praised its combination of deep research, including almost endless endnotes, and novelistic imagination that verges on cinematic. Atkinson, a journalist by training, emphasizes the costs ... More Workers behind the concert stars are hurtingNEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Joshua Dirks began last Thursday in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as a lighting technician on Kiss arena tour. He ended the day on a bus home to Nashville, Tennessee, as that tour along with the rest of the multibillion-dollar concert industry came to an abrupt halt. Last week, Live Nation Entertainment and AEG Presents, the two biggest powers in the industry, put their shows on hiatus amid growing concern over the rapid spread of the coronavirus, sending stars like Billie Eilish, Jason Aldean and Cher to social media to apologize to their fans for the scuttled shows. Behind the artists who appear onstage, however, is a fragile pool of thousands of workers like Dirks, who perform much of the labor that allows tours to go on from sound and lighting to transportation, merchandise sales and hospitality. Most are freelancers ... More |
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Flashback On a day like today, German-American painter Josef Albers was born March 19, 1888. Josef Albers (March 19, 1888 - March 25, 1976) was a German-born American artist and educator whose work, both in Europe and in the United States, formed the basis of modern art education programs of the twentieth century. In this image: Color Study. Gouache on paper, 7 1/16 x 10 3/16 inches (18 x 25.8 cm) © 2016 The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
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