| The First Art Newspaper on the Net |   | Established in 1996 | Wednesday, December 14, 2016 |
 |
| | Lost 'sensual' drawing by Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci discovered in France | |
|
|
A member of Paris auctioneer Tajan displays a previously undiscovered drawing by Leonardo da Vinci at the auction house in Paris on December 13, 2016. The rare drawing is valued at around 16 million USD. PHILIPPE LOPEZ / AFP.
PARIS (AFP).- A lost drawing by the Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci has been discovered in the papers of a French provincial doctor, a Paris auction house said Tuesday. The dreamily sensual sketch of Saint Sebastian is thought to be worth around 15 million euros ($15.8 million) and is an "extraordinary discovery", the Tajan auction house said. It has been authenticated by the French specialist Patrick de Bayser and Carmen C. Bambach, curator of Renaissance drawings at New York's Metropolitan Museum and a Da Vinci expert, it added. The dramatic study, which it is thought Leonardo did in his late twenties or early thirties after he was acquitted of sodomy, is one of eight he is known to have drawn. The find is extremely rare, with the last Da Vinci drawing that came to market -- a sketch of a horse and rider -- equalling the world record for an Old Master drawing when it sold for $10 million in 2001. ... More |
The Best Photos of the Day Two Nazi-stolen Dutch Old Master paintings have been returned to the Max and Iris Stern Foundation. (L to R) Günter Stock, President, German Friends of Hebrew University; Marie Gervais Vidricaire, Canadian Ambassador to Germany; The Honorable Melanie Joly, Minister of Canadian Heritage Clarence Epstein, senior director, Urban and Cultural Affairs, Concordia University; Dr. Susanne Anna, Director, Landeshauptstadt Düsseldorf Stadtmuseum. Photo: Trevor Good.
| Restitution of Signac's Port-en-Bessin nears completion | | McNay Art Museum acquires painting by Vincent Valdez | | Jasper Johns catalogue raisonné to be published in April 2017 | 
Paul Signac, Port-en-Bessin. © Ayre Wachsmuth.
VIENNA.- The Vienna Philharmonic is relieved that an important chapter in its history is about to be closed. The painting Port-en-Bessin by Paul Signac has been made available to the heirs for collection. The orchestra had been given the painting in 1940 by a Gestapo official in France. After decades of research, the provenance of the painting was clarified. At the end of November 2016, the heirs of the rightful owner of the painting, Marcel Koch, authorized a representative to receive the canvas. The further disposition of the painting rests with the heirs. Jergers growing artistic, administrative and political influence became particularly obvious when a chamber formation of the Vienna Philharmonic gave frontline guest performances in occupied France in August 1940 following the Salzburg Festival. The concerts were performed in Salins - les - Bains, Besançon and Dijon in front of troops from ... More | | 
Vincent Valdez, The Strangest Fruit 9, 96 x 138.
SAN ANTONIO, TX.- The McNay Art Museum announces the addition of Vincent Valdezs The Strangest Fruit 9 to its collection. The painting is part of the artists The Strangest Fruit series featuring large-format oil paintings. The series takes its title from the 1937 poem, Strange Fruit by Abel Meeropool, made popular through a song by Billie Holiday in 1939. The original text addressed the hanging of black Americans; for his series, Valdez adapted the poem to reference the obscured history of Mexican American lynchings from the late 1800s to the 1930s. It's a rare yet powerful moment when a work of art comes our way that is equally beautiful and political, says McNay Director Richard Aste. Vincent's iconic The Strangest Fruit series does both, and well. He reminds us here that it's not an either/or situation; there's room for both in today's art museums. The McNay is the perfect home for this arresting tour ... More | | 
The catalogue raisonné is authored by Roberta Bernstein. Photo: Courtesy of The Wildenstein Plattner Institute.
NEW YORK, NY.- The Wildenstein Plattner Institute (WPI) today announced the April 2017 publication of the Catalogue Raisonné of the Painting and Sculpture of Jasper Johns, the most comprehensive resource on the artists work to date. Produced in close collaboration with the artist and developed over more than a decade, the catalogue raisonné is authored by Roberta Bernstein, pre-eminent scholar of Johnss work, who led a team of researchers including Heidi Colsman-Freyberger, Senior Researcher; Betsy Stepina Zinn, Editor; and Caitlin Sweeney, Senior Research Associate, who also oversees research projects at the WPI. The WPI will debut its publishing imprint with the release of this publication, which was initiated and supported by Guy Wildenstein, co-founder of the WPI. Publicly launched in November 2016, the WPI is a new ... More |
|
| Smithsonian American Art Museum acquires major collection of Self-Taught American art | | Lost Christmas 'drinking' song by George Butterworth discovered at Bodleian Libraries | | Two paintings taken by Nazis returned to beneficiaries in Canada | 
William Edmondson, Untitled (Bird Bath with Figures), about 1932-1940. Carved Limestone. Smithsonian American Art Museum. The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson.
WASHINGTON, DC.- The Smithsonian American Art Museum announced today a gift of 93 works of art from the collection of Margaret Z. Robson. The Robson collection includes important paintings, drawings and sculptures by 48 major self-taught artists, including James Castle, Ulysses Davis, Thornton Dial Sr., William Edmondson, Howard Finster, Bessie Harvey, Judith Scott, Bill Traylor and many others. The collection adds strength and depth to this specialty area of the collection with 11 new artists. The Robson gift comprises the largest acquisition of self-taught artworks in 20 years and signals the museums deep and lasting commitment to this area of artistic production. The museums acquisition of the collection, given by her son, Douglas O. Robson, was approved by the ... More | | 
The festive find is particularly special because the body of Butterworths surviving work is relatively small.
OXFORD.- A long-lost song by English composer George Butterworth has been rediscovered at the University of Oxfords Bodleian Libraries, a century after his death in the trenches. The three-page score is a musical setting of a short festive poem by Robert Bridges, beginning with the words Crown winter with green. It is believed to be the only surviving copy of this Butterworth composition. The festive find is particularly special because the body of Butterworths surviving work is relatively small. Butterworth (1885-1916) was one of the most promising English composers of his generation, but his life was cut short when, at the age of 31, he was killed at the Battle of the Somme in World War I. Before going off to war he destroyed all of his music which he thought not worthy of preserving. His few surviving works, which include his song settings of AE ... More | | 
Willem Buytewech the Younger (1625-1670), Landscape with Goats. Photo: Max and Iris Stern Foundation.
MONTREAL (AFP).- Two valuable paintings of former Dutch masters, despoiled by the Nazis in the late 1930s, were returned to the beneficiaries of a German Jewish art dealer exiled to Canada, said Monday the Max-Stern Foundation. The paintings, "Ships in Distress on a Stormy Sea," by the marine artist Jan Porcellis (1584-1632), and "Landscape with Goats" by the animal painter Willem Buytewech the Younger (1625-1670), were recovered from an auction in Germany, which facilitated their restitution. They were presented to the Max-Stern Foundation and its three beneficiary institutions, Concordia and McGill universities in Montreal and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. These are "little jewels," Clarence Epstein, director of the Max-Stern Foundation at Concordia University, told AFP. For 14 years Epstein, an art historian, has been ... More |
|
| James Cohan announces the representation of the Estate of Lee Mullican | | Marilyn Monroe's hand-annotated scripts from Something's Got to Give to be auctioned | | Unique copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard sells for £368,750 | 
Lee Mullican, Untitled, 1949 (detail). Oil on canvas, 30 x 40 in.
NEW YORK, NY.- James Cohan is announces its representation of the Estate of Lee Mullican. Lee Mullican (b. 1919, Chickasha, Oklahoma; d. 1998, Los Angeles, California) was active as a painter and educator for over sixty years. He has been the subject of exhibitions in both the United States and abroad including a solo show at James Cohan this year. Mullican developed a uniquely West Coast method of abstraction; grounded in content, full of mysticism and connected to the transcendent. His prolific and varied sixty-year career was launched in San Francisco as one of three artists who identified as the Dynaton Group. Through a chance meeting, he befriended Gordon Onslow Ford and later met the Surrealist painter, Wolfgang Paalen, who had published the influential Dyn Magazine. Their shared interests culminated ... More | | 
Bidding for the scripts begins at $20,000 each.
LOS ANGELES, CA.- Two scripts with Marilyn Monroes handwritten annotations will be auctioned by Nate D. Sanders Auctions on December 15, 2016. The scripts were used by Monroe for her last role, in the 1962 unfinished film, Somethings Got to Give. Actor Dean Martin was cast as Monroes co-star. Each script provides distinct insight into the actress creative thinking process. The two scripts feature Monroes handwritten notes in pencil and green ink; her notes differ on each respective script. In the first script, (lot #13), Monroes notes appear on 42 pages and include simple dialog corrections, in-depth sense memory notes and more. Back cover notes include Monroes comments, Joke writers Mel Brooks / Herb Gardner / Need spice / raisins / Need some funny lines.'' The second script being auctioned (lot #14) features Monroes comments o ... More | | 
A Major Piece of Harry Potter History. Photo: Sotheby's.
LONDON.- This afternoon at Sothebys in London, a rare presentation copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard, created, hand-written and illustrated by J.K. Rowling sold for £368,750 to an anonymous buyer bidding on the telephone. Containing a personal inscription by the author to the editor who launched her career, the present copy, number 3 of the 7 that J.K Rowling produced, was presented to British publisher Barry Cunningham, who famously accepted the first Harry Potter book for publication. The copy holds considerable special significance, as Cunningham played an instrumental role in launching J.K Rowlings career as an international best-selling author. In a dedication written in the front of the book, JK Rowling wrote: To Barry, the man who thought an overlong novel about a boy wizard in glasses might just sell
THANK YOU. Cunningham recalls the experience ... More |
|
| Largest exhibition of paintings by Vicken Parsons to date on view at Alan Cristea Gallery | | Treasures of Imperial Russia featured in Dec. 18 auction hosted by Jasper52 | | "handiCRAFT: Traditional Skills in the Digital Age" opens at the Austrian Museum of Applied Arts | 
Vicken Parsons, Untitled, 2015. Oil on board, 30.8 x 34.0 cm. Courtesy Vicken Parsons and Alan Cristea Gallery, London.
LONDON.- Alan Cristea Gallery presents the largest exhibition of paintings by Vicken Parsons to date. It will run until 7 January 2017 and is the gallery's second solo exhibition with the artist. Best-known for her small scale paintings which evoke architectural space and elemental landscape, this exhibition comprises several groups of new works including her most recent paintings which use a broken grid structure as part of a matrix to create an elusive sense of depth, using layering rather than perspective. Within a careful confusion of planes, lines and marks, the eye of the viewer is engaged in continuous movement between an illusory deep space and the picture plane. It is not clear what is near and what is far, where the source of light is and what is reflection, illusion and reality. The title of the show, IRIS, is an inversion of previous exhibition titles used by Parsons which have referenced ... More | | 
Russian porcelain Imperial presentation Easter egg, oxblood flambé, gold monogram of Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna beneath the Imperial crown, 3 1/2 inches (8.9 cm). Estimate: $3,000-$5,000. Jasper52 image.
NEW YORK, NY.- Masterfully crafted items from Imperial Russia will be offered Dec. 18 at a Jasper52 auction curated in partnership with John Atzback, a leading authority in the field of Russian works of art. Absentee and Internet live bidding will be available exclusively through LiveAuctioneers. The auction consists of more than 300 decorative masterpieces from the John Atzbach Antiques collection, each reflecting the rich traditions of Russia's fascinating Imperial era (late 17th century through the 1917 Revolution). John Atzback was introduced to the subject at the age of 9, when a neighbor, recognizing his interest, allowed him to examine her collection of Russian enamels. He was immediately intrigued and spent the next several years learning about Russian silver and enamels, ... More | | 
Jochen Holz, Lampworking Neon, 2016. Borosilicate glass and argon © Sylvain Deleu.
VIENNA.- The MAK exhibition handiCRAFT: Traditional Skills in the Digital Age invites visitors to reflect on the significance and status of handicraft as an integral component of material culture and cultural identity. In six sections, this comprehensive MAK exhibition encompasses handicraft from historical times to current European perspectives, examines how handicraft can help preserve natural resources, explores interfaces to digital technologies, and presents masterpieces from a range of craft disciplines. Currently the terms handicraft and handmade are used with inflationary frequency in advertising and lifestyle media. The Maker Movement and DIY culture are enormously successful, creating a worldwide hype. Globally operating luxury labels explicitly foreground handicraft as a mark of quality and distinction, in contrast to the reality of locally operating craftspeople struggling for recognition and a fair wa ... More |
|
href=' href='
The Art of a Bespoke Suit
| More News |
 French Modern and Contemporary art peaks with splendid results of $14 millionPARIS.- Artcurials prestigious Contemporary and Modern Art auctions organised during the Second Semester of 2016, focussed on private collections and celebrated French Artists from the 2nd market. Under the gavel of Francis Briest, the sales totalled 12 970 400 / 13 878 328 $, with 82 % of the lots sold. Thirteen new auction world records were made, five of which were over 500 000 and were reached during the last five sales. A drawing by Antonin Artaud from the Jean Laymarie collection was pre-empted by the French state to be housed within the Graphic Arts department of the Centre Pompidou in Paris. The auction series began with the sale of the Contemporary Art collection belonging to Michel Fedoroff on Monday 28th November. This was followed on Monday 5th and Tuesday 6th December 2016 with the traditional Impressionist & Modern and Post- ... More Acolytes of Pina Bausch keep her dance in motionBERLIN (AFP).- The dance company that legendary German choreographer Pina Bausch, who died in 2009, built into one of the world's most acclaimed is doing its utmost to foster her moving legacy. Beloved of fellow artists and seen as a visionary by her peers in the dance world, Bausch mixed dance and theatre to produce a tumult of emotions, free from traditional constraints, that often divided audiences. "I'm not interested in how people move, but in what moves them," she said shortly before her death from cancer. Now her life's work is being honoured with a Berlin exhibition, "Pina Bausch and the Tanztheater", where members of the company will offer up to five workshops a day to curious visitors and dance lovers until January 7. "I couldn't have imagined that you could express yourself without difficult technique, and that it could be so much fun," said 38-year-old Kerstin ... More Predator invasion had devastating, long-term effects on native fish: SmithsonianWASHINGTON, DC.- In 1969, 60 to 100 peacock bass imported from Buga, Colombia, were introduced into a pond in Panama for sport fishing. Several individuals escaped. By the early 1970s, they colonized Gatun Lake, the reservoir forming the main channel of the Panama Canal. Forty-five years later, native fish populations in the lake still have not recovered according to a new Smithsonian report. Peacock bass, Cichla monoculus, originally from the Amazon River and its tributaries, are voracious predators. They are considered delicious game fish and have been intentionally stocked for recreational and commercial fishing around the world. In 1973, Thomas Zaret and Robert Paine, working at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute field station on Barro Colorado Island, published a study in Science magazine showing that 60 percent of the native freshwater ... More On offer today at Sotheby's New York: Important Design & Tiffany: Dreaming in GlassNEW YORK, NY.- Sothebys shared highlights from tomorrows auctions of Important Design and Tiffany: Dreaming in Glass in New York. Both auctions are on public exhibition today in our York Avenue galleries, alongside the auction A FOCUSED OBSESSION | Modern Italian Glass: The Martin Cohen Collection. Together the three sales will offer more than 300 works. The 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris presented a pavilion based on the theme of a French Embassy, with each room of the embassy designed by a different decorative artist. André Groult was in charge of the Chambre de Madame, or Ladys bedroom. The interior he created expressed a sophisticated harmony, combining exquisitely executed pieces and precious materials such as shagreen, ebony, ivory, and amazonite. A few years later and for ... More 1964 Ferrari 330GT Nembo Spyder for sale with H&H ClassicsLONDON.- Racing driver and motor enthusiast Richard Allen who passed away on November 26th 2016 could clearly remember the helicopter of the East Anglia Air Ambulance Service (EAAA) coming to the help of one of his fellow race drivers after a crash, hence his generous gesture the gift of a Ferrari Nembo Spyder to be sold at auction by H&H Classics to benefit the EAAA on March 29th at the Imperial War Museum, Duxford. The 1964 Ferrari 330GT is conservatively estimated to sell for a figure well in excess of £500,000. The car is a very rare specially commissioned Nembo Spyder and has a 4 litre V12 engine. Richard Allen acquired the Nembo from Italy in the mid-nineties and decided not to drive it on the road but display it regularly at Ferrari events in the UK. The car became the most beloved of all the cars in his extensive collection. Patrick Peal CEO ... More CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts opens solo shows of work by Melanie Gilligan and Yuki KimuraSAN FRANCISCO, CA.- Continuing to introduce international figures to Bay Area audiences and give artists a platform to explore new directions in their work, CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts presents the west coast debut of Parts-wholes (2016), a new multichannel video installation by Canadian artist Melanie Gilligan; and Inhuman Transformation of New Years Decoration, Obsolete Conception or 2 (2016), a commissioned mixed-media installation by Japanese artist Yuki Kimura. The two concurrent solo exhibitions are free and open to the public and are on view December 13, 2016, through February 25, 2017. Yuki Kimura The installation practice of Yuki Kimura (b. 1971 in Kyoto; based in Berlin) borrows from architecture, design, photography, and sculpture to make the immaterial material. She often incorporates found photographs in her work as sculptural objects, ... More Aleppo's famed Old City left 'unrecognisable' by warALEPPO.- Once renowned for its bustling souks, grand citadel and historic gates, Aleppo's Old City has been rendered virtually unrecognisable by some of the worst violence of Syria's war. For centuries, Aleppo was Syria's economic and cultural powerhouse, attracting tourists from around the world to its celebrated heritage sites. But now, only gaunt stray cats roam the rubble-strewn alleyways of its Old City, a UNESCO World Heritage site, after years of savage conflict. In the famed Al-Hatab Square, recently recaptured by the Syrian army, lawyer and Aleppian historian Alaa al-Sayyed could scarcely believe his eyes. Al-Hatab was one of the oldest squares in the city, but it now lay dotted with sand barricades and the charred remnants of overturned buses. "I couldn't even recognise it because it was so severely damaged. I told myself, this can't be Al-Hatab square ... More Tastemakers of ancient China explored in Nelson-Atkins exhibitionKANSAS CITY, MO.- A new exhibition offers visitors a rare chance to view fragile treasures, some of which have not been seen in decades, from the internationally-acclaimed Chinese collection of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City. Emperors, Scholars, and Temples: Tastemakers of Chinas Ming and Qing Dynasties, explores the art of the Ming (13681644) and Qing (16441911) dynasties from the perspectives of the three groups that were most influential in its production. The free exhibition gives insights into the canons of taste formed during a period of 500 years. Some of the treasures in this exhibition were acquired by Laurence Sickman, the museums first curator of Asian art and a Monuments Man who later became the Nelson-Atkins Director, said Julián Zugazagoitia, Menefee D. and Mary Louise Blackwell CEO & Director of the Nelson-Atkins. ... More The Berlinische Galerie opens retrospective of the work of Cornelia SchleimeBERLIN.- The Berlinische Galerie worked closely with Cornelia Schleime, born in East Berlin in 1953, on a retrospective entitled A Blink of an Eye. It offers insights into the artists work from the 1980s until today. There are early pieces from her years in East Germany − photographs of her body actions, super-8 films − as well as paintings, including her latest works, drawings, photographic works and travel journals from different creative periods. Cornelia Schleime studied printmaking and painting at the Academy of Fine Arts (HfBK) in Dresden from 1975 to 1980. As a student, she belonged to a milieu of young artists who formed a counter-movement to official GDR art doctrine. These artists pursued new paths and devised alternative formats for presentation in studios and private homes. In the early 1980s, Cornelia Schleime was drawing, painting, writing poetry, exploring ... More Sarah Curran named Director of Wesleyan University's Center for the Arts MIDDLETOWN, CONN.- Wesleyan University has announced that Sarah Curran, Associate Director of the Stanford Arts Institute, will lead its internationally recognized Center for the Arts starting on February 20, 2017. Curran brings to the job more than ten years of experience in arts programming, a creative interdisciplinary curatorial practice, wide knowledge of contemporary performance, and a deep understanding of academia. At the Stanford Arts Institute, where she was previously Director of Programming and Partnerships, Curran designed a sustainable mobile art studio built by students; built a research residency program to allow artists to spend their time doing academic research to inform new projects; expanded an arts immersion program, taking students to different cultural capitals across the U.S.; and created the 72 Hour Musical Project, ... More Omaha Beach D-Day flag signals $1.1 million Arms & Armor sale at Heritage AuctionsDALLAS, TX.- An Omaha Beach D-Day Flag that was flown on LCT Landing Craft emerged from Heritage Auctions' $1.1 million Arms & Armor, Civil War & Militaria auction as the top lot in Dec. 11 in Dallas. The flag, with 48 stars and frayed edges, realized $45,000. It was one of a trio of flags that brought the three highest returns in the Dec. 11 auction. In the runner-up position was a Confederate Second National Flag, "The Stainless Banner," that was captured Feb. 16, 1865 at Battery Bee in Charleston (S.C.) Harbor. This completely hand-stitched flag, which after years of fraying has been reduced from its original 96-inch length to about 92-1/2, was coveted by more bidders than any other lot in the auction, who drove the return up to $40,000, while a wool WWII Royal Navy Ensign that was flown from the British Landing Ship S.S. Empire Crossbow at Gold Beach on D-Day ... More |
|
href='
Flashback On a day like today, English artist and art critic Roger Fry was born December 14, 1866. Roger Eliot Fry (14 December 1866 - 9 September 1934) was an English artist and art critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent developments in French painting, to which he gave the name Post-Impressionism. He was the first figure to raise public awareness of modern art in Britain, and emphasized the formal properties of paintings over the "associated ideas" conjured in the viewer by their depicted content. He was described by the art historian Kenneth Clark as "incomparably the greatest influence on taste since Ruskin... In so far as taste can be changed by On a day like today, English artist and art critic Roger Fry, was born In so far as taste can be changed by one man, it was changed by Roger Fry". In this image: Roger Fry (1928 self-portrait).
|
|
|
