Tuesday, 7th October 2008
5:00pm
In the news this week it has been reported that as the U.S. presidential campaign reaches its climax, the Obama Victory Fund is hoping to raise millions of dollars through the sale of a set of limited edition prints.
Given that the art market appears so far to have remained immune to the global economic crisis, the ‘Artists for Obama’ project seems a shrewd move. Organised by Gemini G.E.L., the Los Angeles artists’ workshop and print-publisher, 13 high-profile American artists (John Baldessari, Jonathan Borofsky, Frank Gehry, Ann Hamilton, Jasper Johns, Ellsworth Kelly, Brice Marsden, Julie Mehretu, Ken Price, Susan...
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2:33pm
Christie’s unwittingly sells stolen miniatures
Fourteen portrait miniatures stolen from Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendal, in 2006, inadvertently went under the hammer at Christie’s King Street saleroom on 10 June. The loss, including miniatures by Richard Cosway and John Smart, had been reported with Trace, a computerised database of stolen art, but images had not been supplied. This caused difficulties for the police and it was only after the sale that it was realised the works were stolen. The lender is expected to return insurance money in exchange for the recovered miniatures.
Brueghel painting discovered by Dutch Antiques RoadshowContinue reading...
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Thursday, 2nd October 2008
1:57pm
Nature-inspired works, by two very different female artists, go on display this month; the first exhibition features work by the late Joy Adamson (1910-80). A remarkable conservationist, Adamson is best known for her book Born Free, the story of raising Elsa, a lion cub, in Kenya, which was made into a highly acclaimed film of the same name. Adamson was an accomplished watercolourist and over 60 of her beautiful paintings of the flora and fauna of East Africa (above) will be on show at the Riverhouse Art Centre in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey (15-19 October).
It’s not quite lion-taming, but artist Eleanor...
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Wednesday, 1st October 2008
4:48pm
Last week Peter-Ashley Russell was sentenced to three years in prison at Snaresbrook Crown Court in London for faking and forging antique silver. It was, according to the Goldsmiths’ Company, which oversees Britain’s hallmarking system, the biggest case of its kind since the 1890s. Mr Ashley-Russell’s offences included converting spoons into (more valuable) forks and creating false hallmarks using imitation punches. The Goldsmiths’ Company observed that the fakes were of high quality: the punches were well made, producing hallmarks that would have easily fooled most people, and his fake flatware had remarkably convincing false patination and engraving.
Are forgers getting...
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Tuesday, 30th September 2008
12:23pm
Two unconnected events in the art world last week set me thinking about the relationship between art and politics. The first was the opening of the V&A’s latest exhibition, ‘Cold War Modern: Design 1945-70’, which was followed by Bloomberg's report that almost 50 per cent of the Gagosian gallery’s global sales are buyers from Russia and other republics of the former Soviet Union.
According to the Bloomberg report, the Gagosian gallery had almost no Russian buyers four years ago but with Russia now the world’s second largest oil exporter, the country's number of billionaires has jumped from 36 in...
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A recent exhibition in Nottingham showcases contemporary artists' exploration of the Communist-era space race.
Cast aside by Modernists for much of the 20th century, Classicism
has a comeback of sorts, with an excellent new book reappraising
architecture partnerships and a recent exhibition at one of the very
institutions that so derided the style.
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