News
London Burns, for the Sake of Art
Featured on nytimes.com
The skyline of the British capital burst into flames Sunday night. Unlike when London burned in 1666, this was only an art project.
A 400-foot, scale replica of the city’s older skyline was incinerated on the Thames River as part of London’s Burning, a weekend-long festival marking the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire.
The 1666 fire broke out in a bakery, and, over the course of several days, it destroyed large swaths of the city center, consuming 13,000 buildings but resulting in surprisingly few deaths.
Zoos make money selling paintings made by animals. Are they art?
Featured on washingtonpost.com
In 2005, three works of art by a relatively unknown artist sold for more than $25,000 at an elite auction house in London. That’s not a huge amount as art sales go, but it made headlines because the painter was hardly typical. The artist was an ape, and the amount was the largest ever paid for art by a nonhuman.
Zoos have since taken note. Art by animals sells.
Meet the artist that shot a bouquet of flowers 30,000 meters into space
Featured on cnn.com
From flowers locked in ice to space-age pine trees, Japanese artist Makoto Azumahas built a career from a "new genre of art" that blends plants with artificial mediums to strikingly beautiful effect.
A florist by training, the Tokyo-based Azuma creates what he describes as "living art" -- ecosystems using fish and bonsai, bicycles covered in astroturf and spectacular fungi dipped in gold, platinum and copper.
Long vacant Presidio army bunkers to become art hub
Starting September 10 through December, the mind behind the Ai Weiwei Alcatraz exhibition will bring artists' works to the long-vacant batteries
Featured on sf.curbed.com
Poke around the Presidio’s Fort Scott and you’ll stumble on the old army batteries, long-abandoned, bunker-like structures where gigantic guns used to point out into the bay, ready to pump 30 rounds per minute (an impressive rate at the time, and still a bit queasy to consider today) into anything that looked sufficiently threatening.
A Hollywood Agency Opens an Art Space, but It Won’t ‘Function Like a Gallery’
Featured on nytimes.com
Ever since the art lawyer Joshua Roth joined United Talent Agency in early 2015 to start its first fine art division, gallery owners have wondered if the giant Hollywood agency would encroach on their business.
Now, the questioning is sure to grow louder, as Mr. Roth and his colleagues prepare to open a new gallery-like venue, U.T.A. Artist Space, in a former manufacturing building downtown.
10 Underrated Cities for Art Lovers
Discover creative, offbeat and inspiring art scenes across the country.
Featured on travel.usnews.com
What Do You See in Art? Nearly 50 People Told Us
We wanted to better understand the modern museumgoer. So we went to the Met Breuer exhibition “Unfinished: Thoughts Left Visible” and talked to visitors.
Featured on nytimes.com
The Bizarre Art Lawsuit Where a Painter Proved He Didn’t Paint Something
It’s not every day that a renowned artist like Peter Doig has to show that a painting isn’t his.
Featured on chicagomag.com
A bizarre lawsuit just wrapped in Chicago this week, pitting an internationally renowned artist against a deceitful art dealer—and the dealer got a two-hour smackdown from a federal judge during the oral decision. Here’s what you need to know about the ridiculous art-world courtroom drama.
Art experts fear serious earthquake damage to historic Italian buildings
Featured on theguardian.com
Art experts fear numerous historic Italian buildings and their contents were damaged in Wednesday’s earthquake, across a region where almost every hilltop town and village has beautiful churches and monuments.
The Dutch classicist David Rijser, an expert on the culture of Abruzzo, said there had been damage to the central region’s many churches, funeral monuments and museums. “It has been a true drama, there is a lot that has been lost,” he told Dutch radio.
For Rikers’s Most Troubled Inmates, Art Offers Hope
Featured on artsy.net
Every weekday morning, Katie Hinson drives across the long bridge from the tip of Astoria, Queens, to the penitentiary on Rikers Island. She passes through three security checkpoints and heads to the women’s jail. Hinson is neither a correctional officer nor an administrator; she is among a handful of therapists who have dedicated themselves to helping Rikers inmates through making art.
Scientists just solved a 100-year-old art mystery — with a particle accelerator
Featured on washingtonpost.com
Edgar Degas’ “Portrait of a Woman” arrived at the National Gallery of Victoria to great fanfare in 1937. It was the Australian museum's first work by the French impressionist master, and it had been a bargain. "It is by a very great artist and has sufficient of him in it to make it desirable," wrote the museum's director, J.S. MacDonald.
Then he saw the painting in person.
Dr. Seuss’ Secret Art Collection Finally Goes On View
Featured on huffingtonpost.com
Theodor Seuss Geisel, also known as Dr. Seuss, passed away in 1991, having written and illustrated over 60 children’s tales of enchanted animals in foreign lands, embarking on adventures, learning lessons, and improbably rhyming all the while. What few people knew, however, was that after dark, Seuss switched gears a bit, shifting from his storybook illustrations to what he dubbed “Midnight Paintings,” fine artworks made in secret, purely for pleasure.
Pittsburgh’s NAP Celebrates the City’s Rich History for their Bicentennial
Pittsburgh celebrates the 200th anniversary of its incorporation as a city this year. The Bicentennial is a time to acknowledge Pittsburgh’s great triumphs, from innovations that created mighty industries to world class medical and educational facilities. They have also overcome severe economic challenges. The City of Pittsburgh has a unique convergence of three rivers, and a rich culture that is reflected in every corner. Mayor Peduto asked that everyone in the city celebrate this historic occasion, and invited community organizations to get involved too.