Works that we take for granted today as masterpieces, or as epitomes of the finest of fine art, could also have been considered ugly, of poor quality, or just bad when they were first made.
Art News
This weekend in Houston, the Menil Collection opened the doors to the newest building on its 30-acre campus. The Menil Drawing Institute’s 30,000-square-foot, $40 million building houses the Menil’s comprehensive drawing collection and represents the first freestanding building in the United States built expressly for the exhibit, study, storage, and conservation of modern and contemporary drawings.
Works that we take for granted today as masterpieces, or as epitomes of the finest of fine art, could also have been considered ugly, of poor quality, or just bad when they were first made...
Beginning this month, Raleigh’s North Carolina Museum of Art (NCMA) has a new director in Dr. Valerie Hillings. After a worldwide search for Director Dr. Larry Wheeler’s replacement, who was with the museum for 24 years, the museum has found a leader with local roots and global connections.
French-Tunisian artist eL Seed released his first book project, Perception, earlier this month. The book, in limited edition of 500, is both an accompaniment to and documentation of the artist’s extraordinary mural by the same name, which stretches across fifty buildings in Cairo. Displaying the words of Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, a Coptic Bishop from the Third Century: ‘Anyone who wants to see the sunlight clearly needs to wipe his eyes first,’ the project employs the artist’s signature style, “calligraffiti,” which incorporates the visual culture of traditional Arab calligraphy into contemporary, often politically charged, street art.
This weekend the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Manhattan is offering free admission for visitors, giving them a chance to see a rare work on loan. Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s 1919 Two Women in the Garden (Deux femmes dans un jardin) is making a pit stop at the museum on it’s way to a new home.
In a new text from Cambridge Press, authors Elina Gertsman and Barbara H. Rosenwein offer readers easy access to understanding a complex period of time. "The Middle Ages in 50 Objects" (Cambridge Press, 2018) uses individual works from the comprehensive collections of the Cleveland Museum of Art to exemplify both broad movements and specific moments in history.
As the world mourns the loss of the Brazil National Museum to a monumental fire, we look back on some of the greatest losses to humanity’s art and cultural heritage.
The U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announced today that artist Martin Puryear to represent the US at the 2019 Venice Biennale. In its 58th year, the Biennale will run May 11 through Nov. 24, 2019. The Madison Square Park Conservancy will serve as this year’s curator of the United States Pavilion and will commision site-specific work from Puryear. Puryear follows 2017’s representative for the US, painter Mark Bradford.
A new set of tariffs proposed by President Trump could hit the art world this month. As part of continued efforts to reduce the US’s trade deficit with China, the list of items subject to import tariffs continues to grow. Set to go into effect as soon as late August, that list now includes categories covering paintings, sculpture, collage, ceramics, and antiques from China. The 25 percent import tariff would present a heavy burden to galleries, individual collectors, and museums in the US.
