View of a glyptodont shell found in Carlos Spegazzini, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, on December 29, 2015. AFP PHOTO/EITAN ABRAMOVICH.
CARLOS SPEGAZZINI(AFP).- A passer-by on Christmas Day found a meter-long shell on a riverbank in Argentina which may be from a glyptodont, a prehistoric kind of giant armadillo, experts said Tuesday. A local man thought the black scaly shell was a dinosaur egg when he saw it lying in the mud, his wife Reina Coronel told AFP. Her husband Jose Antonio Nievas found the shell beside a stream at their farm in Carlos Spegazzini, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the capital Buenos Aires. "My husband went out to the car and when he came back he said, 'Hey, I just found an egg that looks like it came from a dinosaur," she said. "We all laughed because we thought it was a joke." Nievas told television channel Todo Noticias he found the shell partly covered in mud and started to dig around it. Various experts who saw television pictures of the object ... More
Desk and bookcase. Mid 18 century. Mexico. Inlaid woods and incised and painted bone, maque, gold and polychrome paint, metalhardware. Courtesy, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
BOSTON, MASS.-The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, has acquired a rare and important "Desk and bookcase" (mid-18th century, Mexico) from the Ann and Gordon Getty Collection. Originally made in Puebla de los Ángeles, this work is a remarkable piece of furniture that displays influences from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas. The striking geometric exterior looks toward Europe with its wood-and-bone Mudéjar designs—a Hispano-Moresque style popular during the era. Opening the doors reveals a dramatic interior of chinoiserie-style painting in gold on a red background. The inside recalls early colonial mapping traditions of Nahuatl-speaking artists, showing views of an extensive hacienda in Veracruz drawn in an indigenous style. The estate, once owned by a wealthy Spaniard, was the site of one of the earliest free ... More
BERN.- The exhibition «About Trees» is interested in trees as a symbol and embodiment of the principles in the contemporary world. The artists allow them to "speak" through their works. In all cultures, since time immemorial, the tree has been seen as a symbol of life in general and as the world tree, and as such is the starting-point for many myths and fairy tales. The tree can also be seen as an image of a human being: roots, trunk and crown correspond to the feet, the body and the head. Last of all, the tree is a vegetable creature that has a different concept of time from our own. Trees live much longer than humans. Trees can be climbed, but they can also be felled, defeated, exploited, for example as firewood, which is to say that they are a precious raw material and provide energy. And in our contemporary world ... More
EDINBURGH.- The work of a hugely influential forerunner of the Impressionists, 400 years of artists' self-portraits, and the story of four legendary collections of Surrealist art are among the subjects to be explored in a programme of major exhibitions at the National Galleries of Scotland in 2016, it was announced today. Next year has an international flavour at the National Galleries, with the three summer exhibitions all being organised in collaboration with major European and American institutions, including the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and the Hamburger Kunsthalle. Each of these exhibitions - Inspiring Impressionism: Daubigny, Monet, Van Gogh; Surreal Encounters; and Facing the World: Self-Portraits from Rembrandt to Ai Weiwei - will have its only UK showing in Edinburgh. Among the other highlights of the programme, and closer to home, autumn 2016 will see the opening of a fascinating new exhibition which ... More
The Chinese Room of the Geelvinck Hinlopen Huis (Amsterdam).
AMSTERDAM.- After a quarter of a century at the 'Geelvinck Hinlopen Huis' in Amsterdam, Museum Geelvinck relocates to Huis 'De Wildeman' in Zutphen. The Amsterdam Museum Geelvinck is keeper of the Sweelinck Collection of historic pianos. It has been a long cherished wish to create a music museum around this collection of playable fortepianos. The municipality of one of the oldest and best-preserved historic cities of the Netherlands, Zutphen, now grants Museum Geelvinck the opportunity to establish a music museum for the development of the piano and its music. Till about a century ago, Zutphen, the capital city of the county of the same name in the Eastern part of the Netherlands, was thought to be the possible place of birth of Ludwig van Beethoven in 1772. In 2014, the bi-annual Beethoven Festival Zutphen was established. The permanent exhibition at the Geelvinck Music Museum Zutphen ... More
A student of Edouard Lanteri at the Royal College of Art, Derwent Wood’s early artistic career was distinguished.
LONDON.- The final volume in the prestigious British Sculptors and Sculpture series published by Lund Humphries, in partnership with the Henry Moore Institute, addresses the work of the important but neglected British sculptor Francis Derwent Wood RA (1871 – 1926). ‘Withey demonstrates Derwent Wood’s artistic development, underlining his observant eye and attention to detail that led him to become recognised as ‘the first English sculptor of his time’ in 1919’’– Lisa Le Feuvre, Head of Sculpture Studies, Henry Moore Institute. A student of Edouard Lanteri at the Royal College of Art, Derwent Wood’s early artistic career was distinguished. His reputation grew rapidly and a period as Director of Modelling at the Glasgow School of Art saw him working on public commissions with many of the city’s most important architects. Simultaneously, he built his London practice, perfecting ... More
This picture dated between 1932 and 1940 shows Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. AFP PHOTO / HO / BERTHET SAMUEL / Alain Daniélou.
BEIJING(AFP).- The Chinese translator of Indian Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore's poetry collection "Stray Birds" defended himself Tuesday after his publisher pulled the work from bookstores following controversy over its unusually sexual content. The poems and epithets, originally in Bengali, were first published in 1916, three years after Tagore won the Nobel literature prize for "his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse", the first non-European to do so. The new translation by Chinese novelist Feng Tang, known for his racy depictions of Beijing youth in the 90s, was released earlier this year but its content raised eyebrows in recent weeks. In Feng's version the original line "The world puts off its mask of vastness to its lover" became "The vast world opened the crotch of its trousers before its lover." Online commentators have been scornfully comparing ... More
MADRID.- Juan Giralt (Madrid, 1940-2007) was a self-taught artist whose beginnings were inscribed within the informalism reigning in the Spanish art of the fifties. During a brief stay in the Netherlands at the end of that decade, he came into contact with the CoBrA group and started to define a more personal pictorial vocabulary that was susceptible to a new interpretation of figuration. From then on his work was characterized by a combination of languages and interests, and he became one of the leading figures in Madrid’s New Figuration movement during the seventies and eighties. In his last years, he gradually reincorporated abstraction without wholly abandoning figurative elements, which remained present in his constant use of collage and the painted word. The debate on figuration and abstraction, traditionally posited as a dilemma, was overcome by Giralt by means of an extremely personal synthesis of both languages, ultimately resulting in ... More
The Spring House, Windham, c. 1910-1919. J. Alden Weir. Estate of William B. Carlin.
NEW LONDON, CONN.- The National Endowment for the Arts and the National Park Service (NPS) announced $797,500 in support of 33 grants in 16 states, including an award of $30,000 to the Lyman Allyn Art Museum. ‘Imagine Your Parks’ is a new grant initiative from the National Endowment for the Arts to support projects in which the arts engage people with memorable places and landscapes of the National Park System. NEA Chairman Jane Chu said, "As the National Endowment for the Arts celebrates its 50th anniversary and the National Park Service observes its Centennial, we want people to remember that our cultural and natural treasures are part of what makes America great. ‘Imagine Your Parks’ projects from the Grand Canyon in Arizona, to downtown Atlanta, Georgia will inspire the imagination of people across the country. We are proud to support projects from organizations like the Lyman Allyn Art Museum to offer more opportunities t ... More
This picture shows a sculpture (R) of the human form, modelled on British sculptor Antony Gormley's 188cm (6ft 2in) frame. AFP PHOTO / ISAAC LAWRENCE.
CAMBRIDGE, MASS.-The MIT List Visual Arts Center announced that artist Antony Gormley has been awarded a new Percent-for-Art commission for MIT. Gormley’s proposed work, a spiral sculpture composed of irregular polyhedra connecting the floor to the skylight in the staircase of Building 2, will be the latest of the artist’s large-scale, site-specific works. The work will play on the movement of living bodies and the geometry of the stair itself, giving a counterpoint that animates the experience of ascending and descending the building. Building 2—which houses the Department of Mathematics and parts of the Department of Chemistry—is currently under renovation by Ann Beha Architects. Upon his selection, Gormley said, “I am delighted to have the opportunity to make a physical manifestation of geometry for the staircase of the Mathematics Department at MIT. This is a helical polyhedral column, an unsteady tower of space- ... More
Tereza Pirscova Brichtova and Daniel Pirsc. Cher. Porcelain Vase, 2015. Photo: Pirsc Studio.
NEW YORK, NY.- At the same time the New York Ceramics & Glass Fair opens its doors on January 20 to 24, a half-dozen contemporary glass and ceramic artists will debut their masterworks side by side with renowned galleries from the world over. Here is more about these up-to-the-minute artists: Based in Berkshire County in Massachusetts, Michael Boroneic says that one of his primary goals as a ceramics sculptor is to re-introduce substance and craftsmanship to the world of fine art. "Art is not just about an object or concept," Boroneic maintains. "It is a conversation between an object and idea. And for me, ceramic art is about having a conversation with the clay. It's about the hands-on relationship of the artist and the medium that makes for a piece that is more than just beautiful. It is an expression of the human soul." Classes outside her ... More
Tsherin Sherpa, Contemplation, 2015, gold leaf, acrylic and ink on cotton, 122 x 98.5 cm (48 x 38 in).
LONDON.- Active Blur spotlights works by two Nepalese artists of Tibetan descent that blur the line between the sacred and the mundane. Melding religious and secular images and philosophies to create vibrant pieces, brothers Tsherin Sherpa and Tulku Jamyang produce art from different vantage points: Sherpa identifies as ‘an ordinary artist’, having apprenticed from a young age under his father, Urgyen Dorje, a renowned thangka painter. Jamyang, on the other hand, is a tulku, the recognised reincarnation of a lama, or spiritual leader, whose works are inspired by his monastic background. Jamyang’s works incorporate rice paper, incense and colour, and are the result of burning paper, a process that leaves no room for mistakes. His interest lies in the dichotomy of the process itself—the simultaneous constructive (or positive) element of creating a collage and the destructive (negative) ... More
Blue and Joy also show two massive rose windows made of empty capsules and candies.
ROME.- After the recent success of the solo show in New York City, ironically and prophetically entitled “An inevitable success”, blue and Joy come back to Rome after 5 years, and they do it at the Galleria Ca' d'Oro. The exhibition, curated by Maria Letizia Tega, is entitled “Landing is tiring” and opened to the public on the 17th of December. In the historical rooms of the roman gallery, where history was written by art giants such as De Chirico and Guttuso, it is up to Blue and Joy to ignore the weight of the past and unload the future with their irony and lightness. Among the artworks a fleet of paper planes (actually made out of metal) is on display in the show. These works, which became a trademark of the recent Blue and Joy production, literally flew all over the planet during the collaboration between fashion powerhouse Fendi and the italian artist duo. The title of the exhibition refers ... More
Quote Art is for all. David Hockney
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MACBA acquires the collection of photographs taken by Xavier Miserachs between 1954 and 1998 BARCELONA.- In 2011 MACBA received on loan the archive of Xavier Miserachs, consisting of some 60,000 negatives, 20,000 transparencies, 2,500 contact sheets, correspondence and other documents that reflect the development of the photographer’s career between 1954 and 1998. The exhibition A.XMI, a title taken from the identification code of the Xavier Miserachs Fonds in MACBA’s Archive, makes available to the public a selection of photographs, documents, books and magazines, together with an overview of the working processes that the Archive of the MACBA Study Centre undertook in order to incorporate, catalogue and publicise this important photographic collection. Among the documents included in this exhibition, of particular note are those that were used to produce the most relevant photobooks in the history of photography in our country: Barcelona, blanc ... More
PUBLICA 2016: Delhi and Mumbai gear up for the second edition of the public art festival NEW DELHI.- After the resounding success of the 2013 edition, PUBLICA, the public arts festival, returns to Delhi in 2016 in a bigger, more engaging and more international form. The second edition of the festival is scheduled to take place in Delhi and Mumbai from 23 January - 29 February 2016. The 2013 edition engaged over 2 million people during a month in Delhi, and this edition hopes to reach even greater audiences. PUBLICA 2016 has invited Indian and International artists to produce works to feature in the festival under this year’s curatorial theme, ‘Touch’. Artists will make site-specific works responding to the local context and guided by the festival’s theme. The finished works will be placed in high footfall areas around Delhi and for the first time Mumbai, in an attempt to build on the outreach of the first festival and touch as many people as possible. The 2016 ... More
Missoula Art Museum features the work of John Buck MISSOULA, MT.- John Buck is a dynamic artist widely known for his carved wood and bronze sculptures and large woodblock prints that incorporate a variety of diverse imagery. Recently, the artist has been creating large-scale mechanical kinetic sculptures. On the event of MAM’s 40th anniversary, the museum is realizing its longstanding desire to host a solo exhibition of Buck’s work. The scale of his sculptural work requires an installation in two of MAM’s larger spaces, the Carnegie and the Aresty galleries. The exhibition includes a mix of sculptures and prints on loan from the artist, paired with select works borrowed from the collections of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation. The exhibition premieres Buck’s most recently completed kinetic sculpture State of the Union. State of the Union includes a host of signs and signifiers that convey a dense narrative typical of Buck’s ... More
Pier Giorgio De Pinto & Valter Luca Signorile make anomalous project happen at MACT/CACT TICINO.-The MACT/CACT brings 2015 to a close with an exhibition entitled FRAUGHT, devised and conceived in 2014. The two artists who are making this anomalous project happen are Pier Giorgio De Pinto and Valter Luca Signorile, who have combined forces for the occasion to create a joint thematic project for four hands. FRAUGHT (frɔ:t) is a term with a venerable pedigree: northern European in origin, it encompasses a variety of different meanings, including those of ‘charged’, ‘weighed down’, ‘full’, ‘dense’ and ‘pregnant’ with archetypes. It is with the diverse meanings of this term that the two artists have worked to develop their entire site-specific project, which embraces all four of the exhibition rooms available. Each room has been named with the neologism ‘FRAUGHTIANA’ (or ‘FRAUGHTIAN’) and each of them has a number, whose sequence follows the Fibonacci progre ... More
Joris van de Moortel's show at BE-PART: Botanics of sound in which wires get crossed and play WAREGEM.- Joris van de Moortel is presenting his first monographic exhibition in a Belgian institution at BE-PART, the contemporary art centre in Waregem. All the exhibition space has been set aside for this young artist from Antwerp (b. 1983), allowing him to demonstrate the full range of his versatile talent. As always, Joris van de Moortel invites us to engage in an experience that is both visual and sensorial. In his role as a musician, performer and visual artist, Joris van de Moortel has produced some twenty new works for the occasion (drawings, sculptures and installations), conceived to offer answers to the question “Ça vous intéresse l’architecture?” The title of the exhibition underlies the artist’s current research, which questions the notions of volume and space using the trajectories followed by light (neon) and sound, from which he takes ... More
Depardieu to play Stalin in new film PARIS(AFP).- Larger-than-life French actor Gerard Depardieu is to play Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in a forthcoming movie, his press representative said Tuesday. Depardieu -- made a Russian citizen by Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin -- will feature in a screen adaptation of a 2013 novel called "Le Divan de Staline" (Stalin's Sofa), the representative said. The source confirmed a story in the movie business journal The Hollywood Reporter, which said the film will be directed by French actress and director Fanny Ardant. The novel, written by Jean-Daniel Baltassat, is set in the Soviet Union of the 1950s, centering on a young artist who is commissioned to create a monument to Stalin but faces scrutiny by the KGB, the Reporter said. The film will be produced by a French-Portuguese company, Leopardo Filmes, while the Moscow-based studio Mosfilm will provide costumes ... More
Oklahoma City Museum of Art is exclusive U.S. venue for Matisse exhibition OKLAHOMA CITY, OKLA.- Oklahoma City will be the exclusive North American venue to host “Matisse in His Time: Masterworks of Modernism from the Centre Pompidou, Paris.” The exhibition will include 100 works of art, including nearly 50 paintings, sculptures and works on paper by Henri Matisse, as well as masterworks by Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris, Georges Braque, André Derain, Fernand Léger and Amadeo Modigliani. “Matisse in His Time: Masterworks of Modernism from the Centre Pompidou, Paris” will be on view from June 18 through Sept. 18, 2016 at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art. The museum is one of only three international venues to host the exhibition, and is the only one outside Europe. The exhibition is organized from the collection of the Centre Pompidou, one of the world’s leading modern and contemporary art institutions. Henri Matisse is one of the ... More
Florian Rothmayr largest solo show to date on view at Camden Arts Centre LONDON.- Florian Roithmayr presents a new body of sculptural works in Gallery 3 which observe material transformation and transference in the processes of making. Capturing the unforeseeable gestures which occur in the interstice between mould and cast, the sculptures embody the consequences of one surface, material or body yielding another. The configuration of the exhibition changes daily at the inclination of the front of house team as Roithmayr sets up parameters before relinquishing control of the works. with, and, or, without is Roithmayr’s largest solo show to date and his first in a London public gallery. Interested in labour that renders itself invisible on completion, Roithmayr has previously undertaken intensive internships, shadowing engineering specialists, such as a car surface decorator and a concrete beautician, who manipulate materials to enact ... More
Exhibition of paintings and drawings by Mariam Aziza Stephan opens at the Gezira Art Center CAIRO.- The Gezira Art Center announces an exhibition of paintings and drawings by Mariam Aziza Stephan at 1 ElMarsafy St., Zamalek, Cairo. This is the first solo exhibition for artist, and Fulbright Award winner Mariam Aziza Stephan in Egypt. Her current work has been in pursuit of synthesizing her interests and influences that grew out of her time in Egypt right before and into the beginning of the January 25th revolution in 2011.The exhibition comprises several chaotic imagined landscapes, sombre ruins and detritus living in the hinterland between the external world and the inner soul. They exist between representations and interiority. “They are a dreamscape of journeys and arrivals, of objects simultaneously collapsing and growing. At first glance they appear dark, mysterious, inaccessible, post-apocalyptic even, yet upon further contemplation they invite the viewer ... More
Bortolami exhibits works by Daniel Buren in Miami MIAMI, FLA.-Bortolami announces Daniel Buren/Miami, marking the 50th anniversary of the artist’s iconic 8.7 cm stripe. The exhibition includes situated works with fabric from 1965 to the present. When Buren began painting stripes in 1964, he used tape to delineate the vertical motif on bed sheets. In December 1965, he found a striped linen fabric at a Parisian market and began using the precisely printed cloth rather than continuing to render the pattern by hand. Daniel Buren/Miami will show the artist’s lead-up to the 1965 discovery and just a few of the many ways he has since engaged with the 8.7 cm stripe which he calls a “visual tool.” The next 12 months will provide Buren with the time and space to alter the exhibition as he sees fit, eventually installing a new presentation of in situ works that will change periodically throughout the year. This versatile exhibition platform ... More
Joey Yu x noiamreiss on Illustration and the Internet
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Flashback
On a day like today, Russian photographer and architect El Lissitzky died
August 30, 1941. Lazar Markovich Lissitzky (November 23 [O.S. November 11] 1890 - December 30, 1941) was a Russian artist, designer, photographer, typographer, polemicist and architect. He was an important figure of the Russian avant-garde, helping develop suprematism with his mentor, Kazimir Malevich, and designing numerous exhibition displays and propaganda works for the Soviet Union. In this image: El Lissitzky, "Proun, Street Decoration Design", 1921. Photo Peter Cox.
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