31 August 2006 | Books, Modern
Earlier this month, the Chronicle of Higher Education surveyed a crop of (relatively) recent Dada books: the blockbuster exhibition catalogue, Amelia Jones’ Irrational Modernism: A Neurasthenic History of New York Dada, Tom Sandqvist’s Dada East: The Romanians of Cabaret Voltaire, and The DADA Reader: A Critical Anthology, edited by Dawn Ades. “It is ironic that [...]
31 August 2006 | Renaissance
From the UK Observer: “Peering from his scaffold, 12 metres above ground, Maurizio Seracini could make out the inscription in the detail of a Renaissance fresco: ‘Cerca Trova.’ For the Florentine art detective it was the beginning of a 30-year quest. Translated into English, the words mean: ‘He who searches shall find.’ Imagine the works [...]
30 August 2006 | Books
In the September Art in America, Prestel executive editor Christopher Lyon surveys the “mounting crisis in art book publishing”: “[MOMA's new bookstore stocks] barely one-fourth of the more than 10,000 titles offered before MOMA’s temporary relocation to Queens in 2000 … Over the past 15 years the marketplace for art books has bifurcated [into] a [...]
29 August 2006 | Architecture, Books
Theodor Fischer Prize-winner Christian Welzbacher has published his research on the state architecture of the Weimar Republic, which was torn between tradition and modernity. Political instability, among other things, doomed efforts to define a state style (Jürgen Tietz). It was not the young avant-garde of the Bauhaus or Werkbund, but older, more measured modernists who [...]
28 August 2006 | Baroque/Neoclassical, Books
Bettina Erche reviews a new catalog of the drawings of Johann Gottfried Schadow (1764-1850), who worked on paper before learning to sculpt. The 2300 drawings, carefully assembled by the book’s three authors, show the artist’s knack for ethnology, physiognomy and caricature. His perspective was human-centered (animals and landscapes were always domesticated). He dedicated himself to [...]
25 August 2006 | Modern, Museums
Manet who? Three nicely illustrated articles in La Tribune de l’Art demonstrate there was much more to the art of the French 19th century than a few rebel geniuses. Phillip Dennis Cate surveys (in English) “Sculpture by Carpeaux, Dalou and Carriès” at The Petit Palais, Thierry Cazaux “Pierre Loti: Phantoms of the Orient” at the [...]
24 August 2006 | Contemporary, Museums
Live from New York, it’s contemporary art. Fifty years’ worth comes to the Grimaldi Forum in Monte Carlo – 500 works by 200 artists, including film, photography and architecture. Laura Larcan in La Repubblica: “Creative euphoria, emancipation, liberty and dissolution. In other words, the belle epoque.” The Principality of Monaco offers an alphabetical guide. David [...]
23 August 2006 | Medieval
Anja Grebe reviews the catalog from last year’s Limbourg Brothers exhibition at the Museum Het Valkhof Nijmegen. Despite its sensationalist title, the work is scholarly. However, basic questions, such as which brother did what, are left unanswered and maybe unanswerable. She hopes that technical methods of analyzing manuscripts (still in their infancy as compared with [...]
22 August 2006 | Books, Modern
Christoph Lüthy reviews Bodo Vischer’s new book on Goya’s still lifes, The Eye of Nature. Only ten of these remain; made from 1810 to 1812, most found their way via Paris to the wider world, thanks to the late 19th-century French intoxication with Spain. Vischer argues that the paintings somehow look back at the viewer, [...]
21 August 2006 | Museums, Renaissance
In La Repubblica, Goffredo Silvestri has a long and detailed review of the Lorenzo Monaco from the Giottesque tradition to the Renaissance exhibition at the Florence Accademia. (English catalog and description.)
18 August 2006 | Architecture, Conservation
Spain’s ABC discusses the €3,000,000 restoration of the Santiago cathedral being undertaken in preparation for the 2010 Holy Year.
17 August 2006 | Books
Ian Wilson’s new popular book on the rock art of northwest Australia is drawing attacks, notably from the reclusive expert Grahame Walsh. At issue: the painters’ artistic, political and cultural relationship to the present-day aborigines, and the proper balance of conservation and exhibition. Articles include Robin Hanbury-Tenison’s in the TLS (“Some of Wilson’s hypotheses are [...]
16 August 2006 | Books
Fabula is a good resource for those looking to keep up with French research, especially in literature. It recently took note of the new essay collection L’art a-t-il besoin du numérique? and a new edition of J.-K. Huysmans’ writings on art.
15 August 2006 | Uncategorized
El Pais profiles blogger Alejandro Pérez of Sí a la historia del arte. Among Pérez’s recent entries included discussion of Van Gogh with respect to the theory of fluid turbulence, the $135 million Klimt, and exhibitions in Seville and Salamanca.
14 August 2006 | Uncategorized
Art historian Martin Warnke has received a cool 100,000 Euros for the 2006 Gerda Henkel Prize, beating out 210 other nominees. Lord Ralf Dahrendorf, jury chairman, praised Warnke for reconnecting German art history with its pre-1933 roots, via his work on Aby Warburg.
11 August 2006 | Teaching
From Artnet: “Is art getting smarter? Seems so! Last year, the School of Visual Arts in New York began offering an MFA in ‘art criticism and writing,’ a program chaired by art historian and critic Thomas McEvilley. Now, SVA is launching a second new degree program, this one aimed at undergraduates — a BFA in [...]
10 August 2006 | Crime, Modern
From The Age (Australia): “The National Gallery of Victoria has rejected claims that a $25 million Vincent Van Gogh painting it has lent to an exhibition in Scotland is a fake. Britain’s Sunday Times newspaper quoted a number of experts who doubt the authenticity of the painting, known as either Portrait of a Man or [...]
9 August 2006 | Theory
From the New Scientist: “[Neuroscientist] Vilayanur Ramachandran … claims to have discovered ‘the key to understanding what art really is.’ Semir Zeki … claims that great art can be defined ‘in neurological terms’ … [According to Ramachandran,] works of art that we appreciate or enjoy activate the same neural mechanisms that are activated when we [...]
8 August 2006 | Contemporary
From the New York Times: “Arlene Raven, a pioneering historian and advocate of women’s art, died Tuesday at her home in Brooklyn. She was 62 … Ms. Raven wrote or edited nine books, including the important anthology ‘Feminist Art Criticism’ (1988), with Cassandra L. Langer and Joanna Frueh as co-editors … She also wrote monographs [...]
7 August 2006 | Uncategorized
Art Journal has a new editor-in-chief, Sarah Lawrence professor Judith Federika Rodenbeck, and The Art Bulletin has a new reviews editor, Harvard professor David J. Roxburgh, whose 2001 book Prefacing the Image received a glowing review from Kishwar Rizvi in The Art Bulletin — “an important book … a welcome corrective and critique.” Incoming CAA [...]
