"We have not been able to sleep, eat and live peacefully. We are fed up with the scary dreams and are returning your valuables," said a note left by the thieves who had taken ritual objects from a temple to Balaji, an incarnation of Vishnu, in Uttar Pradesh state. - The Guardian (AFP)
"The United Kingdom will hold formal talks with Greece regarding the potential repatriation of the Parthenon Marbles, which have been in the British Museum since 1816. ... The contested sculptures were stripped from the Acropolis in 1801 by Lord Elgin while Greece was under Ottoman occupation." - ARTnews
Five years ago the German painter, one of Europe's most prominent living artists, announced that he was ending his career. But he couldn't stop painting, and now he has a major exhibition at a museum near Basel. - Artnet
For some philosophers, the experience of color is most similar to that of pain: an internal state that resists quantification. But who wouldn’t rather philosophize about azure instead of aches and pains? - Lapham's Quarterly
"Starting out as an informal gathering of local men painting wherever they could find some shade, Papunya Tula has become one of the most respected players in the world of Indigenous art, with two art centers (in tiny desert towns) and an art gallery in Alice Springs." - Smithsonian Magazine
A new game, Artle, launched by the National Gallery of Art (NGA) in Washington, DC, invites art lovers to guess the artist in four attempts using visual prompts from their oeuvre. - Hyperallergic
Cambodian investigators have explained to the BBC the routes by which sculptures stolen from ancient temples made it to Britain, and two former looters identified items in the British Museum and V&A catalogues which they themselves had taken during the Khmer Rouge years. - BBC
Expanding on an earlier excavation, the team discovered the tomb while digging within a dry moat that encircles the larger Step Pyramid of Djoser, a complex built for the late pharaoh who ruled from approximately 2630–11 BCE. - ARTnews
Following conservation work that included removing centuries' worth of dust and debris, archaeologists have fully revealed the intricately colored engravings on the walls of the Temple of Esna in Luxor, along with a striking set of painted reliefs on the ceiling. - ARTnews
The Vltava Philharmonic Hall, which will be the home of the Czech Philharmonic and the FOK Prague Symphony, will have auditoriums of 1,800, 700 and 500 seats (acoustics by Nagata, Yasuhisa Toyota's firm) as well as a major hub for the Czech capital's public library system. - Prague Morning
Today, it’s quite confusing. Certain auction houses are mimicking the collectibles market. Everything is a tchotchke to flip. You have sneakers, dinosaur bones, some NFTs, 50 artists you’ve never heard of, and then three artists who actually should be in an evening sale. - The New York Times
“It’s something way beyond a conventional studio, where it’s just an artist working on paintings. They’re walking through each other’s studios, they’re promoting each other.” - The New York Times
While digging ditches in anticipation of a potential Russian attack, Ukrainian military men discovered several amphorae (bottle-necked ceramic containers) estimated to be up to 2,500 years old. - ARTnews
