ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

VISUAL

Shame On, And For, Both Liverpool And UNESCO

The citizens of Liverpool should be on the same side as UNESCO. "They have the same enemies: the shoddy and contemptuous treatment of the world heritage site, over years, both by the city’s government and private property companies." - The Guardian (UK)

How A Vacuum Cleaner Became An Icon

Henry wasn't planned, but his beloved status even survived this: "Charles and Diana received one of the first models as a wedding present in 1981." - The Guardian (UK)

England’s New Monument To Shopping And Instagram

Yikes: "Rearing up at the western end of Oxford Street as a faceted green shell ... the 25-metre high Marble Arch Mound is one of the more unlikely strategies for stimulating our Covid-stricken high streets." - The Guardian (UK)

Overhauling ‘Traditional’ Monuments With An Indigenous Focus

In the wake of nationwide protests, Native artists are changing the way U.S. institutions see, and commission, public art. - FastCompany

China Outlaws Super-tall Buildings

The building boom in China was often a kind of arms race between cities trying to outcompete each other and grab global attention, typically without much care given to the urban context in which the tall buildings were placed. - Fast Company

American Carpenters Use Medieval Techniques To Help Rebuild Notre-Dame’s Roof

A group of about 30 young workers and students will gather at Catholic University in DC next month and use hand tools to build a 45'x35' wooden truss, which will be used in the Paris cathedral's reconstruction following the 2019 fire. - The Art Newspaper

Oh, The Stories We Tell About Works Of Art… Any Of Them True?

The treasures residing in august museums, the antiquities we revere. They acquire meaning as the stories around them grow. Problem is... - London Review of Books

Artists Protest Polish Government’s Plans To Oust National Gallery Director

More than 800 Polish artists, curators and critics have written to the country’s culture minister opposing plans to remove the director of the Zachęta – National Gallery of Art in Warsaw. - Art Review

Why I Loved The Video Of Greek Police Dropping A Picasso

Sophie Haigney: "I thought, before seeing this video, that I was tired of art. … It was only after watching this video repeatedly that it occurred to me: What I was tired of was not art but the predictability of how we encounter it." - The New York Times Magazine

Uffizi Gallery Is Suing Pornhub Over Its ‘Classic Nudes’ Virtual Museum Tour

Last week the adult website launched an online guide to erotic(ized) artworks at six of the world's great museums. Then one of those institutions started legal action over Pornhub's infringement of intellectual property rights. (The Louvre made threats but has backed off.) - Hyperallergic

Battle Breaks Out Over Who Gets Benin Bronzes Returned To Nigeria

The Western institutions who now hold the looted treasures have been assuming the works were destined for a state-sponsored Edo Museum of Western African Art. Now the hereditary king of the Benin people insists they must go to a museum at his palace. - BBC

After Two Decades And $800 Million, Berlin’s Humboldt Forum Is Finally Welcoming Visitors

"The museum's programs are to reflect three core themes: the history of the site, the brothers Wilhelm and Alexander von Humboldt's global discoveries, and an examination of colonialism and its consequences." - Deutsche Welle

UNESCO Revokes World Heritage Status Of Liverpool Waterfront

The UN's cultural heritage organization had been warning for years that unchecked building development was destroying the beauty and character of the old port city's docks and their grand Victorian structures. - BBC

The Language Of Public Art Vandalism

There’s a language of defacement, according to artist Shanequa Gay, who’s just finished restoring her Reframing Herstory (2019) mural on Edgewood Avenue near the Georgia Beer Garden. - ArtsATL

Major Cutbacks At SF-MOMA

The museum will stop publishing its online journal Open Space and its podcast Raw Material, drop its film programming after the fall season, and, at the end of this year, shutter its offsite Artists Gallery at the Fort Mason Center in San Francisco's Marina District. - San Francisco Chronicle

Our Free Newsletter

Join our 30,000 subscribers

Latest

Don't Miss

function my_excerpt_length($length){ return 200; } add_filter('excerpt_length', 'my_excerpt_length');