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Richard ArmstrongKate Taylor gets her scoops the old-fashioned way---by working her sources. In a story posted late today, she fingers Richard Armstrong, director of the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, as the person whom the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation is expected to name as its next director, succeeding Tom Krens. Taylor reports: Through a spokeswoman at the Carnegie … [Read more...] about NY Sun’s Guggenheim Director Scoop—Is It Richard Armstrong? UPDATED

Get-It-First VogelThat does it. I've really had it with selective disclosure of important breaking news by cultural institutions. (So has distinguished architecture critic Martin Filler, who previously vented his frustration on CultureGrrl, here.) I've known major mainstream-media cultural journalists who have boycotted important stories that were spoonfed to the NY Times first … [Read more...] about MoMA Announces Elderfield’s Replacement…but only to the NY Times

Francesco RutelliThe Great Repatriator strides across our land once again. But fear not, art-lings: He comes in peace.Having spent last week at the Democratic National Convention, deposed Italian Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli, now a member of Italy's Senate and Rome's City Council, tomorrow reengages with his old antagonist, the J. Paul Getty Museum, viewing both its … [Read more...] about Rutelli Visits the Getty to Make Nice

Those of you who read the online version of my piece, Krasner at Her Unknown Best, published on the "Leisure & Arts" page of today's Wall Street Journal, must be scratching your heads at this garish cartoon image that accompanied the piece on the web:Lee Krasner, "Shellflower," 1947, private collection, New YorkThen again, if you saw the image in the hard copy, on Page D7, … [Read more...] about Little Krasner Images: An Irreverent Photo Essay

CultureSpouse Rocks! (at I.M. Pei's Hall of Fame and Museum)How I spent my Labor Day Weekend: ---Dancing the night away at the Cleveland wedding of my husband's cousin (having first visited three museums and viewed an air show).---Fielding vibrate-only phone calls during that celebration from: my son Paul, who announced his engagement to the fabulous Lisa; my excited daughter … [Read more...] about Labor [Day] of Love: Family Wedding, Future Daughter-in-Law, WSJ Krasner Review UPDATED

New Regime: the September issueIt's out with the old, in with the new in the September issue of Art in America magazine, where Marcia Vetrocq assumed the editorship in June, replacing artworld editorial giant Betsy Baker (who remains as "Editor-at-Large/Special Projects").A redesign is underway, which for September features bolder headlines and bylines and new layout for the … [Read more...] about The New “Art in America”: Vetrocq Vets the Masthead

A CultureGrrl reader helpfully alerted me to the fact that Max Hollein, possibly to be named the next Metropolitan Museum director, is also on the board of trustees of the Neue Galerie, New York. And I've also discovered that a documentary film has recently been made about him by Avanti Media.According to the description of "Max Hollein---My Life":Hollein's museum policies … [Read more...] about More on Hollein: Another U.S. Museum Connection; “Too American”?

Max Hollein: The frontrunner? Pop Quiz for Met Museumologists: Which of these four museum professionals is not like the others? A) Gary Tinterow, the Metropolitan Museum's curator in charge of 19th-century, modern and contemporary art B) Ian Wardropper, the Met's chairman of European sculpture and decorative arts C) Thomas Campbell, a curator specializing in … [Read more...] about Name That Met Director: The Game Show’s Final Round

Damien Hirst, "For the Love of God," 2007It looks like the investment syndicate that owns Damien Hirst's diamond skull, "For the Love of God," has finally succeeded in lining up an exhibition for it at a major museum: The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, has just announced that it will present the "world premier of the work's international tour," Nov. 1-Dec. 15. But wait! There's … [Read more...] about Hirst Skull to Rijksmuseum Exhibition, Curated by Diamond Damien

Claude Gerstle, subject of an Impact Film Festival documentary on stem cell research, being shown during each party's national conventionNow that we've shifted from the athletic Olympics to the political olympics, it's time to peruse Barack Obama's Platform in Support of the Arts (see P. 3). It's pro-arts education and also favors a budget increase for the National Endowment … [Read more...] about Obama Drama: Tax Fairness for Artists, Impact Film Festival

Damien Hirst, "The Virgin Mother," 2005, the Lever House Art CollectionWhen it comes to the two mega-million contemporary art-market stars---Koons and Hirst---I've sometimes thought that the sensibility that feels attuned to one cannot also strongly admire the other (unless you're a profit-oriented dealer or a trophy-hunting collector). The former artist is engaged in what … [Read more...] about Hirstians vs. Koonsians: Two Warring Camps?

John Russell and his wife, Rosamond BernierPhotograph by Trish LewisThe last time I saw John Russell, the former NY Times art critic who died Saturday at 89, he looked frail, supported by his wife Rosamond Bernier, the arts writer and cultural raconteur, at the opening of the expanded Taniguchi-designed Museum of Modern Art. I asked him what he thought and, of course, he gave … [Read more...] about John Russell, 89: The Kinder, Gentler Critic

Eric Gibson, editor of Wall Street Journal's "Leisure & Arts" pageEric Gibson, on today's "Taste" page in the Wall Street Journal, adds his baritone to what he calls the "chorus of condemnation" against the idea of selling the Pollock held by the University of Iowa's art museum. And he appends a new verse, recommending that the federal government step in to deter future … [Read more...] about Iowa Brouhaha: WSJ’s Eric Gibson Calls for Enforcement of Deaccession Standards

Crystal Bridges: the planIn its recently file appeals brief arguing for a proposed $30-million deal with Alice Walton's planned Crystal Bridges Museum, Bentonville, Arkansas, Fisk University sought to convince the Tennessee Court of Appeals that the in-construction institution will be a solid collection-sharing partner.Using information supplied in the legal deposition of Bob … [Read more...] about Crystal Bridges: Alice Walton’s $488-Million Museum

Fisk University's Carl Van Vechten Gallery, prior to closingIn its appeals brief (full text here) seeking to enter into a $30-million collection-sharing agreement with Alice Walton's Crystal Bridges Museum, Fisk University continues to send a mixed and contradictory message about its ability to display and care for its Stieglitz Collection. (Complete list of its 101 works is … [Read more...] about A Brief that Strains Belief: Fisk’s Legal Flip-Flop