Lee Rosenbaum's cultural commentary

Jean Nouvel, 2008 Pritzker WinnerAs occurred last year, the media-embargoed announcement of the winner of architecture's highest honor, the Pritzker Prize, was leaked a day early (here and here). Prescient (or well informed at an early date), Arthur Lubow has a long profile of Nouvel slated for NEXT Sunday's NY Times Magazine, already available online here. That piece includes … [Read more...] about Nouvel Wins the Pritzker Prize (and Media Embargo Broken Again, UPDATED)

Kanye West's latest album cover, designed by MurakamiI thought I should really give the Vuitton thing a rest, until another designer-branded press release hit my inbox yesterday from the Brooklyn Museum: Turns out that "special items, created by Takashi Murakami as part of the latest collaboration with Louis Vuitton, ...will be auctioned during the gala dinner to benefit the … [Read more...] about Brooklyn/Murakami/Vuitton: It Keeps Getting Worse

Shelby WhiteThey were not in the recently closed Nostoi exhibition of repatriated works, but the nine objects recently relinquished to Italy by American collector Shelby White will go on display at Rome's Palazzo Poli beginning this Saturday, according to Louis Godart, advisor on culture to Italy's President. Chatting with me at the recent "Return of Cultural Objects" … [Read more...] about Italy’s Rutelli Expects to Reclaim “Hundreds of Other Works”; Shelby White’s Returns to Be Exhibited

Rendering of the planned new museums on Saadiyat Island, Abu Dhabi:Gehry's Gargantuan Guggenheim Abu Dhabi (left) dwarfs the rest.People tend to be more controversially candid in interviews published abroad than in those that they do for domestic consumption. This was true of Philippe de Montebello in Le Monde, blasting the Louvre Abu Dhabi (and, by implication, the … [Read more...] about Krensmania in Der Spiegel: “Pharaonic” Aspirations Undiminished

Peter Schjeldahl lecturing last night in New YorkWith too much art to see at the Armory Show of contemporary art that opens today at Pier 94 in New York, how can you hone your must-see list to something manageable?One way could be cross-referencing the list of the art fair's exhibiting artists with those with work in the current Whitney Biennial.When I last I covered the … [Read more...] about More on the Whitney Buy-ennial, and a Schjeldahl Thumbs-Up

Ingrid Sischy and Sandra Brant---uprooted by the ownership change at Brant Publications, where Sandy was publisher for 23 years and Ingrid was longtime editor at Interview magazine---are job-changing together, to become international editors of the European editions of Vanity Fair magazine. According to Condé Nast's press release:In her new position, [Sischy] will continue … [Read more...] about Sischy and Brant, Together Again…at Vanity Fair

Rembrandt, "Portrait of Catrina Hooghsaet," 1657, Penrhyn Castle, Bangor, WalesMore than a year ago, the Rijksmuseum revealed that it hoped to buy one of the finest Rembrandt portraits in private hands, "Portrait of Catrina Hooghsaet" (above), then on loan to the museum from Penrhyn Castle, North Wales. According to Martin Bailey's story last year in The Art Newspaper, the … [Read more...] about Rijksmuseum Decides Against Buying Pricey Rembrandt Portrait

Leaving Athens for Africa, for the moment---nothing I heard at the two-day "Return of Cultural Objects" conference last week in Athens articulated as comprehensively, intelligently and passionately the arguments for return of objects to their countries of origin as the long article by Kwame Opoku appearing in Monday's Modern Ghana.Opoku details and decries the various ways in … [Read more...] about Out of Africa: Kwame Opoku’s Repatriation Advocacy

Edward Hicks, "The Peaceable Kingdom with the Leopard of Serenity"Photo: Sotheby'sI was surprised to get today's press release that Sotheby's will sell Edward Hicks' "The Peaceable Kingdom with the Leopard of Serenity" at its May 22 American paintings sale. As I reported here (scroll down to last item in the linked post), the auction house had intended to sell that painting … [Read more...] about Esmerian’s “Peaceable Kingdom,” Failing to Sell Privately, Goes Public at Sotheby’s

Rendering of proposed Guggenheim Guadalajara, designed by Enrique Norten I had somehow assumed that the Guggenheim Guadalajara, designed by Enrique Norten/TEN Arquitectos, was one of those figments of Tom Krens' imagination that had been permanently installed in his Museum of the Unbuilt. But a story in today's Guadalajara Reporter indicates that in the Mexicans' minds, this … [Read more...] about Guggenheim Guadalajara: Not a Dead Deal?

Oh no! I may have started something. Here's an excerpt from the latest entry from the Walker Art Center's "Off Center" blog:A quick answer to Rosenbaum's query [about whether a boutique selling Richard Prince's Vuitton handbags might open at the Walker] comes with a stroll to the Walker shop, where a table of products timed to the Prince exhibition is stocked with dozens of … [Read more...] about Vuitton News Flash: Prince Handbags Are Not at the Walker…Yet