Fisk University and the Stieglitz Collection: The final ruling

We’ve had a couple of updates in the last six months, but this week the final decision was announced: The Tennessee Supreme Court denied the application of the Tennessee Attorney General to hear an appeal of the decision of the Court of Appeals to permit Fisk’s Alfred C. Stieglitz Art Collection to be shared with the new Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art located in Arkansas. This means the university can move ahead with working out the logistics of the deal, which includes the museum paying $30 million for a half interest of the Collection.

For previous posts, click here.

Update: Christo’s “Over the River” overcomes a hurdle

A couple of years ago we posted a story about how Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s “Over the River,” a project where the artists would drape material over parts of the Arkansas River in Colorado, faced local and potentially national opposition. The New York Times reports that Christo (collaborator and wife Jeanne-Claude has since passed away) received an important green light from the U.S. Department of the Interior (see their statement here). Local permits are still needed and may delay or derail it.

Modern sculpture ruined by “overzealous cleaner”

Oops.

Martin Kippenberger’s When It Starts Dripping From the Ceiling (Wenn’s anfängt durch die Decke zu tropfen), on loan from a private collector to Museum Ostwall in Dortmund, suffered an attack motivated by … a strong work ethic. Upon noticing what appeared to be grime in part of the sculpture, a cleaner apparently thought all it needed was a good scrubbing. Unfortunately, it had been deliberately-placed paint to represent dried rainwater and the sculpture is “now impossible to return it to its original state.”

via The Guardian

Ara Pacis Augustae in pictures and words

Charles S. Rhyne, Professor Emeritus of Art History at Reed College, has created a new website dedicated to the visual and historiographical study of the ancient Roman monument Ara Pacis Augustae. In his preface, Professor Rhyne explains that the site’s objective is “to make available a more comprehensive body of images of the Ara Pacis than previously available in any print or web publication.” Offered into 10 languages and with numerous images, the website also has a section with useful tips.

Latest additions to ARTstor

ARTstor has added these collections to the Digital Library:

• Fowler Museum, UCLA: 717 images from the permanent collection, with a focus on Africa
• Richard F. Brush Art Gallery (St. Lawrence University): 196 images of African textiles, contemporary Inuit prints and drawings, and Vietnam War-era photography
• Colby College Museum: 2,463 images from the permanent collection, especially American artists and particularly painter Alex Katz (this is 95% of the total 2,477 expected images)
• The Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD): 1,142 images from the Visual Resources Collection

There are also two collection agreements to announce. Sara N. James, professor at Mary Baldwin College, will contribute 614 field images of European architecture and sculpture and Rob Linrothe, professor at Northwestern University, will share an additional 3,000 field images of Tibetan, Chinese, and Indian monuments and architecture.

Last chance for an audience with a goddess

Patrons visiting the Getty Villa in Malibu have until this Sunday to view the ancient Greek “Cult Statue of a Goddess”. Her trip back to Sicily in January is a piece of a “cultural collaboration” with the Sicilian government to return objects that had been sold to the Getty under questionable circumstances. The Villa’s current display of “The Agrigento Youth” through April 19 is the collaboration’s inaugural loan from Sicilian museums to the Getty.

via L.A. Times

Online database for art looted by Nazis

More than 20,000 works of art were plundered in Germany-occupied France and Belgium from 1940 to 1944. These works, meticulously documented during the war by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR), can searched and researched via a new online database. The database combines records from the U.S. National Archives in College Park (MD), the German Bundesarchiv in Koblenz, and records from the French government.

via artdaily.org

Computer art of a different kind

For your Friday fun, check out this slide show on wired.com of recycled computer circuit boards as “circuitry sculpture”. The artist, Theo Kamecke, creates both functional works (like this manuscript chest, left) as well as freestanding and wall pieces. For recent works not on his website, click here.

Ownership dispute over Michelangelo’s “David”

The Guardian reports that Italy’s state government now asserts it is the true owner of Michelangelo’s iconic sculpture rather than the city of Florence. Lawyers hired by the state have said they’ve found archival proof that the work’s ownership passed to the state when it absorbed the Florentine Republic in the nineteenth century. The mayor of Florence has refuted this claim with archival evidence of his own, arguing that control over the Palazzo Vecchio and its contents — including David, which used to stand outside the Palazzo’s entrance — remained with the Tuscan city.

A new look at the Mourners from the Court of Burgundy

They will be coming to a town near you, but in the meantime check out The Mourners Photography Project website, hosted by FRAME (French Regional & American Museum Exchange). The website offers new digital high-resolution, 360° multi-perspective, and stereo 3D (anaglyph glasses required) views of the alabaster sculptures of monks and clerics that surround the tomb of John the Fearless (1371–1419) and his wife. These images have been created in conjunction with an unprecedented traveling exhibition of the figures, which until now have never been seen in their entirety outside of France. The exhibition stops in seven cities in the US, including LACMA from May 8-July 31, 2011.

In related news, ARTstor recently reached an agreement with FRAME to host approximately 1,600 images of these sculptures as well.

the alabaster sculptures of monks and clerics that surround the tomb of John the Fearless (1371–1419) and his wife