| | Earthquake closes Smithsonian museums; damages Washington National Cathedral
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The top of the pinnacle (C) of the National Cathedral Washington is damaged after an earthquake struck the east coast of the United States August 23, 2011. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas.
WASHINGTON (AP).- All of the Smithsonian Institution museums on the National Mall have been closed in the wake of an earthquake centered in Virginia that shook the nation's capital. Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough tells The Associated Press that staffers are examining the buildings for damage, and no injuries were reported. Clough, who is an earthquake engineer, says a main concern is the Smithsonian Castle, the red, gothic-style building that was constructed in 1857. He says he was meeting with his staff when they felt the floor move. Clough says there are some minor cracks and broken glass in the castle. There are also reports of damage at two Smithsonian facilities in suburban Maryland that do not receive visitors. The National Zoo ... More |
| Sotheby's to sell Sir Henry "Chips" Channon's spectacular mirrored dining table | | BBC and Victoria & Albert Museum announce major new year-long partnership | | Lisette Blumenfeld Georges, 89, succumbs to complications of Crohn's Disease | 
The dining room at 5 Belgrave Square, Country Life, 26th Feb, 1935. Photo: Sotheby's.
LONDON.- Tuesday 23rd August 2011, Sotheby’s London announced that it will offer Sir Henry “Chips” Channon’s 25 feet long, mirrored dining table and three sets of double doors from his celebrated rococo dining room at 5 Belgrave Square. The spectacular table (estimated at £5,000-£7,000*) and doors (£3,000-£5,000) will be offered as part of the Fine Furniture Sale on September 20th 2011. Channon, the self-proclaimed “Lord of Hosts” and his heiress wife, Honor Guinness, were renowned for the flamboyance of their entertaining and the glamour of their guest-lists. Sotheby’s UK Chairman, James Stourton has written about the sale: “The house and dining room at 5 Belgrave Square have an important place in the history of 1930s taste. The dining room was the centrepiece of “Chips” Channon’s makeover of the house, which he and his wife acquired as a stage for their entertai ... More | | 
V&A exterior.
LONDON.- The BBC and V&A today announce Handmade in Britain, a year-long season of programming that will be the most wide-ranging and ambitious exploration of decorative arts ever to be undertaken on British Television. Furthering the BBC’s commitment to building partnerships with the arts sector that go beyond broadcast, from sharing expertise to widening public engagement in UK arts, from autumn 2011 to autumn 2012, Handmade in Britain will present three, three-part series and a selection of individual hour-long films, focusing on a wide variety of art and design disciplines: ceramics, wood, metalwork, textiles, stained glass and paper. The programmes will follow the development of each of these media, unveiling stories about the objects that tell us about the social, political and cultural climate of Britain at the time in which they were made. They will also reveal why, throughout the nation’s history, maker ... More | | 
Lisette by Erwin Blumenfeld, Haute Savoie, 1938.
NEW YORK, NY.- Lisette was the first born child of photographer Erwin Blumenfeld from Berlin and Lena Citroen of Amsterdam , cousin of Paul Citroen: Blumenfeld’s best friend. since age 6. Upon her birth Lisette became Blumenfeld’s most photographed model and muse. They lived in Zandvoort on the Zee and then in Ardenhout. Lisette was model and assistant in her youth recalling time spent in an early ‘darkroom’ closet under the staircase. Fantastic chemical experiments took place in the middle of the living room floor during the early years. In 1937 Lisette aged 14 and her mother and 2 brothers joined Blumenfeld in Paris. Lisette spent her first year in Paris cutting classes of 8th grade to watch movies at the cinema across the street “Le Pagode” then dropped out of school all together to become model and assistant to her father at his studio at 9, rue Delambre and frequenting “le Dome’ where she saw Picasso, Matisse, Rouaoult, Kertesz and th ... More |
| John Romita Spider-Man #49 cover art brings $167,300 to lead $4.45+ million Heritage Comics & Comic Art Auction | | Swords and medals of Royal Navy commander who lost his ship to the French for sale at Bonhams | | Norfolk's past illustrated through Kenneth Harris exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art | 
The original John Romita, Sr. Amazing Spider-Man #49 cover art.
DALLAS, TX.- The original John Romita, Sr. Amazing Spider-Man #49 cover art, featuring Spidey dueling the deadly dual menace of Kraven the Hunter and the Vulture brought $167,300 on Thursday, Aug. 18, as the web-slinging top lot in Heritage Auctions? $4,45+ million Signature® Comics and Comics Art auction. All prices include 19.5% Buyer?s Premium. All told, the auction had a 96.5% sell-through rate by value and 98% by total lots in the auction. The top comic book in the auction came in the form of a restored copy of Action Comics #1 (DC, 1938) CGC Apparent VF 8.0 Moderate, offered without reserve, which realized $149,375. Demand for the few elite super-keys of the comic hobby goes up with each passing year, and attractively restored Action #1s like the present example are among some of the most coveted. Meanwhile, a very sharp copy of Spider-Man?s first appearance in Amazing Fantasy #15 (Marvel, 1962) was the object of vigorous bid ... More | | 
A Lloyds Patriotic Fund sword awarded to Arthur Farquhar. Estimate: £60,000 to £80,000. Photo: Bonhams.
LONDON.- A Lloyds Patriotic Fund sword awarded to Arthur Farquhar will be offered by Bonhams Knightsbridge on 30 November with an estimate £60,000 to £80,000. Farquhar, Commander of HMS Acheron, survived the ultimate Royal Navy catastrophe of losing his ship to a French man of war, but in the subsequent court martial he was acquitted of any wrongdoing and complimented for his actions which were described as 'highly meritorious and deserving imitation'. In a naval action off Malta while on convoy duty to 35 ships, he took on a much larger French adversary and after a stiff fight was overcome by a ship with many times the firepower of his own. David Williams, Director the Antique Arms and Armour Department at Bonhams, comments: “Farquhar is the living embodiment of the plucky naval officer who helped Britain to rule the waves by his willingness to take on overwhelming ... More | | 
Kenneth Harris, East Main Street Looking West, 1951 (detail). Watercolor on paper. Museum purchase, Norfolk Newspapers' Art Trust Fund.
NORFOLK, VA.- The Chrysler Museum of Art showcases a snapshot of historic Norfolk in Portraits of a City: Views of Norfolk by Kenneth Harris. The exhibition is on view August 24, 2011 to January 29, 2012. Admission is free. A selection of 30 of Harris’s beautifully crafted watercolors from the Chrysler Collection provides a nostalgic glance at the bustling seaport in the 1950s. In 1949 Norfolk became the first city in the United States to take part in the newly enacted federal Housing Act, which was designed to replace decaying urban buildings with new construction. Norfolk was soon in the throes of wholesale urban renewal, which involved the razing of decaying neighborhoods, construction of public housing, and a massive redesign of the city’s commercial core. Arriving in Norfolk in the midst of this transformation, Harris began painting watercolors of the city’s monuments ... More |
| American Institute of Architects selects three projects for National Healthcare Design Awards | | California Gold Rush leads to Don Presley's auction featuring retired prospector's personal collection | | The secret life of Cuba's creative class: photographer Michael Dweck's allegorical narrative of seduction | 
Seattle Children’s Bellevue Clinic, Bellevue, Washington.
WASHINGTON, D.C.- The American Institute of Architects (AIA) Academy of Architecture for Health (AAH) has selected the recipients of the AIA National Healthcare Design Awards program. The AIA Healthcare Awards program showcases the best of healthcare building design and healthcare design-oriented research. Projects exhibit conceptual strengths that solve aesthetic, civic, urban, and social concerns as well as the requisite functional and sustainability concerns of a hospital. Jurors for the 2011 National Healthcare Design Awards include: Larry Speck, FAIA (Chair), Page Southerland Page; Sheila Bosch, Gresham, Smith and Partners; Turan Duda, AIA, Duda Paine Architects, LLP; Bruce Fowle, FAIA, FXFOWLE; Joseph Kuspan, AIA, ANSHEN+ALLEN; R. Doss Mabe, FAIA, ZGF and Thomas Trenolone, AIA, HDR, Inc. Three healthcare facilities were selected in two categories; Built and Unbuilt. The ... More | | 
White quartz specimen, total weight 59.2 ozt., containing 29.5 ozt. of gold. Don Presley Auctions image.
ORANGE, CA.- Gold is the commodity on everyone’s minds these days, and bidders could very well strike paydirt over Labor Day weekend, Sept. 3 and 4, when southern California auctioneer Don Presley offers nuggets and other specimens from the private collection of a retired professional prospector. Now in his late eighties, the prospector – who traded in precious metals and sold mining equipment for a living – built a special reserve collection over his lifetime that consisted of exceptional geological specimens. He is now liquidating his collection to provide for his grandchildren. “Over the years, he has prospected all over the world, and this is the first time he has ever sold anything at auction,” said Don Presley. “Some of the pieces in his collection are just fabulous.” Headlining the gold lots is a spectacular white quartz specimen with a total weight of 59.2 ozt. that contai ... More | | 
"Habana Libre is a story suggested, never told."
NEW YORK, N.Y.- Almost immediately upon his arrival in Cuba for the first time, American photographer Michael Dweck was swept up in a cultural bohemia reminiscent of 1930’s Paris salons. His unprecedented (and unrestricted) access to this hidden society of keenly observant artists, writers, musicians and glamorous models had never before been experienced by anyone in the West and is still not acknowledged within Cuba itself. Dweck’s personal exploration of this creative class existing in a classless society, a compelling aspect of Cuba’s contradictory status in the world today, is the basis of his third published work Michael Dweck: Habana Libre (Damiani editore). “Habana Libreis a story suggested, never told,” he explained. “Its subtext is an allegory of seduction, a ‘forbidden island’ that embodies a provocative mix of danger, tension, authority and mystery; teeming ... More |
| The Spiral and the Square: Exercises in Translatability at Stockholm's Bonniers Konsthall | | New exhibition at the Museum of London exposes modern slavery in London | | Rare coins, new discoveries, historic medals and aviation awards to highlight Fall auction | 
Rirkrit Tiravanija, Untitled (Police Police Potato Grease), 2011.
STOCKHOLM.- What happens in translations between cultures, between languages, between a viewer and an artwork? In The Spiral and the Square. Exercises in Translatability, the works are varied exercises in translatability: Rivane Neuenschwander’s phantom draughtsman translates the visitor’s description of their first love into a portrait on paper. Cildo Meireles’ simple paper bags are translated into a series of volume units. Laura Lima’s living sculpture lends an image to the process of translation as a physical and demanding struggle. Cao Guimarães’ full-length film Ex Isto challenges how history is written by transferring European historical events to the Amazon rainforest. The Spiral and the Square has its starting point in the Brazilian writer Osman Lins' cult novel Avalovara (1973), but an exhibition that encompasses the meeting of cultures inevitably and ... More | | 
A survivor ‘Sarah’.
LONDON.- A new exhibition at the Museum of London and Museum of London Docklands will lift the lid on the shocking reality of trafficking and forced labour in the capital. The exhibition, which opens on 23 August 2011 to coincide with the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, is the Museum’s first cross-site exhibition and will run until 20 November 2011. In partnership with Anti-Slavery International (external page), the world’s oldest human rights organisation, Freedom from: modern slavery in the capital explores the personal impact of human trafficking and slavery in London in the 21st century. The display will include a map representing cases of slavery across greater London. It will also include the personal testimonies of those affected by slavery. These include ‘Gheeta’, trafficked from India, made to hand over all her earnings to her trafficker, as we ... More | | 
Gold trophy from the first Pulitzer air race. Est.$15,000 - 20,000. Photo: Courtesy of Bonhams & Butterfields.
LOS ANGELES, CA.- Bonhams announced the addition of a highly sought after five-piece Panama Pacific coin set to the September 4, 2011 auction of Rare Coins and Medals. Created to commemorate the opening of the Panama Canal and the workmen that created it, the coins graced the 1915 exposition in San Francisco in celebration of the monumental event. Paul Song, Director of the Rare Coins and Banknotes Department at Bonhams & Butterfields, said of the coin set: “The Panama Pacific coin set is one of the highest-priced coin sets of this type to come to market. Many of the sets made by this mint have been melted down since 1915. Bonhams is pleased to offer such a pristine set.” Coins featured in the set include a 1915-S 50C, 1915-S G$1, 1915-S $50 Round, 1915-S $50 Octagonal and a 1915-S $2.5. It was during this time that many new devices were being ... More |
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 Georgian frivolities: fine English enamels from the Mort and Moira Lesser collection for sale at Bonhams LONDON.- The sale of the Mort and Moira Lesser Collection of Fine English Enamels will take place at Bonhams on 19th October 2011. Consisting of 203 lots, estimates range from £500-18,000 and the entire collection is expected to fetch £250,000-350,000. When society ladies went shopping for objects d’vertu in 18th century England, few could resist the colourful charm of enamel. Snuff boxes and bonbonnières, scent bottles and other trinkets, made from painted enamel, were a speciality of ‘toy-makers’ in Birmingham and the nearby village of Bilston in South-Staffordshire. English enamel has a charming folk quality that appeals to discerning collectors. Our royal family has one of the finest collections, formed by Queen Mary and added to by the late Queen Mother. Not every piece costs a queen’s ransom, however, and Bonhams auction presents a special opportunity for new collectors to acquire many exceptiona ... More Kellogg defends Toucan Sam against Maya Archaeology Initiative's logo SAN FRANCISCO (AP).- Kellogg Co. is asking a group working to defend Mayan culture to reconsider its logo, saying consumers can confuse it with Toucan Sam, the mascot of its Froot Loops cereal. An attorney for the world's largest cereal maker has sent a letter to the nonprofit Maya Archaeology Initiative saying Kellogg opposes the group's bid to trademark its logo. The attorney suggests a settlement that would limit the group's use of the image. The Maya Archaeology Initiative, based in San Ramon, says there is little similarity. It says its logo is based upon a realistic toucan native to Mesoamerica, while Toucan Sam is a cartoon character with the coloring of Froot Loops. The organization says that it hopes can resolve the matter with Kellogg, which is based in Battle Creek, Mich. ... More"Fields of Vision" series features 20th-century photographers Gordon Parks, Arthur Rothstein, and Carl MydansWASHINGTON, D.C.- The more than 172,000 black-and-white and 1,600 color images that comprise the Farm Security Administration Office of War Information (FSA/OWI) Collection at the Library of Congress offer a detailed portrait of life in the United States from the years of the Great Depression through World War II. Selected images from the works of FSA/OWI photographers Gordon Parks (1912-2006), Arthur Rothstein (1915-1985) and Carl Mydans (1907-2004) are now featured in the Library of Congress series titled "Fields of Vision." These new titles join the first six volumes in the series, which feature the work of FSA/OWI photographers Russell Lee (1903-1987), Ben Shahn (1898-1969), Marion Post Wolcott (1910-1990), Esther Bubley (1921-1998), Jack Delano (1914-1997) and John Vachon (1914-1975). Edited by Amy Pastan, an independent editor and book packager, and published by D Giles Ltd. in association with the Library of Congress, each ... More Berlin library returning books stolen by NazisBERLIN (AP).- Berlin's Central and Regional Library says it will return books the Nazis stole from the Social Democratic Party, including an English-language copy of the Communist Manifesto. The copy dates from 1883 and is believed to have belonged to Friedrich Engels, who penned the original German work with Karl Marx in 1848. The library said Monday the work is one of some 70 to be returned to the party on Aug. 31. The Social Democratic Party was banned in 1933 after Hitler came to power. Activists from the party continued to oppose the Nazis. Many were persecuted or killed for their activities. ... More Dallas Museum of Art appoints Sue Canterbury as Associate Curator of American ArtDALLAS, TX.- Patricia “Sue” Canterbury has been appointed The Pauline Gill Sullivan Associate Curator of American Art at the Dallas Museum of Art, it was announced today by Olivier Meslay, the DMA’s Interim Director and its Senior Curator of European and American Art and The Barbara Thomas Lemmon Curator of European Art. She will begin work in Dallas on September 19, 2011. Canterbury comes to the Dallas Museum of Art from the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, where she was the Associate Curator in the Department of Paintings from 1998 to earlier this year. Canterbury has extensive knowledge of late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century American art and the role of transatlantic exchange between the art centers of Europe and the United States. Her masters’ thesis, James McNeill Whistler's The Gold Scab: Eruption in ‘Frilthy’ Lucre, explored Whistler's relationship with his first great patron, Frederic ... More Skinner auction of paintings, prints & photographs to feature works by Robinson, Utrillo, Calder, WarholBOSTON, MA.- Skinner, Inc. will auction prints, photographs and paintings on Friday, September 9th in two sessions at their Boston gallery. The prints portion of the sale will kick-off at 12 p.m.; paintings at 4 p.m. The two sessions will total over 600 lots including works by Cahoon, Parrish, Warhol, Burliuk, Corot and Utrillo. Two prints both signed and numbered from Andy Warhol’s ten image series Cowboys and Indians will be available at the sale. As a portraitive work, Geronimo, lot 172, is consider more quintessential of Warhol’s style. It has an estimated auction value of $15,000 to $25,000. Plains Indians Shield, lot 171, has an estimate of $8,000 to $12,000. Another Warhol print Speed Skater, lot 170, will also be offered. This print is from the deluxe edition of 50 plus proofs, published by Visconti Art Spectrum, and numbered and signed. Speed Skater is expected to fetch $5,000 to $7,000 at aucti ... More Iconic Japan cartoon cat gets his own museumTOKYO (REUTERS).- He's a small, blue robot cat from the future who's been the inspiration for an animated TV series, served as Japan's cartoon cultural ambassador and is beloved around the world. Now, the iconic Doraemon has his own museum on the outskirts of Tokyo -- though he shares the space with his creator, Fujiko F. Fujio. The museum collection features 50,000 items, many of which are original drawings, as well as a desk and other things used by Fujio until his death in 1996. The museum building also includes a small theatre and coffeeshop. Sent back in time to help a hapless schoolboy named Nobita save himself from a life of failure, and his descendants from a life of misery, Doraemon often uses gadgets from the future to solve Nobita's problems. Many episodes of the animated version feature lessons about moral values. "I personally believe that the very fact that children from all over the world read and enjoy Doraemon is a testament to the fact that children are childre ... More |
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