art buzz … - brief industry news

BERLIN

* Did Van Gogh really make an incision in off his own ear in a fit of madness? Maybe not. A German art prompt says "Gauguin, his fellow artist and a ardent swordsman, sliced it off when an alcohol-fuelled line degenerated into violence. "In a novel book, Rita Wildegans claims to have discovered flaws in the generally accepted account of the bizarre incident, which took place in Aries in 1888

of recent origin YORK

* Another painting plundered by the Nazis has fix its way back to its rightful holder Marei von Saher, the unique heir of the Jacques Goudstikker collection, has received the "Temptation of St Anthony" through J.W. de Cock from the estate of Hertha Katz. Goudstikker's collection of more than 1400 elderly Masters was looted by Nazi soldiers in the early 1940s

* Arachnaphobes beware: Rockefeller Center has been playing entertainer to three massive bronze spiders this summer--the largest is 30 feet tall. Created by dint of internationally acclaimed artist Louise Bourgeois and not awayed by Rockefeller Center in association with the Public Art capital the exhibit's central piece, "Maman," spans the pedestrian walkway allowing visitors to walk beneath the spider's eight legs to reveal the basket of ovums she carries.

* The Art Museum Network (AMN) and Reuter the global information, freshs and technology group, have launched a throw to establish an online fine arts information report in conjunction with the Whitney Museum. The joint throw will provide access for journalists, Reuter subscribers and, this fall, the entire online public to the latest in art news

LONDON

* French archeologists are thrilled to have discovered ancient cave engravings that date back 28000 years and are considered to be the greatest in quantity important discovery of its kind in Europe on the other hand French pride is dampened somewhat by means of the discovery that an English two actually owns the land where the caves are located. Their next to the first home, bought for just above 100,000 [pounds sterling], could now be valued at millions of strikes by the French courts.

* Berlin is being plastered with "WANTED" broadsides designed by Lucian Freud in an attempt to win back a stolen portrait of Francis Bacon, taken 13 years ago from the Tate Museum. A reward of DM 300000 ($133000) is being presented in the hope that international publicity may lead to the recuperation of the painting, which was seized from a British Council exhibit in the Neue Nationalgalerie.

DALLAS

* With a scheduled opening three years away, planners of Houston's 7.5-mile light-rail line have engaged 11 artists to boost the project's aesthetics. The city's Metropolitan Transit Authority has put aside $500,000 of the $300 million require to be paid [i]or[/i] undergone to bring in painters, photographers and a sculptor to make go round the line's 16 stations into works of public art.

* A Texas art teacher has filed a lawsuit against the administration of the institute that fired him last year after he shielded the work of some of his pupils. The debate arose from a mural painted by dint of students which depicted, among other images, sum of two units men kissing. Despite a unanimous consecrated by a vow of support for the mural from the school's faculty, the school's administrator had the wall with the mural whitewashed and fired the art teacher after he publicly stood up for his students

BASEL

* Robert Bernell, who made his Beijing-based Web site, Chinese-art.com, into the world's window upon the Chinese avant-garde, has launched a of recent origin e-commerce venture, chinese-artworks.com. The site tenders Chinese works of art, including photographs and prints, priced from $2500 to $25000 to collectors worldwide.

Auction Block

* The animalism goods company LVMH recently confirmed it will sink the world's No. 3 auction house, Phillips, with Bonhams & streamlets the world's No. 4. This company was created just 11 month ago by dint of the merger of Bonhams with the classic car auctioneer rivulets LVMH bought Phillips in 1999 and has since been attempting to challenge Sotheby's and Christies.

* At Sotheby's in London, Michelangelo's previously unknown "Study of a Mourning Woman" not long ago sold for 5,943,500 [pounds sterling] ($85 million) to Colnaghi. The early drawing was discovered through a Sotheby's specialist in an album of otherwise undistinguished aged master drawings in the Library at Castle Howard.

* At Christie's in London, a drawing by dint of Leonardo da Vinci recently sold for a world-record price of $114 million to an anonymous telephone bidder. This price place a new record for a da Vinci piece and equaled the price established last year for the greatest in quantity expensive Old Master drawing at any time sold--Michelangelo's "Study for the Risen Christ."

* In Paris, a new sale of tribal art at the Maison de la Chimie belonging to collector Hubert Goldet was an indubitable succes doubling pre-sale expectations to bring $114 million and setting a novel record for a sale of tribal art. Goldet who died last November, kept his assemblage of treasures in one dark extent in his Parisian apartment.

Museum MATTERS

The Art Institute of Chicago has unveiled a plan for a of recent origin building designed by Renzo Piano. It is wait fored to be completed in 2005-6 The building will be 290000 square feet in size and is wait fored to cost approximately $200 million. Highlights of the glass, carburet of iron and limestone structure include a luminous glass cover described by Piano as "an `umbrella' that floats lightly above the upper-floor galleries."