Art Movements
Brooklyn Botanic Garden fires research staff, racy painting of Putin and Medvedev seized, more paintings from the studio of G.W. Bush, ancient Libyan necropolis bulldozed, and more...
Art Movements is a weekly collection of news, developments, and stirrings in the art world.
The four researchers who run the Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s plant library that holds around 330,000 plant specimens were all fired. The library has long been a vital research center for plant life, and the access to the library with its many rare specimens is now in limbo as it’s expected to go into storage.
Four paintings by Konstantin Altunin, including one depicting Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev in lingerie, were confiscated by Russian police, and his Saint Petersburg exhibition was shut down. Altunin has fled to France for asylum.
The “hacker” GUCCIFER released images of several new George W. Bush paintings to Gawker, which noted the shift in subject matter from dogs to cats and suggested the 43rd president might be entering a “cat period.”
Following the curtailing of the plan to kick out Old Master paintings from the Gemaldegalerie in Berlin in favor of contemporary art, a new modern art museum is planned to be built on Museum Island, although the government still needs to approve funding.
Several 18th century paintings and other objects were stolen from a Bolivian church, its third looting in the past five years. The remote churches of Bolivia and Peru are increasingly targeted by thieves, who often dig beneath walls or even putting sedatives in the meals of parishioners.
A necropolis dating back to at least 700 BC in eastern Libya was bulldozed for the construction of new houses.
The grave of abstract artist Kasimir Malevich will finally be marked after it was discovered beneath a Moscow housing development.
The Los Angeles City Council has lifted its decade-long ban against outdoor murals.
Ann Goldstein left the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam where she had served as general and artistic director since 2009. Some are speculating she might be a candidate for MOCA director following the departure of Jeffery Deitch.
Michael Lieberman, a dealer previously with the recently closed Harris Lieberman Gallery, joined Marianne Boesky Gallery as their senior director of sales.
Sylvie Fortin joined the Biennale de Montréal as executive and artistic director, leaving her role as curator of contemporary art at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre at Queen’s University.
A dispute is growing over the building of chocolate museums at Mayan archaeological sites in Mexico with debates of the protection of heritage by the National Institute of Archaeology and History.
The science museum in Tampa canceled a pirate exhibition for the second time in the past decade due to the slave transport history of the ship and its artifacts.
One of the Louvre’s central sculptures, the “Winged Victory of Samothrace,” is departing for nine months for restoration. The process will be streamed online.
The “Masstransiscope” zoetrope by Bill Brand that shows a rocket ship launching in an empty station on the B and Q MTA line in New York is again visible for the first time following Hurricane Sandy.
The 2013 AIMIA | AGO Photography Prize announced their shortlist, including Edgardo Aragón, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Chino Otsuka, and Erin Shirreff.
