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# Art Movements
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/art-movements-72/
- Published: 2014-10-31T16:00:01.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:43:50.000Z
- Description: This week in art news: A wax house is melting in London, Egyptian activist Sanaa Seif was sentenced to three years in prison, and da Vinci's "Portrait of a Man in red chalk" (c.1512) is to go on public display in Turin.
- Author: Tiernan Morgan
- Tags: News, Art Movements, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:03 (2014, 2015, part 1)

![4_Alex Chinneck_Melting House_Credit - Tommophoto](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/10/4_alex-chinneck_melting-house_credit-tommophoto.jpg)

Alex Chinneck, “A pound of flesh for 50p” (2014). On display as part of the Merge Festival in London, the work consists of 8,000 wax bricks (photo by Tommophoto)

*Art Movements is a weekly collection of news, developments, and stirrings in the art world.*

[**Sanaa Seif, an Egyptian political activist who worked on the Oscar-nominated documentary *The Square* (2013), was sentenced to three years in prison by a court in Cairo**](http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/egypt-court-sentences-editor-oscar-744086?ref=hyperallergic.com). Seif was arrested for demonstrating against new anti-protest laws. Seif’s brother, Alaa Abd El-Fattah, was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for violating the protest law last June. Hyperallergic’s interview with *The Square*‘s director and producer, Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer, can be found [here](https://hyperallergic.com/the-universal-humanism-of-emancipatory-struggles/).

[**The U.K. amended its copyright rules to free up the use of so-called “orphan \[art\]works.”**](http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-29819136?ref=hyperallergic.com) Under a new licensing scheme, museums, publishers, and filmmakers, will be allowed to use artworks whose copyright owners can’t be traced, provided that they have demonstrated a “diligent” search for the rights holders.

[**Artist Alex Chinneck has created a two-storey wax house in London**](http://mergefestival.co.uk/merge-events-2014/2014/9/19/alex-chinneck-a-pound-of-flesh-for-50p-the-melting-building?ref=hyperallergic.com). Entitled “A pound of flesh for 50p,” the work, which consists of 8000 wax bricks, will be definitively melted down on November 18 (image at top of post).

[**Artist and writer Katsuhiko Akasegawa, better known by his pseudonym Genpei Akasegawa, passed away**](http://artforum.com/news/id=48860?ref=hyperallergic.com). Closely involved with the neo-Dada movement, Akasegawa is best known for printing fake banknotes which served as invitations to a solo exhibition, a stint which landed the artist in prison for several months.

[**Art historian Mina Gregori has claimed to have identified a painting by Caravaggio**](http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/oct/24/italian-art-historian-claims-caravaggio-masterpiece-found?ref=hyperallergic.com). The painting, which depicts Mary Magdalene in ecstasy, is accompanied by a note referring to Cardinal Scipione Borghese of Rome, a patron of the artist.

![Leonardo da Vinci, "Portrait of a Man in red chalk" (c.1512) (via wikipedia.org)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/10/leonardo_da_vinci_-_presumed_self-portrait_-_wga12798.jpg)

Leonardo da Vinci, “Portrait of a Man in red chalk” (c.1512) (via wikipedia.org)

[**Sotheby’s is being sued over claims that it misattributed a painting purported to have been painted by Caravaggio**](http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-29791571?ref=hyperallergic.com). Bill Thwaythes sold the painting in 2006, an apparent copy attributed to a follower of the artist, for £42,000\. The painting’s new owner has since claimed that the painting is by the Italian master.

[**The inaugural Cultural Heritage Rescue Prize has been awarded to Maamoun Abdulkarim**](http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/25/syrian-official-honored-for-work-protecting-antiquities/?ref=hyperallergic.com), Syria’s director general of antiquities and museums.

[**A plan for a new Munch museum was approved by Oslo’s city council**](http://www.theartnewspaper.com/articles/Oslo-council-votes-yes-on-new-Munch-Museum/36059?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**A Texas museum is to be named after British rock star Phil Collins**](http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/28/us-usa-alamo-collins-idUSKBN0IH20620141028?ref=hyperallergic.com). The $100 million center will display the musician’s collection of artifacts from the Battle of the Alamo (1836).

[**Leonardo da Vinci’s “Portrait of a Man in red chalk” (c. 1512), believed by some to be the only known self portrait by the artist, is to go on public display in Turin**](http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29815227?ref=hyperallergic.com). The famed drawing was smuggled to Rome during WWII in order to protect it from the Nazis.

[**John Constable’s “Willy Lott’s House from the Stour” (c. 1816-18) is to go on display at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford**](http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-29800521?ref=hyperallergic.com). The painting was donated to the nation as part of the U.K’s [Acceptance in Lieu scheme](http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/what-we-do/supporting-museums/cultural-property/tax-incentives/acceptance-lieu/?ref=hyperallergic.com) in order to settle a £1,012,200 inheritance tax bill.

[**Eli and Edythe Broad’s new contemporary art museum, currently under construction in downtown Los Angeles, is slated to open next Fall**](http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/culture/la-et-cm-eli-broad-museum-sets-fall-2015-opening-20141028-story.html?ref=hyperallergic.com). The collectors recently acquired Jordan Wolfson’s “[Female Figure](http://news.artnet.com/art-world/eli-broad-adds-jordan-wolfsons-terrifying-robot-to-collection-148914?ref=hyperallergic.com)” (2014), the artist’s best known animatronic work.

[**A report by the *New York Times* has compared how two Egon Schiele lots are being presented and sold by Christie’s and Sotheby’s**](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/25/arts/design/christies-and-sothebys-differ-on-handling-of-2-schieles.html?ref=hyperallergic.com). Both works were owned by Fritz Grünbaum, a Viennese cabaret performer murdered by the Nazis. Christie’s will provide compensation to Grünbaum’s heirs whereas Sotheby’s will not.

[**The Badische Landesmuseum in Germany identified seven Nazi looted artworks within its collection**](http://news.artnet.com/in-brief/new-trove-of-nazi-looted-artworks-found-in-german-museum-146512?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**The first exhibition under Melissa Chiu at the** ](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/arts/design/melissa-chiu-takes-over-at-the-hirshhorn-museum.html?ref=hyperallergic.com)[**Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden will feature the work of Iranian-born artist Shirin Neshat**](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/arts/design/melissa-chiu-takes-over-at-the-hirshhorn-museum.html?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Michael E. Shapiro is to step down as director of the High Museum of Art following twenty years of service**](http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/director-of-atlantas-high-museum-to-step-down/?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Fred Ritchin was appointed the dean of the International Center of Photography’s school**](http://www.icp.org/sites/default/files/exhibition%5Fpdfs/Ritchin%20announcement%20%5F%20Press%20Release%5F0.pdf?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Steinway & Sons’ New York showroom is relocating from 57th street to 43rd Street**](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/nyregion/steinway-piano-showroom-is-moving-to-a-new-home-in-midtown.html?ref=hyperallergic.com). The company’s 57th Street location was designed by Warren and Wetmore, the architectural firm behind Grand Central Terminal.

[**Elite Decorative Arts, an auction house based in Boynton Beach, Florida, has been charged with illegally selling ivory and rhinoceros horns**](http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/palm-beach/fl-auction-house-wildlife-20141028-story.html?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Applications for “Container,” an artist residency program on a commercial shipping carrier, will be accepted this November**](http://daily.jstor.org/artist-residency-cargo-ship/?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Artist Lawrence Abu Hamdan has been commissioned to create an on-site artwork for the 2015 Armory Fair**](http://www.thearmoryshow.com/press/press%5Freleases.html?ref=hyperallergic.com).

[**Monday marks the anniversary of the first animal to orbit the earth**](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika?ref=hyperallergic.com). On November 3, 1957, Laika the Soviet space dog died of heat exhaustion a few hours into her flight, a fact that was kept secret by the Soviet Union for decades. Hyperallergic’s Allison Meier recently reviewed a new publication by Fuel entitled [*Soviet Space Dogs*](https://hyperallergic.com/the-sacrificial-glory-of-the-soviet-space-dogs/) (2014), which includes propaganda images of the USSR’s furry cosmonauts.

![Postcard of Laika with the first three Sputniks in the background by artist E. Gundobin, USSR (1958). Text reads: “International Geophysical Year 1957–1958″ (© FUEL Publishing)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/10/sovietspacedogs8.jpg)

Postcard of Laika with the first three Sputniks in the background by artist E. Gundobin, USSR (1958). Text reads: “International Geophysical Year 1957–1958″ (© FUEL Publishing)