ARTFIXdaily News Feed - Breaking News from the Art World
News Feed Search
Art Basel: The Works That Sold — and Sparked Conversation
New York Magazine / December 9th, 2009
All revelry aside, the art that’s shown — and, especially, sold — at Art Basel Miami Beach and its satellite fairs sets the tone and tastes in the art world for months to come. New stars arise, power reshuffles, and deals are done. And while there weren’t many deals in the seven-figure range this ...
Athens exhibition exposes love in ancient times
Boston Herald / December 9th, 2009
A major new exhibition in Athens explores the many facets of love, and lust, in Greek and Roman antiquity — the sacred, profane, graphic and mundane. Together more than 270 artifacts from Greek and abroad, dating from the 6th century B.C. to early Christian times, were amassed from 50 museums. ...
Film on modernist John Marin premieres at Portland Museum of Art
MPBN / December 9th, 2009
John Marin the "undisputed father of American modernism" is in the limelight and many of his never-before-seen, privately-held works have figured into a new film. Independent film-makers Michael Maglaras and Terri Templeton have already produced two films about another great modernist painter, ...
Church plans to sell Tiffany window to raise cash
Newser / December 9th, 2009
A Vermont church that's down to its last $8,000 is selling a valuable stained-glass window to boost finances and keep open a homeless shelter it runs. The multicolored image of St. John the Divine is a Tiffany original that has been in the First Baptist Church in Brattleboro for almost 100 years. ...
Art Basel Miami Beach closes on high note
Miami Herald / December 8th, 2009
The art market roared back to life during its annual trip to Miami Beach, with galleries reporting double-digit sales growth at Art Basel's winter show. Bouncing back from last year's weak showing, nearly 75 percent of galleries at Art Basel Miami Beach said sales revenue grew at least 15 percent ...
Audrey Hepburn's cocktail dress sells for almost $100,000
Times Online / December 8th, 2009
Actress and style icon Audrey Hepburn's letters were sold for £3,800 yesterday in London by Kerry Taylor Auctions. In the same sale, 48 of Hepburn’s designer outfits, including the wedding dress that she never got to use, sold for £268,320. The top lot was a Givenchy Chantilly lace cocktail ...
New $100K prize for international artists under 35
Associated Press / December 8th, 2009
A new prize recognizing artists age 35 and under would provide the winner with $100,000 and help from mentors like Jeff Koons and Damien Hirst. The Future Generation Art Prize is the creation of the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, whose namesake is a Ukrainian billionaire and art collector. Artists in ...
$32.9 million Rembrandt, $48 million Raphael lead in London sale
AFP / December 8th, 2009
Two masterpieces by Rembrandt and Raphael smashed record prices Tuesday, selling for 20.2 million pounds and 29.2 million pounds respectively at Christie's. Raphael's 1508 "Head of a Muse," which got a record price for any work on paper sold at auction, was a draft for his famous fresco ...
Colin Campbell Cooper's California scene snags record
Antiques and the Arts / December 8th, 2009
A rediscovered Colin Campbell Cooper was offered by Connecticut auctioneer Shannon's on Oct. 29 in a $3.6 million sale. Consigned from a private Midwest collection where it had remained in the same family since the 1930s, the painting caused quite a stir. Dated 1927, the Santa Barbara, Calif., ...
Australia accused of censorship over North Korean art
Washington Post / December 8th, 2009
Australia was accused of censorship Tuesday for denying visas to North Korean artists whose works are on display in a regional exhibition, but the government says the art comes from Pyongyang's propaganda machine and its creators are not welcome. Critics said the decision is a missed opportunity ...
Old Masters set to break records in London
Bloomberg / December 7th, 2009
Works by Rembrandt, Raphael and Van Dyck are being offered for record prices in London this week at Old Master auctions that may raise as much as 81.1 million pounds ($133 million). Among a diminishing supply of great Old Masters on the market is a previously unrecorded portrait by Peter Paul ...
Painter of evanescent frescoes wins U.K's top contemporary art honor
Reuters / December 7th, 2009
Richard Wright seems an oddly sedate choice for a prize normally associated with the enfants terribles of conceptual art. Damien Hirst won the Turner Prize in 1995 with a pickled cow. Wright's exhibition piece at Tate Britain is a baroque-style painting in gold leaf, which progresses in geometric ...
Inge Morath, in living color
Guardian / December 7th, 2009
Looking at this picture – the scarlet signage on an Edward Hopperesque scene of urban America – it's hard to understand why photographer Inge Morath's work in colour has been hidden for so long. Morath – the first woman to become a full member of the Magnum agency, in 1955 – took pictures on ...
Louvre aims to spread culture to mining town, desert island
AP / December 7th, 2009
It's an abandoned coal mining site in a depressed corner of northern France that was pummeled by the two world wars. Soon, a branch of the Louvre Museum will rise up on this unlikely site. The (EURO)150 million ($226 million) museum in Lens, France, to open in 2012, was ...
Fierce bidding sends Washington letter, Poe works to world records
ABC News / December 6th, 2009
A letter by George Washington sold for an auction record $3,218,500 in New York, according to Christie's. An Edgar Allen Poe poem snagged $830,500, a world record for a 19th-century literary manuscript, A rare first edition of Poe's first book, "Tamerlane and Other Poems," reached $662,500, the ...
Despite Dubai's debts, art show is optimistic
Financial Times / December 6th, 2009
Following state-owned conglomerate Dubai World's recent announcement that it is seeking a standstill on its debt, with its liabilities close to $60 billion, Art Dubai organizers say the 4-year-old show should fare well with an expected 80 international exhibitors next March. Last year, 14,000 ...
Parmalat founder's hidden art trove seized
BBC News / December 6th, 2009
Authorities say they have retrieved artwork owned, and concealed, by Calisto Tanzi, the Parmalat founder who is accused of fraud in the Italian company's 14 billion-euro collapse in 2003. The 19 paintings and drawings, including works by Picasso, Monet, Cezanne, and Van Gogh, are worth more than ...
Folk art portrait soars to record $419,000
Cape Cod Online / December 6th, 2009
A folk art painting of two girls sitting on a sofa with a cat fetched a record $419,000 (with fees) at Cape Cod, Massachusetts-based, Sandwich Auction House on Saturday. The painting, along with two others by itinerant limner Zedekiah Belknap (1781-1858), were put on the block by an anonymous ...
Art Basel Miami Beach drums up sales, drama
Bloomberg / December 3rd, 2009
A dozen U.S. Marshals and police officers were among the first visitors to the Art Basel Miami Beach fair Wed. as they seized paintings by Leger, Miro, Degas and Yves Klein following an insurance dispute between Zurich-based Galerie Gmurzynska and New York dealer Asher Edelman. The VIP party ...
Robust segments in auctions worldwide
Bloomberg / December 3rd, 2009
This week in London, four auction houses -- Bonhams, Christie’s, MacDougall’s and Sotheby’s -- sold an encouraging (although the total missed estimates) 39.7 million pounds ($65.7 million) of Russian art. Romanov-owned Faberge soared at Sotheby's. Mainland Chinese pushed a five-day Christie's ...