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Calligraphy Sells: Record price smashed for Arab art
Maktoob Business / October 28th, 2009
A double calligraphy by Egyptian artist Ahmed Mustafa became the most expensive work by an Arab artist on Tuesday, selling for $662,500 at a Christie's auction in Dubai and raising hopes of a recovery in the Middle East’s struggling art market. Mustafa’s "Remembrance and Gratitude" went under the ...
"Who Shot Rock & Roll" at Brooklyn Museum: Photographers who shaped the legends
The Brooklyn Paper / October 27th, 2009
Brooklyn Museum’s massive new fall show, “Who Shot Rock & Roll,” is a sprawling and captivating look at the last 60 years of American popular music as seen through the lens — or, more accurately, the lenses — of some of the world’s greatest photographers. An entire section devoted to ...
$48k Schoolgirl Stitches: Southern sampler snags auction record
Maine Antiques Digest / October 27th, 2009
A rare and exceptionally well-preserved silk-on-linen sampler stitched by Sarah Ann Gibbons in 1834 in Harrisonburg, Virginia, its colors bright and clear, opened at $9000 and quickly moved past the $20,000/30,000 estimate last July. Virginia auctioneer Jeffrey Evans brought the hammer down at ...
No Money Back Guarantee: Beijing woman loses suit against art dealer
Law.com / October 27th, 2009
A woman who worked in art galleries in Beijing and relied on an art dealer's valuation of a painting by contemporary artist Julian Schnabel cannot recoup the $290,000 she paid for the work, a Manhattan judge has ruled. Najung Seung claimed she was misled by art dealer Mary Dinaburg into believing ...
Who Owns Disaster Relics?: Storm brewing over Titanic
Luxist / October 27th, 2009
An ongoing legal battle over ownership of the remnants of the Titanic ocean liner is currently heating up. Thousands of items have been recovered from the ship which went down in the north Atlantic in 1912 killing 1,522 people. The company RMS Titanic (RMST) wants to be named the legal owner of ...
"It Don't Look Like Much": Possible Picasso sold for two bucks
NY Daily News / October 27th, 2009
A Louisiana woman sold a painting for a mere $2 at a garage sale -- and then learned it could be an original Picasso, according to ABC News. Edith Parker, of Shreveport, was shocked to learn the painting may be worth millions of dollars. Parker lives in a trailer park. ""I kept ...
Asian Art in London: From 17th-century jade to Mao vases, diverse offerings for sale
Wall Street Journal / October 26th, 2009
Galleries, auctions houses and museums join forces this week for the 12th annual Asian Art in London (Oct. 29-Nov. 7) which will include special shows at some 40 galleries, dealing in the ancient and the contemporary, with works from China, Japan, Korea, India and the Himalayas. Christie's, ...
Buyers Eager for Edo Period: Japanese armor hits record price of $602,500
Japan Today / October 26th, 2009
A 17th century suit of Japanese armor fetched a record $602,500 at an auction in New York on Friday. The successful bid for the Edo Period armor named Honkozane Nimai Do Gusoku—red and blue laced and gold lacquered—marked a new world auction record for Japanese armor, Christie’s said. The armor, ...
Chinese Art for Sale: Great English collections going to foreign buyers
New York Times Art / October 24th, 2009
As Asian Art in London opens on Thursday, British collecting in the field of Chinese art is in steep decline, in startling contrast with the strength of the English trade. London is the undisputed international capital of the Chinese art trade, with some 30 serious dealers, more than the whole of ...
Banks Hoard Troves of Art: Public wants to see corporate collections
New York Times Art / October 25th, 2009
The art owned by financial institutions should get out more — at the least to give the taxpayers, who have been so generous with the financial sector, an aesthetic return. Deutsche Bank is believed to own the largest corporate collection in the world, with some 60,000 pieces of contemporary art. ...
Norman Rockwell: At Long Island's Nassau County Museum of Art
New York Times / October 25th, 2009
Ever-popular Norman Rockwell painted in a realist style, but a close examination of the 40 original Rockwell paintings and studies and of all 323 of his vintage Saturday Evening Post covers in this touring exhibition suggests he was more of a fabulist than a realist. He painted archetypes, not ...
"The Sacred Made Real": Spanish Painting and Sculpture, 1600-1700
Guardian / October 25th, 2009
This is the most powerful show London's National Gallery is ever likely to hold. One can say that without overstatement. It is not common for people to weep at a press view, nor to fall silent with awe, but both happened this week at "The Sacred Made Real." El Greco to Velázquez, forgotten ...
"I'm a Victim": Australian art dealer accused of $30 million fraud
Brisbane Times / October 25th, 2009
The alleged mastermind of Australia's largest art fraud, Ron Coles, is hiding out in an Australian coastal haven, driving taxis to make ends meet. The former multimillionaire art dealer, who once rubbed shoulders with the country's rich and famous, is accused of forging artworks and defrauding ...
Style-Mixing Guru: Designer Suzanne Tucker will speak at SF Fall Antiques Show
San Francisco Chronicle / October 25th, 2009
At this year's San Francisco Fall Antiques Show, which will be held Thursday through Nov. 1, interior designer Suzanne Tucker will reveal her creative insights in a lecture based on her new book "Rooms to Remember: The Classic Interiors of Suzanne Tucker." Tucker is known as especially adept at ...
Consignor Scammer: Russell Pritchard gets more prison time
Delaware Co. Times / October 22nd, 2009
Described as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Russell A. Pritchard, already in prison for stealing from clients, has admitted to duping additional people who hired him to sell their antiques. The former owner of Bryn Mawr Auction Company and an appraiser on "Antiques Roadshow," who was booted from ...
At the Grand Palais: Istanbul exhibit seeks to reveal city's soul to Parisian public
Associated Press / October 22nd, 2009
The glories of Istanbul have arrived in Paris. From white marble statues of Greek and Roman gods to gleaming medieval Christian icons to a huge red Ottoman tent, an exhibition devoted to Istanbul seeks to expand French awareness of the city's multicultural heritage in a country deeply skeptical ...
Great Houses of New York: River House, the Best Address
Huffington Post / October 22nd, 2009
Author Michael Henry Adams takes readers on a trip to Manhattan's fabulous River House overlooking the East River. Surmounted by a ballroom in the tower's graceful cupola was once a most palatial apartment occupied by the family of sportsman and publisher, Marshall Field, III. Field's English ...
"Looking East": Exhibit of young Chinese artists touches on cultural discord
Kansas City Star / October 22nd, 2009
Kansas City art dealer Byron Cohen sold more than $1 million worth of contemporary Chinese art at last year’s Art Basel Miami Beach art fair. Now, his gallery's “Looking East,” an exhibit of seven artists from China, includes works that address discord in contemporary Chinese culture. In three ...
Flawless: Annenberg diamond fetches $7.7 million
Huffington post / October 21st, 2009
A square, 32.01-carat emerald-cut diamond ring that billionaire philanthropist Leonore Annenberg bought for her 90th birthday sold for $7.7 million at Christie's on Wednesday. About the size of a walnut, the flawless, colorless diamond is flanked by two pear-shaped diamonds. Annenberg died in ...
Distress Sale: Financier sends $40 million worth of art to auction
Bloomberg / October 21st, 2009
A collection of 39 major modern and Impressionist artworks, including paintings by Monet, de Chirico, Degas and Picasso, will be offered by Dutch financier Louis Reijtenbagh, who resolved three legal claims earlier this year. The works will be auctioned in New York on Nov. 4 and 5 and may fetch ...