Blog
Ruin or rebuild? Conserving heritage in terrorism’ era
In the wake of the Taliban’s destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas of Afghanistan in 2001, a decision was made. The giant stone statues had been so pulverized by explosives that UNESCO said it was impossible to reconstruct them using original material. The statues’ niches were best left empty as a […]
The Hague Convention on the Protection of Cultural Property
Earlier on 2017 the Government of the UK decided finally to ratify the 1954 Hague Convention on the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and its two tougher protocols of 1954 and 1999. A bill is now being debated by Parliament that could become UK law […]
The “Uber effect” in the Art
Barely a month goes by without the launch of an online initiative that aims to disrupt the art market and bring the “Uber and Airbnb effect” to art transactions. But witness the crowds pacing the aisles at a big-league art fair, or spilling out of the salesrooms during the evening […]
The importance of expertise
If an answer is important for the art’s world now and in the future is linked with this crucial question: Are we facing a crisis of expertise in the art market? Probably, the answer, in my opinion, is yes, I believe we are. And I think that because it is […]
A new Terra Sancta Museum
Founded in 1217 by St Francis of Assisi, in the middle of the Fifth Crusade, the Custody of the Holy Land is a branch of the Franciscan monastic order that has operated in Jerusalem continuously for more than eight centuries. Their mission has been to preserve the places in the […]
Why US universities are investing in their art museums
Over the past decade, many university leaders and donors have come to the same conclusion: investment in the arts is essential to building a competitive institution in an increasingly global world. This year, around half a dozen new museums and arts centers are opening on campuses across the country, from […]
Using art to examine Obama legacy
The valedictions for Barack Obama’s presidency are being prepared. Perhaps few will have the romanticism of the epic labor that New York artist Rob Pruitt has been preparing daily over the past eight years. By the time Obama steps down on 21 January 2017, there will be some 3,000 red […]
TRUMP AND THE TYRANS OF ANCIENT ROME
He looks like a strong man, the strongest. Holding a huge club to beat his enemies with, the Roman emperor Commodus wears a lion skin over his bearded, empty-looking face in a marble portrait bust made in the second century AD, which is one of the treasures of Rome’s Capitoline […]
John Berger, art critic and author, In Memoriam
John Berger, who died on Monday January, 2, wrote and said a lot of smart things, but he will be remembered longest for his 1972 BBC television series and book Ways of Seeing. The TV series belongs to the pixelated past, but the brilliantly designed book published alongside it by […]
Art Revolutionaries
An exhibition (Art Revolutionaries, 6 Duke Street, London SW 1, from 18 January-10 February 2017) coming to London in January will attempt to recreate the impact of the Spanish pavilion of 1937, a little gallery built as cheaply as possible at the Paris International Exposition by Spain’s republican government at […]