Indian high commission made claim bronze depicting Tirumankai Alvar which it believes may have been looted
Oxford University has announced it is to hand back a 500-year-old sculpture of a Hindu saint to India.
The almost 60cm-tall bronze statue, which depicts Tirumankai Alvar, had been on display at the university’s Ashmolean Museum.
Continue reading...Alison Aye’s work will be seen alongside 481 other new exhibitors at the Summer Exhibition
Artist Alison Aye had a surprising reaction to being accepted for this year’s Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy. Founded in 1769, it’s the world’s oldest open submission show – a chance for hobbyist painters to hang next to Turner prize-winners and artists such as Tracey Emin and David Hockney, with everything for sale.
The 58-year-old textile and collage artist, who is based in London, has submitted work to the Royal Academy (RA) over the last 31 years, and always been rejected. But when, this year, she found out she had finally succeeded, she felt conflicted. “It’s the establishment acknowledging me and I don’t know if I like it,” she said. “There’s a part of me that thinks being on the losing side is all right.”
Continue reading...The Tony award winner says ‘Racism and bigots are real’ after being turned down by landlord in Harlem
The Tony award winner Wendell Pierce has alleged that he was denied a rental apartment in New York’s historically Black Harlem neighborhood because he is Black.
“Racism and bigots are real,” the actor posted on X this week. “There are those who will do anything to destroy life’s journey for Black folks. When you deny our personal experiences, you are as vile and despicable.”
Continue reading...Hello, I’m Dolly, a stage show inspired by the superstar’s life, will include her classics and new songs
Dolly Parton is heading to Broadway with the musical Hello, I’m Dolly.
The star is writing new songs to go along with some of her past hits and co-writing a stage story inspired by her life – a stage show that she hopes to land on Broadway in 2026.
Continue reading...The KX100 design caused controversy when it replaced the classic red phone box – but now a handful may be given listed status
Campaigners are trying to secure listed status for the “boringly ugly” telephone boxes that BT controversially used to replace thousands of red phone boxes in the 1980s.
The Twentieth Century Society, which champions outstanding examples of modern design, has applied for listed status for one KX100 box each in England, Scotland and Wales before they are removed next year.
In England, the 100,000th box to be installed in the country, located at Dunsop Bridge in Lancashire, which sits at the geographic centre of Great Britain and its 401 associated islands.
In Scotland, a contender for the country’s most remote and scenic payphone near Maaruig, on the Isle of Harris. It is believed to be the only example still bearing the full original yellow British Telecom livery.
In Wales, an experimental model at the Centre for Alternative Technology in Machynlleth, which is uniquely powered by a solar panel atop the kiosk and an adjacent 18ft-high wind turbine.
Continue reading...The lookalike actor who played the Queen for 50 years, including in Naked Gun and Austin Powers films, died on 2 June
Jeannette Charles, the British actor best known for her striking resemblance of Queen Elizabeth II that landed her roles in Naked Gun and Austin Powers, has died at the age of 96.
On Wednesday the actor’s daughter, Carol Christophi, announced her mother died on 2 June in a care home in Great Beddow, Essex.
Continue reading...Ben and Annie Vautier’s children say in statement their father killed himself just after their mother died of a stroke on Wednesday
French artist Ben, best known for his ironic painted slogans, has died aged 88, killing himself just hours after the death of his wife of 60 years, his family said Wednesday.
His wife, Annie, suffered a stroke on Monday evening and died on Wednesday, the couple’s two children, Eva and Francois, said in a statement.
Continue reading...Text appears to have been copied out and backdated by Camus in 1944, possibly as a way to raise funds during Nazi occupation
A handwritten manuscript of the classic French novel L’Étranger by Albert Camus has sold for more than €650,000 (£553,000) at auction, despite bafflement over the reasons for which the Nobel prize-winning author appeared to have faked and backdated it.
The bound, 104-page draft of Camus’s novel about a French settler in Algeria who kills an unnamed Arab man went under the hammer in Paris on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Radiohead musician issues statement on his ongoing work with Israeli musician Dudu Tassa after being accused of ‘artwashing genocide’ by pro-Palestine movement
Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood has defended his ongoing collaboration with the Israeli artist Dudu Tassa amid criticism from pro-Palestine activists, calling the backlash “unprogressive” and “silencing”.
Greenwood, a composer and musician who also plays in the Radiohead spin-off group The Smile, has been playing with Tassa since 2008. Last year, Greenwood and Tassa released a collaborative album titled Jarak Qaribak, a compilation of Arabic love songs featuring artists from across the Middle East.
Continue reading...The radio and voiceover veteran was diagnosed with aggressive skin cancer in 2019
John Blackman, the Australian radio and television presenter who was best known as the voice of Hey Hey It’s Saturday, has died aged 76.
His death was announced on Channel Seven’s Morning Show by entertainment reporter Peter Ford. No cause was given but Blackman had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of skin cancer in 2019, which resulted in his jaw being removed. He underwent extensive surgeries again in 2022 when the cancer reappeared.
Continue reading...The actor and his wife will be the focus of a TLC docuseries, announced just weeks before his manslaughter trial begins
Alec Baldwin and his wife Hilaria have announced a new TLC reality show following their family life.
The 66-year-old actor, whose films include Beetlejuice and Glengarry Glen Ross, shared a video on Instagram with his seven children.
Continue reading...A lawsuit alleges the musician, involved with hits such as Umbrella and Single Ladies, of sexual battery and abuse by a former protege
Terius Gesteelde-Diamant, the songwriter and producer better known as The-Dream, has been accused of rape by a former protege.
Gesteelde-Diamant, who scored hits himself but had bigger success working with artists such as Beyoncé, Rihanna and Britney Spears, is the focus of a lawsuit filed by singer Chanaaz Mangroe, also known by her stage name Channii Monroe.
Continue reading...South Africa-born painter Gavin Jantjes says institutions tried to buy work they ignored decades earlier
British arts institutions deployed “kneejerk” and “stopgap” responses in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter movement as they attempted to avoid criticism for the lack of diversity in their collections, according to the artist Gavin Jantjes.
The South Africa-born artist, who was a key figure during the British black art movement of the 1980s, told the Guardian that under-pressure organisations approached him to buy work that they had ignored since it was made decades earlier.
Continue reading...Musician who had huge 1984 hit with Agadoo had retired last month
Colin Gibb, who had huge success as a core member of novelty pop band Black Lace, has died aged 70.
His wife Sue Kelly announced the news on Facebook, writing: “I love you Colin … we were due to retire to Spain on Thursday, you were so happy, so looking forward to our new life, now you’re gone. As we used to say, always love you forever.”
Continue reading...Actor, who played campaigner Alan Bates in TV drama, calls Horizon scandal a ‘Hitchcockian nightmare’ at Hay festival
The post office operators prosecuted in the Post Office Horizon scandal have “extraordinary dignity” after living 20 years in a “Hitchcockian nightmare”, according to actor Toby Jones.
Jones played Alan Bates, a former post office operator and leading campaigner for justice for staff wrongly blamed for accounting shortfalls caused by faulty software, in the ITV drama that put the scandal back in the spotlight.
Continue reading...Former Australian prime minister issues warning that young men’s thinking on the issue is going backward
Former Australian prime minister Julia Gillard has said global progress on gender equality is “really glacial and slow” as she warned that it is going backwards among young people.
Gillard cited recent polling by King’s College London’s Global Institute for Women’s Leadership, which showed that 51% of respondents believe that men are doing too much to support gender equality, while 46% think that men are now discriminated against.
Continue reading...Former Tory minister admits at festival that he felt a fraud due to need to give the impression he was in three places at once
Former Conservative MP Rory Stewart found being a politician “very yucky” and felt like a fraud, he told an audience at Hay festival on Saturday.
Asked whether he would consider going back into politics, he said that he found being a politician “personally very, very unpleasant” and “didn’t like it”, adding: “I feel like a fraud all the time, in a whole series of ways.”
Continue reading...Author of novel Prophet Song about an imagined fascist Ireland tells Hay audience he is not a political writer
“I miss my solitude,” last year’s Booker prize winner Paul Lynch told an audience at Hay festival on Saturday.
“In many ways I didn’t sign up for this. I’m an introvert who’s learned how to be social, a social introvert,” he said. “I signed up to sit in a room on my own for three or four years and write a book,” he said.
Continue reading...Auction house hit by cyber-extortionist group RansomHub which claims to have sensitive information of at least 500,000 clients
A ransomware hack was the last thing the precarious fine art market needed – but that’s what it got when Christie’s website went down days before it began its all-important 20th and 21st century May auctions in New York.
Guillaume Cerutti, CEO of the French-owned auctioneer, gently called the attack a “technology security incident”. Christie’s posted its auction catalogs on a separate site, the sale went ahead with sales of $640m, and 10 days later the website came back to life.
Continue reading...D:Ream members regret association with Tony Blair and do not want song played at July general election
The pop group that sing Things Can Only Get Better – which became an anthem for Labour at the 1997 general election victory – will deny any request from Keir Starmer to use the track at this year’s election.
D:Ream’s founding members Peter Cunnah and Alan Mackenzie said they were dismayed to hear their song play through a loudspeaker as the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, called a 4 July general election on a wet afternoon in Downing Street.
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