Category Archives: Art and design

Max Beckmann self-portrait breaks German art auction record with €20m sale

Posted on by

Beckmann painted work in Amsterdam after fleeing Nazi Germany and shows him as younger man with enigmatic smile

A rare and remarkable self-portrait by the 20th-century German expressionist Max Beckmann has sold in Berlin for €20m (£17m), breaking the record for a work of art sold at auction in Germany.

The striking Selbstbildnis gelb-rosa (Self-portrait Yellow-Pink) was painted by Beckmann during his wartime exile in Amsterdam after he fled Nazi Germany. The identity of its new owner was not immediately available. With fees and other charges, the cost to the buyer was €23.2m.

Continue reading...

Indonesian group first Asian artists to top power list after ‘antisemitic’ mural

Posted on by

The ruangrupa collective’s last show was removed from key German exhibition for caricatures of Jews

An Indonesian collective that became embroiled in an antisemitism row earlier this year has taken the No 1 spot in the annual ranking of the contemporary art world’s most influential people and organisations.

The ruangrupa group, founded in Jakarta in 2000, are the first artists from Asia to top the ArtReview Power 100. Their position “reflects the growing influence of the global south and the move towards greater diversity in the art world,” ArtReview said.

Continue reading...

Iranian artists call for boycott of cultural institutions with links to regime

Posted on by

Art activism has increased in and outside the country since death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini

Dozens of Iranian artists have called for an international boycott of cultural institutions run by or affiliated with the Islamic Republic in protest against the regime’s worsening human rights abuses.

The call by artists, writers, film-makers and academics living in Iran and among its diaspora comes amid growing anti-government art activism by Iranians inside and outside the country after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.

Continue reading...

British Museum works to restore ‘rare and complex’ Michelangelo drawing

Posted on by

16th-century work Epifania is one of only two existing cartoons by the Italian master

One of only two surviving Michelangelo cartoons is undergoing delicate and highly technical conservation work at the British Museum in an attempt to stabilise the fragile work for the coming decades.

Epifania, created by the Italian master artist around 1550, has degraded and been subject to repeated repairs over its almost 500-year history. Now it is laid out in the museum’s state-of-the-art conservation studios as specialists consider how best to preserve the complex structure and black chalk lines.

Continue reading...

Criticism mounts of ‘climate killer’ modern art museum in Berlin

Posted on by

Calls for construction on Museum of the 20th Century to be halted until energy efficiency issues addressed

A vast modern art museum under construction in Berlin has been castigated by conservation experts and architecture critics for its poor environmental credentials, as the energy crisis intensifies scrutiny of the efficiency of new buildings.

The Museum of the 20th Century, designed by the Swiss star architects Herzog and de Meuron, is intended to propel the German capital into the top tier of world cities for modern art, competing with New York’s Moma and London’s Tate Modern.

Continue reading...

‘Beautifully chosen’: David Hockney’s yellow Crocs impress King Charles

Posted on by

Artist’s choice of footwear for Order of Merit luncheon highlights shoe brand’s enduring popularity

It is a question that must have plagued those attending King Charles’s first luncheon for the Order of Merit on Thursday – what to wear while eating partridge pie with the new monarch.

For the 85-year-old artist David Hockney it was simple – his signature checked Savile Row suit, a knitted checkerboard tie … and a pair of yellow garden Crocs. As a fan of the great outdoors, the king was delighted. “Your yellow galoshes!” he remarked. “Beautifully chosen.”

Continue reading...

Max Beckmann self-portrait poised to fetch record price at German auction

Posted on by

Rarely seen work painted during artist’s Dutch exile from Nazi Germany has an estimate of €20m-€30m

A moody self-portrait of the 20th-century expressionist Max Beckmann painted during his Dutch exile from the Nazis is predicted to break the record for a price secured at auction in Germany when it goes under the hammer in Berlin next week.

Art lovers have been flocking first to New York and then to Berlin to see the painting in preview showings, which have offered a rare opportunity to view a masterpiece that has always been in private hands.

Continue reading...

‘I’m not humble’: Artist Ken Done delivers colourful speech as 2022 Australian fashion laureate

Posted on by

The painter known for his vivacious Australiana prints accepted the award with a 10-minute speech that elicited laughter and some uncomfortable silences

Ken Done, the artist known for his riotously colourful Australiana paintings and prints, has been named the Australian fashion laureate for 2022. The lifetime achievement award honours individuals for their significant contribution to the Australian fashion industry.

“I’m not humble, fuck it,” Done said upon receiving the award at a ceremony in Sydney on Tuesday.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Computer says there is a 80.58% probability painting is a real Renoir

Posted on by

Swiss company uses algorithm to judge whether contested Portrait de femme (Gabrielle) is genuinely by French artist


Staring enigmatically at an unseen object to her right, the black-haired woman bears a striking resemblance to the person depicted in Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s painting Gabrielle, which Sotheby’s recently valued at between £100,000-150,000.

However, art connoisseurs disagree over whether the work, which is owned by a private Swiss collector, is the real deal. Now, artificial intelligence has waded in to help settle the dispute, and the computer has deemed that it probably is a genuine Renoir.

Continue reading...

Climate activists throw black liquid at Gustav Klimt painting in Vienna

Posted on by

Pair attack Death and Life painting in Leopold Museum in protest against fossil fuel ‘death sentence’

Climate activists in Austria have attacked a painting by Gustav Klimt, with one throwing a black, oily liquid at it and another gluing himself to the glass covering the painting.

Members of Letzte Generation Österreich (Last Generation Austria) tweeted that they had targeted the 1915 painting Death and Life at the Leopold Museum in Vienna to protest against their government’s use of fossil fuels.

Continue reading...

Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games mascots likened to ‘clitoris in trainers’

Posted on by

Pair of red triangular Phryges meant to represent floppy conical hats linked to French Revolution

France’s mascots for the 2024 Olympic Games have been likened to a giant “clitoris in trainers”, with the French newspaper Libération hailing it as a revolutionary departure from the traditional phallic symbol of the Eiffel Tower.

When the two triangular red mascots, the Phryges, were unveiled for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, they were presented as the shape of Phrygian caps, the floppy, conical hats associated with the French Revolution.

Continue reading...

John Constable’s favourite Hampstead pond to be restored after two centuries

Posted on by

Branch Hill pond dried up in the 1880s. Now it will teem with wildlife again, as it did in the artist’s heyday

It was a view that John Constable sketched and painted dozens of times. From the top of Hampstead Heath, London’s highest point at 134 metres (440ft), the artist would look west and north towards today’s suburbs of Willesden, Edgware and Harrow. About 100 metres away, down below, was a beautiful natural pond.

But in the 1880s, Branch Hill pond dried up. Now, nearly two centuries after Constable immortalised on canvas his favourite landscape in the capital, the pond has been recreated.

Continue reading...

Banksy artwork appears on damaged building in Ukraine

Posted on by

Graffiti artist appears to confirm presence in war-torn country after unveiling latest work on Instagram

Banksy appears to have confirmed he is in Ukraine after revealing his latest artwork on Instagram.

Speculation had been mounting that the anonymous graffiti artist was in the war-torn country after a series of murals appeared in the town of Borodianka, near Kyiv.

Continue reading...

Digital Benin project reunites bronzes looted by British soldiers

Posted on by

Comprehensive database of Benin bronzes held by museums raises questions about where they belong

Cheerfully gnashing their magnificent fangs as they stand side by side, the two bronze leopards look back on a journey that was as adventurous as it was cruelly absurd.

Looted by British soldiers on a punitive expedition to the west African kingdom of Benin in 1897, the bronzes were shipped to the UK, where they spent some time guarding the fireplace of army captain George William Neville’s Weybridge home. They were later put in display at Moma in New York and bought by a French art collector – who eventually sold them back to the colonial administration in Lagos in 1952 with a considerable mark-up.

Continue reading...

Microsoft co-founder’s collection poised to raise $1bn in ‘largest art auction in history’

Posted on by

Proceeds from sale of 150 works owned by the late billionaire Paul Allen will go to charity

The vast private art collection of the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen is expected to fetch a record-breaking $1bn (£890m) when it is auctioned next week.

The collection of more than 150 masterpieces includes Georges Seurat’s Les Poseuses, Ensemble (petite version) and Paul Cézanne’s landscape La Montagne Sainte-Victoire, which are both expected to sell for more than $100m, and Gustav Klimt’s 1903 work Birch Forest, which has an auctioneer’s estimate of $90m.

Continue reading...

John Singer Sargent sketch to return to National Trust house where it was created

Posted on by

Oil sketch of Elsie Palmer to go on display at Ightham Mote in Kent after being acquired by trust

An oil sketch by John Singer Sargent of one of his most famous models will be returned to the English country house where it was painted after being acquired by the National Trust.

Sargent’s sketch of Elsie Palmer, which was done in preparation for his masterpiece A Lady in White, will go on display at Ightham Mote in Kent, where the Palmer family lived and hosted artistic and literary gatherings for the likes of the actor Ellen Terry and the novelist Henry James in the late 1890s.

Continue reading...

Protesters who targeted Girl with a Pearl Earring jailed by Dutch court

Posted on by

Two activists from Just Stop Oil Belgium each sentenced to two months in prison with one month suspended

Two Belgian climate change activists who last week targeted the Johannes Vermeer painting Girl with a Pearl Earring have been sentenced to two months in prison by a Dutch court, of which one month was suspended.

One activist glued his head to glass covering the painting at a museum in The Hague. The artwork was not damaged, gallery staff said.

Continue reading...

Andy Warhol work not seen in public for 15 years could fetch $80m at auction

Posted on by

White Disaster (White Car Crash 19 Times) to go under the hammer in New York

Six months after a vivid image of Marilyn Monroe smashed records when it sold for $195m, a rather more dark and brutal work by the cult pop artist Andy Warhol may also be about to fetch a large sum.

White Disaster (White Car Crash 19 Times) – repeated graphic black and white images across a huge canvas measuring 12ft tall and 6ft wide – is expected to sell for at least $80m in New York next month.

Continue reading...

Mondrian painting has been hanging upside down for 75 years

Posted on by

Despite the discovery, the work, titled New York City I, will continue to be displayed the wrong way up to avoid damaging it

A painting by abstract Dutch artist Piet Mondrian has been hanging upside down in various museums since it was first put on display 75 years ago, an art historian has found, but warned it could disintegrate if it was hung the right side up now.

The 1941 picture, a complex interlacing lattice of red, yellow, black and blue adhesive tapes titled New York City I, was first put on display at New York’s MoMA in 1945 but has hung at the art collection of the German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia in Düsseldorf since 1980.

Continue reading...

2,500 naked bodies needed: Spencer Tunick announces his return to Sydney

Posted on by

The US artist’s next mass nude installation will take place in November at a Sydney beach. ‘We’re hoping for a rainbow of people,’ he says

The US artist who has made an international name for himself by urging volunteers to strip naked en masse in public is returning to Australia.

Spencer Tunick’s next “nude installation”, commissioned by the charity Skin Check Champions to raise awareness of skin cancer and coinciding with National Skin Cancer Action Week, will take place on 26 November at a Sydney beach.

Continue reading...