Category Archives: Sculpture

Biggest ever Leonardo da Vinci exhibition to open in Paris

Posted on by

Louvre will host works of Italian artist after long-running political spats and legal battles

The most important blockbuster art show in Paris for half a century took 10 years to prepare and was nearly thwarted by the worst diplomatic standoff between Italy and France since the second world war. With days to go before the opening, there is still no sign of whether one of the major works will appear.

The Louvre’s vast Leonardo da Vinci exhibition to mark 500 years since the death of the Italian Renaissance master will finally open next week as the world’s most-visited museum prepares to handle a huge influx of visitors.

Continue reading...

Restored 19th-century ships’ figureheads to go on display in Plymouth

Posted on by

The 14 carvings will hang from the ceiling in arts venue The Box, due to open in the spring

A collection of 19th-century wooden figureheads from British naval warships has been lovingly restored from the ravages of years at sea and will form a striking display at a new heritage and arts complex in Plymouth.

The 14 figureheads, some of which were so badly water-damaged that their insides had turned into a soggy mulch, are to be suspended from the ceiling of The Box gallery and museum, which is due to open in the spring.

Continue reading...

Fantastique beasts: cult art from the Lalannes’ private collection to go on sale

Posted on by
Surreal works from the home of François-Xavier Lalanne and his wife Claude expected to fetch up to £20m

For years, a giant brass and Sèvres porcelain grasshopper that could, if needed, double as a wine-cooler sat outside the royal apartments at Windsor Castle; a gift from French president Georges Pompidou to the Duke of Edinburgh during a state visit to France in 1972.

Across the Channel, an hour from Paris, the home of its late creator François-Xavier Lalanne and his artist wife Claude is full of such wonderful and whimsical creatures: a huge rhinoceros that transforms into a desk; a bronze cabbage on chicken legs; a herd of sheep that can be sat on, tables of enormous ginkgo leaves.

Continue reading...

Ghana shakes up art’s ‘sea of whiteness’ with its first Venice pavilion

Posted on by

In curving galleries designed by David Adjaye, artists are putting Africa firmly on the biennale map

The Venice Art Biennale, the world’s most celebrated international art event, has a history that is inextricably bound up with colonialism.

Its first pavilion for the showcasing of a “national” art was established by Belgium in 1907. Britain followed soon after. European countries remain dominant at the event – at least numerically.

Continue reading...

All the presidents’ busts – in pictures

Posted on by

Standing nearly 20 feet high, 43 US presidents’ busts, remnants from a bankrupted theme park, are stored in Croaker, Virginia, on the property of Howard Hankins who is seeking to restore the massive sculptures. Hankins has launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money to relocate the statues to a place where they can be visited by all

Continue reading...

Anish Kapoor: ‘If I was a young Muslim, would I feel angry enough to join Isis? I would at least think about it’

Posted on by

Britain has gone through the looking glass and the artist’s new show follows it into the abyss. He talks about the upsurge in racism, fighting for Shamima Begum – and his clash with France’s president

At 7.30 on the morning after Britain voted to leave the European Union, Anish Kapoor left his London flat for an appointment with his analyst. On the street, he heard two men talking. “Bet he doesn’t even speak English,” said one. “I turned around and they were talking about me. I was so furious.”

Sir Anish Mikhail Kapoor, CBE, RA, the 65-year-old, Turner prize-winning, Mumbai-born British-Indian artist, who has lived in London since the early 1970s and (though this is hardly the point) speaks better English than most of his countrymen, had woken up in a new land. “Since then permission has been given for difference, rather than being celebrated, to be undermined.”

Continue reading...

‘An egregious offence’: Canada battles Norway for tallest moose statue

Posted on by

After Norway’s Storelgen stole Mac the Moose’s place as world’s tallest, a Canadian city hopes to ‘stick it to Oslo’ by increasing their statue’s size

For three decades, the Canadian city of Moose Jaw took pride in its status as the home of the world’s largest moose statue.

Standing at a majestic 10 meters tall, Mac the Moose has weathered brutal winters, graffiti and even the inglorious loss of his jaw. His recognition was so great that in 2013, he was named the city’s most popular celebrity.

Continue reading...