Previous Posts: June 2013
Guffwatch - Biennale 2013
June 10 2013
Video: Biennale Channel
Here's a video about the US pavilion at the Biennale, which I found to be one of the more pointless ones. Note how all the usual Guff genericisms trip off the tongue, especially the use of opposites, which are useful because they allow you to say pretty much anything:
...this experiance of intimacy in a very public space
...it seems like it's an accumulation of found objects and random, but in fact it's carefully studied, it's almost like a poem on many levels...
...it's about the organic growth of things, and also their detrioration...
...there's this mesmeric beauty that is inevitable with a pendulum, but there's this constant anxiety of the potential for something to go wrong...
Regular readers may be surprised to hear that there were a number of pavilions I liked very much, such as those of Belgium, Spain and Germany. More on my trip to Venice soon...
Update - a reader says the above approach is not dissimilar to the fashionista inteviewed by Sacha Baron Cohen here.
Honthorst's 'Duet' sold in New York
June 10 2013
Picture: Christie's
Christie's did well with the above Honthorst in their New York Old Master sale last week, selling 'The Duet' for $3.37m (inc. premium). The estimate was $2-3m. The picture had an interesting provenance; having once been in the collection a Russian aristocratic family, the Stroganovs, it was seized by the Soviets and displayed in the Hermitage in St Petersburg. It was then sold by the Soviets in Berlin in 1931, where it was bought by Bruno and Ellen Spiro. Their possessions were seized by the Nazis in 1938, and it was re-sold, again in Berlin, only to end up in the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in 1969. Happily, the picture was restituted to the Spiro heirs earlier this year.
Update - a reader Tweets:
Happy for the Spiros, but will they be dividing the proceeds with the Stroganovs?
Interesting point - how far back should we take restitution cases?
Cuts ahoy!
June 10 2013
Picture: Evening Standard
It's interesting to see the briefing going on here in the UK press about cuts to the arts. Details of the Government's spending review are due to be announced in late June, and departments are now engaged in last minute negotiations with the Treasury. On Saturday, the FT reported that Culture Secretary Maria Miller (of whom AHN recently disapproved) is 'resisting' cuts to her department's £1.2bn budget, a briefing which comes hot on the heels of suggestions that she might be sacked and her department axed altogether. On Sunday, the Sunday Times quoted a 'Whitehall Source' as saying that the Opera-loving George Osborne was in favour of shielding the arts from hefty cuts, but that his 'Philistine' deputy, Liberal Democrat Tresury Secretary Danny Alexander, was insisting that the arts take a hit. This last story is most curious, as Osborne is Chancellor after all, and has the final word. Either way, it all points to the fact that the arts world is being softened up for a significant cut, and that axe-wielding Tories are looking for someone to blame.
It's curious to note that there has been relative silence about cuts from the art world, aside from a recent plea by Sir Nicholas Serota. Are the grand fromages of the arts resigned to the inevitable, or are they concerned that, in these austere times, public pleas for special treatment might only damage their case?
A Turner for Bristol
June 10 2013
Picture: Bristol Art Gallery
Congratulations to Bristol Art Gallery, who have acquired a Turner watercolour of Avon Gorge. More details here in the Bristol Post, which delights in the fact that the city of Bristol has acquired the picture 'without paying a penny' (all the funding came from charitable sources).
LACMA buying and selling
June 10 2013
Picture: LACMA
Didier Rykner at Tribune de L'Art reports on two new acquisitions by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, a Daniele Crespi Mocking of Christ, above, and a Pieta by Francesco Trevisani. All most encouraging, though I have heard lately of an imminent LACMA disposal of a work more important than this. I can't reveal the picture, but its instances like this which make me glad we don't have deaccessioning here in the UK.
Sewell on the Royal Academy Summer Show
June 9 2013
Picture: artnews.org
He doesn't like it:
In the past I have occasionally discussed the 10 best exhibits and ignored the other 1,200 or so; this year, as there are no best, I thought to choose the 10 worst, but in so universally dismal a gathering, even that has proved impossible and I have only three to offer, all in their own ways so ghastly that I must award them Equal First. They are Lorry Art, by Rose Wylie [above], a daub worthy of a child of four; Sudden Rain in Mombasa, by Mohammed Abdullah Ariba Khan, who has the impertinence to ask £1,400 for a seascape (in an ornate sham gold frame) of the kind to be expected in a Margate B&B; and The Vanity of Small Differences, Perry’s six tapestries in hideous homage to Hogarth, visually raucous and machine-made offences to all for whom the word tapestry conjures the glories of Mortlake and Brussels.
A copy of a Raphael - yours for £1m
June 7 2013
Picture: The De Brecy Trust
Some years ago I was taken to a bank vault in London to look at the above picture, which was claimed to be a contemporary copy or version of Raphael's Sistine Madonna.
The picture is now being sold by the De Brecy Trust, which owns it, in an online auction with an opening bid of £1m. Various claims, some backed by 'science', are made for the picture.
I can say only one thing - caveat emptor.
A rare National Gallery deaccession
June 7 2013
Picture: Christie's
A fascinating enamel by Henry Bone RA is being offered for sale at Christie's later this month (est. £80k-£120k), of Titian's Bacchus and Ariadne (National Gallery, London). The provenance reveals that Bone's copy after Titian was in fact once owned by the National Gallery, having been bought by them in 1971 for $8,000 but then sold just two years later, though the catalogue doesn't state why.
Update - a reader has been sleuthing around in the National Gallery's online archive pages, and has found the story. The enamel was loaned to the National Gallery during the restoration of Titian's Bacchus and Ariadne in 1969. But the enamel was somehow damaged, and the Gallery was obliged to buy it. They then sold it on soon afterwards. From the NG archive:
Enamel after Titian by Henry Bone. Damage sustained on return from loan at the National Gallery, photographs and x-rays, correspondence with conservators and owners re cost of repair to be met by the National Gallery. Agreement made for work to be ceded to the National Gallery upon payment to owners. Correspondence with Christie’s re sale of enamel upon Department of Education and Science’s advice.
Curiously, this aspect of the Bone's history is not mentioned in the latest catalogue entry.
Update II - another reader writes, from Truro:
Henry Bone, that great Truronian, himself precipitated a catastrophic crash of a different nature with his masterpiece in 1811.
This was at the time the largest enamel ever painted and was viewed by 4000 people before the buyer, Mr Bowles, took it away. He paid 2,200 guineas for it.
Bone was paid a big fat cheque which he promptly cashed at Fauntleroys Bank so that he could impress his wife with a huge pile of money. The next day the bank collapsed.
Always so nice when extra information like this is sent in by readers - thanks!
'Non!' - attributing works the French way
June 7 2013
Picture: TAN
Melanie Girlis in The Art Newspaper reports that a possible Utrillo consigned to Sotheby's has been turned down by the Association Utrillo, which is run by the man who has inherited the right to attribute Utrillos all over the world, Jean Fabris.
Inherited? Indeed, for in France you can only authenticate modern art if you have inherited the droit de moral of an artist. As TAN reports:
The weight of Fabris’s decision is entirely in accordance with French law, under which artists have moral rights that protect the integrity of a work, including when and how it is shown and treated, regardless of its owner. When an artist dies, this right is bequeathed either to an heir or to another designated person, or people. In theory, the right does not extend to authentication, but in practice, the owners of the droit moral also, by default, become artists’ external validators, often compiling their catalogues raisonnés.
Incroyable. Mind you, there's a hefty reward for any geneologists out there who can find a link between me and Van Dyck.
Update - a reader alerts me to M. Fabris' previous form on hunting down what he thinks are fake Utrillos. This comes from an AP news story back in 1989:
Jean Fabris, 58, is waging war against the alleged fakes, accusing art dealers, auctioneers and experts of putting profit before art. Critics of his efforts claim he's the one who is after money.
He disrupted auction sales in April at both Christies and Sotheby's in London, crying ''Fake, fake.'' He was removed from the auction houses, and the sales of the 17 contested Utrillos went ahead. His campaign scored a tentative victory in Paris when he persuaded a criminal court judge to confiscate seven alleged Utrillo paintings valued at more than $1 million from well-known Paris auctioneer Guy Loudmer.
Verification of the disputed paintings will be handled by a court-appointed panel of experts. A final decision is not expected until early summer.
Fabris has also challenged the New York market. He has written to Sotheby's and Christie's threatening court action if they do not withdraw nine Utrillos to be sold by Sotheby's on May 10 and six more by Christie's on May 11.
''We're not surprised to learn that he is once again attempting to promote unfounded allegations in the press,'' said Diana Levitt, a vice president and director of corporate affairs for Sotheby's in New York.
''As we previously stated, and as the courts in France have also found, Mr. Fabris is not a recognized expert in Utrillo's works. We have notified him that we stand by our authentication of the works in our sale and that we intend to offer them for sale on the date scheduled and that if he interferes in our sale, we will take whatever action we think approbriate to protect Sotheby's and our consignors' rights.''
The seven Utrillos in the April 4 London sale fetched over 1 million pounds ($1.68 million).
Update II - an auctioneer with direct experience of this kind of thing writes:
These self-acclaimed experts are quite a nuisance, since they can't just be ignored, how preposterous their claims might be. Insecure potential clients seek their advice or request their approval, and as an auctioneer to say 'Don't listen to him, he's a nutter" doesn't really come through as a nuanced advise…
Ciao Venezia
June 7 2013
Picture: BG
I'm back - apologies for the lack of service this week. I'll return soon with a bountiful haul of stories and the usual nonsense.
Is the Future Online?
June 4 2013
Auctions to Axe Buyer's Premium?
June 4 2013
By Lawrence Hendra
We wish...
However, in response to declining attendance numbers, this New Jersey auction house decided to do just that, completely axing buyer’s premium in a recent sale for anyone who bought in the room and not remotely via the internet from elsewhere. It's amazing how much bidding is down via the internet now; I recently went to an auction in central London and could count on one hand the number of people sitting in front of the rostrum.
