Michelle Obama at the Whitney Museum’s dedication ceremony (photo by Filip Wolak, courtesy Whitney Museum of American Art)
Art Movements is a weekly collection of news, developments, and stirrings in the art world.
The new Whitney Museum officially opened to the public today. Yesterday’s dedication ceremony was attended by First Lady Michelle Obama and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio. The Empire State Building will mark the museum’s opening with a special lightshow inspired by 12 works from the museum’s collection. The display will commence at 8pm tonight.
Pakistani activist Sabeen Mahmud was murdered by unknown gunmen shortly after leaving a talk at T2F (The Second Floor), the pioneering Karachi arts venue she founded in 2007.
Following its postponement amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, the second Kiev Biennial will open on September 8 at the Visual Culture Research Center.
As part of a law banning Nazi propaganda, major Moscow bookstores withdrew copies of Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel Maus (1991). The book, an examination of the Holocaust, features a swastika on its cover.
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement returned dozens of looted artifacts to the Egyptian government as part of a five-year investigation dubbed “Operation Mummy’s Curse.”
A fire severely damaged Clandon Park House. The Palladian mansion, renowned for its collection of eighteenth-century porcelain and furniture, was structurally gutted by the fire.
Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s “Young Woman” (c.1769) (left) alongside a replica produced for £70) (right) (courtesy Dulwich Picture Gallery)
The Dulwich Picture Gallery revealed the identity of the artwork that it had temporarily replaced with a replica. A £70 (~$106) knock-off of Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s “Young Woman” (c.1769) was inserted into the gallery’s collection as part of Doug Fishbone’s Made in China project. Of those who took part, a little more than 12% of gallery visitors correctly identified the forgery.
A number of Times Square’s iconic billboards may have to be removed following passage of a bill that places the square’s roadways under the jurisdiction of the 1965 Highway Beautification Act.
China’s ministry of culture vowed to reduce the number of art and literature awards by 60% as part of an anti-corruption drive.
Tour guides at Shakespeare’s Globe are to go on strike over a pay dispute. The guides have sought to increase their hourly pay from £11.24 (~$17) to £13.50 (~$20.70).
Expo Milan 2015 opens to the public today despite the fact that well over half of the site’s structures have yet to be completed.
The “Left Shark” (via Flickr / Huntley Paton)
Katy Perry’s application to trademark the “left shark” — the costumed dancer who became the viral hit of the singer’s Superbowl half-time show — was denied by the US Patent and Trademark Office.
Adele Sarno, the 85-year-old pensioner at the center of a row with New York’s Italian American Museum, agreed to vacate her apartment in Little Italy by June 30. The museum’s decision to evict Sarno, the daughter of Italian immigrants, angered many of the museum’s patrons as well as housing campaigners.
Jeffrey Deitch is working with real estate developer Joseph J. Sitt — the founder and chief executive of Thor Equities — to put on a street art exhibition at Coney Island.
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts is looking to raise $1 million for Igor Mitoraj’s monumental sculpture of Eros, the Greek god of love.
The former Upper East Side townhouse of cartoonist Al Hirschfeld is on the market for $9.2 million. The house comes with an eight-foot-long mural painted by the artist.
Miami rapper Trina will star in a new film by Jacolby Satterwhite entitled “En Plein Air: Diamond Princess.”
Monika Rostvold, a student at Texas State University, sat naked on campus as part of an art project highlighting the objectification and abuse of women.
The “world’s shittiest museum,” the Museum of Shit, opened in Italy.
Transactions
Ansel Adams, “Monolith, the face of Half Dome” (1927), gelatin silver print, 11 ¼ x 8 inches (© 2015 The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust; gift of George Melvin Byrne and Barbara S. Barrett-Byrne; courtesy the Huntington)
The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens acquired all seven of Ansel Adams’s limited edition portfolios (produced between 1948 and 1976).
The Smithsonian Institution began acquiring protest artwork and signage, including placards used by protestors in Ferguson, Missouri.
Daniel W. Dietrich II donated $10 million to the University of Pennsylvania’s Institute of Contemporary Art.
T206 White Border Honus Wagner PSA VG 3 (better known as an “Oceanside Wagner”) (1909-11) (courtesy Robert Edward Auctions)
The “Oceanside Wagner,” considered to be one of the world’s rarest baseball cards, sold for $1.3 million.
Japan is set to donate $1 million to the Smithsonian’s Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery.
The Austrian Museum of Applied Arts/Contemporary Art (MAK) became the first museum to purchase a work of art using Bitcoin.
Transitions
Miguel Falomir was appointed deputy director for collections and research at the Museo del Prado.
The Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art appointed Gordon Peterson as executive director.
Sara Reisman was appointed artistic director of the Shelley and Donald Rubin Foundation.
Clyde B. Jones III was appointed senior vice president for institutional advancement as the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens will add 5,000 square feet of gallery space by summer of 2016.
Accolades
Rachel Rose won the Frieze Art Award.
Thomas J. Lax became the seventh recipient of the Menil Collection’s Walter Hopps Award for Curatorial Achievement.
Marion Coutts was awarded the Wellcome Book Prize for her memoir, The Iceberg.
Anita Molinero was awarded the inaugural Salomon Foundation Residency Award.
Obituaries
Richard Corliss (1944–2015), film critic for Time magazine.
Jane Farver (unconfirmed–2015), curator.
Jack Knox (1936–2015), painter.
Edward Coke, the 7th Earl of Leicester (1936–2015), conservationist.
Keith Shackleton (1923–2015), artist and naturalist.
Bernard Stollman (1929–2015), founder of independent record company ESP-Disk, which released albums by artists such as Sun Ra and William Burroughs.
Janet Turner (1936–2015), lighting designer.
Kathrine Sorley Walker (1920–2015), dance critic and historian.