Some days the intrigues of the international art market are more exciting than others. This is one of them.
About 1,500 modernist masterpieces – thought to have been looted by the Nazis – have been confiscated from the flat of an 80-year-old man from Munich, in what is being described as the biggest artistic find of the postwar era.
The artworks, which could be worth as much as €1bn (£860m), are said to include pieces by Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Marc Chagall, Paul Klee, Max Beckmann and Emil Nolde. They had been considered lost until now, according to a report in the German news weekly Focus.
The works, which would originally have been confiscated as “degenerate art” by the Nazis or taken from Jewish collectors in the 1930s and 1940s, had made their way into the hands of a German art collector, Hildebrand Gurlitt. When Gurlitt died, the artworks were passed down to his son, Cornelius – all without the knowledge of the authorities.
– the Guardian UK
Here’s the painting that did him in:
MAX BECKMANN, Löwenbändiger – Zirkus (Lion Tamer – Circus)
Now, the authorities “caught” this guy 2 years ago shortly after he sold the Max Beckmann painting shown above from this stash – not because he sold a painting known to have been looted by Nazis, but because he turned up in a random cash check on a train by customs officers, and a tax investigation was launched. The stash was discovered when his apartment was raided in 2011. German Customs knew about this 2 years ago but haven’t said anything up until now.
The original article in Focus.de links to user comments that ask a lot of… uncomfortable questions. How is it possible that a known art dealer under the Nazis could have amassed this collection without current authorities being aware of it at all? How did the son of a known Nazi art dealer manage to sell works known to be in this collection? Whose protection was he under, and doesn’t this make the museum that verified the Beckmann painting’s authenticity complicit in covering up this stash of Nazi treasure?
As the title of the comments article states, „Das stinkt zum Himmel“; this stinks to high heaven.
…the plot thickens…
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I went to the Musée des Beaux-Arts (aka the Montreal Museum of Fine Art) today to see the Dale Chihuly show, Utterly Breathtaking. It was pretty impressive (breathtaking even). To be honest, the idea of going to see an exhibition of hand-blown glass art made me expect some yawneriffic decorative ho-hummery but boy, was I wrong. More like strange visions of distant worlds, represented in light and colour.
Without blathering on at great length, here are a few photos I took of the many pieces at the show to blow your mind a little in advance. It’s worth noting that the hanging pieces are quite monumental – roughly 25 feet tall or so – and for hand-blown glass, that’s an impressive technical feat, straight-up eye-candy appeal aside. It runs until October 27 so if you happen to be in Montreal I strongly recommend that you haul yourself down to the Musée des Beaux-Arts and check it out for yourself.
To see more of Dale Chihuly’s work, you can check out his website.
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Zwei Grau nebeneinander
(Two Greys Juxtaposed) 1966
Grey. It makes no statement whatever; it evokes neither feelings nor associations: it is really neither visible nor invisible. Its inconspicuousness gives it the capacity to mediate, to make visible, in a positively illusionistic way, like a photograph. It has the capacity that no other colour has, to make ‘nothing’ visible.
– Gerhard Richter, From a letter to Edy de Wilde, 23 February 1975
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This week’s topics: Women in Street Art, Colour Use in Marketing, Vintage Cookbook Illustrations, the Psychology of Over-Exposure to Art, a New Show by Jenny Holzer, and Scientific Illustration of Ugly Extinct Creatures as Body Art. Whew! It’s not every day you get street art, colour theory, vintage illustration, psychology, & art news all in one blog post but I like to aim for the stars.
While most of the people that “like” Grey not Grey on Facebook get to see all my blog posts, I often post things to the Book of Faces that I don’t post here. Not because these things aren’t interesting, but usually because the author has expressed themselves eloquently enough or the topic of the post is sufficiently self-explanatory that there’s really no need for me to go on at any further length, charming though my turns of phrase might be.
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October 1
Women are still under-represented in the street art scene, but that’s slowly changing.
Though graffiti and street art tend to be male-dominated art forms, a growing number of women are both embracing the medium and getting good attention. “There are a couple of women that have really made a name for themselves in this game,” says Jenni Button, director of the nonprofit Holiday Exploits, which connects artists with humanitarian and social causes. Button also curates gallery shows and street art projects in the Chicago area. I talked to her about women’s place in the street scene and which female artists we should have on our radar.
Lady Aiko at work // via ladyaiko.com/
Read more on Bustle: Women Artists are Gaining Ground in the Graffiti and Street Art Scenes
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October 1
Everyone always tells design students not to use red in logos & ctas as that implies “stop” or “danger”… yeah, that’s not actually true. There are many very interesting insights into colour theory for designers and marketers in this article.
…KISSMetrics cites one study by Performable (now Hubspot), in which green and red buttons were pitted against each other. Defying the analysts’ hunch that green would promote purchasing behavior, red outperformed green handily with 21% more clicks. No other changes were made to the site’s copy or design.
Read more on Print: The Science, Business and Voodoo of Color in Marketing
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October 1
Now, a lovely paean to an often overlooked genre of illustration – instructional illustration in cookbooks. For instance, did you know that Andy Warhol illustrated a cookbook written by Amy Vanderbilt? Yup, before he became the enfant terrible of the art world, he was an extremely successful commercial illustrator. This article showcases a variety of work not just from Andy Warhol, but from a number of illustrators and styles.
I recently thumbed through some favorite old cookery books and started thinking about cookbook illustrations. Not the decorative splashes of line and color you see today (when a cookbook is not illustrated with drop-dead color photography), but the kind of didactic, black-and-white line illustrations that show you how to bone a chicken breast, flute a mushroom cap and make a lattice pie crust. As my cookbook collection proves out, those illustrations can be stylish, elegant and memorable.
How to Roll Tea Sandwiches from “Amy Vanderbilt’s Complete Cookbook”
illustration by Andrew Warhol
Read More on Print: Mastering The Art of Cookbook Illustration
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September 30
Does looking at great art make you horny? There’s a name for that. Rubens Syndrome. Then of course there’s being physically overwhelmed by looking at too much great art; Stendhal Syndrome.
You know the feeling. Having negotiated the hazards of modern travel, you fetch up in Florence, light-headed with heat and the Tuscan skyline. You’ve identified your itinerary of must-see museums, and – guidebook in hand – you join one of the long lines of art lovers outside the Uffizi, the Bargello or the Accademia. Once you’ve passed through the turnstiles, you’re torn between anticipation and a rebellious inclination towards the blasé, brought on by such a wealth of world-class artworks. Then suddenly you are in front of it – the real thing, a Raphael, a Fra Angelico, a Piero della Francesca. Your heartbeat increases, your eyes dilate and the gallery begins to recede …
Read more on Frieze: The Shock of the Old
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September 28
Nice to see Jenny Holzer is still a big deal… not many of her contemporaries are still producing work on this level. Impressive!
Hong Kong: The hottest show in town at the moment is Jenny Holzer’s Light Stream, which just opened at Pearl Lam Galleries. A major show of both new and vintage work, it is the artist’s first exhibition in Hong Kong.
Jenny Holzer: Light Stream
Read more on artnet: Holzer at Lam
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September 27
Scientific illustration as art. Pretty interesting idea… I wouldn’t mind a tattoo of a Carolina Parakeet but a giant earwig would be a bit much for me.
To overcome how people tend to care only about cute endangered animals, Samantha Dempsey designed and distributed temporary tattoos of ugly—and extinct—species.
Read more on blogs.smithsonianmag.com: These Tattoos Honor Lost, Not-So-Loved Species
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Of course no Book of Faces roundup would be complete without some spam poetry.
red feet shop and so oftentimes through the sky
sneakerhead
Five protective two feet are for all the leather bottom
because of a bag. This multi-billion-dollar
country is one of the very most identifiable tags in the
recent industry. The effect will happen to be an awesome burst of wow inside an unexpected
put in. I bought my own self a admirable prepare of christian christian
Why Google Image Search Suddenly Stopped Working
I don’t know about the rest of you, but when Google came out with an image search function that would actually let you search by matching images, my life was changed. No more unattributed images I would forever wonder who the photographer or artist was. No more tiny thumbnails, hunting hopelessly for a bigger version.
Yesterday I tried to search for an image and got the error that there were no matching images. Now, anyone who has used Google knows that the incidence of no matching images is about as probable as Jesus Christ coming back to Earth specifically to give you the 23 cents you were short on a burrito. Turns out all those recent updates with the way the Google User Interface is set up are the culprit.
Long Story Short: Image search by match isn’t working because Safe Search has been reconfigured, so you have to reset it. I will show you how.
In the Before Times there were 3 settings for safe search – now it is a binary, safe search is on or off. If you had Safe Search enabled before, currently it is in a funny stasis and basically you have to reboot it.
First step, go to Google.
step 1
Second step: Enter some random search term in the search field. Click on the search icon (magnifying glass in the blue box), That will give you text matches. Then click on “images”. I don’t know why, but you have to access the next step through image search.
step 2
Third step: Go to the far right and click on “SafeSearch”. In the example shown, I have it enabled. If it does not say “SafeSearch on”, it’s not enabled for you.
step 3
Fourth Step: if it just says “SafeSearch”, click on it and select “Filter Explicit Results”. You can turn this off after by clicking on the Safe Search link as shown in Step 3. SafeSearch is simply either on or off now.
step 4
Fifth Step: Now you’re ready to test your image search by matching image. Click on “Images” in the navigation list to the upper right of your Google Search start page.
step 5
Sixth step: Click the wee camera icon, “Search by Image”
step 6
Seventh step: paste the URL of an image or drag it from your desktop when prompted. I used this one I saw on Dangerous Minds. (Audrey Hepburn with a ball gag? No way! I had to know who was responsible for this TRAVESTY)
step 8
Step 9: Results! Now even if you turn SafeSearch on or off, it is reset and you will be able to use search by matching image as before.
Ta daa! Happy searching.
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