Libya: Unesco director-general Irina Bokova has said that international museums should avoid buying objects from Libya for fear that they may have been looted from ancient sites during the recent unrest. There are five World Heritage sites in Libya, including the Roman city of Leptis Magna.
Netherlands: The Netherlands Museums Association will vote at a meeting next month on whether to suspend the Gouda-based Museumgouda following its decision to sell Marlene Dumas’s painting The Schoolboys, in June, after the city cut the institution’s funding by 50%. Rotterdam’s Wereldmuseum also plans to sell its African and American collections (see news analysis, p15).
Spain: The Reina Sofía modern art museum in Madrid hopes to attract more private funding after a law passed last May by the Spanish council of ministers gave the institution a new legal status. Meanwhile, La Caixa bank has extended its sponsorship of the Prado museum for another four years in a deal worth €2.5m.
Sweden: The Stockholm-based photography museum Fotografiska said it had been forced to censor images by Robert Mapplethorpe on its Facebook page, as the social media giant had previously deleted photographs by the late US photographer from its site. The nude works have blue rectangles placed over potentially offensive areas.
Turkey: The Turkish government has asked the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) to return a 1,700-year-old life-sized marble carving of a child’s head, which was removed from Anatolia in 1882 by the archaeologist Sir Charles Wilson. It was attached to a third-century Sidamara Sarcophagus tomb. The V&A “is considering the request seriously”, a spokeswoman said.
US: A major project made up of 60 exhibitions across southern California focusing on the post-war Los Angeles art scene, Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980, launches this month. The scheme, co-initiated by the Getty Research Institute, includes shows at the Santa Monica Museum of Art and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
US: The Museum of Fine Arts Boston opened its $12.5m Linde Family Wing for contemporary art last month. The seven galleries house more than 200 works by artists such as Kara Walker and Andy Warhol.
Seen in the Art Newspaper, the Independent, Reuters and BBC
Netherlands: The Netherlands Museums Association will vote at a meeting next month on whether to suspend the Gouda-based Museumgouda following its decision to sell Marlene Dumas’s painting The Schoolboys, in June, after the city cut the institution’s funding by 50%. Rotterdam’s Wereldmuseum also plans to sell its African and American collections (see news analysis, p15).
Spain: The Reina Sofía modern art museum in Madrid hopes to attract more private funding after a law passed last May by the Spanish council of ministers gave the institution a new legal status. Meanwhile, La Caixa bank has extended its sponsorship of the Prado museum for another four years in a deal worth €2.5m.
Sweden: The Stockholm-based photography museum Fotografiska said it had been forced to censor images by Robert Mapplethorpe on its Facebook page, as the social media giant had previously deleted photographs by the late US photographer from its site. The nude works have blue rectangles placed over potentially offensive areas.
Turkey: The Turkish government has asked the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) to return a 1,700-year-old life-sized marble carving of a child’s head, which was removed from Anatolia in 1882 by the archaeologist Sir Charles Wilson. It was attached to a third-century Sidamara Sarcophagus tomb. The V&A “is considering the request seriously”, a spokeswoman said.
US: A major project made up of 60 exhibitions across southern California focusing on the post-war Los Angeles art scene, Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980, launches this month. The scheme, co-initiated by the Getty Research Institute, includes shows at the Santa Monica Museum of Art and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
US: The Museum of Fine Arts Boston opened its $12.5m Linde Family Wing for contemporary art last month. The seven galleries house more than 200 works by artists such as Kara Walker and Andy Warhol.
Seen in the Art Newspaper, the Independent, Reuters and BBC
