Disney-Britton

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By  Gregory A. Disney-Britton "With You Always" (2014) by Devan Shimoyama Christians in today's art world often feel alone because we will not conform. We refuse to hide our faith as required by artistic elites, and we refuse to conform to religious conventions. In Devan Shimoyama's  glitter-sprinkled portrait " With You Always ," (above) at LA's Samuel Freeman gallery, I was reminded of this dilemma. In it, I see a soul uniting with the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, three Persons but one God, and I remember  Matthew 28:20 : "I am with you always, to the end of the age."

BBC NEWS NEW YORK---Rock star  David Bowie   left an estate valued at about $100m (£70m), according to his will which has been filed in New York. Half will go to his widow, Iman, along with the home they shared in New York. The rest is shared between his son and daughter. It was also revealed that Bowie had requested that his ashes be scattered in Bali in a Buddhist ritual. The singer died of cancer on 10 January, aged 69. The will was filed in a Manhattan court on Friday under Bowie's legal name, David Robert Jones. The star's personal assistant, Corinne Schwab, was left $2m and another $1m went to a former nanny, Marion Skene. [ link ]

DAILY MAIL To the list of Sundance 2016 deals so far we can now add another, and not just any deal; this is the biggest sale in the long history of Robert Redford’s film festival.  HOLLYWOOD---Murdering a baby, taking an axe to a sleeping woman and slaughtering children in a schoolroom - the bloody 'true account' of rebel slave who inspired movie being hailed as antidote to the white Oscars. "The Birth Of a Nation" has just secured biggest ever deal at Sundance film festival at same time as row over all-white Oscars Movie tells story of Nat Turner's rebellion in Virginia in 1831 when slave killed up to 60 whites, including his master. [ link ]

NPR By David Edelstein Gay teens Maalik (Curtiss Cook, Jr.) and Naz (Kerwin Johnson, Jr.) face rejection by their family and community, as well as suspicion from authorities, in Naz & Maalik. Wolfe Video HOLLYWOOD---Given the recent expression of anger about the lack of racial diversity in American cinema, it's nice to be able to tell you about Jay Dockendorf's very fine indie feature Naz & Maalik, in which the title characters are African-American teenage boys who also happen to be devout Muslims who also happen to be gay. Here is one more piece of the puzzle that is American life — a piece that has never made it to the screen before. You wonder how many others are missing.[ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS Jan van Eyck (Netherlandish, ca. 1390–1441). The Crucifixion (detail), ca. 1440–41.  NEW YORK---A newly opened exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art focuses on two beloved Van Eycks, “The Crucifixion” and “The Last Judgment,” from 1440-41 to solve long-standing mysteries about them. In a collaboration at the Met between Maryan Ainsworth, a Curator in the Department of European Paintings, and the Department of Paintings Conservation, these paintings and their frames have undergone technical investigations in an effort to solve long-standing mysteries about them. Whether the paintings were always intended as a diptych, or whether they were originally the wings of a triptych whose centerpiece has long disappeared, has been in question.

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Robin Pogrebin “Danaë” (1621) by Orazio Gentileschi. Credit Sotheby's The 17th-century painting “Danaë” by Orazio Gentileschi , a peer of Caravaggio , which set an auction record for the artist at $30.5 million in a sale on Thursday at Sotheby’s in New York, was purchased by the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. The oil painting, which depicts the classical theme of Danaë and the shower of gold, was one of three paintings commissioned together in 1621. The Getty has had in its collection since 1998 another of the three, “Lot and His Daughters.”

THE CREATORS PROJECT By Beckett Mufson A series of hand-drawn African masks by Brooklyn artist Matthias Brown , a.k.a., Traceloops transforms in a series of seamless GIFs as addicting to watch as the Domino's Pizza Tracker in winter (read: very addicting). Each illustration starts with the same basic image: a thick-browed face Brown tells The Creators Project is "based off of a barn owl and various old statues and masks." A fraction of a second later, the mask splits, warps, divides, combines, changes color, changes shape—and then inevitably winds up back at square one. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Eva Kahn A wooden Guanyin deity, about 900 years old, will return to view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Credit Museum of Fine Arts, Boston A  Buddhist deity sculpture , absent from the galleries at the  Museum of Fine Arts, Boston , for 17 years, will go back on view there next month after undergoing analyses and treatments throughout its gilded surface. This deity, Guanyin, which embodies compassion, was carved about 900 years ago from a tree trunk. Nearly six feet tall, the figure is seated in a casual pose, with its glass eyes facing downward and one leg dangling as though being dipped in a pool of water. The underlying legend is that the deity was gazing at a reflection of the moon in the water. [ link ]

ARTFORUM MICHIGAM---The Detroit Institute of Art announced Tuesday that its newly renovated Ancient Middle East gallery is also receiving a new name. The gallery will host the name of the late philanthropist William Davidson in recognition of a $5 million gift made by his foundation. The museum plans to reserve a section of the gallery for displaying early glass production in the region of the Middle East as a tribute to Davidson’s company, Guardian Industries, one of the world’s largest manufacturers of architectural and automotive glass. (Davidson also owned the Detroit Pistons and the Tampa Bay Lightning.)[ link ]

LOS ANGELES TIMES By David Pagel Toba Khedoori, "Untitled (grid)," 2015, oil on canvas, 37-by-37 inches. (Fredrik Nilsen / Regen Projects) Toba Khedoori burst onto the scene 20 years ago with small drawings on gigantic sheets of paper. Her realistic depictions of interiors and exteriors seemed to say: “Come in for a close look, and don’t forget to block out all of the distractions that might prevent you from focusing.” At Regen Projects , the L.A. artist’s fourth solo hometown show features much smaller works: domestically scaled graphite drawings and oils on canvas and linen.  [ link ]

ARTNET | NEWS By Andrew Russeth Thornton Dial, Out of the Darkness, the Lord Gave Us Light, 2003, collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. STEPHEN PITKIN, PITKIN STUDIO/©THORNTON DIAL Artist Thornton Dial , who used found objects, fabric, and paint to make astounding, intricate wall reliefs and sculptures that harbor nuanced narratives at once grand and intimate, died yesterday, Monday, January 25, at his home in Emelle, Alabama. The cause of death was not released. In recent years he had been ill and had strokes. He was 87. The dense surfaces of Dial’s art, loaded with everything from slices of metal to doll parts to carpeting and bedecked with intriguing combinations of color, radiate carefully controlled energies. The undulating compositions can bring to mind titans like Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock. [ link ]

PADDLE 8 By Lindsay Talbot Modern and contemporary mix comfortably in Joan Juliet Buck's home, with a Fernand Léger carpet covering a bench sourced from the boardroom of the New York Times. Behind Buck is her collection of Mexican tin paintings; above them is a Todd Eberle photograph of Robert Wilson's "The Magic Flute" from her final issue of French Vogue. The former editor of French Vogue needs only to open her jewelry box to summon fond memories of collaborations with famous friends, pre-dawn flea-market raids, and other aesthetic adventures. Within her sanctum, walls flanked with crisp white bookcases—stretch up to meet soaring, vaulted ceilings. Hundreds of titles and tomes are artfully displayed along the shelves, from massive art monographs ( Daumier drawings alongside David Sall e, Mondrian into Marcel Duchamp , Irving Penn to Peter Hujar to volumes of vintage Thurber and old Hollywood biographies. [ link ]

THE HUFFINGTON POST By Carol Kuruvilla Religion has always helped people feel connected to the divine and by extension, cultivate a sense of awe. In fact, some studies have shown that awe can directly inspire spirituality, and act as an assurance when awe causes fear or vulnerability. Religious buildings and rituals are designed specifically to give people the sense that there is a higher power in the universe. In 2003, University of California, Berkeley researchers Dacher Keltner and Jonathan Haidt proposed that all of the ways that people may feel awe (through encounters with religion, nature, art, or even powerful people) share two characteristics: vastness and accommodation. [ link ]

THE SENTINEL By Joseph and Barrie Ann George Jeanne Douphrate's "Conflicting Desires" won Best of Show PENNSYLVANIA---The Carlisle Arts Learning Center has on exhibition its first juried show, “ Framing Religion: Connections and Conflicts .” Artists locally and across several states responded to the theme of the exploration of faith. The intent of each artist is as varied as the media and techniques on view. The common thread is the continuation of mankind’s ancient thirst for answers, our desire to honor and hold sacred, and the conflicts that arise when beliefs collide. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS The Getty Research Institute. Iskandar at the Kaaba, about 1485 – 1495. Unknown maker and Nizami Ganjavi. Iranian. Ink, opaque watercolor, and gold. 9 x 6 1/8 in. EX.2016.2.6. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection, gift of Joan Palevsky. Photo courtesy of LACMA. CALIFORNIA---" Traversing the Globe through Illuminated Manuscripts ," on view January 26–June 26, 2016 at the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Center, offers the opportunity to explore the strong connections between Europe and the broader world during the Middle Ages and Renaissance. The nearly 80 works on display have been selected to illustrate the exchange of ideas, styles, and materials that took place between the East, West, and cross-geographic centers and periphery regions, during the 9th to the early 17th centuries.

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS Takashi Murakami and his Superflat Collection (photo by Kentaro Hirao, all images courtesy Yokohama Museum of Art) JAPAN--- Takashi Murakami's contemporary art collection comes to Yokohama Museum of Art in Japan. This exhibition is the first large-scale public showing of the renowned contemporary Japanese artist Takashi Murakami's private collection centered around contemporary art. This exhibition of Murakami's unique collection, with its overwhelming quantity and diversity, will provide an insight into the sources of the artist's aesthetic ideas, the nature of art and desire, and the mechanisms that create value in contemporary society, while also encouraging viewers to question art's conventional context.

NPR | NEWS By Gregy Myre Iran's President gave Pope Francis a rug hand-woven in Qom, a Shiite holy city in Iran, and a large book by artist Mahmoud Farshchian . ITALY--- Pope Francis met Tuesday with Iran's President Hassan Rouhani, the latest sign of Iran's improving ties in the West as years of sanctions fall away. The two said they discussed the problems in the region, a reference to the wars in Iraq and Syria. The pope has made pleas for peace in both conflicts, while Iran is deeply involved in supporting the embattled governments in both countries. This was the first meeting between a pope and an Iranian head of state since 1999, which was the last time an Iranian leader toured Europe. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Amy Qin NORTH KOREA---The giant mural in the foyer depicting a smiling stone face offers a mere taste of the grandiosity within the new  Angkor Panorama Museum  here. The museum, which opened in December, is a sweeping homage to what historians call one of the greatest cities in the world between the ninth and 15th centuries and the capital of the Khmer empire. But almost everything that went into this building — the money, the concept, the design and the artists — came not from Cambodia but from North Korea, namely, Mansudae, the largest art studio in that country. [ link ]

LOS ANGELES TIMES By David Pagel Devan Shimoyama, "With You Always," 2014, oil, glitter, sequins, graphite, spray paint, found objects on canvas, 60 by 50 by 7 inches. (Devan Shimoyama / Samuel Freeman) CALIFORNIA---With just the right mix of purposefulness and playfulness, the two-artist exhibition “ Devan Shimoyama/Salomón Huerta ” at Samuel Freeman gallery sets visitors to thinking about what it means to be human while leaving us free to make up our own minds. Pittsburgh artist Shimoyama’s L.A. debut features six midsize canvases. Slapdash theatricality — and whip-smart intelligence — animates his potent pictures. In contrast, Huerta’s paintings and drawings are understated. All are intimate, melancholic, restrained. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS Song Yige, Dance Party, 2015, oil on canvas, 203 x 180 cm, courtesy of the artist and Marlborough Fine Art, London UNITED KINGDOM--- Marlborough Fine Art is pleased to present an exhibition of new paintings by Beijing-based artist Song Yige , curated by Zeng Fanzhi. The exhibition is the artist’s first solo show outside of Asia. Known for her figurative paintings, Song depicts everyday objects and anonymous characters, alongside subjects from the natural world in imaginary settings. Her atmospheric works feature modest items often eschewed from their pictorial background. Through large-scale emotive and unsettling paintings Song merges childhood memories with autobiographical settings to reinterpret modern society.

BLOUIN | ARTINFO By Nicholas Forrest UNITED KINGDOM---London’s Victoria and Albert Museum has announced a shortlist of 11 artists and designers for the 4th edition of the Jameel Prize , the V&A’s £25,000 biennial international prize for contemporary artists and designers inspired by Islamic traditions of craft and design. The shortlisted artists for the Jameel Prize 4 are: David Chalmers Alesworth , Rasheed Araeen , Lara Assouad, Canan , Cevdet Erek , Sahand Hesamiyan , Lucia Koch , Ghulam Mohammad , Shahpour Pouyan , Wael Shawky , and Bahia Shehab . The winner will be announced on June 7, 2016. [ link ]

CHRISTIANITY TODAY By Mark Wood A Christian couple with matching crosses. Should Christians get tattoos? In a world that sometimes seems to be falling to pieces around our ears, it's probably fair to say that's not the most burning question of the day. At the same time, it's definitely a thing. For some Christians, the "clobber text" that rules tattoos out completely is found in Leviticus 19:28, which says: "Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the Lord." Today, most Christians would accept that tattoos are just art, with no religious overtones. Some still insist they are the Mark of the Beast in Revelation, though serious scholars do not accept this. [ link ]

CRAVEN HERALD & PIONEER By Lesley Tate, Senior Reporter UNITED KINGDOM---Craven Museum and Gallery, Skipton, will host a new exhibition showcasing some of the top contemporary Islamic artists working in the UK. The world-class Faith In Art exhibition , run in collaboration with the Muslim Museum Initiative, opens on February 5 and runs until March 28. Curated by Initiative founder Mobeen Butt, the exhibition will bring together ten exceptional artists and will showcase calligraphy, geometry, arabesque, illumination, miniature painting, wood crafting, paper-cutting, embroidery, fabric printing and three dimensional works. [ link ]

DAILY SABAH By Gulsah Dark Circular forms in Indian art are generally called mandalas, the Sanskrit word for "sacred circle." TURKEY---These days, mandalas have increasingly been designed by patients with Alzheimer's disease and Down syndrome as well as other people to relieve stress. The word "mandala" comes from the classic Indian language of Sanskrit, meaning "circle." In mandala, circles are associated with the concepts of wholeness, unity, harmony and the cycle of life. Mandala experts believe that these circles help practitioners focus inwardly; namely, on the spiritual world. [l ink ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Neil Genzilinger Advertising for new Fox series Even Satanists will be reaching for the remote when … The Devil deserves better than … Oh, heck, Fox’s “ Lucifer ” is so terrible that it doesn’t even warrant the effort of a clever opening line. The series, which begins on Monday night, stars Tom Ellis in the title role. Does he want to be mortal? Is he trying to get back in God’s good graces? — but you probably won’t be around to care. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Roberta Smith “Untitled” (2015), by Ann Veronica Janssens, who plays with Light and Space conventions. Credit Courtesy the Artist and Bortolami Gallery, New York NEW YORK---The work of Ann Veronica Janssens , a British artist who lives in Brussels, precipitates the heightened optical and spatial awareness similar to that of Light and Space but without the often attendant fuss that seems antithetical to the movement’s less-is-more, dematerialized aesthetic. Bortolami Gallery : Ann Veronica Janssens, 520 West 20th Street, Chelsea Through Feb. 20, 2016. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Rchael Donadio A poster for the film, "Made In France" FRANCE---From the start, the subject hit too close to home. Out of security concerns in a country still in shock after the November terrorist attacks, “ Made in France ,” a French film about homegrown jihadists plotting strikes on downtown Paris, will head straight to video-on-demand this month and forgo release in cinemas. The film’s French release was originally scheduled for Nov. 3, 2015, but was moved to Nov. 18 because too many other films were opening the first week of November. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Dorren Carvajal ITALY---The Louvre is preparing to start the restoration of Leonardo da Vinci’s “Saint John the Baptist,” a 16th-century work that has darkened over the years. The restoration is scheduled to begin later this month despite past criticism that earlier makeovers of two other paintings by Leonardo overly brightened them. Two experts on a French scientific commission resigned during the two-year restoration of “The Virgin and Child With Saint Anne” in 2012 because of concerns. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS INDIANA---The worship arts are the focus for the Arts Council of Indianapolis' 20th annual Art & Soul  series running Jan. 30-Feb. 27, 2016. With 87% of African Americans identifying as Christian, the month-long celebration of artists features gospel choirs, African American foods and crafts, spoken word performances, musicians, dance companies, and artwork by Christian artist Derrick Carter . All events are held at the Artsgarden in downtown Indianapolis, and begin at 12:15pm.

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By  Gregory A. Disney-Britton Outsider artist Tony Melendez (December 27, 1938 - January 24, 2015)  Do  outsiders  light-up your life? I'm not talking about  Sarah Palin and Donald Trump , but about  outsider artists  like those in this week's  Outsider Art Fair  in Manhattan. These artists share one unifying trait: "a raw quality untouched by academic rules or current trends." In  Psalm 18:28 : “the Lord, my God, lights up my darkness,” and God let one of those outsider artists  Arsenio   Tony Melendez  (above) be our light. Do you want to light up the darkness? Surround yourself with works by God's outsider artists.

THE WASHINGTON POST By G. Willow Wilson Illustration from "American Qur'an" artwork by Sandow Birk. (2016 by Sandow Birk) WASHINGTON,DC---Images enter our minds as infallible: Few of us wonder whether the carpet on the floor is true or false, whether the person who smiles at us on the subway is real or unreal. Daily life would be impossible without this visual credulity. But the same instinct that tells us everything we see is true makes us intriguingly vulnerable to distortion and suggestion in art. It is this visual vulnerability that prompts most schools of Islamic thought to prohibit images of sacred figures — prophets, angels, Allah — and in a few extreme cases, images of any living being whatsoever. [ link ]

SLATE By Akinyi Ochieng A fish-shaped coffin. GHANA---In the last 50 years, these fantasy coffins have become one of Ghana’s most unique cultural exports. The curious tradition of burying people in coffins shaped like everything from lobsters to busty women is primarily practiced in Accra and has spawned over 10 workshops in the capital city. Almost all of these are owned by former apprentices of Kane Kwei, who died in 1992. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Stephen Holden Film poster for Naz & Maalik The endearing title characters of Jay Dockendorf’s film “ Naz & Maalik ” are 18-year-old best friends who recently became lovers, living in Bedford-Stuyvesant, a Brooklyn neighborhood in the throes of gentrification. Naz (Kerwin Johnson Jr.) and Maalik (Curtiss Cook Jr.) are closeted and Muslim, and especially for Naz, the Islamic taboo against homosexuality weighs heavily. Both live with observant Muslim families for whom any sex outside of marriage is forbidden. Naz’s disapproving sister, Cala (Ashleigh Awusie), discovers their secret and teasingly threatens to expose them. [ link ]

ADVOCATE MAGAZINE By Bil Browning RUSSIA---Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, has joined the American religious right in blaming gays for the world's problems, in an interview posted to the church's website. Kirill claims that "many honest people" are joining the terrorist group ISIS to go fight in Syria because they are upset with the rise of LGBT rights. He says they are joining for "truly religious reasons," according to an English translation posted online by a Russian LGBT organization. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS Moses Haughton II, after Henry Fuseli. The Nursery of Shakespeare, 1810. Gift of Chalkley J. Hambleton. ILLINOIS---The title characters of William Shakespeare’s plays certainly might get the most name recognition, but the Bard’s meddling witches and mischievous faerie folk often steal the scenes and have rightly become some of his most memorable characters. This focused Shakespeare 400 installation features three atmospheric engravings of fantastical Shakespearian scenes by various artists emulating works by the renowned Gothic artist Henri Fuseli (1741–1825).

ARUTZ SHEVA "The Israelites crossing the Red Sea" (1931) by Marc Chagall; gouache, oil on paper ISRAEL--- Once there was a painter who decided the time had come to create his masterpiece. Shunning the accepted trend of his time, he decided that rather than paint a portrait of the king, as all great artists did, he would create something more interesting: A life-size portrait of the king’s horse. For many years he labored, until at last the great day arrived, his masterpiece was complete. Rabbi Shlomo Kruger used this parable to explain the primary event of Parshat Beshalach : the splitting of the Red Sea. In today’s reality, that which is plainly visible to our eyes is hidden from our perception. We expect to see only that which we are used to seeing, and thus are unable to truly see much of what surrounds us. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By JENNIFER SCHUESSLER David Kasnic for The New York Times For decades, the bronzes created by the artist Malvina Hoffman for the Field Museum’s “Races of Mankind” exhibit have had a ghostly afterlife at the institution. Hailed at their unveiling in 1933 as “the finest racial portraiture the world has yet seen” and viewed by millions of visitors, the sculptures were banished to storage in 1969, embarrassing relics of discredited ideas about human difference. Now the Field Museum has put 50 of the 104 sculptures back on display as part of “ Looking at Ourselves: Rethinking the Sculptures of Malvina Hoffman .” [ link ]

THE HUFFINGTON POST By Natalie Hegert Anida Yoeu Ali, The Buddhist Bug, Into the Night (production still), 2015, 2-channel HD video projection, 7:00 minutes. Collection: Queensland Art Gallery. AUSTRALIA---The eighth Asia Pacific Triennial (APT8), now underway at the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane, Australia, offers a view into the diverse contemporary art practices of the Australian, Asian and Pacific regions, from the far reaches of Oceania to former Soviet bloc countries such as the Kyrgyz Republic and Georgia. Widely considered as a bellwether for art from the region, APT is not concerned with contextualizing the artworks in relation to Western art traditions, but rather presents them in the context of different and varied art traditions deriving from multiple, interdependent sources. [ link ]

TODAY US soldiers celebrate a Catholic Easter mass at St Elijah's Monastery on the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq. The monastery has since believed to have been razed. Photo: AP IRAQ---Satellite photos obtained by The Associated Press confirm what church leaders and Middle East preservationists had feared: The oldest Christian monastery in Iraq has been reduced to a field of rubble, yet another victim of the Islamic State group’s relentless destruction of heritage sites it considers heretical. St Elijah’s Monastery stood as a place of worship for 1,400 years, including most recently for US troops. [ link ]

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL By Anna Russell Bosch’s triptych ‘The Last Judgment,’ from circa 1495-1505 In the work of Hieronymus Bosch , the threat level is always “Imminent.” While other artists in 1500 were trying to depict the world realistically, Bosch was painting the imaginary, the grotesque and the horrific. In his triptych “The Temptation of St. Anthony,” his subject wanders a desert filled with demons. In “The Garden of Earthly Delights,” strange creatures devour one another across a vast and grim landscape. As the art world prepares to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Bosch’s death in 1516, a series of coming major exhibitions spotlight the enigmatic artist whose work still has the power to draw crowds five centuries later. [ link ]

ARTNET NEWS By Sarah Cascone Jacques de Du-Glass, St. Stephen Parish School. Photo: Lindsay Gallery. NEW YORK---Getting a jump on the 2016 art fair season is the Outsider Art Fair, on view this weekend in its new home at the Metropolitan Pavilion on West 18th Street. Lindsay Gallery of Columbus, Ohio, impressed with Jacques Du-Glass' s drawings of "The Town That Never Was"—fictitious Lynxbourgh, Indiana. The insanely detailed drawings are just scratching the surface of the artist's fantasy world, however. Du-Glass, who was adopted as a child, also created detailed family histories for the town's denizens, some of whom he imagined were his birth family. [ link ]

MIAMI HERALD By Ana Veciana-Suarez Book cover Internationally recognized architect and artist Ken Treister’s touch can be found all over his hometown of Miami, but until recently his soaring, daring designs had not been collected in a book to do them justice. Now a long-awaited volume highlights some of Treister’s most notable works in a gorgeous art book with short essays by the architect and photos by architectural photographer Laszlo Regos. The Fusion of Architecture and Art: The Judaic Work of Kenneth Treister ( Books & Books Press, $30 ) presents six of his projects spanning four decades, five of them immediately recognizable to even the most recent Miamian. [ link ]

HYPERALLERGIC By Bansie Vasvani Khvay Samnang, “Rubber Man” (2014), digital c-print, 80 x 120 cm (all images courtesy Queensland Art Gallery) AUSTRALIA---Suppressed voices, marginalized histories, and public spaces take center stage at the 8th Asia Pacific Triennial (APT8) , displayed at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) and the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) in Brisbane, Australia. Throughout the exhibit, art and activism bring the outside in, the peripheral to the center, and the unacknowledged to a point of great relevance. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Sunita Puri In my first year of practice in palliative medicine, I made house calls to patients in South Los Angeles. In these neighborhoods, people die an average of 10 years earlier than those who live less than 10 miles away. Death may be humanity’s great equalizer, but the inequalities suffered in life – leading to a shorter life expectancy – become inequalities in the experience of dying as well. [ link ]

BLOUIN | ARTINFO ByBY Darryl Wee Lee Wen, Dream Boat (detail), from Werkleitz Biennale, Tornitz & Werkleitz, Germany, 1998 (Courtesy the artist) Singaporean artist Lee Wen has been announced as the winner of the second annual Joseph Balestier Award for the Freedom of Art. Named after Joseph Balestier, the first American diplomat to Singapore who was appointed US Consul to the country in 1836, the Award “honors artists who stand up for the fundamental right of freedom of speech in a difficult environment, and who blaze a path, not just for the next generation of artists, but for the broader society in Southeast Asia," according to U.S. Ambassador to Singapore Kirk Wagar. [ link ]

ART AGENDA Corita Kent, give a damn, 1968. Serigraph, 58.5 x 58.5 cm. Image courtesy of the Corita Art Center, Immaculate Heart Community, Los Angeles, California and Galerie Allen, Paris. FRANCE---In difficult times, we look to the past for comfort and clarity. In the wake of France's deadliest attacks since World War II, Corita Kent's late 1960s and early 1970s silkscreens promoting pacifism and tolerance take on an unexpected urgency. Planned well before terrorists killed 130 Parisians, Galerie Allen’s exhibition devoted to the late American artist, activist, educator, and former Catholic nun, now feels eerily prescient. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By Gregory Disney-Britton "Saint Anthony" (2010) by Brooklyn-born artist Arsenio Tony Melendez; Acrylic, pencil, and collage on white poster board 22 x 28 in. Gifted on January 10, 2015 to Alpha & Omega Project for Contemporary Religious Arts, Inc. by David Woods. Earlier this month, one of outsider artist  Arsenio   Tony Melendez's collectors David Wood, and a fellow parishioner at Life Journey Church gifted Melendez's 2010 painting "Saint Anthony" to Alpha Omega Arts. This self-taught artist Tony Melendez (1938-2015) spent decades exploring non-spiritual themes before coming to focus on religious themes when he moved to Indianapolis with his life-partner of 25-years Gary Dyer , a fellow artist. We sat together at church with Melendez, until his unexpected passing last January 2015. We miss him, but our lives continue to be made rich by his creations.

THE INDIANAPOLS STAR By David Lindquist Spoken-word artist Mariah Ivey is one of four highlighted Art & Soul performers. (Photo: Photo provided by pauldbestphoto.com) INDIANA---The 20th annual Art & Soul series will commemorate the African-American journey to freedom. Seventeen Black History Month performances are scheduled at the Indianapolis Artsgarden. Art & Soul will emphasize sacred traditions at multiple midday events, including gospel jazz with drummer Kenny Phelps (Feb. 5), a Mahalia Jackson tribute by singer Brenda Williams (Feb. 10) and gospel and hip-hop dance from Krash Krew Dance Ministries (Feb. 25). "At the intersection of every African-American religious and freedom movement you will always find African-American artists," said Ernest Disney-Britton , Arts Council of Indianapolis director of grant services and arts education. "This February, we will celebrate how the arts have impacted the African-American journey to freedom." [...

THE VILLAGE VOICE By Madison Margolin 34-year old artist Sara Erenthal NEW YORK---A nine-month trip to India in 2010, ten years after she had returned to New York following her army service, became the foundation for Erenthal's art career. She began painting murals in restaurants and designing repurposed clothes for money. "The first time I finally accepted that I'm an artist, a traveler asked to buy a drawing. That gave me a push to take it more seriously," she says. Art is her calling, but these days dog-walking brings in consistent cash. "My story is the story of discomfort to liberation," says Erenthal. "Dog-walking, bike riding — it's not a rebellion per se. It's a consequence of growing into a different world, of evolving." [ link ]

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL By Christian C. Sahner Limestone sculpture of Horus wearing Roman military costume (1st–2nd century). UNITED KINGDOM---I confess I was initially wary that current concerns about sectarianism and the Arab Spring would color the show, especially given the video about Muslim-Christian relations in modern Egypt that greets visitors as soon as they enter the galleries. The exhibition, however, is a masterly and evenhanded take on a world that defies easy stereotypes. In first-millennium Egypt, pagans, Jews, Christians and Muslims lived on top of one another, often in tense, cacophonous competition. Yet it is precisely this competition that served as a catalyst for their terrific creativity, a creativity the curators at the British Museum have highlighted so ably. [ link ]

THE HUFFINTON POST By Katherine Brooks TANTRA PAINTINGS selected by Franck André Jamme What is outsider art? It's a question we've been asking a lot this month, in the weeks leading up to one of the genre's biggest events: the Outsider Art Fair . "While they invoke the highly symbolic cosmology of Hindu Tantra , these contemporary, anonymous paintings from Rajasthan are unlike the more familiar strands of Tantric Art," Perdriolle writes online. Outsider Art Fair : Galerie Hervé Perdriolle at booth 38 (January 21 - 24, 2016);  Metropolitan Pavilion 125 West 18th Street New York, NY; (212)337-3338; outsiderartfair.com  [ link ]

UNIVERSITY OF DAYTON By Cilla Shindell Treasures from the University of Dayton's Marian Library will be on display throughout 2016 OHIO---Treasures from the University of Dayton's Marian Library will be on display throughout 2016 as the library reaches into its vast collection for five exhibits, including the religious works of one of the most important representatives of German Expressionism. Recognized as the world's largest and most comprehensive collection of printed materials on Mary, the library includes more than 100,000 books and printed materials in more than 50 languages, holy cards, music, paintings, sculptures and statues, prints and more than 3,000 Nativity scenes from around the world. [ link ]

TWC NEWS By Stef Manisero The Crusader Bible, also known as the Morgan Picture Bible, the Maciejowski Bible, and the Shah ‘Abbas Bible, is not only one of the greatest medieval manuscripts in the Morgan, it also ranks as one of the incomparable achievements of French Gothic illumination. TEXAS---Exhibitors say it's one of the most celebrated manuscripts of the Middle Ages. ”Because of its attention to detail, depictions of everyday life, the scenes here are not very different from modern day comic books,” said Jeongho Park of the Blanton Museum of Art. And, for the next few months, the Crusader Bible will call the Blanton Museum of Art home. Historians say the artifact was likely created in the 1240s in Paris, for King Louis the 9th. Artistic precision aside, it's the journey of the pages that make it so significant. From France, to Italy, to Poland, the folios have transformed with each stop along the way. [ link ]

CBC NEWS 'Creation', by Taslim Samji, the curator of the exhibit Commonality, on display in Surrey's Newton Cultural Centre. CANADA---We're more alike than we are different — that's the message behind a new art exhibit in Surrey which features the work of nine female Ismaili Muslim artists. Aptly named Commonality, the exhibit on display at the Newton Cultural Centre until Jan. 30 features about 20 pieces of art ranging from paintings to sculptures. "When you really look at the diversity of cultures and people, there's actually a lot of commonality that transcends those cultural barriers," said Taslim Samji , the Burnaby artist who curated the exhibit. The art on display was created by women who have roots in East Africa, India and Pakistan. [ link ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS Sean Scully (b. 1945), Harlequin (Arlequín), 2003, color aquatint, sugarlift, and spitbite, Gift of the Artist, 2004.1153:5 OHIO--- Sean Scully's etchings for Federico García Lorca juxtapose the poetry of the Spanish poet, are now on view at the Cincinnati Art Museum. The artist immerses himself in the Humanistic tradition of literature and art by using the text as his muse to create his images. These prints should not be viewed as illustrations but as independent works that celebrate the expressive character of printmaking through colors and luminosity. Cincinnati Art Museum : " Sean Scully Etchings for Federico García Lorca " (Ends March 20, 2016); 953 Eden Park Drive, Cincinnati, OH; (513) 639-2954; cincinnatiartmuseum.org

PADDLE8 "The Last Supper" (2005) by Damien Hirst. Lot Number 32. Lithograph printed in colors 58.25 x 76.75 in; Open Edition; Signed in crayon on lower right, recto; Estimate $1,000 - $1,500 This print entitled “Last Supper” is wholly representative of Damien Hirst’s provocative and persistently unsettling oeuvre. A colorful map, highlighting the 13 nations that openly possess nuclear weaponry or are alleged to do so. Accompanying each country is the name of one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ, with Jesus himself representing Israel. A continuation of Hirst’s ongoing examination of the role of religion and science in the contemporary world, it varies immensely from his other studies on this topic. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Waqar Gillani and Rod Norland PAKISTAN---Late one night, the imam Shabir Ahmad looked up from prayers at his mosque to see a 15-year-old boy approaching with a plate in his outstretched left hand. On it was the boy’s freshly severed right hand. Mr. Ahmad did not hesitate. He fled the mosque and left the village, in eastern Punjab Province. Earlier that night, Jan. 10, he had denounced the boy as a blasphemer, an accusation that in Pakistan can get a person killed — even when the accusation is false, as it was in this case. The boy’s family, however, argues that the cleric did nothing wrong and should not be punished. [ link ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Scott Reyburn Bruce Springsteen's manager buys 15th-century wooden putto attributed to Donatello . UNITED KINGDOM---One of the problems for a billionaire wanting to put together a trophy collection of old master art is that the supply of documented works by the most illustrious sculptors and painters has all but dried up. Speaking on condition of anonymity, three people with knowledge of the sale said the buyer was Jon Landau , the longtime manager of Bruce Springsteen and a prominent collector of Italian Renaissance art. The transaction, involving a part exchange of works that Mr. Landau had bought from Mr. Butterfield, was worth $8 million to $11 million, those people said. The possible reattribution was first reported last fall in The New York Times. [ link ]