Disney-Britton

THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE By Brennan Smith (Photo courtesy of McNaughton Fine Art Company) Provo painter Jon McNaughton's latest work, "You Are Not Forgotten" SALT LAKE---Conservative Provo artist Jon McNaughton has turned his brushstrokes into brushes with fame at various points in his career — earning an endorsement from Fox News pundit Sean Hannity and satirical praise from Stephen Colbert. Now, the political and religious painter has created his first work depicting President Donald Trump. Titled ”You Are Not Forgotten,” McNaughton’s painting features Trump — his foot on a snake — standing over a young family nursing a small plant growing out of the cracked ground. ”I want a president that will crush the enemies of liberty, justice, and American prosperity,” the description reads. ”They may have the power to bruise his heal (sic), but he will have the power to crush their head!” [ More ]

THE WEEK By Jonathan Merritt Back in the 1990s, it often seemed that every city and town in America had a strip mall with a Christian bookstore where you could purchase WWJD bracelets and enough devotional books to fill up the Ark of the Covenant. Over the last decade, Christian bookstores across the nation have been shuttering. But Christian consumers should not let their hearts go troubled. This trend may turn out to be good news for the faithful. But here's the real shocker: The purging of religious kitsch, better quality prose, and a greater diversity of ideas — means the loss for retailers is a gain for readers. Hallelujah. [ More ]

ARTSY By Christopher Snow Hopkins Anila Quayyum Agha, All the Flowers Are for Me, 2017. Courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum. From the late 16th to the early 20th century, the salon-style hang was the predominant display convention across Europe. But hanging paintings like this—crammed cheek to jowl in a gallery space—has since fallen out of favor, in part because it tends to prevent viewers from concentrating on a single work. But why, exactly? The reason may have something to do with the circuitry of the human brain—which is why the Peabody Essex Museum, in Salem, Massachusetts, is branching out and recruiting a neuroscientist to join its team. The implicit aim of the museum’s neuroscience initiative, made possible by a $130,000 grant from the Boston-based Barr Foundation, is to boost the institution’s relevance at a time of declining attendance across the museum landscape. [ More ]

THE NATIONAL By Nick Leech Zarah Hussain's digital Numina installation at The Barbican. Courtesy Max Colson If all goes well, September 20 will be a day that gives Zarah Hussain reason to celebrate. An artist whose work combines the traditions of Islamic geometrical design with the very latest digital technology, Hussain discovered at the end of July that one of her installations, Numina , had been selected for the Lumen Prize longlist. An international award that celebrates and promotes digital art and creativity, the Lumen Prize recognises projects that occupy a space where art, research and technology meet, which seems like a pretty good fit for Hussain’s work, sitting as it does at the intersection of science and spirituality, drawing and coding. [ More ]

ALETEIA By Philip Kosloski Caravaggio's "Beheading of John the Baptist When viewing artistic depictions of Christian martyrs, it is often very easy to recognize the way in which the saint was killed for the faith. Many Christian artists over the centuries made it a point to visually represent the means of a martyr’s death, seeing in it a sort of “badge of honor” that proves the saint’s holiness. This tradition has continued even to the present day with modern-day martyrs. In one painting of the Coptic Christians who were killed in 2015, they are shown next to men dressed in black who are holding knives to their throats. So the next time you are wondering why a saint is depicted the way they are, it might just be in reference to their manner of death, a sign of their entrance into heavenly glory. [ More ]

THE PENINSULA QATAR Fadel Al Mansoori, Collector during the media tour at his exhibition Powder and Damask which opened officially at the Museum of Islamic Art . Baher Amin DOHA---The “Powder and Damask: Islamic Arms and Armour” from the Collection of Fadel Al Mansoori exhibition opened today at the Museum of Islamic Art. The exhibition, running from August 27, 2017 through May 12, 2018, presents edged weapons and firearms crafted primarily in Turkey, Iran and India from the 17th to the mid-19th century. The exhibition was curated by Dr Mounia Chekhab Abudaya and Julia Tugwell of MIA, with support from Al Mansoori. Fadel Al Mansoori, who became the first Qatari collector to exhibit his private collection at MIA, was on hand to walk guests through artefacts that represent some of the best examples of craftsmanship from the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires. [ More ]

APOLLO MAGAZINE The Divine Spouse (c. 1750), Miguel Cabrera. Photo © Museum Associates/LACMA/Fomento Cultural Banamex, A.C., by Rafael Doniz LOS ANGELES---This exhibition foregrounds the connections between Mexican painting and transatlantic artistic trends while emphasizing the former’s internal developments and remarkable pictorial output. In the 16th century, European artists immigrated to Mexico to decorate newly established churches and complete artistic commissions. The 18th century ushered in a period of artistic splendour as local schools of painting were consolidated, new iconographies were invented, and artists began to group themselves into academies. Find out more about the ‘Painted in Mexico’ exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art . [ More ]

ALETEIA By Elizabeth Lev Detail of "Madonna of the Rosary" The Renaissance had transformed intercessory images of Mary into sacred conversations, where several saints, gathered around an enthroned Mother and Child, quietly invoked her for prayers and intentions. The Counter-Reform era pressed this advantage and revitalized images of Marian intercession, encouraging the faithful with even more fervor to turn to Mary in times of need. A string of artists— Domenichino , Cigoli , Guido Reni and Massimo Stazione —produced images of the Madonna of the Rosary, the quintessential Marian devotion. These proliferated in religious houses, in churches and even in private homes, but perhaps the most striking was Caravaggio’s version, painted in 1607. [ More ]

THE HINDU Mr. Behl’s travels took him far and wide Frontline, a magazine of The Hindu Group has published a coffee-table book titled The Art of India: Sculpture and Mural Painting in the Ancient and Medieval Periods , authored by renowned art historian Benoy K. Behl, who is also an accomplished culture photographer. The book has more than 450 exquisite photographs taken by Mr. Behl, supported by a narration that is based on a series of articles published over the years in Frontline and on courses in art history that he was invited to give for Delhi University and for the College of Art, Delhi. Copies of the book can be bought at the branch offices of The Hindu and at the head office in Chennai. The special publication, priced at ₹5,000, is in two volumes.  [ More ]

THE CATHOLIC HERALD By Nora Hamerman Detail of "The Return of the Holy Family" by Peter Paul Rubens (1624) ANTWERP, Belgium—A unique event took place in late June at St. Charles Borromeo, one of this city’s five touristic monumental churches. A painting of “The Return of the Holy Family” by Antwerp’s greatest son, artist Peter Paul Rubens , came back to the Chapel of St. Joseph near the chancel after a 240-year absence.Antwerp suffered terribly in the Iconoclastic Fury of 1566. Angry mobs spurred on by an extreme Calvinist doctrine that condemned all religious art in churches, and fueled by anger at the cruel rule of the Spanish monarchy in the Low Countries, stormed through the churches tearing down statues, smashing stained glass, and burning paintings. In 1581, Calvinist Christians seized all the Catholic churches and purified them of “idolatry.” [ More ]

TIMES OF ISRAEL By Richard McBee Bezalel by Joel Silverstein at Abrazo Interno Gallery | The Clemente NEW YORK--- My Metaphysical Romance maps Joel Silverstein’s wrestling with his identity as a contemporary American Jewish artist. In the fifteen recent large acrylic works shown he examines the notion of himself as the ‘New Jewish Artist’ distilled in a mix of heady late 20th century American culture and 2000 years of Jewish thought. (Because I share many of these ideas in my own artwork as well as Jewish Art in general, I will dwell extensively on Silverstein’s work. Apologies to Tine Kindermann.) What is an artist…or more specifically what is a Jewish artist? Ask most educated Jews who the first Jewish artist was and the biblical Bezalel will be the answer. [ More ]

THE GUARDIAN By Jonathan Jones Immediacy and compassion … Caravaggio’s The Taking of Christ (1602). Photograph: © The National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin The ‘beer-mat Banksy’, 130 photos by René Magritte, Leonardo, the magic of Mantegna and more – all in your weekly dispatch. " Beyond Caravaggio " exhibition • Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh, until 24 September. Not many works of art ever made can compare with Caravaggio’s paintings for truth, immediacy, power or compassion. [ More ]

ARTDAILY Abdulnasser Gharem_The Path_2012_Silkscreen on paper_ 51x70.9in_129.6x180cm (1) SALT LAKE CITY---“ Cities of Conviction " examines the parallels between spiritual and urban cultures in Saudi Arabia and Utah; and especially the symbolism of creativity that connects cities of pilgrimage in both places," says exhibition curator, Jared Steffensen. "Since the 7th Century, the holy cities of Makkah and Medina have drawn millions of Muslim pilgrims every year to worship at the holiest sites in Islam, the Kaaba (House of God) in Makkah and the Tomb of the Prophet in Medina. The common histories of these cities extend well beyond issues of faith. Cities across both Utah and Saudi Arabia arose from the desert; have laws driven, in large part, by the predominant religion, and at first blush have comparatively conservative cultures. [ More ]

ALJAZEERA By Nigel Wilson Iraqi/Dutch artist Athar Jabar created Stone - Opus 15, a Palestinian stone installation that explores the importance of stone in the religious and everyday landscape of Jerusalem BIRZEIT, Occupied West Bank---Outside the white-walled facade of the Palestinian Museum in Birzeit , a cacophony of sharp, demanding voices disturbed the quiet. The sound installation, Untitled (Servees) by Emily Jacir , brought a chaotic urban scene to a sleepy hilltop in the occupied West Bank for the launch of Jerusalem Lives, the inaugural exhibition at the Palestinian Museum. The museum's formal opening was set for Sunday evening. Inside the museum, the exhibition begins with a colourful display that explores the representation of Jerusalem in popular culture and the media. Scale models of the Dome of the Rock are placed in front of screens depicting news footage of conflict in Jerusalem, and the imagery continues in a series of posters archived by the Palestinian Post...

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By  Gregory  &  Ernest Disney-Britton "The Cathedrals of Art" by Florine Stettheimer (1942); Oil on canvas, 60 1/4 x 50 1/4 in. What a month this has been? National attention has been fixated on the public art known as Confederate monuments. During this week of  debate about American history , iconoclasm, and censorship, the team at 20x200.com offered a set of limited edition prints of  Florine Stettheimer's The Cathedrals of Art from the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection. The symbolist painting is one in a series of four where the artist depicted the major “places of worship” in New York City: Broadway, Wall Street, Fifth Avenue, and the art world. At Alpha Omega Arts , we celebrate artistic freedom, and oppose censorship , even of the Confederate “places of worship.” We support plans for contextualizing our past and for building new “cathedrals” for our future.

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Robin Pogrebin and Sopan Deb A toppled Confederate statue in Durham, N.C., on Monday. Credit Virginia Bridges/The Herald-Sun, via Associated Press Mark Bradford , the renowned Los Angeles artist, says Confederate statues should not be removed unless they are replaced by educational plaques that explain why they were taken away. But others argue that removing a statue from its place of origin diminishes the power of its historical significance. And there are those who warn against rashly removing public art without thoughtful and thorough public discussion. “If this whole conversation is about the history of this country, then you have to talk about the history of this country,” Mr. Bradford, said. “Don’t just leave these empty spaces. Contextualize the action. I don’t feel like that can be rushed.” [ More ]

HYPERALLERGIC By Allison Meier Arranged! – The Arranged Marriage Board Game (courtesy Nashra Balagamwala) Five years ago, designer and illustrator Nashra Balagamwala left Pakistan for the United States to study at the Rhode Island School of Design, and to avoid an arranged marriage. Now her student visa has run out, and she’s crowdfunding a game about arranged marriages on Kickstarter. It’s partly a way to fund her escape from a loveless union, as well as to support her application for an artist visa. “There is a higher chance of people having a conversation about something when they experience it together,” Balagamwala told Hyperallergic. Arranged! – The Arranged Marriage Board Game is designed as an accessible platform for dialogue about the issue. [More]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Steven Lee Myers A mural in Punakha. Photo: imageBROKER / Alamy Stock LOBESA, Bhutan — For centuries, Bhutan has celebrated the phallus. They are painted on homes, or carved in wood, installed above doorways and under eaves to ward off evil, including one of its most insidious human forms, gossip. They are used by masked jesters in religious festivals and at one temple near here in Lobesa as a blessing of fertility. The tradition has been widely traced to one lama, Drukpa Kunley, who spread the tenets of Buddhism through Bhutan in the 15th and 16th centuries. Called the “Divine Madman,” he was a holy fool, a mendicant, drunkard and Lothario who subdued women and demons alike with his heightened spirituality and what legend called his “Flaming Thunderbolt of Wisdom.” [ More ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS "God the Father" (1628-1629) by Rubens at Victoria & Albert Museum OKLAHOMA CITY - The Oklahoma City Museum of Art's special exhibitions planned for fall 2017 through spring 2018 range from original drawings by Peter Paul Rubens and Rembrandt van Rijn and video installations by the provocative contemporary filmmaker and artist Apichatpong Weerasethakul, to a highly controversial collection of modern art acquired by the Museum in 1968. OKCMOA will present some of the most important works from the Victoria and Albert's collection of Dutch and Flemish drawings, one of the principal holdings in Britain. Showcasing 93 works from the 16th to the 20th centuries, the exhibition includes masterpieces by Rubens, Rembrandt, and Sir Anthony van Dyck. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Hili Perlson Khalil Rabah, 48%, 67%, detail from Palestine after Palestine New Sites for the Museum Department, 2017. Steel. Installation view, Sharjah Biennial 13. JERUSALEM---The Palestinian Museum in Birzeit —located just north of Jerusalem, in the West Bank—is opening its inaugural show this Sunday after a 15-month delay. The exhibition is curated by Reem Fadda , the former ­associate curator for Middle Eastern art at the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. Fadda’s show, titled “Jerusalem Lives,” explores the role of Jerusalem as a global city and features works by nearly 50 artists including Oscar Murillo , Kahlil Rabah , and Adrián Villar Rojas . The idea behind this presentation is to recreate the chaos and noise of the holy city. “ Jerusalem Lives ” will be on view in the Palestinian Museum, Birzeit, from August 27-December 15, 2017. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Sarah Brown Ursula Johnson's "Hot Looking" (2014). Photo: Michael Wasnidge. Courtesy Sobey Art Award The Sobey Art Award is one of the most coveted prizes in Canada, comparable in status and sum to UK’s Turner Prize. This year’s Sobey Award offers a larger sum of money than ever before: the prize money has been increased to $110,000, with $50,000 going to the winner and $10,000 to each shortlisted artist. According to the award’s press material, the list focuses on artists who question and challenge preconceived ideas around diversity, identity, and performance. These include Ursula Johnson , whose work reflects her Mi’kmaw First Nation heritage. Raymond Boisjoly is an Indigenous artist of Haida descent.  Divya Mehra, who works between New York, Winnipeg, and Delhi. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS Virginia State Police in riot gear stand in front of the statue of General Robert E. Lee before forcing white nationalists, neo-Nazis and members of the "alt-right" out of Emancipation Park after the "Unite the Right" rally was declared an unlawful gathering August 12, 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia. Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Across the United States, the d ebate about Confederate memorials and other monuments to a racist past has entered a critical phase. In the wake of the horrifying events of Charlottesville, city governments from Baltimore, Maryland , to Madison, Wisconsin , have been moved to act. Yet important questions about how to act remain. What is the most effective way to deal with such historically loaded material? Once removed, what is to be done with the disputed monuments? We asked 12 art historians and experts, who have dedicated their work to exploring the finer points of such matters, for their insight on the deba...

CATHOLIC REGISTER By Deborah Gyapong BARRY’S BAY, Ont. – Man’s need for beauty springs from his profound hunger for God, artist and best-selling author Michael D. O’Brien told a conference at Our Lady Seat of Wisdom College. “Beauty is not decoration on a wall” or “sensory stimulus in a concert hall,” but a “celestial language that passes all barriers” and goes “directly to the heart and touches us in ways rational thought cannot,” O’Brien said. Western culture began a process of de-Christianization that began to “reshape man’s consciousness” from that of a providential God to a desolate spiritual cosmos, he said. [ More ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES Show Us Your Walls By Brett Sokol Mark Harris, left, and Tony Kushner in the living room of their Provincetown house. Hanging above is one of Kukuli Velarde’s angel sculptures. Credit Kayana Szymczak for The New York Times PROVINCETOWN, Mass. — “I don’t have a big angel collection, but …” the “Angels in America” playwright Tony Kushner insisted with an embarrassed laugh. After all, evidence to the contrary — via a sculpture’s outstretched wings — nearly smacked a reporter in the head as he entered Mr. Kushner’s home here. Suspended from the ceiling, just past the doorway, was an infant-size ceramic angel created by the Peruvian-born Philadelphia artist Kukuli Velarde — one of four such angels hanging in the house Mr. Kushner shares with his husband, Mark Harris. Provincetown artists (also) feature prominently in their home. [ More ]

ARTLYST By Rev. Jonathan Evens “Untitled” – Hijab series (Photographic print) by Boushra Almutawakel, © Boushra Almutawakel CARAVAN is the international intercultural and interreligious peacebuilding arts NGO which has brought I AM , an art exhibition showcasing the insights and experiences of Middle Eastern women, to London. In this interview Rev Jonathan Evens speaks to the President and Founder of CARAVAN, Rev Paul-Gordon Chandler, about its work and use of the Arts. Paul-Gordon is an author, interfaith advocate, social entrepreneur, art curator and a U.S. Episcopal priest who has lived and worked in the Middle East for many years. I AM is at St Martin-in-the-Fields London until 20 August 2017 and then will be in Washington, D.C. at the Katzen Arts Center of American University from September 5 – October 22. [ More ]

HAARETZ By Shaul Setter Shy Abady's 'The Pretty Jewess (After Synagoga)' Avi Amsalem TEL AVIV---An exhibition of portraits that features lesser known or errant offspring in Jewish history positions the ‘Arab Jew’ as the necessary extreme of the dynasty. The exhibition of portraits by Shy Abady (Jerusalem-born, 1965) enters the Schechter Gallery and transforms it, precisely because it is not “unorthodox” or progressive in the usual sense. On the contrary, this exhibition, “The Restless,” is fraught with a pungent sense of looking back, reexamination, turbulence and complication. On the face of it, the show follows the regular contour lines of Conservative Judaism. It consists of 10 portraits of Jewish women and men from different eras of Jewish history: from Abinadav, the son of King Saul, to Felix Mendelssohn, Hans Herzl (Theodor’s son) and Hannah Arendt, down to the artist’s mother and grandfather. [ More ]

THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE By Charles Desmaris Carved figure of a “Crucified Christ” (ca. 1650-1750) by an unknown artist. SAN FRANCISCO---Art museums in Europe and America reflect the tastes and interests, for the most part, of private collectors. What did not engage the collector, therefore, did not easily enter the museum. The Asian Art Museum acknowledges its own challenge with regard to the art of Southeast Asia — particularly the Philippines. There’s also the problem of stereotype expectations: Objects from a culture with strong Christian traditions and Spanish colonial influence just feel out of place to scholars looking for Buddhist or Hindu sources. A small exhibition on view through March 11, “Philippine Art: Collecting Art, Collecting Memories,” presents 25 acquisitions, nearly all made in the past 10 years. [ More ]

TEHRAN TIMES TEHRAN---A historical house in Tehran has been converted into the Calligraphy Museum of Iran. The museum, home to a rare collection of Persian calligraphy, was inaugurated on Saturday during a ceremony attended by a large number of calligraphers and artists. The house that was formerly owned by Gholamreza Fuladvand, a senator during the reign of Iran’s last monarch Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was converted into a museum under the auspices of Tehran Municipality’s Beautification Organization. Speaking at the ceremony, the director of the organization, Isa Alizadeh, said that calligraphy enjoys a high status in Islamic art. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Ben Davis The statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee stands behind a crowd of hundreds of white nationalists and neo-Nazis during the "Unite the Right" rally August 12, 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia. Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images. The president has very effectively appropriated the term “fake news” for his own ends. I hope, then, that I am not walking into a trap when I say that the important thing to stress about the contested monument to Robert E. Lee is that it represents “fake history.” Moreover, its particular brand of fake history is engineered to do exactly what it is doing now. The Reconstruction Era (1865-1977) had seen newly freed blacks participate in political life to an unprecedented and, in the minds of their former masters, unacceptable degree. The cause of Confederate preservation would aid in reconsolidating the prestige of traditional Southern elites. They sought, as James M. Lindgren wrote , “to win through monuments a...

BLOUIN ARTINFO Rare early Bengal Krishna Kali 26x35. (Courtesy: Artist and Akar Prakar Art Advisory) DELHI--- Akar Prakar Art Advisory presents " 19th Century Swadeshi Art ” at the gallery’s New Delhi venue. The exhibition takes you through the time when the Mughal era, famous for its art and architecture, was coming to an end and the French and Portuguese had established their trading outposts during the time of Aurangzeb, the last great Mughal. Some rare oil, litho and oleograph paintings of the pre-Bengal School from 19th century are collected here. At that time, religious and mythological paintings were more popular. The exhibition will be on view from August 28 through October 15, 2017 at Akar Prakar Art Advisory, 1st floor, 29 Hauz Khas Village, New Delhi 110016, India. [ More ]

THE AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE By Rod Dreher The ultimate result of American iconoclasm (Pavel Chagochkin/Shutterstock) Iconoclasm often accompanies radical, even violent, change in a society. The word comes from the Greek meaning “image-smashers,” and was first used to describe a turbulent period in the Byzantine empire in which the Emperor attempted to ban the use of religious icons as idolatrous. He failed, as you can see by visiting an Orthodox church today. But the word stuck because it was useful. Whether religious or political (e.g., French revolutionaries, militants in China’s Cultural Revolution), real iconoclasts are violent. It seems to me that the (American) culture war has shifted into a dangerous phase, accelerated by both Donald Trump and progressive militants, who feed off each other. Our unity is fragile — more fragile than people think. You cannot destroy symbols of people’s identity without calling forth rage. [ More ]

THE NEW EUROPEAN By Ian Walker "The Great Last Judgement" by Peter Paul Rubens (1614 and 1617) Munich’s art gallery, the Alte Pinakothek, when it was designed in the 1820s, was designed around one painting – Peter Paul Rubens’ The Last Judgement. The painting is huge; it is more than six metres high, almost five metres wide and is one of the largest of all European canvasses. It is huge not just in size, but also in theme. It is Heaven versus Hell, God versus Satan with the damned being dragged down to the depths and the saved being raised up to salvation. When it was painted the Dutch and Spanish were embroiled in the Eighty Years’ War and the Holy Roman Empire was on the verge of the Thirty Years’ War. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Terence Trouillot The J. Marion Sims statue stands near the corner of 5th Avenue and 103rd Street on August 22, 2017 in New York. The Black Youth Project 100, an activist group founded in 2013, is calling for the removal of the J. Marion Sims statue. (Photo: Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images.) NEW YORK---In a statement yesterday, the Museum of the City of New York (MCNY) took a stand: It is now advocating for the removal of a much-protested statue of 19th-century physician J. Marion Sims, located in East Harlem on 103 Street and Fifth Avenue in New York City. The Sims statue, which sits just a stone’s throw away from the MCNY across Fifth Avenue, represents Dr. James Marion Sims (1813–1883), regarded as the father of gynecology. His legacy, however, rests on his grossly unethical medical practices, performing countless experimental surgeries between 1845 to 1849 on black female slaves without their consent. [ More ]

ARTFIXX DAILY Walter Isaacson's upcoming book "Leonardo da Vinci" Paramount won a seven-figure bidding battle against Universal for the film rights to the latest Walter Isaacson book Leonardo da Vinci , reported Deadline . The Hollywood biopic will star none other than Leonardo DiCaprio. Legend has it that the star's pregnant mother was looking at a da Vinci painting when she first felt her baby kick, thus naming him after the Renaissance artist. DiCaprio, who is also a big league art collector and environmental activist, will produce the film with his company Appian Way. Isaacson, studied da Vinci's own meticulous notebooks to create the book's narrative. The book will be published by Simon & Schuster in October. [ More ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS "The Cathedrals of Art" by Florine Stettheimer (1942); Oil on canvas, 60 1/4 x 50 1/4 in. NEW YORK---This week, the folks at  20x200.com  made prints available online of  The Cathedrals of Art by Florine Stettheimer . It's a symbolist painting of the art world that she knew so well as both artist and critic. The Cathedrals of Art  is a portrait of the New York art world where the city’s three major museums and their collections are watched over by their directors: the Museum of Modern Art (upper left), The Metropolitan Museum of Art (center), and the Whitney Museum of American Art (upper right). Born to a wealthy Jewish family in Rochester, Stettheimer studied under the Symbolist painters of Europe. The original now hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art , and a Stettheimer show is showing at the Jewish Museum in NYC through September.

MY SALAAM By Tharik Hussain Interior of Al Quaraouiyine (or al-Qarawiyyin) Mosque and university in Fez, Morocco. / saiko3p / Shutterstock.com Eid is once again upon us, and most of us are looking forward to the warm, familiar rituals of praying together, visiting family and eating good food. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t shake things up a little. We’ve put together four experiences to make Eid more memorable this year, and each one comes with an amazing place to perform that all-important Eid prayer. [ More ]

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA NEW DELHI---Himalayan bronze sculptures of 'Shiva and Parvati', 'Vishnu', 'Mahishasuramardini', 'Shakyamuni Buddha' and 'Shadakshari Lokeshvara' made for the highest bids at Saffronart's first Asian Art Online Auction . The auction held earlier this month sold almost 70 per cent of the 74 lots achieving a total sale value of Rs 62.75 lakhs. The sculptures featured Himalayan art, an important part of India's cultural heritage with leading museums in the country, such as the CSMVS Museum in Mumbai, housing significant collections. [ More ]

THE WASHINGTON POST By Peggy McGlone The entrance to the Museum of the Bible, under construction and set to open Nov. 17 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post) WASHINGTON, DC---The Museum of the Bible will offer free admission when it opens its 430,000 square-foot facility on Nov. 17, officials announced Friday. The nonprofit museum will suggest a donation of $15 for entry but it will not require guests to pay anything. Operating in a city where many museums have free admission, officials decided a suggested donation was the best policy. Museum officials also announced advanced timed passes will be available online starting Aug. 28 at 10 a.m. The tickets extend 90 days and will be available on the website, museumofthebible.org. [ More ]

JEWISH NEWS OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA By Rob Gloster “Lilith’s Lair and Other Stories of Deception” (2011) by Siona Benjamin. 39″ x 61″ gouache and mixed media on museum board. FOSTER CITY, CA---“Very often I look down at my skin and it has turned blue,” says artist Siona Benjamin. “The blue skin has become a symbol for me of being a Jewish woman of color.” Benjamin, who was born in India and now lives in New Jersey, reflects her upbringing as a Bombay Jew in her artwork — which is on display through Sept. 18 at the Peninsula JCC in Foster City. Coming from a Hindu-majority nation in which the revered god Krishna is often depicted as having blue skin, Benjamin said that color represents a sense of crossing cultural lines. “ Blue Like Me: Art by Siona Benjamin ,” at Peninsula JCC, 800 Foster City Blvd., Foster City. Free. Through Sept. 18. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Eileen Kinsella, July 20, 2017 Alice Cooper received this Warhol Little Electric Chair as a birthday gift in 1974. Courtesy Alice Cooper. School’s out for summer, and Alice Cooper’s memory went on vacation—at least when it came to his art collection. Amid a 40-year rock career, the legendary singer apparently forgot all about an Andy Warhol canvas he’s had in storage since it was given to him in 1974. When Cooper was touring during his ’70s heyday, he typically included an unusual theatrical element in his macabre shock rock act: an actual electric chair. Aware of his fondness for the sinister stage prop, Cooper’s then-girlfriend, Cindy Langa—a model who had appeared on the cover of Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine—bought him the Pop artist’s red electric chair silkscreen. She paid $2,500 for it. [ More ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Holland Cotter Protesters in Durham, N.C., pulled down a statue of a Confederate soldier last week. Credit Kate Medley/Reuters The Charlottesville incident, and the president’s remarks, had created a consciousness-raising call to eliminate — or defend — statues associated with the Confederacy. A frenzied ideological war over visual images was underway. Basically, I take the move to isolate and banish Confederate nationalist images as a healthy one. The art critic in me welcomes the unloading, too, though for different reasons. As to where they go: museums, existing or custom-built, urban and regional. For this to happen, though, museums will have to relinquish their pretense of ideological neutrality. They will have to become truth-telling institutions. [ More ]

THE HINDU By P. Sujatha Varma A sketch of the proposed project, that will develop Ghantasala as a major Buddhist destination. GHANTASALA, India---To develop Ghantasala village in Krishna district as one of the prime Buddhist tourist spots in the State, decks have been cleared for construction of a ₹1.5-crore project here. “The new facility will be themed on Mahaparinirvana of the Buddha. A two-storied structure in Buddhist architecture resembling a pedestal with a 100-ft wide and 70-ft high Budha in Mahaparinirvana posture will be a major highlight,” said Executive Director of AP Tourism Development Corporation Mallikarjuna Rao. [ More ]

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS By  Gregory  &  Ernest Disney-Britton D'Angelo Lovell Williams "Untitled (Portrait)" (2017) pigment print 20 x 30 inches edition of 6 In D’Angelo Lovell Williams's Untitled (Portrait) , we see the artist kneeling in a river-bed with his face turned up to heaven, but is this a baptism or a moment of despair? In the days since Charlottesville and President Trump's shocking support of the white nationalist threats against Jews, Blacks, gays, and Hispanics, we read The New York Times review of a new gallery show by gay, black photographer D’Angelo Lovell Williams. This color photograph resonates with texture and spiritual emotion. In watching the figure, we are witness to faith as a spiritual shield in the face of hatred, and especially for gay African Americans. D’Angelo Lovell Williams's Untitled (Portrait) invites us into a dialogue about race, homosexuality, and faith in America.

DAILY SABAH By Vana Stellou The Benaki Museum of Islamic Art Ignorance is the root of all delusions and is thus the source of all fears. The most effective weapon against ignorance is education and, as Mark Twain said, "Education consists mainly of what we have learned." The same thing applies to religion. It is unawareness and lack of respect regarding religious values and views that leads to accusations of Islam being linked to terrorism. Instead of blaming Islam, it would be useful and is more important than ever, to try to depict Islam in a positive manner and show the beauty behind the religion and the huge accomplishments Muslim empires have been able to achieve in history. The two main reasons that have led to the widespread, stereotypical acceptance of this religious community are: a) systematic one-sided portrayal and b) ignorance of the richness of the polymorphic Islamic culture. [ More ]

ARTDAILY Christie's : "Indian, Himalayan and Southeast Asian Works of Art," September 13, 2017, New York City

ARTNET NEWS By Nate Freeman WASHINGTON, DC---Yesterday morning, the Washington Post reported that many of the remaining members of the White House Committee on the Arts and Humanities have announced their resignation. In a letter to the president, 16 actors, artists, writers, and architects said that they could no longer stay in their positions following the president’s “support of the hate groups and terrorists who killed and injured fellow Americans in Charlottesville.” The full letter is below. [ More ]

ARTNET NEWS By Terence Trouillot Cy Gavin in his studio. Image courtesy the artist. NEW YORK---He’s a rising star now, but the young Cy Gavin never thought he would become an artist. Now Gavin has two sold-out solo exhibitions at Sargent’s Daughters under his belt, one in 2015 and one 2016, and is featured currently at the Rubell Foundation in Miami. He draws inspiration from Bermuda, the homeland of his father, and a place the artist has often visited to conduct research on his family’s history. His art incorporates the country’s flora and fauna, as well as its complicated history as a pivotal site during the transatlantic slave trade, and as the first island in the Atlantic to attract wealthy American tourists seeking an alternative to summers in Europe during in the 1920s. [ More ]

THE HINDU  By Rinky Kumar Black, an Artist’s Tribute to Contemporary Mithila Art by Santosh Kumar Das is ongoing till August 16 at Artisans’, Kala Ghoda MITHILIA, India---“The rightful place for an artist, his real world, is a pot of black ink. I believe it contains all the magic, all the forms, everything that human beings can imagine and render. It hides inside itself the seeds of creation.” These words by contemporary Mithila artist Santosh Kumar Das not only portray his belief but also aptly depict the thought behind his book Black – An Artist’s Tribute as well as his first solo exhibition that is currently ongoing in the city. Das, who hails from Ranti village in the Madhubani district of Bihar, is a prolific artist who has been practicing the Mithila style of painting since several decades. His passion for the arts started since his childhood when he saw his mother, Savitri Devi, draw calendar-style images with black, which was made of the soot that she collected on...

THE NEW YORK TIMES By Roberta Smith D'Angelo Lovell Williams "Untitled (Portrait)" (2017) pigment print 20 x 30 inches edition of 6 The 10 reverberant color photographs in D’Angelo Lovell Williams’s show at Higher Pictures form one of the year’s best gallery debuts. Seemingly uncomplicated and improvisational, the works set off startling strings of associations and meaning, tearing through references to race, gender, eroticism, art, fashion, culture and history like crashing dominoes. Yet silence reigns: All is encompassed and centered by the presence of the artist, who is usually shown leveling a steady, slightly quizzical gaze at the camera, and the certainty with which he wields his black, male body as shape-shifting subject and material. This happens with special power in “ Structural Dishonesty ,” a title that resonates with the phrase institutional racism. [ More ]

BAZAAR By Rebecca Anne Proctor Sleem and Lamia Hasan in the Jumeirah Living apartment in Dubai surrounded by their art. Photography by Ausra Osipaviciute DUBAI---All of this is an accumulated collection,” says Lamia. “Sleem and I have been married for 10 years but we have been collecting individually for around 20 years – Sleem a little bit longer.” As Lamia explains, Sleem’s is a more eclectic collection with a lot of different artists from all over the world, including from South Africa, the US, and the Middle East. “For the last 20 years I have been collecting mainly Pakistani art and a little bit of Indian art,” she adds. Works by Pakistani masters such as Sadequain, Shahid Jalal, Tassaduq Suhail, Ismail Gulgee and Jamil Naqsh decorate the walls of their apartment exuding much colour and vibrancy. [ More ]

THE NEW YORK TIMES Show Us Your Walls By Ted Loos The architects Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi in their Brooklyn apartment with “KISS,” from a former Times Square adult movie theater; Luigi Rossini’s etching of the Capitoline Hill in Rome; and Lucio Pozzi’s “Parallel Puppet” (1981), a work on paper. Credit Harrison Hill/The New York Times NEW YORK CITY---For the married architects Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi, who have run their own firm for 26 years, the current state of the kitchen in their Brooklyn Heights apartment — deeply mid renovation — is an anomaly. Inside the clean-lined apartment, much more the couple’s style, hangs what Mr. Manfredi called “stuff we’ve collected over the years,” and several pieces have a distinct Italian flavor. ”A grouping on the opposite wall includes a “KISS” sign from a former Times Square adult movie theater; Luigi Rossini’s 1823 drypoint etching of the Capitoline Hill in Rome; and Lucio Pozzi’s “Parallel Puppet” (1981), a work on ...