Spain: Court orders Salvador Dalí's remains to be exhumed in paternity suit

A Spanish court has ordered the exhumation of Salvador Dalí’s body in order to obtain samples for a paternity suit brought by a woman claiming to be his daughter.

The Madrid court said the exhumation aimed “to get samples of his remains to determine whether he is the biological father of a woman from Girona who filed a claim to be recognised as the daughter of the artist.

“The DNA study of the painter’s corpse is necessary due to the lack of other biological or personal remains with which to perform the comparative study.”

The order could be appealed, the court said.

Pilar Abel, 58, claims her mother met the surrealist painter in the 1950s when she was working for a family that would often spend summers in Cadaqués, close to where Dalí had a home. The pair “had a friendship that developed into clandestine love”, Abel said in documents presented to a Madrid court in 2015. She was born in 1956.

Read more: Court orders Salvador Dalí's remains to be exhumed in paternity suit | Art and design | The Guardian

Armenia: Art fair in Istanbul showcases works by Armenian artists

Since 2010, art fair Contemporary Istanbul has been offering a glittering special section called “Art from Armenia.” Although there are currently no diplomatic ties between Turkey and Armenia, there is a growing cultural relationship which promises a brand new future for both countries.

With the aim of discovering regional art and gathering Armenian artists and Turkish art lovers, “Art from Armenia” has hosted many Armenian painters in Istanbul over the past three years, Today’s Zaman reports.

This year’s “Art from Armenia” selection, on display until Sunday at the IstanbulCongressCenter, features paintings and sculptures by six Armenian artists: Daron Mouradian, Vahram Davtian, Emil Kazaz, Armen Gevorgian, Ara Mikaelian and Ruben Grigorian. Aram Sargsyan, the curator of the exhibition in 2011, has contributed to the exhibition this year as well.

According to Sargsyan, people in Istanbul have respect for art. “I have seen many paintings on the walls of restaurants and they were high standard paintings. So in Istanbul, you do not have to go to a museum, you are exposed to art everywhere.”


Read more: Art fair in Istanbul showcases works by Armenian artists | Public Radio of Armenia

Architecture - The Netherlands - Almere: The Green Cathedral A Touristic Gem - by RM

The Green Cathedral seen from the outside

There is a local architectural curiosity called the Green Cathedral in Almere which is a replica of the Rheims Cathedral in France and worth your visit if you are in the neighborhood..

Where it is different from the real Cathedral is that it is an outline of the Rheims Cathedral defined by trees.

Inside the Green Cathedral

Quite a spectacular view, specially once you walk into the tree enclosed area. It probably can also best be seen when flying overhead. De Groene Kathedraal (The Green Cathedral), was designed by Dutch artist Marinus Boezem and replaces the stone and glass of the one in Rheims with poplar trees and sky.

About 20 years after it was started the artwork was "completed" in 1996 and is expected to reach its full height in 2015.

Unfortunately the Green Cathedral in Almere is not easy to find by outsiders because directions to the Green Cathedral are limited and not strategically located. The weathered billboard in front of the Green Cathedral is also unreadable.

Regardless of these shortcomings, the Green Cathedral certainly is a Dutch architectural and artistic gem.

Almere-Digest 

Russia: 'Bleak' Russian Provinces Full of Humor and Color - by Melissa Purkiss

For many Muscovites, the Russian provinces are a distant land, visited or passed through rarely, if at all, and for the most part experienced secondhand, through anecdotes, news stories or art. Yet often, the art in which they do take center stage seems only too eager to present them as drab and hopeless places, a claim perhaps best summed up with the wailed refrain in Chekhov's "Three Sisters" of "To Moscow! To Moscow! To Moscow!"

But thanks to the Veresov Gallery's ongoing exhibition of watercolors by Valery Arkhipov, titled "Provincial Stories," this typically bleak view of the Russian provinces has been washed away in favor of color, humor and liveliness that are both refreshing and fascinating in equal measure.

What is most striking on first viewing the paintings is that they are brimming with hustle and bustle.

There is a sense that we as viewers are peering not on static snapshots but on entire scenes that our imaginations construct around them. This is something that in Arkhipov's own words can "undoubtedly" be attributed to his background and personal interest in film. The painter is, notably, also the dean and professor of the Russian State Institute of Cinematography.

Read more: 'Bleak' Russian Provinces Full of Humor and Color | Arts & Ideas | The Moscow Times

The Netherlands: Art -Tefaf: going Dutch has never felt better - by Gareth Harris

Where in the world can you see long and good-humohibitionred queues waiting to get into an art fair at three o’clock on a weekday afternoon?” asked the correspondent in our assessment of the European Fine Art Fair (Tefaf) in Maastricht 11 years ago.

This undisputed grande dame of art fairs has proudly polishing her silver this month to mark her jubilee (16-25 March). Twenty-four years ago Tefaf Maastricht, now in its 25th edition, launched in the Maastricht Exhibition and Congress Centre (MECC) with 89 participating dealers, the majority of them Dutch. Most of the 17,672 visitors to the fair in 1988 traveled at most a few hundred kilometres. “Sunday was Belgian housewife day when they would come in and criticize all the frames,” says Peter Fairbanks, president of the San Francisco-based Montgomery Gallery, which has participated in all but three fairs since 1988.

This month, more than 270 international dealers will bring their most important inventory to Maastricht situated at the southernmost end of the Netherlands, close to the Belgian and German borders. “All the dealers save their best things for Maastricht” has become an art market truism. The queues, peopled with collectors from the US, Asia and across Europe, are just as long; indeed, fair organisers have struggled with the volume, raising ticket prices in 2007 after 84,020 visitors pressed their way down the aisles in 2006. The fair appears to have outpaced its rivals such as the Biennale des Antiquaires in Paris, maintaining a lead when other fairs, including London’s Grosvenor House and the Haughton International Asian Art Fair in New York, have fallen by the wayside.

Crucially, trade specialists still see Tefaf as a market bellwether. “It is universally accepted as the master of its art and the focal point of traditional market activities,” says James Goodwin, the head of the art market course at Maastricht University. Richard Green of the eponymous London gallery, which deals in Old Masters, is one of the fair’s most fervent supporters. “It goes from strength to strength because it shows high quality paintings, fresh to the market and correctly priced,” he says. The stakes are high, with a substantial number of exhibitors making at least 30% of their annual turnover at Maastricht, but a post-crash “flight to quality” benefits certain sections such as Old Masters and modern blue-chip works.

For more: Tefaf: going Dutch has never felt better - The Art Newspaper

BBC NEWS: Greece to unveil Acropolis museum

For the complete report from the BBC NEWS click on this link

Greece to unveil Acropolis museum

The long-awaited Acropolis Museum in Athens is to be unveiled soon. The modern glass and concrete building, at the foot of the ancient Acropolis, houses sculptures from the golden age of Athenian democracy. The euro 130m ($182m)structure also offers panoramic views of the stone citadel where they came from. Culture minister Antonis Samaras said he hoped it would be the "catalyst" for the return of the Parthenon sculptures from the British Museum. Some of the sculptures, also known as the Elgin Marbles, originally decorated the Parthenon temple and have been in London since they were sold to the museum in 1817.

NY Times:The Netherlands - 'Scripture for the Eyes' - At the Museum of Biblical Art, Dutch Printmakers and the Good Book - by Ken Johnsen

For the complete report from the NYTimes.com click on this link

The Netherlands - Scripture for the Eyes' - At the Museum of Biblical Art, Dutch Printmakers and the Good Book - by Ken Johnsen

Just how provocative the Good Book has been can be seen in “Scripture for the Eyes: Bible Illustration in Netherlandish Prints of the 16th Century” at the Museum of Biblical Art. Among the 79 works in this superb show are pieces by some of the biggest names in Western printmaking. Woodcuts and engravings by Lucas van Leyden and Hendrick Goltzius alone would make a visit worthwhile.

While some viewers may be fascinated by the scholarly issues and biblical themes that the exhibition so adroitly frames, the pictorial and narrative excitement will captivate many others.What remains undeniable, though, is the ability of Dutch printmakers to measure the heights and plumb the depths of the European soul.

Guardian.co.uk: Art historians claim Van Gogh's ear 'cut off by Gauguin' - by Angelique Chrisafis

For the complete report from The Guardian click on this link

Art historians claim Van Gogh's ear 'cut off by Gauguin' - by Angelique Chrisafis

Vincent van Gogh's fame may owe as much to a legendary act of self-harm, as it does to his self-portraits. But, 119 years after his death, the tortured post-Impressionist's bloody ear is at the centre of a new controversy, after two historians suggested that the painter did not hack off his own lobe but was attacked by his friend, the French artist Paul Gauguin. According to official versions, the disturbed Dutch painter cut off his ear with a razor after a row with Gauguin in 1888. Bleeding heavily, Van Gogh then walked to a brothel and presented the severed ear to an astonished prostitute called Rachel before going home to sleep in a blood-drenched bed.

But two German art historians, who have spent 10 years reviewing the police investigations, witness accounts and the artists' letters, argue that Gauguin, a fencing ace, most likely sliced off the ear with his sword during a fight, and the two artists agreed to hush up the truth.

Artdaily.org - David Cerny Laughs at Europe with Installation at the Council of the European Union

For the complete report from the Artdaily.org click on this link

David Cerny Laughs at Europe with Installation at the Council of the European Union

The idea was simple but good. So effective that he convinced the presidency of the European Council, which this semester is headed by the Czech Republic, to give its blessing and the 500,000 Euros needed to finance it. Czech artist David Cerný promised the following: a collaboration between 27 artists from the European Community who would put forth their vision from their own countries. France was portrayed as a labor strike, Spain as a slab of concrete and Italy into a soccer field. The only problem is that behind this work of art, which has caused great controversy reducing Greece to a huge fire, Romania into a Dracula castle, there is only one creative mind, that of David Cerný. Czech Deputy Prime Minister, Alexandr Vondra, has confessed feeling "surprisingly sorry" after discovering that the only author of Entropa is Cerný and not 27 artists, as had been stipulated in the contract with the artist.

"David Cerný is the only person responsible for not fulfilling his commitment", said Vondra, who added that the Czech presidency is analyzing what to do with the installation, which has already been placed at the Justus Lipsius builiding of the EU Council building and which was supposed to be inaugurated on Thursday. Meanwhile, Cerný, known for his sculptures such as Freud hanging in the middle of the streets in Prague or for painting a rose on a Soviet tank, has laughed all along and said that he wanted to prove "that Europe could laugh at itself".

Note EU-Digest: Picasso said, “Art is a lie that tells the truth." David Cerný has certainly proven that point. The Commission should let the sculpture stay where it is.

Telegraph.co.uk: Oil painting 'invented in Asia, not Europe' - by Roger Highfield

For the complete report from the Telegraph click on this link

Oil painting 'invented in Asia, not Europe' - by Roger Highfield

The idea that oil painting was invented in Europe is overturned today by a remarkable discovery made as a result of one of the worst examples of cultural vandalism in recent years.Scientists have proved, thanks to experiments performed at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, that the paints used were based of oil, hundreds of years before the technique was "invented" in Europe, when artists found they could use pigments bound with a medium of drying oil, such as linseed oil.

In many European history and art books, oil painting is said to have started in the 15th century in Europe. But the team that used the ESRF, an intense source of X rays, found the Bamiyan paintings date back to the mid-7th century AD

FT.com - Barcelona - Making of a modernist capital - by Clare Henry

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Barcelona - Making of a modernist capital - by Clare Henry

Barcelona and Modernity: Gaudí to Dali at New York’s Metropolitan Museum is a revelation. Well-focused, often spectacular, always informative, this show of 300 exhibits covering the half-century from 1888 to 1939 starts with a bang – haunting Blue Period Picasso, gritty Modernista oils, elegant Symbolist sculpture – and closes with powerful studies for “Guernica” and a group of celebrated works by that great 20th-century trio: Miró, Dali and Picasso.

In between, a rich mix of pictures, decorative art, graphic design, jewellery, sculpture, ceramics, art nouveau furniture, unfamiliar Gaudí artifacts and period photos provide a broad window on the arts created during this period. It all came to a crunching halt in 1939 with the birth of Franco’s fascist regime, although as any visitor to Barcelona today will know, the city has since recovered its dynamism.The exhibition is organised into nine thematic sections.‘Barcelona and Modernity: Gaudí to Dali’ is at the Metropolitan Museum, New York until June 3. Tel