The statue of Pharaoh Akhenaten was found beside a trash can. Image by Jon Bodsworth, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. CAIRO (AP) – Egyptian antiquities officials say a small limestone statue of the father of King Tutankhamun that went missing from Cairo’s famed Egyptian Museum during recent turmoil has been found.
Antiquities Minister Zahi Hawass had reported a total of 18 missing museum artifacts, three of which were found on the museum grounds, possibly abandoned by looters making their escape.
The most important missing object was the limestone statue of the Pharaoh Akhenaten, which depicts the standing king with a blue crown, and holding an offering table in his hands.
The Antiquities Ministry said Thursday that an anti-government protester had found the statue beside a trash can, and his family contacted officials to arrange its return.
Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-ES-02-17-11 1043EST
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The statue of Pharaoh Akhenaten was found beside a trash can. Image by Jon Bodsworth, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) – The Hungarian government on Wednesday asked a U.S. court to dismiss a lawsuit by the heirs of a prominent Jewish collector who are seeking the return of art worth over $100 million seized during the Holocaust.
The Ministry of National Development said that the 2010 suit by the heirs of Baron Mor Lipot Herzog in Washington should be dismissed, in part because compensation for the 44 artworks was covered by a 1973 claims agreement between Hungary and the United States.
David de Csepel, Herzog’s great grandson, and two other heirs sued Hungary and several state-owned museums seeking the return of works that included paintings by El Greco and Francisco de Zurbaran.
The ministry also said that in 2008 a Hungarian appeals court rejected a lawsuit filed in 1999 by De Csepel’s aunt, Martha Nierenberg, and other heirs, also seeking restitution of the artworks.
Herzog died in 1934. His collection, which at its zenith may have grown to as many as 2,500 objects and numerous paintings from the Old Masters, including 10 by El Greco, was inherited by his three children after his wife’s death in 1940.
With the onset of World War II and the persecution of the Herzogs and other Jews, the collection began to be dismantled. Some artworks were taken by the Nazis and Russia’s Red Army, others may have been stolen and some were seized by Hungary’s communist regime.
According to experts, Adolf Eichmann, who oversaw the deportation of over 400,000 Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz and other concentration camps, took some of the masterpieces for his own collection.
The art sought by the heirs is housed in Hungary’s National Gallery and several Budapest institutions – the Museum of Fine Arts, the Museum of Applied Arts and the University of Technology and Economics.
A 16th-century portrait by German painter and engraver Georg Pencz of businessman Sigismund Baldinger, which was restituted by Germany to Herzog’s heirs last year, was sold in July at a Christie’s auction for 5 million British pounds (then $8.56 million).
Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) – University of Iowa President Sally Mason is urging lawmakers to reject the proposed sale of a famous painting that is the centerpiece of the school’s art collection.
Mason told lawmakers in a written statement Wednesday donors have been questioning whether their gifts will be protected after the introduction of a bill that would require the school to sell the Jackson Pollock masterpiece titled Mural.
Mason noted that painting was donated by art dealer Peggy Guggenheim in 1951. She said scholarly works given to the school for caretaking cannot be replaced, and Iowa “will suffer a far greater long-term loss in the state’s image and quality of life than any immediate proceeds gained.”
A House panel nonetheless voted to support the sale of the painting, which is valued at $140 million.
Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
A first edition of ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ was among the items given to the U.S. National Slavery Museum, which has not come to fruition. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archives.
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. (AP) – Therbia Parker Sr. looked forward to the day he would walk inside the finished U.S. National Slavery Museum in Fredericksburg and see the artifacts he donated among the exhibits.
Parker, 62, and his wife, Marva, of Suffolk gave the museum leg and wrist shackles that once restrained slaves. They donated 19th-century newspaper articles and posters advertising slaves for sale. They handed over a first-edition Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Those were among 95 items the Parkers turned over to the museum in September 2004, acquisitions from years of visiting East Coast antique stores. Parker estimates the collective value of the artifacts, if they chose to sell them, would be about $75,000.
A deed of gift from the National Slavery Museum outlines the terms of the donation. If the museum ceases to exist or fails to become a reality under stated conditions, the gift reverts to the Parkers.
As the years passed and their artifacts were kept out of public view, Parker grew concerned.
Early in 2010, with no museum under construction, he tried to contact the museum’s leaders to learn where his donated items were being kept.
In a February 2010 e-mail to Parker, former National Slavery Museum Executive Director Vonita Foster said she had resigned her position, and was unaware of the status of the museum.
She referred Parker to the museum’s founder and chairman of its board of directors, former Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder. She gave him Wilder’s contact information at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he is an adjunct professor.
Parker said his attempts to reach Wilder by certified letter and phone in the past year were unsuccessful.
So when he saw news reports that the city of Fredericksburg was starting the process of selling the museum’s 38-acre property at the Celebrate Virginia Retail and Tourism complex to collect more than $147,000 in back taxes, unpaid since 2008, Parker decided to go public to find his collection.
“If they get their taxes back, I want my artifacts back,” Parker said.
He said he’s disappointed the museum has not come to fruition.
“Our hopes for the museum were heartfelt,” the Parkers wrote in a March 4, 2010, letter to Wilder. “The Black Memorabilia items in your possession were placed in your care in good faith.”
But to let a year pass without a response is unacceptable, Parker said.
Now he’s just angry, he said.
“I haven’t heard anything from them. Not a peep. Zilch. I’ve been totally ignored,” he said.
An e-mail sent to Wilder’s address at VCU this week inquiring about the Parkers’ artifacts was not answered.
Wilder answered the phone at his VCU office this week, but after a Free Lance-Star reporter identified herself, he said he was speaking on another line.
The call was immediately transferred to a receptionist, who took a message.
Parker is not the only donor trying to have a gift returned if it won’t be displayed in the museum.
Mae Tarver, 78, of Wadley, Ga., has been trying to reach museum officials about a piece of artwork her husband donated in 2008.
Willie Tarver, a Korean War veteran and retired mechanic known for creating concrete and metal folk art pieces, died of cancer in August. One of his pieces, Faces on the Wall, is on permanent display at an outdoor park in Atlanta built for the 1996 Olympics.
A friend of Tarver’s who collected his artwork heard about the museum and its search for exhibit materials.
Tarver decided to give the museum a piece depicting an old slave market in Louisville, Ga.
“He said, ‘This piece is one of my best pieces,’” Mae Tarver said. He was willing to donate it because he believed museum officials would take care of it, she said.
Tarver also kept documentation of the gift.
“We appreciate your interest and trust in the museum,” Wilder wrote in a Feb. 19, 2008, letter to Willie Tarver. “Your contribution is an asset to our collection.” Foster, the museum’s executive director at the time, also sent a thank-you letter that same month, saying Tarver would be invited to the museum opening.
“We kept waiting and waiting,” Mae Tarver said.
If the museum cannot display the piece as planned, she would like it returned so she can decide what to do with it, she said in an interview last week.
Cassandra Newby-Alexander, associate professor of history at Norfolk State University, said the Parkers’ donated pieces were part of an exhibit at the university several years ago, “Legacies of Slave Images: The Therbia and Marva Parker Collection.”
In addition to the shackles, the couple shared a number of commercial pieces from the Jim Crow era, such as coffee tins, cookie jars and salt and peppershakers portraying blacks with distorted, exaggerated features.
Newby-Alexander said she and others tried to discourage Parker from donating the pieces to the National Slavery Museum.
“None of us believed that Wilder was going to really do this museum, because the people he had leading the charge weren’t experienced in working with museums,” Newby-Alexander said.
But Parker was determined to share what he’d found with a wider audience, a sentiment she said she understands.
The reaction to the exhibit at Norfolk State was powerful, she said.
The shackles and collars collected by the couple are in good condition, which is rare for working farm materials, she said.
But students at Norfolk State had a strong response to seeing the commercial items. Several compared it to being slapped across the face, Newby-Alexander said.
Other museums would undoubtedly be interested in displaying the pieces to “make sure that the next generation of people don’t forget how vile this kind of image or these images were, and how they really hurt groups of people by playing to people’s fear, by playing to their stereotypes,” Newby-Alexander said.
She is disappointed the museum has failed to honor its contract.
“It shouldn’t be a messy legal battle,” she said.
Kym Rice, director of the museum studies program at George Washington University in Washington, said a deed of gift signed by the donor and museum ultimately determines whether artifacts can be returned.
Deeds of gift are “fairly airtight,” Rice said. “Once the donor has signed off on a deed of a gift, the museum is the owner of the objects, and they really can’t return them to the donor, and in many cases the donors have taken tax write-offs because of the gifts, so it’s a complicated IRS issue, as well.”
It is rare for a museum to include a clause in the deed saying a donor can reclaim the gift, she said.
“That’s so unusual,” Rice said. “No museum would typically do that.”
By including such a clause, the institution leaves itself open to questions about whether it is fulfilling the donor’s wishes, Rice said.
Occasionally, museums are founded but do not survive in a difficult economy and go out of business, Rice said.
Since most deeds of gift do not contain a return clause, these museums generally keep donated items and transfer them to an appropriate venue, Rice said.
In the case of the National Slavery Museum, that could be the Virginia Historical Society or another museum about slavery, Rice said.
Such a transfer would need to be communicated to donors, she said. “The museum has a legal obligation to be transparent and above-aboard,” Rice said.
But since it appears there was a provision for the return of artifacts donated to the National Slavery Museum, that complicates the situation, Rice said. “This sounds to me like a lawsuit in the making,” she said.
Artifacts given to museums are often treasured family heirlooms, and donors care deeply about the destination of their gift, she said.
“Hopefully the objects are somewhere in a safe place and they’re packed up and waiting,” Rice said.
Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-ES-02-16-11 2020EST
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
A first edition of ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ was among the items given to the U.S. National Slavery Museum, which has not come to fruition. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archives.
19th-century beveled Italian mirror with tortoise cushion and a decorative pressed brass surround. Image courtesy of Morton Kuehnert Auctioneers & Appraisers. HOUSTON – Morton Kuehnert Auctioneers & Appraisers’ Sunday, Feb. 27, Specialty Auction will feature European and American antique furniture, paintings and decorative objects.
Bidding will begin at 1 p.m. Central and is open to the public. Also available are absentee bids, phone bids and online live bidding through LiveAuctioneers.
Examples of the unique pieces sure to captivate bidders from around the world are Lot 69, a 19th-century French bronze doré and ebonized portico mantel clock from the Louis Philippe period, estimated at $600-$900; Lot 33, a 19th-century six-piece silver carving set with stag horn handles, hallmarked London, 1881, by Francis Higgin, estimated at $1,500-$2,500; and Lot 76, a 19th-century beveled Italian mirror with tortoise cushion and a decorative pressed brass surround, estimated at $700-$1,000.
Lot 13, a Russian diamond, gilded silver and nephrite jade letter opener, is estimated at $1,800-$2,400. Lot 85, a Louis XV Vernis Martin 19th-century commode, is estimated at $2,200-$3,200 and Lot 74, an early 19th-century Dutch Baroque inlaid walnut vitrine, is estimated at $5,000-$6,000.
Lot 39 is a real conversation piece. It is a 19th-century cast-iron French fireplace with three pairs of tiles (with matching swan scenes) and tortoise shell inlay, estimated at $500-$800. Lot 31, a late 18th-century oil on canvas, Virgen de Orcopiña, 1786, after Ambrosio Villarroel, is estimated at $5,000-$7,000. Lot 5, an opulent American Brilliant cut glass punch bowl, probably O’Connor for Dorflinger, last quarter 19th century, is estimated at $3,000-$4,000.
Examples of 20th-century pieces include Lot 93, a monoprint by German-American artist Friedel Dzubas, entitled GTW-F.D._05-#15, 1987, estimated at $2,500-$4,500 and a Dan Christensen acrylic on canvas, entitled Corinth, 1975, estimated at $10,000-$12,000.
Lot 91, a pair of Classical-style limestone pilasters, 121 inches x 12 1/4 inches x 16 inches (307.3 x 31.1 x 40.6 cm) is estimated at $2.500-$3,500 and Lot 32, a Lalique Daydream bowl inscribed “Lalique France 10244,” is estimated at $1,200-$1,400.
For more information, contact Lindsay Davis at 713-827-7835 or ldavis@mortonkuehnert.com and visit the website at www.mortonkuehnert.com.
A.B. Levy Antiques. Image courtesy of the Original Miami Beach Antique Show. Last week I was an exhibitor at The Original Miami Beach Antique Show. This was their 50th year putting together one of the biggest antique shows in this country.There are 800 exhibitors from around the globe and thousands of buyers walking through the doors daily.
I’ve had the pleasure of exhibiting at the show for about 13 years, and each year the quality of merchandise on exhibit seems to keep getting better.
This is the kind of show you can find just about anything your heart desires. If you are looking for 18th-century furniture, you’ll find it. Should you dream of having a 5-carat canary diamond – or even one in pink – they have it. Perhaps a Tiffany window, no problem! The show offers row after row of drool-worthy antiques.
Often dealers claim the climate of the show sets the pace for how well the business will be for the rest of the year. If that theory holds true, we’ll see strong numbers at auctions, and many sales at shops as the energy this year was very high, and the shoppers were there to spend their money.
Every year the show does something for charity, and they enlist the help of the dealers to donate items for the cause they choose. This year it was for the Make a Wish Foundation Southern Florida. The Miami Beach Show and Make a Wish will help send a special 7-year-old girl and her family to Disney World.
In past years the show took up three exhibition halls. This year we were down to two, and I think it enhanced dealer’s sales greatly. While there is nothing wrong with a big show, it can become daunting to try to see it all in a few days, and I also think it makes it a bit challenging for some buyers to decide on what item(s) to take buy.
We had seen an increase over the last few years of jewelry exhibitors. And while jewelry is a strong seller during the show, I think it was smart of management to cut back on the number of jewelry dealers in the show.
Overall, the feedback I received from other dealers/friends on the floor was very positive. Sales were strong, many of their longtime customers came, and they were pleased. I will say early dealer buying seemed weak. Many of the dealers complained there wasn’t much to be found, and past shows, many dealers will tell you, the dealer-to-dealer sales are usually very strong.
If there isn’t enough to see and buy at the show, there is always the outdoor flea market that runs a good portion of Lincoln Road that is open on the first Sunday of every month. Many of the dealers head over there before making their way to the show. There are always reports of great finds at the market, that get put on display in dealers’ booths later that day. This year I found a beautiful vintage Pucci button-down shirt and denim jacket. My friend, whom I shared a booth with, bought a vintage barber’s pole, which worked. It sold within an hour of being placed in our booth.
Mark your calendar for the show dates next year: Feb 2-5, 2012. It’s certainly a show you won’t want to miss.
For more information, please visit: http://www.originalmiamibeachantiqueshow.com/
ADDITIONAL IMAGES OF NOTE
A.B. Levy Antiques. Image courtesy of the Original Miami Beach Antique Show.Roberts Antiques. Image courtesy of the Original Miami Beach Antique Show.Ophir Gallery. Image courtesy of the Original Miami Beach Antique Show.
LONDON and NEW YORK – Both Bloomberg News and The Wall Street Journal are reporting that Andy Warhol’s 1967 Self-Portrait, auctioned by Christie’s London on Feb. 23, was purchased by art dealer Larry Gagosian.
The striking, 6-foot-square red and white depiction of Warhol in a thoughtful pose, with splayed fingers pressed against the front of his face, was purchased by Gagosian for $17,441,892. Reportedly, Gagosian was speaking to a client on his cell phone while bidding in the room.
One of the underbidders vying against Gagosian was Jose Mugrabi, a Jerusalem-born textiles importer who is said to own the world’s largest collection of Warhol paintings.
Gagosian, owner of the Gagosian Gallery chain of art galleries, got his start in business by selling posters near the campus of UCLA in Los Angeles. In the early 1980s he developed his business rapidly by exploiting the possibilities of reselling works of art by blue-chip modern and contemporary artists, earning the nickname “Go-Go” in the process.
PAAM’s Hawthorne Gallery. Image courtesy of Provinetown Art Association and Museum. PROVINCETOWN, Mass. – Provincetown Art Association and Museum has announced its newest community-oriented, educational offering Gallery Conversations, a monthly free event based around exhibitions. This series brings together curators, artists, collectors and visitors to discuss artwork and explore each exhibition.
The first discussion took place with the 2010-2011 visual fellows from the Fine Arts Work Center on Feb. 17. PAAM is committed to working together with other local organizations, partnering annually with the Fine Arts Work Center to provide an exhibition to the visual fellows.
In February, PAAM hosts a panel on juried exhibitions. The jurying process is often one of mystery and sometimes frustration. “Why didn’t my piece make it? They picked that one?” can often be heard after jurying has occurred. Juror James Veatch, chair of the UMass Dartmouth Art Department, and PAAM Executive Director Chris McCarthy will host this discussion on Saturday, Feb. 26, at 12:30 p.m. This is in conjunction with the Members’ Juried Exhibition on view Feb. 25-April 17.
Curator Mike Wright and the three Mid-Career artists Karen Cappotto, Liz Carney and Megan Hinton will discuss their exhibition “Beyond Surface” on Thursday, March 17, at 6:30 p.m. Come weigh in on what it means to be at your mid-career point and see how these artists worked together in creating their exhibition. In conjunction with their exhibition Beyond Surface on view March 11-April 24.
Curators Robert Henry and Selina Trieff will join artist and educator Robert Rindler to discuss his site specific installation on Thursday, April 28, 6:30 p.m. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear more about their collaboration, the installed pieces, the desire to collect and what each of them thinks about the dialogue that transpired in the process of realizing it all. In conjunction with the exhibition Robert Rindler: “Recycling Vernacular, Collecting Sorting Illuminating, Moment Place Object, A Site Specific Installation” on view April 15-May 29.
The last in the series is an evening with artist and collector John Raimondi, in conjunction with the exhibition about his collection on Thursday, May 12, 6:30 p.m. The exhibition is on view April 22-June 19.
Since the 1920s the Provincetown Art Association and Museum has participated in outer Cape Cod’s tradition of offering instruction and studio art classes to visitors and members of our community. In 1982 PAAM’s educational mission was furthered when the Museum School at PAAM was officially founded, with an onsite studio classroom. Modeled after the Art Students League of New York, the Museum School has provided students of all levels the opportunity to work with local, professional artists in a variety of settings and media-working en plein air and in the traditional, studio classroom environment.
PAAM was renovated in 2003-05, creating greatly improved studios for the school, which are naturally lit with skylights, ventilated and handicapped accessible. The space includes a drawing studio, painting studio with movable wall, and a nontoxic print studio featuring three printing presses. In 2009, the school was named to honor the late Lillian Orlowsky and William Freed, who were artists, teachers, and active members of PAAM and the Provincetown arts community for over 50 years.
Over the past 29 years, programming has evolved to year-round offerings, featuring four months of summer classes, as well as fall and spring workshops. Media covered includes art history, drawing, film, mixed media, painting, photography, printmaking and sculpture.
To deepen participation in our artistic community, students are invited to become members of PAAM. As PAAM continues its commitment to support and represent contemporary artists, each new artist/member joins a long roster of distinguished American artists who have studied, taught, and exhibited at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum over the last century.
Provincetown Art Association and Museum is located at 460 Commercial St., Provincetown, MA 02657. Visit the website at www.paam.org or phone: 508-487-1750.
Zevs, Liquidated CBS, Liquitex on canvas, 48 inches square, New York 2010. Image courtesy of De Buck Gallery.
NEW YORK – De Buck Gallery has announced its grand-opening show, which will run from Feb. 24 through April 7, will feature the French graffiti artist Zevs (pronounced “Zeus). Titled “Liquidated Version,” the show’s theme interweaves unconventional street art methods, with a pointed critique on high finance. Zevs artworks are created both on canvas and sculpture.
Zevs, who now divides his time between New York and Zurich, began as a graffiti artist in Paris in the 1990s. He acquired his pseudonym from a Parisian metro train named “Zevs” that almost hit him. Drawing on his namesake’s mythological attributes, Zevs began to view the street and the city as his canvas and his kingdom.
Zevs’ body of work involves performances at its core, beginning with a series of performances titled “Visual Attack,” wherein the artist attacked several public advertisements, leaving them with artistic bulletholes and trails of blood.
His next series of performances, “Visual Kidnapping,” built further on Zevs’ exploration of brands, advertising and consumer culture by literally kidnapping images from advertisements, emblazing the message “PAY NOW” on the victimized ad.
The last series, “Liquidated Logos,” demonstrated Zevs’ growth in his body of work, as he “liquidated” the familiar logos of worldwide companies and made them his own. Zevs’ experimentation with the pervasive symbols of pop culture and consumerism has proven to be a rich discussion in the art world and beyond.
In his first New York solo exhibition, Liquidated Version, Zevs presents a new body of work using the “liquidation” process for which he is known, as well as new conceptual techniques, to confront the financial crisis head on. By targeting the emblematic logos of financial leaders, Zevs questions not only the stability of the institutions, but also their branding strength as visual commodities.
Drawing on Alfred Hitchcock’s famous thrillers, The Birds and Psycho, and Breton Ellis Easton’s American Psycho, Zevs uses looming birds, bloody shower curtains and pristine hatchets to add an eerie element of foreboding and impending doom. Moody and psychological, Liquidated Version fills the space with a fresh look at the “greed is good” theme and the confusion between surface and substance of American high finance.
Gallery De Buck is located at 511 25th St., Suite 502, New York, NY 10001. For additional information on the Zevs exhibition, call 212-255-5735 or visit Gallery De Buck online at www.gallerydebuck.com
The 1987 Paul Verhoeven film ‘RoboCop’ spawned two sequels. The cyborg police officer is the subject of this movie poster promoting the 1990 release ‘RoboCop 2.’ Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archives and Stephen Bennet Auctions. DETROIT (AP) – A group working to build a statue in Detroit of the fictional crime-fighting cyborg RoboCop says it has reached its fundraising goal of $50,000.
Brandon Walley of Imagination Station said Wednesday he’s “very positive” the sculpture will become a reality and could be erected on land the nonprofit owns near the hulking, abandoned Michigan Central train depot in southwest Detroit.
The 1987 science fiction movie was set in a futuristic Detroit.
Meanwhile, Mayor Dave Bing remains skeptical of the idea, telling The Associated Press he doesn’t “see where we get a lot of value” out of immortalizing the alloy-encased cyborg from the 1987 science fiction flick.
The issue got its start Feb. 7 when Bing’s social media manager responded to a query on Twitter about it.
Since then, it’s become a top trending topic on a number of websites.
Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
AP-CS-02-16-11 1252EST
ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE
The 1987 Paul Verhoeven film ‘RoboCop’ spawned two sequels. The cyborg police officer is the subject of this movie poster promoting the 1990 release ‘RoboCop 2.’ Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archives and Stephen Bennet Auctions.
