FBI provides new information regarding the 1990 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art heist

BOSTON (AFP).- The FBI said Monday that they finally know who conducted a daring art heist in Boston exactly 23 years ago — but the thieves can no longer be prosecuted. For two decades, the 1990 theft of 13 works of art from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, including rare paintings by Rembrandt and Vermeer, has been one of America’s greatest unsolved crimes. Now, says the FBI’s Boston chief Richard DesLauriers, agents “confirmed the identity of those who entered the museum and [...]

On long-term loan from a private New York collection, Rembrandt visits the Brooklyn Museum

BROOKLYN, NY.- An installation of six seventeenth-century Dutch portraits and genre scenes, including two paintings by Rembrandt van Rijn, went on view today in the Brooklyn Museum’s European paintings gallery in the Beaux-Arts Court. The six paintings are on long-term loan from a private New York collection. The Rembrandts, Self-Portrait with Shaded Eyes (1634) and Portrait of Anthonie Coopal (1635), were both painted in Amsterdam when the artist was in his late twenties. Self-Portrait with Shaded Eyes was hidden for centuries under [...]

Sotheby’s to present Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Paintings Spring Sale on 6 April

HONG KONG.- Sotheby’s Hong Kong will present its Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Paintings Spring Sale 2013 on 6 April at Hall 5, Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. Leading the sale is an exceptional selection of Modern masterpieces with impeccable provenance, many of which come from distinguished private collections and are completely fresh to the market. For collectors looking for more avant-garde art, an array of cutting-edge works by the most lauded contemporary artists of the region including Ronald Ventura, I [...]

Suicide, Van Gogh’s ear obsessed teenage Picasso, show at the Courtauld Gallery reveals

LONDON (BLOOMBERG).- On February 17, 1901, a young Spanish poet and close friend of Pablo Picasso’s named Carles Casagemas invited several people to a Paris restaurant. After dinner he pulled out a gun, fired at one of his guests — a model with whom he was in love — then, having missed her, shot himself. A splendid small exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery, “Becoming Picasso: Paris 1901” raises an intriguing question: What would we think if had it not been the poet [...]

A private collection of important ceramics by Pablo Picasso to be offered at Sotheby’s London

LONDON.- Over 100 important ceramics by Pablo Picasso from a private collection will be auctioned in Sotheby’s Bond Street salesroom on 19 March 2013. Picasso constantly explored opportunities to break creative boundaries and challenge himself in innovative ways. A chance encounter with the owners of the renowned Madoura pottery in Vallauris, Southern France in 1946, when the artist was 64 years of age, was the starting point for his exploration of a whole new creative medium. It sparked a fascination with ceramics that [...]

Picasso sells; Kanye West, Ronald Lauder and Sheikh Saud al Thani browse $5.2 billion fair

HELVOIRT (BLOOMBERG).- A Picasso painting was among early sales as Ronald Lauder, Kanye West and Sheikh Saud al Thani were among VIPs browsing the world’s biggest art and antiques fair. The U.S. businessman, musician and Qatari prince were in the Netherlands to see 4 billion euros ($5.2 billion) of museum- quality artworks and jewelry. Pablo Picasso’s 1964 oil-on-canvas “Homme au Chapeau” was bought by a European collector for $8 million from the New York-based dealer Christophe van de Weghe, one of 265 [...]

L’Art en guerre, France 1938-1947: From Picasso to Dubuffet opens at the Guggenheim Bilbao

BILBAO.- Organized by the Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris-Musées and the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, L’Art en guerre, France 1938-1947: From Picasso to Dubuffet shows how, in the ominous and oppressive context of Nazi-occupied France during World War II, the artists of the day rebelled against official slogans by coming up with novel aesthetic solutions that changed the content of art. More than 500 works by approximately one hundred artists, including documents, photographs and films brought to light here [...]

Credit Suisse to donate Trumbull’s Portrait of Alexander Hamilton to Crystal Bridges and Met

BENTONVILLE, ARK.- An iconic full-length portrait by the celebrated Revolutionary-era painter John Trumbull of Alexander Hamilton, then Secretary of the Treasury under President George Washington, will join the permanent collections of both Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, thanks to a gift from the painting’s owner, the global wealth manager and investment bank Credit Suisse. Each institution will own a half share of Portrait of Alexander Hamilton (1792), which is currently on view at Crystal Bridges and [...]

Museum-kueppersmuehle in Duisburg presents Gilbert & George’s “London Pictures”

DUISBURG.- Completed in 2011, “London Pictures” is the title of the cycle created by the London-based artists Gilbert & George, to which the eponymous exhibition in the MKM from March 20, 2013, is dedicated. Taking as their theme the countless newsagent posters collected by the artists themselves over a period of six years, the artists compile a detailed inventory of quotidian human behaviour, which they then submit to their hallmark humanistic gaze, and in so doing, furnish their own perspective on the psycho-social [...]

Billionaires lured to TEFAF Maastricht 2013 by ‘reasonably priced’ $14 million Velazquez

HELVOIRT (BLOOMBERG).- A painting by Velazquez priced at a “reasonable” $14 million is among works on show at the world’s biggest art and antiques fair, which opens to VIPs today. The head-and-shoulders portrait of a bearded man is being offered for sale by the New York-based dealer Otto Naumann, one of 265 exhibitors at the 26th edition of the European Fine Art Fair, Tefaf, in the Netherlands. The 10-day annual event in a conference center on the outskirts of Maastricht presents 4 [...]

Sotheby’s Hong Kong presents Fine Chinese Paintings Spring Sale on 5 April

HONG KONG.- Sotheby’s Hong Kong will present its Fine Chinese Paintings Spring Sale 2013 on 5 April at Hall 5, Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. This sale will feature exquisite paintings executed at different stages of the artistic careers of such modern Chinese artists as Zhang Daqian, Qi Baishi, Huang Binhong, Wu Changshuo, Lin Fengmian, etc., many of which amassed from prestigious collections and are fresh to the market. Offering over 300 lots, the sale is expected to fetch in excess [...]

Serbian police find Rembrandt stolen in 2006, painting already been stolen 10 years earlier

BELGRADE (AFP).- Serbian police have recovered a painting by 17th-century Dutch master Rembrandt that was stolen in 2006, and arrested four people, a spokeswoman said on Tuesday. Rembrandt’s “Portrait of the Father” was found on Monday during a police operation in Sremska Mitrovica, some 50 kilometres (31 miles) west of Belgrade, the spokeswoman told AFP. It was stolen from a museum in the northern town of Novi Sad, 70 kilometres from the capital, with three other works. Four people were arrested during [...]

First retrospective of works by painter George Bellows opens at the Royal Academy of Arts

LONDON.- George Bellows (1882-1925): Modern American Life at the Royal Academy of Arts will be the first retrospective of works by American realist painter George Bellows to be held in the UK. When Bellows died at age forty-two, he was considered one of the greatest artists in America. His fascination with New York’s gritty urban landscape, its technological marvels and the diversity of its inhabitants, made him both an artist of the modern city and an insightful observer of the dynamic and challenging [...]

First monographic exhibition on one of the most exquisite painters in 17th-century Europe opens at the Prado

MADRID.- The Museo del Prado presents the first monographic exhibition on one of the most exquisite painters in 17th-century Europe: Juan Fernández El Labrador, who was active in Madrid between 1630 and 1636. El Labrador is one of the least known artists working in this genre and within the history of Spanish Baroque painting. While El Labrador’s paintings have previously been included in survey exhibitions on the still life, this is the first time that almost all his oeuvre has been brought [...]

Sotheby’s to sell beach scene by Spanish painter Joaquín Sorolla, to be offered at auction for the first time

LONDON.- Sotheby’s will offer Niños en la playa by Spanish painter Joaquín Sorolla, in a sale of 19th Century European Paintings in London on 23 May 2013. Its appearance on the market follows the November 2012 sale of the artist’s Pescadores valencianos, which achieved £3,737,250, at Sotheby’s, London, an auction record for Sorolla. Niños en la playa, estimated at £1,800,000-2,500,000*, has been in the artist’s family since the late 50s. It appears at auction for the first time and will spearhead a [...]