COLUMBUS, OH (AP).- The oddball rock group Devo has donated one of the red conical hats from its hit video “Whip It” to an Ohio museum. The Ohio Historical Society says it has received a small collection of artifacts from the band and its official archivist. The items include stickers, T-shirts, costumes and a flower pot-style hat worn in the band’s memorable 1980 video. Three of the band’s founding members grew up in Akron and met at Kent State University in the 1970s. The group’s name came from a theory the human race is in a process of devolution, which members read about in an anti-Darwinism pamphlet. The band most recently performed in Ohio in 2008 for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. An annual DEVOtional convention is held in Cleveland.
MoMA Offers Extended Evening Hours for Final Weekend of Tim Burton Exhibition
NEW YORK, NY.- For the final days of the exhibition Tim Burton, which closes on Monday, April 26, The Museum of Modern Art will offer extended hours to the public on Thursday, April 22, Saturday, April 24, and Sunday, April 25. On those dates, the entire Museum will remain open until 8:45 p.m., offering visitors additional opportunities to see Tim Burton and other special exhibitions, including William Kentridge: Five Themes, Picasso: Themes and Variations, and Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Modern Century (opening April 11). The exhibition Marina Abramović: The Artist is Present will close at 5:30 p.m. on those dates. The Museum will maintain its regular hours, 10:30 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., on Friday, April 23 (including Target Free Friday Night from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m.). Timed entry tickets for Tim Burton are required for the remainder of its run, except for MoMA members, who may enter the exhibition at any time upon presenting a valid membership card. Timed tickets are free with re
Museums Celebrate Art Fund Prize Nomination with Love Your Museum Weekend
LONDON.- Museums and galleries long-listed for the Art Fund Prize will be hosting special events over Love Your Museum Weekend, which takes on Saturday 10 – Sunday 11 April. Helping Henry VIII with his wedding preparations, Raku firing and playing virological cluedo are just some of the activities and events planned for Love Your Museum Weekend 2010 The weekend will be hosted by institutions nominated for this year’s Art Fund Prize for museums and galleries, an award for excellence and innovation in UK museums. On Saturday 10 April at 11.30am, for the very first time, six of the long-listed institutions will embark on a national simultaneous ‘I love my museum’ cheer. Blists Hill Victorian Town, Great North Museum: Hancock, Hampton Court Palace, The Leach Pottery, Towner and Ulster Museum will all be encouraging members of the public to take part and show their support by shouting the loudest in favour of their museum’s bid for the £100,000 prize. Throughout
Second Show for Jeff Charbonneau & Eliza French at Robert Berman Gallery
SANTA MONICA, CA.- Robert Berman Gallery presents Playground the second solo exhibition of photographs by Los Angeles based collaborating photographers, Jeff Charbonneau & Eliza French on view April 3, 2010 through May 5, 2010. As the artists’ first foray into the world of living geometry, the photographs of Playground play with primary shapes and their literal and symbolic relationship to human subjects and the natural world. In these highly-designed panoramic pictures, Charbonneau and French stray away from the emotionally driven narrative that characterized their previous series, Massillon, to create visual poetry through experiments with proportion, distance, and repetition. Each picture begins with the artists’ intervention into a found landscape or surface through the decisive placement of objects, such as large monochromatic spheres. From there, a scenario is performed which transforms the shap
Mary Schneider Enriquez Appointed as Harvard Art Museum Curator
CAMBRIDGE, MA.- The Harvard Art Museum announces the appointment of Mary Schneider Enriquez as Houghton Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art in the museum’s Department of Modern and Contemporary Art, effective April 5, 2010. Schneider Enriquez has been Latin American art advisor to the Art Museum since 2002, working with the museum’s director and curatorial staff to identify collection and programmatic opportunities in Latin American art. She brings a long history of curatorial, academic, and administrative experience to this position, including undergraduate teaching, independent curatorial and advisory work for institutions across the U.S., art criticism, and fundraising. “I am pleased to welcome Mary to our staff,” said Thomas W. Lentz, Elizabeth and John Moors Cabot Director of the Harvard Art Museum. “With her long and varied background in the art world, especially in Latin America, and a
Claude Rutault ‘Ponctualite’ at Galerie Guy Ledune
BRUSSELS.- Through June 26, 2010, the Gallery Guy Ledune/Black Box shows the last work of the French artist Claude Rutault. This exceptional exhibition for several reasons includes the actualization of the definitions/methods in new postures and associations: • d/m n° 7, dépendances et indépendances limites 4, from 1974, presents two actualizations face à face d/m 42 and 43 from 1976; one in its literal version, the other interpreting its presentation with the d/m 254 from 1994, toiles contres le mur, • d/m n°21, figures, from 1975, accompanied by a subtitle… ces toiles qui traversent… associates the d/m 1bis, repeindre, from 1997, the d/m 95 suite et ensuite, from 1978 and the d/m 264 promenades, from 1995, • or the juxtaposition of the first d/m in 1973, fabrique à l’unité, the last in 1997, the d/m 274, ce qu’il ne faut plus faire, and will be held on the two stages of space (600m2). Th
Committee Shares Vision for UI Museum of Art; Search Under Way for Director
IOWA CITY, IA.- Replacing the University of Iowa Museum of Art (UIMA) must be a top priority so the entire permanent art collection can return to the UI, according to a report by the UI Museum of Art Envisioning Committee. The report also recommends that the new museum enhance the UI’s academic and research mission by making its collection and expertise accessible to faculty and students across the disciplines, as well as to Iowans. President Sally Mason, who requested the report, said she would carefully review the recommendations before determining next steps. The report is available online at http://uima.uiowa.edu/assets/UIMA-Final-Report.pdf. Meanwhile, a national search is under way for a Museum of Art director who will help plan and begin major fundraising for the new facility. “The envisioning
André Butzer’s Second New York Show Opens at Metro Pictures
NEW YORK, NY.- André Butzer’s second New York show at Metro Pictures “Nicht fürchten! Don´t be scared!” features a group of new, closely related works that focus on the “formal event” of painting. By emphasizing shapes and fields of color, these works possess a less linear take on the usual motifs in his work—colorful hybrids of abstraction and cartoon figuration featuring a family of characters inspired by art history, comics, politics and animation. Both sinister and amusing, these elegant compositions balance large, vaguely recognizable biomorphic forms within chaotic, multicolored backgrounds or heavily textured monochromatic fields. “Blue Smurf” presents the most identifiable image in the exhibition with the cartoon character embedded in a complex field of thick paint—the Smurf’s wry smile acknowledges his victory over abstraction. In the reductive “Entombment of Winnie
Hirshhorn Moves into the Next Phase of Design for Inflatable Pavillion
WASHINGTON, DC.- The Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden received supportive comments from the National Capital Planning Commission for a proposed seasonal inflatable pavilion to the museum’s plaza. Architectural firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s design for the structure was reviewed at the concept stage. The NCPC voted to approve executive director Marcel C. Acosta’s recommendation of the project. To date, the Hirshhorn Museum has received encouragement to proceed with the development of this project by both the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts and the NCPC. In a written recommendation, Acosta states, “…the semi-annual transformation of the museum’s central courtyard will create an exciting and unanticipated attraction along the National Mall…” The Commission recommends that the Hirshhorn continue to develop designs for two versions of the inflatable pavilion
Rarely Seen Picasso Could Fetch $80 Million at Auction
NEW YORK (REUTERS).- One of the most valuable private art collections ever offered at auction, led by an $80 million Picasso, will be sold in May in a sign that the art market might soon flirt with the record levels seen before the financial crisis struck in 2008. The sale of more than 50 works at Christie’s from the estate of Mrs. Sidney Brody, a Los Angeles philanthropist who died in November, is conservatively estimated to sell for more than $150 million. It is one of two prestigious collections being handled by Christie’s. The other collection includes 100 works owned by late best-selling writer and director, Michael Crichton. “This is one of the more remarkable collections of its kind in this country,” Christopher Burge, Christie’s International honorary chairman said as the works