Arts and Culture Headlines

Picasso painting sold at auction for a world record of $106.5 million

On Picasso’s “Nude, Green Leaves and Bust”:

Picasso Sells at Christie’s for $106.5 Million, a Record for a Work of Art Sold at Auction (ArtDaily) A 1932 Pablo Picasso painting of his mistress has sold for $106.5 million, a world record price for any work of art at auction.

Picasso painting sets world record price at auction (The Guardian) 1932 canvas entitled Nude, Green Leaves and Bust sold for $106m (£70m) at Christie’s in New York, a record for a work of art sold at auction

Picasso painting sold at auction for a world record of $106.5 million (LATimes) Expectations were high, and expectations were met. On Tuesday night Christie’s New York sold Pablo Picasso’s bold 1932 portrait of his lover Marie-Thérèse Walter, “Nude, Green Leaves and Bust,” for $106.5 million, making it the most expensive artwork ever sold at auction.

The Spring Auctions begin tonight with the highly anticipated sale of Picasso’s ‘Nude, Green Leaves, and Bust’ (ArtObserved) The spring auctions in New York, which form the bellwether of the art market, get under way tonight with the Impressionist and modern art sale at Christie’s. Over the next two weeks, Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips de Pury & Co are offering up to $1.2 billion of Impressionist, modern and contemporary art – twice as much as they sold last May.

On Turner Prize:

Turner Prize 2010 shortlist in pictures (Telegraph)

Turner prize 2010: a shortlist that is half-baked (The Guardian) Wot, no Banksy? There was some gossip before the announcement of this year’s Turner prize shortlist that the street artist who comically portrayed his own cultural milieu this year in his film Exit Through the Gift Shop might make the grade. Given that, according to Tate Britain’s director Penelope Curtis, no artist turned the nomination down, perhaps the judges never seriously considered him.

Turner Prize has grown up, says head judge (Independent) The sensation in this year’s Turner Prize shortlist is that there is no sensation. Four artists shortlisted for this year’s most prestigious arts prize were announced yesterday with a promise from the chair of judges that the lack of controversy in their selection meant that the traditionally headline-grabbing contest had finally grown up.

Turner prize shortlist includes painter who imagines death of Dr David Kelly (The Guardian) The death of Dr David Kelly imagined in paint, a haunting Scottish lament heard beneath the bridges of the Clyde and a history of the present told as if by a voyager on the Soviet space station in 2103 – all these are works by the artists on a lyrical, melancholic, even elegiac shortlist for the 2010 Turner prize.

Van Gogh Masterpiece Travels to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Other Headlines:

Van Gogh Masterpiece Travels to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (ArtDaily) Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but for Vincent van Gogh, it was a means of self education for the artist in the 1880s, who copied numerous works by Jean-François Millet to teach himself how to draw and paint. The visual dialogue that ensued between master and student is the focus of Visiting Masterpieces, an ongoing series at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), which showcases great art from museums and private collections around the world within the context of the MFA’s encyclopedic collection.

Naked volunteers pay homage to LS Lowry (Telegraph) Volunteers posed for Spencer Tunick, the American artist, in a park in Salford as he aimed to reflect the work of LS Lowry in a large-scale installation. Naked figures, male and female, young and old, spread out across Peel Park as Tunick gave them instructions through a loudspeaker.

World Expo 2010 Opens in Shanghai (ArtInfo) The wait is over: the World Expo 2010 opened last weekend, starting with a gala performance and fireworks on Friday evening, followed by the Expo site’s opening on May 1.

Matisse’s Two Nudes, Two Different Prices (Art in America) Since the fall of 2008, the market for Impressionist and Modern art has thrived amidst a general decline in the greater market for fine art, especially contemporary art. And although contemporary art has begun to show signs of a recovery in emerging markets like China and is poised to see major sales next week at Christie’s and Sotheby’s, tonight and tomorrow evening will witness a major test of whether Impressionist and Modern art can continue to generate strong demand.

Modern Masters: why modern art is everywhere (Telegraph) Ahead of his new BBC One television series Modern Masters, Alastair Sooke explains how Matisse, Picasso, Dali and Warhol still shape the world we live in.

The Carnival Comes to Deitch for Shepard Fairey’s Opening (ArtInfo) Gallerist and MOCA director-to-be Jeffrey Deitch held his final public opening in New York on Saturday evening, attracting a hulking crowd of celebrities, artists, and assorted hangers-on to his Wooster Street gallery for Shepard Fairey’s “May Day” show.

Hype to Death, Death to Hype: Banksy’s “Exit Through the Gift Shop” (Hyperallergic) Street art enthusiasts seem to have a thing for destructive fanaticism, but I’m not sure they realize how destructive it can be. They exuberantly consume the latest street artworks like hungry piranhas, hyping the artist and his products until there’s nothing left but an embarrassing skeleton.

On The Web, New Conceptual Art (NPR) Commentator Andrei Codrescu says the real conceptual artists are working on the Web now. He compares what is being done online favorably with the best museum pieces that went up and then were dismantled.