Pitfalls Exposed In The Met’s Indigenous Art Collection
New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has not had a good year. The Manhattan District Attorney’s office and third-party investigators have found that many works in their antiquities collection were previously stolen or looted from their places of origin. I … More…
Turner: The Father Of Modern Art
Joseph Mallord William Turner is probably one of the most beloved of Britain’s artists. He created works of art which are now recognizable symbols of the British artistic tradition, as well as pioneered techniques that would become the basis of … More…
Bernini At The Airport
Fiumicino is a small town located about 45 minutes west of the center of Rome. To Romans, Fiumicino means one of two things: the beach or the airport. The Leonardo da Vinci Airport in Fiumicino is where nearly 30 million … More…
Vanity License Plate Sets Record
Did you hear about the guy who just spent Dh55 million ($15 million to you and me) on a license plate in Dubai? I mean, talk about a vanity license plate! The license plate was offered during a charity auction … More…
The Laziest Fakes: Goya & Velázquez Forgeries Seized In Spain
In Spain, the Historic Heritage division of Valencia’s regional police seized five paintings said to be forgeries being passed off as originals by the Spanish masters Diego Velázquez and Francisco de Goya. The suspects involved attempted to sell the works … More…
The Orlando Basquiats: A Year In The Making
Last year, the FBI raided the Orlando Museum of Art (OMA), confiscating 25 alleged forgeries of works by Jean-Michel Basquiat. Since then, the OMA’s board of trustees has fired its chairwoman Cynthia Brumback and the museum director Aaron de Groft, … More…
The FBI’s New Art App
In popular culture, many in the United States and beyond think of federal law enforcement agencies like the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as shadowy organizations watching everything we do. In the eyes of many, they often catch criminals before … More…
Roy Lichtenstein: Pioneer Or Plagiarist?
Roy Lichtenstein became one of the most prominent names in American pop art in the 1960s, entering the broader cultural consciousness through his paintings resembling comic strips from pulp magazines and noir serials. Today works like Whaam! and Masterpiece are some of the most … More…
Sotheby’s Paris Impressionniste & Moderne
On Wednesday April 19th, Sotheby’s Paris hosted a short impressionist and modern art evening sale. The auction consisted of twenty-one lots that took about an hour to get through, mainly made up of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century paintings and … More…