kottke.org posts about art
Yesterday, the FBI announced major advances in solving the biggest art heist in history. The break in occurred at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990 when a night watchman opened the door to men dressed as police. Works by Vermeer, Rembrandt, Degas, and Manet valued at over $500M were taken and have not been seen since.
“The FBI believes with a high degree of confidence in the years after the theft the art was transported to Connecticut and the Philadelphia region and some of the art was taken to Philadelphia where it was offered for sale by those responsible for the theft. With that confidence, we have identified the thieves, who are members of a criminal organization with a base in the mid-Atlantic states and New England,” Richard DesLauriers, special agent in charge of the Boston office of the FBI, said.
The guard who opened the door, Richard Abath, was looked at pretty closely again last week, though he’s not mentioned specifically this week.
Artist Phillip Stearns makes blankets and tapestries out of glitch art. Some of the source images are taken from intentionally short-circuited digital cameras.
All items are woven in the US and cost $200 and up (plus shipping).
Artist Rutherford Chang only collects first pressings of The Beatles’ The White Album on vinyl. Dust & Grooves recently interviewed Chang about his collection.
Q: Are you a vinyl collector?
A: Yes, I collect White Albums.
Q: Do you collect anything other than that?
A: I own some vinyl and occasionally buy other albums, but nothing in multiples like the White Album.
Q: Why just White Album? why not Abbey road? or Rubber Soul?
A: The White Album has the best cover. I have a few copies of Abbey Road and Rubber Soul, but I keep those in my “junk bin”.
Q: Why do you find it so great? It’s a white, blank cover. Are you a minimalist?
A: I’m most interested in the albums as objects and observing how they have aged. So for me, a Beatles album with an all white cover is perfect.
Q: Do you care about the album’s condition?
A: I collect numbered copies of the White Album in any condition. In fact I often find the “poorer” condition albums more interesting.
Chang’s collection is currently on view at Recess in Soho, NYC until March 7th. Gotta get down there and see this. (via mr)
Chris Buck takes pictures of celebrities after giving them 30 seconds to hide. Here’s Cindy Sherman:
Buck’s photos are on display in NYC for a couple more days at Foley but are also available in book form. (via digg)
This video of artist Li Hongbo demonstrating the complexity of his paper sculptures will blow your mind. More wild images at Dominik Mersch Gallery.
(via ★stellar)
These are all so perfect but I’m having a hard time deciding which is the most perfect….the Mrs Patmore tabby or the Dowager Countess Sphynx?
Prints are $22 a pop on Etsy and likely to go quickly. (via @mathowie)
A Path Between Rice Fields is a gorgeous painting by Makoto Aida that caught my eye the other day.
(via ls)
I have a lot more respect for painters now. Who knew it was such an intense sensory workout?
This is taken from a longer video piece with less screaming that will be on display at the Walker Art Center in 2013.
Inspired by Bob Ross-style instructional television programs, the Seoul-based artist says “the theme of this video is the existential nature of contemporary art (and culture) as well as of artists.” Characteristic of Beom’s deadpan humor, the narrator’s demonstration shows how to apply paint while engaged in “a long scream that sounds like when you’re hurt”; “a scream induced by psychological pain”; and “a more pained, wronged, and regretful scream.”
(via ★spavis)
NYC’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has an exhibit running until January 27, 2013 featuring over 200 photos employing old timey trickery.
For early art photographers, the ultimate creativity lay not in the act of taking a photograph but in the subsequent transformation of the camera image into a hand-crafted picture.
A new series of photographs from Shinichi Maruyama shows the nude human form in motion. (Totally SFW.)
According to Petapixel, these are not long exposure shots (like these).
Although the photographs look like long-exposure shots, they’re actually composite images created by combining ten thousand individual photographs of each dancer. The result is a look in which each model’s body is (mostly) lost within the blur of its movement.
You may remember Maruyama from his hand-thrown water sculptures.
Sicilian artist Valerio Carrubba takes portraits and modifies them with MOAR HAIR!
(thx, david)
Billion, by artist Vincent Kohler, shows the different pieces of wood derived from a log. It reminds me of the iconic butchery map showing the different cuts of meat. The sculpture, interestingly, is made out of polystyrene.
(via dens)
This forgotten Vermeer has been floating around for a few months but I just saw it. Love it:
Anyone know who did this? I spent a few minutes trying to find out but got dead-ended in a Tumblr/Imgur attribution black hole. (via ★ryanvlower)
Update: The creator of the image is supposedly Mitchell Grafton, although I couldn’t find any airtight attribution. (thx, all)
Artists in the UK have created a ‘Rain Room’ inside the Barbican that gives the impression from the outside that it is pouring rain. 3D cameras make it so the rain stops when you walk through it. That is, the rain is everywhere you aren’t, and you don’t get wet at all.
(via ★adamkuban)
Update: Neglected to mention the Rain Room is an installation by rAndom International artists Stuart Wood and Hannes Koch.
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