ArtPourri

News from the Art World

Attendance Records Set – The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, has announced that the exhibition Art in the Streets attracted 201,352 visitors, marking the highest exhibition attendance in the museum’s history.  With this exhibition, MOCA expects to double its annual attendance this year to 400,000 visitors. — The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC, has announced that 5.68 million people visited the Met during the fiscal year that ended on June 30. The number, which includes attendance at The Cloisters museum and gardens, is the highest recorded in 40 years. The total was more than 400,000 greater than in Fiscal Year 2010. The recent exhibition Alexander McQueen:  Savage Beauty drew 661,509 visitors, placing it among the top 10 most visited exhibitions.

Admission Increases – Due to escalating costs, effective Sept. 1, the Museum of Modern Art, NYC, will raise adult admission to $25 and full-time student admission to $14; however, admission will remain free for those 16 and under.

Art Graces the Streets – Due to popular demand, The Detroit Institute of Arts has initiated the program “Inside/Out” for the second year.  Eighty reproductions of masterpieces from the museum’s collection will be placed in the streets and parks of greater metro Detroit through Nov. 30 of this year.  Around 44 cities will participate throughout the event, which will continue April-June and July-Sept. 2012.  DIA is working with the communities to plan educational opportunities and other fun activities, and residents of participating cities will receive free museum admission of a designated family Sunday.  See more at http://www.dia.org/calendar/special-event.aspx?id=2814&iid=.

New Art Acquisitions Made – The Philadelphia Museum of Art has announced the acquisition of a wide range of works of art that will significantly enhance its world-renowned collection. These major works—acquired by purchase, gift or pledged to the Museum as donations—include several Impressionist and modern paintings by major masters as well as nearly 200 paintings, sculptures and drawings from one of the country’s most significant private collections of work by self-taught artists, thus making the museum one of the leading centers for the study of this material in the country.  Among the acquisitions are paintings by Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley, as well as a pastel by Mary Cassatt.

New Stamps Salute Our Nation – The U. S. Postal Service continues its “Flags of Our Nation” series with the issuance of 10 more stamp designs that feature the flags of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the states of OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD and TN.  In addition to the official flag, each stamp design includes artwork that provides a snapshot such as an everyday scene or activity, rare wildlife or a picturesque vista.  Art director Howard Paine collaborated with artist Tom Engeman on the 50 stamps in this series.

Love Reigns in Miami – Participate (by appointment only) in Rivane Neuenschwander’s First Love installation at the Miami Art Museum, FL, the artist’s psychologically complex adaptation of Samuel Beckett’s novella by the same name.  In this version, visitors are invited to describe the face of their “first love” to a police sketch artist.  The portraits will hang in the gallery for the duration of the exhibition, ending Oct. 16.  Participants receive free museum admission.  Sessions take approximately 1-1/2 hours and are available on weekends.  Info/Sign-Up:  firstlove@miamiartmuseum.org.

Milestone – Renowned painter Lucian Freud, a grandson of Sigmund Freud, has died in London at age 88.  “Freud built up a formidable reputation as one of the most powerful contemporary figurative painters of nudes, portraits and faces.  His is a gutsy realism characterized by strong forms and arresting detail, rendered with rich dynamic brushwork.”—Acquavella Galleries.

Copyright ARTtalk Vol. 21, No. 11 — September 2011