Kinetic Sculpture: the Poetics of Movement at Vero Beach Museum of Art - posted by FFAB

Anne Lilly, Conductor/Composer, Stainless steel, 36 x 36 x 36 in.

Kinetic Sculpture: the Poetics of Movement
Vero Beach Museum of Art
September 27, 2014 - January 4, 2015

Alexander Calder invented a form of sculpture that constantly changed as it moved in space. Based on the open forms of modernist European sculpture, this new kind of three-dimensional art –called kinetic sculpture– was both lyrical and technical. Like dance, in which forms were constantly flowing and changing as they moved in space, this new kind of sculpture was filled with poetic energy. At odds with the heavy carved or cast sculpture of earlier centuries, kinetic sculpture immediately attracted devoted followers and continues to fascinate viewers today. Vero Beach Museum of Art will present a selection of kinetic sculpture that demonstrates the poetics of movement, involving rhythmic pattern and visual forms in poetic flux. The exhibition will feature artists such as Pedro de Movellan, Tim Prentice, and Ann Lilly, who have explored fresh, lyrical approaches to kinetic sculpture.

Show info

Kinetic sculpture was all the rage a few years ago at Art Basel Miami.  I'm excited to see how the artwork will be displayed.  Lighting is the key and sometimes the shadows create by the sculptures are as exciting as the artwork itself. GL

Jeff Whipple & Liz Gibson - King and Queen of the NE Florida Arts Scene - posted by FFAB

HOW JEFF WHIPPLE AND LIZ GIBSON BECAME THE KING AND QUEEN OF THE NORTHEAST FLORIDA ARTS SCENE

Folio Weekly

By Daniel A. Brown

Posted 9/17/14

Meet Jacksonville’s creative royalty

Jeff Whipple and Liz Gibson think big. The two Northeast Florida-based artists’ careers are testaments to their large-scale visions, approaching huge ideas and rendering those concepts through their respective multimedia works. I visited them at MetaCusp, their studio-gallery space in Riverside, an extension of that inspiration put into practice. A kind of industrial Camelot, MetaCusp is a two-story warehouse space that serves as a laboratory of sorts where the pair can work in relative peace, immune from outside distraction. Pulling my car into the parking lot, I look up to see a banner hanging on the building, a reproduction of one of Whipple’s colorful paintings that features a couple locked in either fierce battle or playful combat. The front door of the space is surrounded with potted plants, the only telltale sign that this otherwise factory-sized building might have human inhabitants. In the entryway, a large birdcage is set to one side, and paintings occupy every available spot on the walls.

Whipple and Gibson meet me in the studio’s lounge area. Both are wearing shorts and T-shirts, and an oscillating fan is set to full blast to cut through the brutal summer heat. It’s early evening, and they seem a little hangdog from the long hours they’ve worked that day. They’re both instructors at the University of North Florida, and they’re working against the clock to complete gargantuan projects before the start of the fall semester.

If there is a concise definition for the term “working artists,” it is surely this pair. Over the years, they have been recognized individually for the caliber of their work and won numerous awards for their ongoing efforts as visual artists. While some artists might be featured in a dozen solo shows over the course of a lifetime, Whipple has had a staggering 82 solo exhibits since 1980. In addition to his visual art, he’s had 17 original plays produced, five of which received playwriting awards. Whipple has won six state arts council individual artist fellowships, and his website features more than 1,000 pages that document a decades-long career that rivals that of any contemporary artist, here or anywhere.

Gibson is equally driven, and has also been recognized for myriad accomplishments. Known for her fusion of performance and 2-D art, Gibson has been featured in more than two dozen performances and exhibits, as well as site-specific installations. She’s won an array of prizes — in the last year alone she won the locally based Spark Grant and Art Ventures grant — and is active in programs that introduce children to visual art.

Most recently, both received Florida Individual Artist Fellowship awards, perhaps the highest accolade offered by the state’s Division of Cultural Affairs. Handed out bi-annually, the fellowship is akin to a Pulitzer, recognizing artists who continually push the limits and expand on their abilities of personal expression.

Whipple seems grateful for the honor, but brushes it all aside, redirecting the focus to what is really important in their lives. “The fellowship and Liz’s other recent grants just helped us do what we always do: make art,” he says. “We would — and did — do it anyway.”

Full article found here

Seeing the Unseen: Photography and Video Art in China Now at the Ringling - posted by FFAB

Li Wei (1970-) Li Wei Falls to the Earth, 2012, 120x212 cm, C-Print, Courtesy of the Artist.

Seeing the Unseen: Photography and Video Art in China Now

The Ringling

Till February 2015

This exciting exhibition features photographic and video works by important contemporary Chinese artists. Reflecting art innovations of our media age, their works provide a fresh view of the changing cultural landscape in China. Unlike their predecessors, these new-generation artists are even bolder in applying new concepts and technology to record the inspiring moments veiled in daily life, and in creating startling and unexpected scenes. Performance and visual tricks are smartly incorporated into their works to create impressive visual and mental experiences, providing the opportunity for viewers to meditate on the invisible.

The artists in the exhibition, including Cao Fei, Li Wei, Wang Qingsong, and Miao Xiaochun, explore their individual approaches, subjects, and styles, while mixing aesthetic ideas, cultural expressions, and commercial inspiration. Individually and as a group, they use art photography and video to tackle issues of identity and experience, youth culture and urban development, history and memory, and the conflicts of tradition and commercialization in contemporary China.

Show Info

The Pink House Art Gallery opens in Tavernier - posted by FFAB

 

Susana Fryman stands in front of the newly-opened Pink House Art Gallery.

The Reporter September 19, 2014 
 
Susana Fryman, a South Florida entrepreneur, and her artist father, Luis Nunez, have opened a new art studio in Tavernier.

The Pink House Gallery features Nunez’s paintings, as well as works by Aleta Burge, Carlos Alvarez Cotera, Victoria Morales, Patricia Rottino Cummins and Fernando Vallejo. 

“It’s been a longtime dream of mine to open an art gallery,” Fryman said in a statement. “We have lovingly and painstakingly taken on this business project. Now it is my goal to place artists’ work in a wide range of public and private collections.” 

The gallery is located at 264 Tavernier Street. There is a grand opening on Saturday, Sept. 27 from 5 p.m. until 8 p.m. The opening exhibit features Nunez’s work “whose vibrant landscapes capture the serene beauty of Florida’s natural environment.” 

Nunez was featured in the 2007 White House Christmas tree ornament exhibit, honoring the centennial of U.S. National Parks. 

In 2010, Nunez was chosen by then-Gov. Charlie Cris as Florida’s featured artist for Hispanic Heritage Month. 

He is an award-winning participant of art in public spaces at Florida International University, and his work is featured in permanent collections of the Florida Department of State, Biscayne National Park, Miami-Dade College, the Frost Art Museum and numerous private collections. 

Call Susana at (305) 394-0069 or go to www.pinkhouseart.com for more information.

I spent a few wonderful summers in a little trailer directly on the Bay in Tavernier.  Right down the street from this new gallery.  I wish them much success.  Oh what a dream it is to have a gallery in such an incredible beach community.  Tavernier is paradise!  One of the challenges will be to somehow get the cars driving past on their way to the lower Keys to stop and check out the artwork.  That and actually trying to get work done on a beautiful day with the ocean calling! GL

The Art World Finds a New Home in Broward County - posted by FFAB

                                                          Sølve Sundsbø
 

The Art World Finds a New Home in Broward County
By Andrea Richard Tue., Sep. 30 2014
New Times

Two years ago, anyone who invited their friends to Artwalk in FAT Village would have gotten a few blank stares. Just one year ago, you couldn't have signed up for an arduino, AKA robotics, class at Makers Square, a communal tool shop where circus music blares in the background. 

But now, Miami has snagged serious international art-world cred with the annual Art Basel Miami Beach, and cultural opportunities spawned from it have crept northward. Some art professionals are making the pilgrimage here because rent and studio spaces cost less than those in the 305. That gives Broward, the attention-starved misfit, its time to shine.

Major cultural institutions paved the way, and those are still kicking: The ­Broward ­Center for the Performing Arts recently expanded its downtown facility and has been bringing audiences major ­theatrical ­productions and ballet spectacles for decades. The little church-turned-arthouse movie theater, ­Cinema Paradiso, will host its 29th International Film Festival this November. And the longstanding NSU Museum of Art | Fort ­Lauderdale, which critics had called mediocre at best, is transforming into a serious institution with acclaimed curator Bonnie Clearwater now at the helm. 

The Museum of Art this year started a club for the young and hip, ages 18 to 30. The JETS get together the first Thursday evening of every month for live music, hip-hop dance workshops, and DJ sets at the museum, followed by an after­party and a free drink at Bar Stache. Upcoming exhibitions at the museum include a show by New York contemporary artist Julian Schnabel, the exhibit "American Scene ­Photography," and, in February, works by early-20th-century Mexican artists such as Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. 

Some city governments are even joining in the frenzy. In suburban Pembroke Pines, the city's curator of special projects, Jill Slaughter, has done some cool street art projects and is working on Inside Out, a global project, this fall. Downtown Hollywood has become like an outdoor arts safari thanks to the Downtown Hollywood Mural Project. Program manager Jill Weisberg has brought in street artists -- including Tatiana Suarez, 2Alas, Jessy Nite, and the London Police -- to do murals. The TM Sisters are slated to create one in January. "They're taking a big parking garage and putting a beautiful sunset mural on it and will change the complete look of that block on Tyler Street," Weisberg says.

Jane Hart, curator of the hip, contemporary Art and Culture Center of Hollywood, is psyched about the explosion of culture: "Together with the Girls' Club; the Museum of Art | Fort Lauderdale, with Bonnie ­Clearwater at the helm; Young at Art; Bedlam Lorenz Assembly; Downtown Hollywood Mural Project; and FAT Village, Broward is becoming a hotbed of contemporary art." 

Hart's venue will host a December exhibition by Los Angeles artist Dave Muller, whose work, she says, "is very much focused on the history of music in all genres. He will be here for nearly two weeks creating a site-specific installation, as well as individual works, sound stations, and sculpture. For one new painting being made for this exhibit, we were able to get Iggy Pop to interact directly with Dave."

Read the full article here
Fat Village website 

I see great things happening across the County.  Artists are being valued and local governments are doing all they can to court artists to establish "art zones" in the more blighted areas of town. Larger art organizations and museums should continue to reach out and partner with local artists to share marketing opportunities.  GL

Alex Trimino | Tales from a Sun-Drenched Elsewhere - posted by FFAB

 Alex Trimino | Tales from a Sun-Drenched Elsewhere

Tales from a Sun-Drenched Elsewhere
Diana Lowenstein Fine Arts Gallery
September 11- October 31

Press Release:

Illuminated totem poles covered in crochet, knittings and found objects reveal the similarities between modern, hi-tech materials (micro-controlled neon lights) and colloquial, lo-tech crafts (crochet, knittingsand weavings) used, creating an equilibrium between traditions, technologies and generations.

Old ways and new technologies commingle together exploring how we connect to reality today.

Tales from a Sun-Drenched Elsewhere explores the nostalgic desire to revisit time like space, refusing to surrender to the irreversibility of time.

Trimino, born in Colombia, lives and works in Miami, FL. She graduated with a Master of Fine Arts degree from Florida International University. As a recipient of the the Joan Mitchell Foundation Scholarship for Visual Artists, she attended the Ox-Bow Artist Residency affiliated with the School of The Art Institute of Chicago. In addition, she has been the recipient of several awards from institutions such as The Frost Art Museum, The Elliot Museum, The Appleton Museum of Art, The Rawls Museum Arts, and The Cambridge Art Association and was selected to participate in an International Art Symposium in Sweden. Her work can be found in public and private collections.

Diana Lowenstein Fine Arts Gallery

Not of This Earth: An Extraterrestrial Art Invasion at Bear & Bird - posted by FFAB

Not of This Earth: An Extraterrestrial Art Invasion
Bear & Bird
October 3rd - November 15th

Opening Night Artist Reception: Friday, October 3 from 6-10pm


Featuring artwork by: Agent 17; Al Negas; Alex Maldonado; Alex Merly; Amy Steinberg; Andrés Arango; Angelina Page; Anomie Rose; Barbrasaurus; Bianca Why; Blackened Honesty; Blair Hess; Bobby Neal Furedi; Brian Reedy; Brittany Maxey; Bryan Steinlage; Butter Cloud; Carlos G. Garcia; CHNK; Colin Christian; Constantina Pratsas-Lopez; Copernicus; Cynthia Goodman; Daniela Reyes; Danielle Brady; Danny Kidwell; Daryl Hyman; Demi Mirsky; Derion Brown; Devin Alexis Saccomanno; Dibbie Jane; Dinah! Caldwell; Elle Olive Ira; Emily Rimada; Erica Sheldon; Erin O’Dea; FWACATA; Gena del Portillo; Gioconda Taylor; Gregory Dirr; IdeaStorm Media; Illustrated Chick; J.P. Duque; Jasmine Espinal; Jenny De La Torre; JME; Johana Lopez; John Kissee; John Vale; Jonathan C. Diaz; Jonathan Gonzalez; Jonathan Jackson; Jose E. Arce Jr.; JulieCImagery; Karl Johnsen; Katnip; Kelcy Erbele; Kerry Tichenor; Kevin King; Kim Vaughan; Lailee Goodman; Lauren Robie; Lindsay Watson; London Buil; Lorenzo Mohammed; Luckas Arias-Torfs; Maor Ovzana; Maranesi; Megan Coffey; Melanie Mastrangelo; Melly Pereda; Miniver Patrice; MOCJOES; Mohammad Mumtaz; mokiok; Nadim Tabsch; Nakia X. Mann; Natalia Contreras; NicholeHatesYou; Nina N. Mitchell; Nomiie; Norma Soulet; Patrick Keane; Pavlina Nichole; Pooka Machine; Rey Acevedo; Ricardo Torraca; Rolando Guillama; Rosanna Pereyra; Rose; Shanan Cummings; Shane Weaver; Steven C. Imas; STIBI; Summer December; T-Ray; T. Sainz D.; Tanya Lopez; Tasha Milano; Tiina Purin; TJL; Travis Amores; Trisha Quintana; Violeta Caloor; Walter Gee; Wenjuice; Willo Segersbol; YoArt; Yuri Meister; Zachary Ensign; Zandra Martinez; Zero and more!

Show Info

The Rudin Prize for Emerging Photographers at the Norton Museum - posted by FFAB

The Rudin Prize for Emerging Photographers
Norton Museum 
October 2nd 2014 - January 11th 2015

Every other year, the Norton invites a panel of world-renowned artists to nominate emerging photographers whose work is on the leading edge of contemporary art and photography, but have not yet had a solo exhibition at a museum. Those nominees share an exhibition. A separate panel of judges awards one of them the $20,000 Rudin Prize, named for the late New York City real estate developer Lewis Rudin.  This year’s nominators are: Thomas Demand (Germany), Adi Nes (Israel), Luis Gonzalez Palma (Guatemala), and Deborah Willis (USA). 

2014 Rudin Prize Nominees: 

Delphine Fawundu (USA)

Miriam Böhm (Berlin)

Renato Osoy (Guatemala)

Rami Maymon (Isreal)

 

Show info

Permutations: Contemporary Art from Cuba at Pan American Art - posted by FFAB

 Gustavo Acosta - Postcards from Havana 2012

Permutations: Contemporary Art from Cuba 
Pan American Art - Miami
Sep1 - Nov 5

Pan American Art Projects is very pleased to announce our next exhibition Permutations. The show brings together the works of five artists who live and work in Cuba. They are Abel Barroso, J. Roberto Diago, Jorge Lopez Pardo, and the duo of Meira Marrero & Jose Toirac (M&T)
Throughout the show we can see a distinctive component that has characterized Contemporary Cuban Art for at least the past two decades: direct or indirect social and political commentaries. While some artists choose to illustrate it straight with clear symbols, others take an introspective attitude and use metaphors instead. 
 

About Pan American Art
Pan American Art Projects specializes in art of the Americas with the mission to build a bridge between North and South American cultures by presenting and exhibiting artists from both regions concurrently. 

Show website

Suzanne Weaver Will Lead Miami’s New Contemporary Art Museum - posted by FFAB

Suzanne Weaver. Photo: courtesy the Speed Art Museum, Louisville, K

Suzanne Weaver Will Lead Miami’s New Contemporary Art Museum
ArtNet - Sarah Cascone, Tuesday, September 23, 2014

The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Miami, formerly the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in North Miami (see “MOCA North Miami Closes in Controversy“), is making a fresh start in its new Miami Design District home with Suzanne Weaver, who has been appointed the reborn institution’s interim director.

A 20 year art world veteran, Weaver has previously held curatorial positions at institutions such as the Dallas Museum of Art and the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. Alex Gartenfeld, who had served in an interim capacity as director since September of 2013, following the departure of Bonnie Clearwater, has been promoted to deputy director and chief curator. He joined the museum in May of 2013 as a curator.

The new ICA Miami looks to move past its troubled MOCA North Miami past, which saw the city fail to provide funding and led to a heated battle over museum leadership (see “The Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami Sues City For Breach of Contract” and “Racist Taunts Escalate MOCA North Miami Feud“).

It will open in the the Design District’s Moore Building in December, presumably just in time for Art Basel in Miami Beach festivities (see “Art Basel in Miami Beach 2014 Boasts an Intimidating 267 Galleries“). The interim space, provided rent-free by Miami Design District Associates while the board of trustees seeks a new permanent home, measures 12,500 square feet.

“We are thrilled to be welcoming Suzanne Weaver as our new interim director, whose talent, enthusiasm, and professional experience will be an invaluable asset as the museum continues to grow,” said Ray Ellen Yarkin, co-chair of the ICA’s board, in a press release.

“It is truly an honor to work with such a highly talented and committed Board of Trustees and staff to launch a new museum of contemporary art dedicated to quality, excellence, and rigor,” added Weaver. “Together, we will create an institution that will be an important addition to Miami’s dynamism internationally and make a lasting mark on the intellectual, cultural, and artistic life of the region.”

 

Clyde Butcher Book Signing – Meet & Greet (Sept. 12) - posted by FFAB

Clyde Butcher Book Signing – Meet & Greet (Sept. 12)

Join Clyde Butcher on September 12, 2014, in the Museum! Clyde will be available for two informal meet & greet, book signings from 2-4 pm and 5:30-7:30 pm. Attendees will be able to speak with Clyde and view his exhibition, Preserving Eden: Clyde Butcher’s Florida Photographs.

The Museum will have books and limited edition prints available for purchase and signing at the event.

Please RSVP by calling (954) 340-5000. Museum members are complimentary and admission is $10 for future members.

For more information on the exhibit, please click here.

oin Clyde Butcher on September 12, 2014, in the Museum! Clyde will be available for two informal meet & greet, book signings from 2-4 pm and 5:30-7:30 pm. Attendees will be able to speak with Clyde and view his exhibition, Preserving Eden: Clyde Butcher’s Florida Photographs.
The Museum will have books and limited edition prints available for purchase and signing at the event.
Please RSVP by calling (954) 340-5000. Museum members are complimentary and admission is $10 for future members.
For more information on the exhibit, please click here.
- See more at: http://coralspringsmuseum.org/clyde-butcher-book-signing-meet-greet-sept-12/#sthash.NL0aJNry.jbHU5ySr.dpuf

oin Clyde Butcher on September 12, 2014, in the Museum! Clyde will be available for two informal meet & greet, book signings from 2-4 pm and 5:30-7:30 pm. Attendees will be able to speak with Clyde and view his exhibition, Preserving Eden: Clyde Butcher’s Florida Photographs.
The Museum will have books and limited edition prints available for purchase and signing at the event.
Please RSVP by calling (954) 340-5000. Museum members are complimentary and admission is $10 for future members.
For more information on the exhibit, please click here.
- See more at: http://coralspringsmuseum.org/clyde-butcher-book-signing-meet-greet-sept-12/#sthash.NL0aJNry.jbHU5ySr.dpuf

Outsider Art at Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale - posted by FFAB

When the Stars Begin to Fall: Imagination and the American South
August 3 – October 12, 2014

When the Stars Begin to Fall: Imagination and the American South considers the category of “outsider” art in relation to contemporary art and black life. Situating itself within current art historical and political debates, the exhibition features work by self-taught, spiritually inspired and incarcerated artists, alongside other projects based in performance and social-engagement, as well as painting, drawing, sculpture and assemblage, that make insistent reference to place. With the majority of work created between 1964 and 2014, the exhibition brings together a group of thirty-five intergenerational American artists who share an interest in the American South as a location both real and imagined. Moving between a graphic sensibility, an interest in creation myths and the use of found materials and detritus, the artists reference various classical tropes of blackness as sites of origin—fantastical and performed, important yet perhaps illusory.

Artists in the exhibition include: Benny Andrews, Kevin Beasley, McArthur Binion, Beverly Buchanan, Henry Ray Clark, Courtesy the Artists, Thornton Dial, Minnie Evans, Theaster Gates, Deborah Grant, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Bessie Harvey, David Hammons, Lonnie Holley, Frank Albert Jones, Lauren Kelley, Ralph Lemon, Kerry James Marshall, Rodney McMillian, Joe Minter, J.B. Murray, John Outterbridge, Noah Purifoy, Marie “Big Mama” Roseman, Jacolby Satterwhite, Patricia Satterwhite, Rudy Shepherd, Xaviera Simmons, Georgia Speller, Henry Speller, James “Son” Thomas, Stacy Lynn Waddell, Kara Walker, Carrie Mae Weems and Geo Wyeth.

When the Stars Begin to Fall: Imagination and the American South is organized by The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York. The exhibition is curated by Thomas J. Lax.

The catalogue includes entries by the exhibition's organizer, Assistant Curator Thomas J. Lax, along with leading scholars Horace Ballard, Katherine Jentleson, Scott Romine and Lowery Stokes Sims, who write on notions of spirituality, the ethics of self-taught art and the idea of the South in the American consciousness.

Exhibitions at NSU Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale are made possible in part by a challenge grant from the David and Francie Horvitz Family Foundation.
Funding for this exhibition is provided in part by the Broward County Board of County Commissioners as recommended by the Broward Cultural Council and Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Sponsored in part by the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture.

Museum info here

Art Around the Web - Incredible Florida Photo Library - posted by FFAB

Deaconess Bedell and a Mikasuki woman 

walking in the Everglades

Florida Memory
Florida Department of State, Division of Library and Information Services

I found this incredible Florida Photo, Video and Audio Library.  I have only just begun to look through the photo collections but what I have found so far is amazing.  I only wish the pictures were better categorized and optimized with a intelligent search engine.  Enjoy!  GL

http://www.floridamemory.com/

Michelangelo works under protection - posted by FFAB

A new air conditioning and lighting system in the Sistine Chapel will protect the priceless Michelangelo frescoes, which receive damage from visitors
 
Michelangelo works under protection
 
A new air conditioning and lighting system in the Sistine Chapel will protect the priceless Michelangelo frescoes, which receive damage from visitors 

Dust, sweat and carbon dioxide brought into the Sistine Chapel by a swelling number of tourists risk damaging priceless Michelangelo frescoes, the Vatican said on June 11, hoping a new air conditioning and lighting system will protect them.

Some six million people a year visit the chapel, home to  Michelangelo’s famous ceiling frescoes, one of the wonders of Western civilization that are over 500 years old. The number of visitors to the chapel, where popes are elected in secret conclaves, can reach 20,000 a day in summer. Their numbers have grown by 300 percent from around 1.5 million a year in 1980, said Antonio Paolucci, the head of the Vatican museums.

“Today, the Sistine Chapel risks being a victim of its own success,” Paolucci, writing in the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, said. “Six million visitors is an impressive number but objectively dangerous for the proper conservation of the frescoes,” he said. “It produces a mix of dust brought in from outside, body sweat and carbon dioxide, which all end up on the surface of the frescoes and can in time harm them.”

Work began on the new air conditioning and lighting system on June 11 and should be in place by October.

Michelangelo’s frescoes, inaugurated in October 1512 by Pope Julius II, underwent a major 14-year restoration that ended in 1994. They include one of the most famous scenes in the history of art - the arm of a gentle bearded God reaching out to give life to Adam.

They also include the famous “Last Judgement” on the wall behind the altar, which the artist painted separately in 1535 and 1541.

Paolucci said the current system of air conditioning, de-humidification, dust removal, filtering and micro-climate controls was designed to handle far fewer visitors.

The Vatican did not say how much the new high-tech air conditioning system, devised by museum experts and the Carrier air conditioning company, or a new lighting system using the energy saving and heat-reducing LED (light-emitting diode) system, would cost but said they were being donated by the companies involved.  

Full article here

Nazi-Looted Painting to Remain in Florida Museum Collection - posted by FFAB

Jacques De Claeuw, Vanitas (1677).
Photo: courtesy the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens in Jacksonville, Florida.

Nazi-Looted Painting to Remain in Florida Museum Collection

ArtNet by Sarah Cascone

There’s good news for the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens in Jacksonville, Florida, which will be able to keep an important piece of its collection, a Dutch Golden Age painting looted by Nazis, reports First Coast News.

First purchased by the Cummer from a New York gallery in 1962, Jacques De Claeuw‘s Vanitas (1677), a striking still life, has been among the collection’s highlights ever since.

“In 2011, as part of our 50th anniversary, this painting was actually voted by our visitors as one of their 50 favorite paintings in the museum, so it means a lot to this community,” chief curator Holly Keris told First Coast.

Two years ago, the painting’s illicit history came to light: before the Nazis invaded the Netherlands in 1940, Dutch art dealer Jacques Goudstikker fled the country. He died at sea, but left behind a detailed inventory of his art collection, 1,400 pieces of which were stolen from his gallery by Nazi leader Herman Göring.

Although Vanitas was sold at Lempertz Auktion in Cologne in 1941, it is unclear how the painting made its way to the US.

When Goudstikker’s daughter-in-law, Marei Von Saher, traced the 17th century work to the Cummer, she called on the museum to return the painting. In April, the institution’s board of trustees voted to do just that.

The two parties have since reached an agreement allowing the Cummer to purchase the painting in part thanks to a gift from the family of Goudstikker, made in his memory.

“It is heartening to see museums like the Cummer do the right thing for Holocaust victims and their heirs. I am grateful to the Cummer for returning this painting to Jacques Goudstikker’s family,” Von Saher told News 4 Jax. “We hope that the restitution of this work will lead other museums to act just as responsibly when faced with the discovery of Nazi-looted art in their collections.”

“It is with great pleasure that the Cummer announces this amicable settlement,” added director Hope McMath, also in an interview with News 4 Jax. “We are delighted that, thanks to the generosity of Goudstikker’s family, this important painting will stay at the Cummer.”

Though this particular restitution case has been settled, Jacques Goudstikker’s heirs are still working to track down the rest of his 1,400-piece collection.

This is a follow up to an article I posted a week ago.  Glad to see the story ends well and everyone is satisfied.  Hopefully other museums will follow the Cummer's example. GL