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The Headlines
ARTIST ALFRED LESLIE, whose rule-breaking work spans the whole historical past of postwar American artwork, died on Friday at the age of 95, William Grimes studies within the New York Times. Born within the Bronx, Leslie studied with Tony Smith at NYU, was an artist’s mannequin for Reginald Marsh’s lessons, and confirmed his Abstract-Expressionist work on the fabled “Ninth Street Show” in 1951. He additionally created experimental movies—1959’s Pull My Daisy, with Robert Frank , most famously—and made a controversial break with abstraction within the early Nineteen Sixties, to as an alternative produce figurative portraits which can be typically grand in scale, imposing in tone, and even a bit menacing. Explaining that shift to Art Papers in 2002, in an interview quoted by the Times, Leslie mentioned that he thought that if “I could tackle something that was wholly discredited and show that there was some tiny glimpse of value in it while making beautiful work, this would be a wonderful accomplishment.”
RETURNS ON INVESTMENT. In the Nineteen Sixties, artist John Craxton purchased a chandelier in a London store for £250, suspecting that it was the work of artist Alberto Giacometti. He was correct, the Guardian studies, and that piece is now headed to public sale at Christie’s with a excessive estimate of £2.5 million ($3.1 million)—and hopes that it may fetch much more. That is spectacular, however in uncooked {dollars}, the National Gallery of Australia has an excellent larger success story. As some art-history varieties could recall, it drew controversy again in 1973 when it purchased Jackson Pollock‘s Blue Poles (1952) for A$1.3 million. The museum not too long ago up to date its valuation of that masterpiece, the Sydney Morning Herald studies, and decided that it’s now worth a cool A$500 million (US$354 million). To the billionaires now studying: Do not get any concepts. The portray shouldn’t be on the market.
The Digest
Photographer George Zimbel, who took unforgettable photographs of nightlife and on a regular basis life, in addition to celebrated snaps of Marilyn Monroe and President John F. Kennedy, has died on the age of 93. [The New York Times]
For its Fifteenth-anniversary version, the Dallas Art Fair has tapped 88 galleries, together with Perrotin, Various Small Fires, and Night Gallery. [ARTnews]
A Canadian artist, Sam Kerson, has been pursuing a go well with towards a Vermont legislation college for overlaying murals he made, which it says some view as racially offensive. Kerson argues that violates the Visual Artists Rights Act‘s prohibition on the modification or destruction of an paintings; the varsity says it has completed neither. An appeals court docket will rule. [The Associated Press]
The CoBrA motion is sizzling, Victoria Woodcock studies. Among its followers: artist Robert Nava, who mentioned that he loves its “sincerity in the return to the basics, in search of newness.” [Financial Times]
After serving as interim director of the Burchfield Penney Art Center in Buffalo, New York, on three separate events, Scott Propeack has been named its director. At the museum, he has additionally been a registrar, affiliate curator, collections and exhibitions supervisor, chief curator, and deputy director. [The Buffalo News]
The Museum of Modern Art‘s Meret Oppenheim retrospective—which earned a rave review from Alex Greenberger in ARTnews—was featured on CBS. “I find it very moving how steadfast she was in always wanting to reinvent herself,” the show’s curator, Anne Umland, mentioned. “You can walk through the show and see countless different ideas on the wall, but it’s all her.” [CBS News Sunday Morning]
The sixth Dhaka Art Summit in Bangladesh will open subsequent month sans personal views or a VIP lounge. “It’s a festival, so everyone has to come, leave and hang out together,” cofounder Nadia Samdani mentioned. She and her husband, Rajeeb, are additionally constructing a cultural middle referred to as Srihatta within the metropolis of Sylhet. [Financial Times]
The Kicker
DOWN THE DRAIN. Archaeologists excavating a Roman bathtub in Carlisle, England, have found semi-precious stones that apparently fell out of bathers’ rings across the third century, the Guardian studies. That should have been traumatic. Of course, they may have taken off their jewellery earlier than hopping into the water, however then they’d have risked a thief making off with it. So-called “curse tablets” addressed to such evildoers have been discovered at Roman baths elsewhere within the nation, the Guardian notes. One declares that an individual will “have all intestines quite eaten away if he has stolen the ring.” Seems painful. No, thanks. [The Guardian]