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• The Pallant House Gallery Presents the First Major Show of Edward Burra for Over 25 Years
• The Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art opens a Retrospective of F C B Cadell
• The Michener Art Museum Showcases 200 of Bucks County’s Finest Works
• The Wexner Arts Center Presents Alexis Rockman's Paintings
• Cornerhouse Presents Rashid Rana in His First Major UK Show
• The Columbus Museum of Art Displays ~ Caravaggio: "Behold the Man!"
• The Tamarind Institute Shows New Lithographs by Hung Liu
• Albright-Knox Art Gallery shows Full Color Depression: First Kodachromes
• 'Pop Life' at Hamburger Kunsthalle Proves that "Good Business is the Best Art"
• SFMOMA will Become Home to Gap Founder's Contemporary Art Collection
• Monet to Dalí: Modern Masters on View at Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA)
• Pinakothek der Moderne hosts Masterdrawings from The Morgan Library & Museum
• Gerald Peters Gallery presents Max Weber ~ Paintings from the 1930s, 40s and 50s
• Munich's Cultural Appeal Expands with New Brandhorst Museum
• Christian Ferreira Presents "Heringa/Van Kalsbeek: Drie" at the Wapping Project, London
• Monika Sosnowska’s Architectural Installation at K21 in Dusseldorf
• Braunstein/Quay Gallery features Ursula Schneider ~ The River
• Nest Egg's April 16 Auction Features Photographs and Fine Art
• Israel Museum Looking for Owners & Restitution of Art Stolen in France
• This Week in Review in Art Knowledge News

The Pallant House Gallery Presents the First Major Show of Edward Burra for Over 25 Years Posted: 21 Oct 2011 10:52 PM PDT Chichesater, UK.- The Pallant House Gallery in Chichester, West Sussex, is delighted to present the first major show for over 25 years of the work of Edward Burra (1905 – 1976), one of the most individual and celebrated British artists of the twentieth century. Featuring some of his best known images of cafés, bars and nightclubs, as well as examples of other aspects of the artist's oeuvre such as his fascination with the macabre and dark sides of humanity, his role as a talented designer for the stage and sensitive depictions of the British landscape, this new exhibition provides a unique opportunity to reassess Burra's extraordinary creativity and impressive legacy. "Edward Burra" will be on view from October 22nd Through February 19th 2012. Despite suffering from acute arthritis, Edward Burra created a large body of memorable images during his lifetime, featuring monumental scale and unusually powerful handling of the watercolour medium. Defiantly anti-intellectual, he was nevertheless widely read and drew on an extraordinary range of influences from Old Master paintings by artists such as Bosch, Brueghel, El Greco, Hogarth and Goya, to his own contemporaries such as William Roberts, Fernand Léger and the Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) artists Otto Dix and George Grosz, as well as Hollywood cinema, ballet, and jazz music. Yet despite these many influences Burra remained distinct from most mainstream art movements though he was a member of the British art group Unit One and the English Surrealist Group in the 1930s and a close friend of the artist Paul Nash. Burra painted for himself, describing it as 'a sort of drug' and each of his paintings is unmistakably his own. The exhibition opens on the 35th anniversary of Burra's death on 22 October 1976, and is the largest single-artist exhibition held at the Gallery. Many of these works have been drawn from private collections, and have not been shown in public for many years, as well as national collection such as Tate, National Portrait Gallery, Imperial War Museum, and the Victoria Albert Museum. Edward Burra (29 March 1905 – 22 October 1976) was an English painter, draughtsman and printmaker, best known for his depictions of the urban underworld, black culture and the Harlem scene of the 1930s. Burra was born in South Kensington, London, and attended preparatory school but later had to be withdrawn due to anaemia and rheumatic fever. Burra studied at Chelsea School of Art from 1921-3, and the Royal College of Art from 1923-4. He had his first solo show at the Leicester Galleries in 1929. He was a member of Unit One in 1933 and showed with the English Surrealists later in the 1930s. Burra travelled widely, and many influences are at play in his works, which were usually watercolour on a large scale in strong colours. During World War Two, when it became impossible to travel, he also became involved in designing scenery and costumes for ballet (including Miracle in the Gorbals) and became very successful in that field. He declined membership of the Royal Academy in 1963 after being elected but was created CBE in 1971. The Tate Gallery held a retrospective of his work in 1973. After breaking his hip in 1974 his health declined sharply and he died in Hastings, England in 1976. Archive material of Edward Burra's is held at the Tate Gallery Archive. Walter Hussey, the Dean of Chichester Cathedral, left his personal collection to the city in 1977 with the condition that the collection be shown in Pallant House, a Grade 1 listed Queen Anne town house dating from 1712. Since 1919, the house had been used as Council offices and from 1979 a restoration programme began and preparations were made for it to open in 1982 as a unique combination of historic house and modern art gallery. In 1985 an independent trust, consisting of the Friends and representatives of the Council, was formed to manage the Gallery. Since then the collections and the Gallery's activities have expanded to the extent that it was decided a new building was needed in order for it to survive. The Gallery reopened Summer 2006 with a new wing and vastly improved facilities. Pallant House Gallery boasts one of the best collections of Modern British art in the UK. donated over the past thirty years, the collections tell the story of a number of individuals, all passionate collectors of art who generously donated their lifetimes' labours to the Gallery for the benefit of the public. Since Dean Walter Hussey's gift of works by Henry Moore, John Piper, Ceri Richards, Graham Sutherland and others that led to its inception in 1982, the Gallery has attracted the interest of other benefactors, most notably Charles Kearley and now Sir Colin St John Wilson. The core of this 'collection of collections' is Modern British art butother artworks figure such at the Bow Porcelain of the Geoffrey Freeman Collection. Each group of works has been formed by different impulses and lends its own character to the collection, making the experience of Pallant House Gallery engaging, insightful and unique. Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.pallant.org.uk

The Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art opens a Retrospective of F C B Cadell Posted: 21 Oct 2011 10:39 PM PDT Edinburgh.- The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art is proud to present the first in aseries of exhibitions on the 'Scottish Colourists". "The Scottish Colourist Series: F C B Cadell" will be on view at the museum from October 22nd through March 18th 2012. Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell (1883-1937) is one of the four artists popularly known as 'The Scottish Colourists' (the others being J. D. Fergusson, G. L. Hunter and S. J. Peploe). He was born in Edinburgh, where he lived for most of his life, and studied in Paris and Munich. Cadell is celebrated for his stylish portrayals of Edinburgh interiors, his vibrantly coloured still lives of the 1920s, and for his evocative landscapes of the west of Scotland and the south of France.This retrospective exhibition includes approximately 70 paintings, from public and private collections.

The Michener Art Museum Showcases 200 of Bucks County’s Finest Works Posted: 21 Oct 2011 08:12 PM PDT Doylestown, Pennsylvania.- The James A. Michener Art Museum is proud to present "The Painterly Voice: Bucks County's Fertile Ground", on view at the museum from October 22nd through through April 1st 2012. This exhibition brings together more than 200 of Bucks County's finest works. Paintings by Daniel Garber, Edward Redfield, Fern Coppedge, and other legends of the Bucks County painting tradition, drawn from the finest work in regional collections, will be together for the first and only time in The Painterly Voice. One of Edward Hicks's "The Peaceable Kingdom," one of the best-known and most beloved images in the history of American art, on loan from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, will be a highlight of The Painterly Voice, as will rarely seen gems from private collections.

The Wexner Arts Center Presents Alexis Rockman's Paintings Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:58 PM PDT Columbus, OH.— Previously on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, "Alexis Rockman: A Fable for Tomorrow" will travel to the Wexner Center for the Arts, where it can be through December 30th. The exhibition is the first major survey of the artist's work, with nearly 40 paintings that trace his career from early works in the mid-1980s to 2009, including several of his monumentally scaled paintings. The exhibition includes three large-scale paintings that are ambitious turning points in Rockman's artistic development. "Evolution" (1992), his first mural-sized painting, is a panoramic sweep that owes as much to a pop cinema stylistic sensibility as it does to actual prehistory; it reflects Rockman's interests in evolutionary biology, cryptozoology, and genetic mutation.

Cornerhouse Presents Rashid Rana in His First Major UK Show Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:30 PM PDT Manchester, UK.- Cornerhouse, with Asia Triennial Manchester 11, is pleased to present the first major UK public solo show from Rashid Rana, widely considered to be the most prominent and original contemporary artist working in South Asia today. "Rashid Rana: Everything Is Happening At Once" is on view at the gallery until December 18th. The exhibition includes new and recent work that cuts across conventional notions of the scale and status of the photographic object, opening up its potential to represent cultural, social and physical realities. The works in this exhibition, spanning 1992 to the present, blur the divide between two and three-dimensional forms to challenge the viewer's understanding of the world in which they live. Photo sculptures, large-scale photo mosaics, installations and new video work subvert perception of size and structure and urge us to look deeper into the relationship between the fragment and the bigger picture.

The Columbus Museum of Art Displays ~ Caravaggio: "Behold the Man!" Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:29 PM PDT COLUMBUS, OH.- Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio is remembered as much for his unconventional lifestyle as his immeasurable talent. His revolutionary art along with a life of personal excess, punctuated by late night brawls, attempts on his life, and multiple arrests, culminated with a Papal death warrant that forced him to live as an exile. Tragically, he died while making his way to Rome after receiving news of having been granted a pardon. Although his life ended abruptly at the age of 38, his powerful realism impacted a generation or more of European artists. Approximately 200,000 people tour the Museum each year, many participating in programs designed for diverse audiences. Art begins a conversation within ourselves and our community. The Columbus Museum of Art is where that conversation begins.

The Tamarind Institute Shows New Lithographs by Hung Liu Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:17 PM PDT Albuquerque, New Mexico.- The Tamarind Insitute is pleased to present "Hung Liu : Pressed Memory", on view in the gallery until December. Hung Liu, a highly respected and widely collected American artist, returned to Tamarind in early August to create lithographs for the third time with Tamarind printers. Liu's new Tamarind lithographs will be exhibited, together with prints from her previous Tamarind projects, and prints from Shark's, Inc. in Lyons, Colorado, and Paulson Press in Oakland, California. On view from 21st October through December.

Albright-Knox Art Gallery shows Full Color Depression: First Kodachromes Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:16 PM PDT BUFFALO, N.Y.- Organized by Bruce Jackson (SUNY Distinguished Professor and UB James Agee Professor of American Culture), with Albright-Knox Curator for the Collection Holly E. Hughes, this exhibition will feature a selection of rarely seen color photographs from the Library of Congress' Farm Security Administration (FSA) photography collection. The black-and-white photographs taken by the FSA's team—composed of Walker Evans (American, 1903–1975), Dorothea Lange (American, 1895–1965), Ben Shahn (American, 1898–1969), Russell Lee (American, 1903–1986), and others, under the leadership of Roy Emerson Stryker—include some of the most recognizable images of American cities, towns, and countryside during the Great Depression. The team began documenting America in 1935 and ultimately took at least 175,000 black-and-white images, as well as some color images using a film called Kodachrome. No one knows exactly how many frames they shot in color, but only 1,615 survive. Until recently, most of these images had not been seen since they were initially processed by Kodak's lab in Rochester well over half a century ago. Kodachrome, the most stable fine-grain color film ever made, was introduced as 16mm movie film in 1935. During the following three years it became available in canisters for 35mm cameras and in sheets for medium- and large-format cameras. By late 1939, the processing was as good as the film, and some of Stryker's FSA photographers began experimenting with it. They continued their work after the FSA project was absorbed by the Office of War Information (OWI) in 1942, through its dissolution in 1944. All of the project's surviving color images are now available as high-resolution scans from the Library of Congress. For this exhibition, Jackson, a photographer himself, has selected, printed, and, in some instances, restored a representative group of images; some of the prints required more than a thousand separate corrections. Jackson's selections range from the first tentative explorations of Marion Post Wolcott (American, 1910–1990)—who used the film in the same way she used monochrome film—to the more complex color work of Lee and Jack Delano (American, 1914–1997)—who were beginning to understand that color photography was different than monochrome—and the hyped advertising-style propaganda images of Alfred T. Palmer (American, 1906–1993) from the early years of World War II. Color photography would not find a firm base in the art world until the exhibition of works by William Eggleston (American, born 1939) at The Museum of Modern Art in 1976, but, as the images in this exhibition demonstrate, the path was marked decades before by Roy Stryker's FSA team. Their assignment was to document what America looked like during and at the end of the Great Depression; in the process, they discovered new ways the camera lens could see and represent the world.  This exhibition is organized by Bruce Jackson, SUNY Distinguished Professor and James Agee Professor of American Culture, University at Buffalo, and Curator for the Collection Holly E. Hughes. It is presented in cooperation with The Humanities Institute, University at Buffalo, and the Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Visit the Albright-Knox Art Gallery at : http://www.albrightknox.org/

'Pop Life' at Hamburger Kunsthalle Proves that "Good Business is the Best Art" Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:10 PM PDT HAMBURG.- The exhibition Pop Life takes Andy Warhol's famously provocative claim that "good business is the best art" as the starting point for a completely new interpretation of the legacy of Pop art and the influence of its chief protagonists. Pop Life shows the various ways in which artists since the 1980s have engaged with the mass media, often involving the deliberate creation and cultivation of an artistic persona as a 'brand'. The exhibition features works by Andy Warhol alongside key pieces by Keith Haring, Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, Richard Prince, Martin Kippenberger, Tracey Emin, Takashi Murakami and others. Some 320 exhibits will be on display, including paintings, drawings, photographs, magazines, sculptures, videos, merchandising products, spatial installations and a shop.  On view through 9 May, 2010 at the Hamburger Kunsthalle. Pop Life argues that Andy Warhol's most radical lesson is reflected in the work of artists of subsequent generations who not only reproduce everyday culture in their artworks but also strategically infiltrate this realm, appropriating the mechanisms of the market, the mass media and the omnipresence of advertising in order to reach an audience far beyond the confines of the art gallery. The conflation of culture and commerce is commonly regarded as a betrayal of the values of modern art; Pop Life, on the other hand, shows that for many artists who came after Warhol, the fusion of the two realms is the only possible means of interacting with the modern world. Pop Life includes reconstructions of Keith Haring's Pop Shop and Jeff Koons's series Made in Heaven, which is rarely presented in its entirety. Haring opened the Pop Shop on New York's Lafayette Street in 1986 to market his branded artistic signature in the form of merchandising products – including T-shirts, toys and magnets – that were aimed at the widest possible audience. In his series Made in Heaven, first shown at the 1991 Venice Biennale, Jeff Koons publicly celebrates his marital union with the Italian porn star Ilona Staller, also known as La Cicciolina. One of the central themes of the exhibition is the performative aspect revealed by the self-presentation and role perception of artists within the spheres of the mass media and the art business. The artists themselves are actively involved in key areas – among other things as forgers, celebrities, publishers, art dealers, gallerists, business owners, curators, TV presenters, even auctioneers. They smuggle themselves in disguise into the operating systems of product and information circulation, exposing these mechanisms without having to take a personal stance. Here in lies the ambiguous content – affirmative and critical at once – of Pop Life. The exhibition begins with an examination of Andy Warhol's late work, looking at his various roles as a television personality, an advertising icon and the publisher of Interview magazine – typical activities for that time. Highlights include a number of works from the initially controversial series that became known as the Retrospectives and Reversals. As reprisals of his own celebrated images of pop icons from the 1960s, these works prefigure installations by artists such as Martin Kippenberger or Tracey Emin. Like Warhol, these artists openly embrace the self-mythologizing impulse: they consider the creation of their public persona and its distribution as a brand to be one of the fundamental tools of their profession. Several rooms in the Hamburg edition of Pop Life are dedicated to Martin Kippenberger. One special presentation that will only be shown here features early works from the collection of Gisela Stelly Augstein, a Hamburg-based filmmaker whom the artist much admired. With this display of black-and-white photo-paintings from Kippenberger's series Un Tedesco in Firenze, along with the 'Ideentafeln' (idea panels), and numerous letters and postcards to Stelly Augstein, the exhibition allows visitors to experience at close quarters the early stages of his development into a skilful self-promoter and social analyst. Following in the tradition of Dada and Fluxus, Kippenberger's provocative, mocking attacks were aimed at dismantling the traditional concept of art. A further section of the exhibition is devoted to the so-called 'Young British Artists', with particular emphasis being placed on their early activities. These include the shop opened by Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas in London's Bethnal Green district, where the two artists created and sold their work. Renowned pieces by Gavin Turk are featured here alongside selected works from Beautiful Inside My Head Forever, Damien Hirst's spectacular auction that took place in September 2008 at Sotheby's in London. A specially commissioned new installation by the Japanese artist Takashi Murakami, who has set up his own multinational company to distribute his art, will be shown in one of the final rooms of the exhibition. Hamburger Kunsthalle  at : www.hamburger-kunsthalle.de/

SFMOMA will Become Home to Gap Founder's Contemporary Art Collection Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:09 PM PDT SAN FRANCISCO, CA.- San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) Board Chair Charles Schwab and Director Neal Benezra today announced that the museum is developing a groundbreaking relationship with Doris and Donald Fisher that would provide the Fisher Collection—one of the world's leading collections of contemporary art—with a home at SFMOMA. The Fishers, who together founded Gap Inc. in 1969, have long envisioned keeping their collection intact for the public in their hometown of San Francisco. The Fisher Collection includes some 1,100 works by leading artists including Alexander Calder, Chuck Close, Willem de Kooning, Richard Diebenkorn, Anselm Kiefer, Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, Brice Marden, Agnes Martin, Gerhard Richter, Richard Serra, Cy Twombly, and Andy Warhol, among many others.

Monet to Dalí: Modern Masters on View at Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:08 PM PDT DETROIT, MI - An extraordinary "who's who" of modern art masters, including Monet, Dali, van Gogh, Renoir, Degas, Matisse, Picasso and Rodin—to name just a few—will be on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) October 12th , 2008 through January 18th, 2009. Through 75 paintings and sculptures, visitors will be immersed in one of the most fascinating periods in the history of art—the gradual shift from a reliance on artistic tradition to an insistence on individual innovation at the turn of the 20th century.

Pinakothek der Moderne hosts Masterdrawings from The Morgan Library & Museum Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:07 PM PDT Munich, Germany - One hundred of the finest examples of draftsmanship from the permanent collection of The Morgan Library & Museum are on view at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich. This exhibition has provided an exciting opportunity for the Morgan to collaborate with one of the foremost European collections of works on paper, the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung Munich, and to share the treasures of its collection with a wider public in one of the cultural capitals of Europe. On view through 3 January, 2009.

Gerald Peters Gallery presents Max Weber ~ Paintings from the 1930s, 40s and 50s Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:06 PM PDT New York City - Max Weber was at the forefront of abstraction as one of its most versatile, inventive, and exceptional trail blazers in America. A consummate Expressionist who touched on virtually every phase of modernism, Weber served as a crucial link between the first wave of American modernism and the action painters associated with the New York School at mid-century. On view at the Gerald Peters Gallery New York from November 13 through December 19, 2008, Max Weber: Paintings from the 1930s, 40s and 50s features over 40 paintings and works on paper selected from the Weber Estate.

Munich's Cultural Appeal Expands with New Brandhorst Museum Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:05 PM PDT MUNICH, GERMANY - With the new Museum Brandhorst, the Kunstareal museum complex has gained a significant new addition. In conjunction with the collection of the Pinakothek der Moderne, the multifaceted profile of modern and contemporary art has been expanded in an impressive manner. The Udo and Anette Brandhorst Collection, with its important work complexes, will open to the public tomorrow in a fascinating building designed by Sauerbruch Hutton architects. Both, architecture and works, further emphasize the city's significant cultural importance and will trigger a far-reaching resonance.

Christian Ferreira Presents "Heringa/Van Kalsbeek: Drie" at the Wapping Project, London Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:04 PM PDT London.- Christian Ferreira is delighted to present a solo exhibition of Heringa/Van Kalsbeek's sculptural work. Titled "Drie" the exhibition will feature an elegantly curated selection of three of the Dutch duo, Heringa/Van Kalsbeek's abstracted sculptures housed in the industrial surrounds of the Accumulator Tower of The Wapping Project, London. The exhibition opens on May 6th and is on view until June 19th 2011. Chaotic in their appearance the works are reminiscent of bestial wildlife photography caught in motion. Created from steel, resin and polyurethane mixed with found objects such as feathers, cloth and coral the work has a rich assemblage like quality.

Monika Sosnowska’s Architectural Installation at K21 in Dusseldorf Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:03 PM PDT DUSSELDORF.- With Monika Sosnowska's project Ohne Titel, 2010 (Untitled, 2010), the imposing interior courtyard of the K21 Ständehaus is made available to an artistic intervention for the first time. At two-year intervals beginning in 2010, the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen will be inviting internationally acclaimed artists to use the "airspace" above the piazza as the site of a contemporary intervention, each designed to heighten awareness of the museum as a "house of art" in the eyes of entering visitors.

Braunstein/Quay Gallery features Ursula Schneider ~ The River Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:02 PM PDT San Francisco, CA - The large-scale paintings by Ursula Schneider are based on her observations of the Hudson River, the architecture of the Indian Point Energy Center, a nuclear power plant in Buchanan, New York , and the intrusion of industrial barges on the river's serenity. On exhibition at Braunstein/Quay Gallery, 430 Clementina / San Francisco, CA 94103 from 25 June through 1 August, 2009. Reception Saturday, June 27, 2009, 3:00 - 5:00pm

Nest Egg's April 16 Auction Features Photographs and Fine Art Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:01 PM PDT Nest Egg's April 16 Auction Features Photographs and Fine Art MERIDEN, CT.- An extraordinary archive of Alfred "Cheney" Johnston (1884-1971) glamour photos of Jazz Age beauties, as well as important artworks from the renowned Ziegfield Follies photographer's personal collection, will be auctioned on April 16, 2011 at Nest Egg Auctions' gallery in Meriden, Connecticut. Johnston's personal photo archive, which was bequeathed to a neighbor 40 years ago and has remained in the same family ever since, includes dozens of beautiful nudes that were considered very daring for their time. Johnston was a trailblazer in celebrity photography and rose to the top of his profession with his stunning pictures of showgirls, film stars and rising starlets – among them Barbara Stanwyck, Clara Bow, Paulette Goddard, Gloria Swanson and Julie "Catwoman" Newmar. Johnston's ability to put his subjects at ease resulted in stylish portraits whose artistic quality has withstood the test of time.

Israel Museum Looking for Owners & Restitution of Art Stolen in France Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:00 PM PDT JERUSALEM, ISRAEL - The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, presents Looking for Owners: Custody, Research, and Restitution of Art Stolen in France during World War II, an exhibition tracing the story of works of art looted by Nazi forces in France during the Second World War. Organized by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, the Direction des musées de France and the Réunion des musées nationaux, in collaboration with The Israel Museum, this landmark exhibition draws from the collection of works of art in France known as Musées Nationaux Récupération (MNR). On view through June 3, 2008, Looking for Owners brings together more than fifty paintings to explore the complex history behind the MNR holdings, with specific focus on the progress over the last ten years in tracing rightful ownership. The exhibition features the work of major European artists, including Eugène Delacroix, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Max Ernst, Claude Monet, Gustave Courbet, and Georges Seurat, Jacob van Velsen and Simon Vouet. Approximately 60,000 objects that were taken from France and brought to Germany during World War II, either through looting or commercial transactions, were repatriated to France after the war. Of these, 2,000 objects that could not be restituted due to a lack of clear ownership history or because they had not been looted, were given in custody to the French National Museums. Today they are stored or exhibited in museums throughout France, including the Louvre, Musée d'Orsay, and Centre Georges-Pompidou, and the French government continues active provenance research and restitution efforts. To help illuminate this ongoing process, the Mattéoli Commission, formed in 1997 by then-Prime Minister Alain Juppé to study the matter of Jewish property restitution in France, recommended an exhibition of MNR works at the Israel Museum at the appropriate time. "There has been much misunderstanding about the history of works taken during World War II and the efforts relating to their recovery following the war," said James S. Snyder, Anne and Jerome Fisher Director of the Israel Museum. "This is an unprecedented opportunity to present the history of MNR for our audience in Israel, together with the ongoing research that has been done to help advance the process of restitution in France." Looking for Owners features fifty-three works from the MNR collection presented in several categories, including: works looted from unknown owners, works stolen from Jewish families that were returned following the war and subsequently re-gifted to or purchased by the State; unprovenanced works; works involved in transactions with the Nazis; and works bought in the French art market by German museums and private individuals during the war. The Looting of Art during World War II - Before the beginning of World War II, Adolf Hitler declared his wish to transform his hometown of Linz, Austria, into the Third Reich's art capital, where all of the treasures of Europe would be exhibited. As a means to this end, Hitler recruited leading art experts to compile a secret "wish list" of works of art by so-called Aryan masters or works that had left German collections after the year 1500, to be "repatriated" to Germany. Plundering of public and private property, and especially of Jewish property, began in 1938 and reached a climax with the Final Solution. Major art collections were confiscated systematically throughout Europe, accompanied by other forms of looting, which included theft of works by Nazi soldiers and officers to give as gifts or for their own private collections, as well as forced sales of inventories from prominent art dealers. At the end of the war a staggering volume of artworks, books, archival materials, and other cultural artifacts was discovered in hiding places throughout Germany and Austria – in depots, salt mines, castles, museum storerooms, and even private homes – and the arduous task of locating rightful owners and returning treasures to their owners or legitimate heirs began. Looking for Owners reflects aspects of this ongoing effort. An online list of the MNR collection was posted in November 1996 by the Museums Department of the French Ministry of Culture and Communication (www.culture.gouv.fr). In 2004, the Réunion des Musées Nationaux published a catalogue of MNR paintings. In conjunction with Looking for Owners, an illustrated catalogue will be published in French and English. Looking for Owners: Custody, Research, and Restitution of Art Stolen in France during World War II is organized by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, the Direction des musées de France and the Réunion des musées nationaux, in collaboration with The Israel Museum. It is curated by Isabelle le Masne de Chermont, Curator-at-large at the Museums Department; Vincent Pomarède, Head of the Paintings Department at the Louvre; Laurence Sigal, Director of the Musée d'art et d'histoire du Judaïsme in Paris; and Didier Schulmann, Curator-at-large at the Musée national d'art moderne (Centre Georges-Pompidou); in collaboration with Shlomit Steinberg, Hans Dichand Curator of European Art at the Israel Museum. The exhibition is made possible through the generosity of: Ingeborg and Ira Leon Rennert, New York; and the donors to the Israel Museum's 2008 Exhibition Fund: Melva Bucksbaum and Raymond J. Learsy, Aspen, Colorado; Ruth and Leon Davidoff, Paris and Mexico City; Hanno D. Mott, New York; and the Nash Family Foundation, New York.   The Israel Museum is the largest cultural institution in the State of Israel and is ranked among the leading art and archaeology museums in the world. Founded in 1965, the Museum houses encyclopedic collections, including the most extensive holdings of biblical and Holy Land archaeology in the world. In just forty years, the Museum has built a far-ranging collection of nearly 500,000 objects thanks to a legacy of gifts and the support from its circle of patrons worldwide.  Visit : www.imjnet.org.il/

This Week in Review in Art Knowledge News Posted: 21 Oct 2011 07:00 PM PDT This is a new feature for the subscribers and visitors to Art Knowledge News (AKN), that will enable you to see "thumbnail descriptions" of the last ninety (90) articles and art images that we published. This will allow you to visit any article that you may have missed ; or re-visit any article or image of particular interest. Every day the article "thumbnail images" will change. For you to see the entire last ninety images just click : here . When opened that also will allow you to change the language from English to anyone of 54 other languages, by clicking your language choice on the upper left corner of our Home Page.  You can share any article we publish with the eleven (11) social websites we offer like Twitter, Flicker, Linkedin, Facebook, etc. by one click on the image shown at the end of each opened article.  Last, but not least, you can email or print any entire article by using an icon visible to the right side of an article's headline.

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