Monthly archive
26 headlines
Source-linked reporting
benningviolins.com
Eric Benning completes a new cello on March 30, 2016. The piece highlights his past motorcycle accident in October 2014 and explains the cello was begun in early 2015 as part of his recovery and attempt to continue making cellos.
welt.de
The article discusses investors increasingly buying valuable violins as a store of value, citing Daniel Hope and the famous 1721 Stradivari Lady Blunt, which fetched 11.6 million euros at a charity auction. It also notes price surges for 1930s-1940s instruments, the role of collectors and banks, and the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben providing historic instruments to young musicians such as Mayumi Kanagawa and mentioning Julia Fischer.
theartnewspaper.com
The Veronese preparatory drawing for Venice Triumphant, dated around 1581, sold for £15.4m. A UK export licence was deferred on 29 March to allow a UK buyer to match the price, with the work previously owned by the Earls of Harewood and previously traced to Peter Lely and the Pembroke family; the initial deferral runs until 28 June.
theartnewspaper.com
Vincent van Gogh’s The Night Café (1888) remains at Yale University after the US Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Pierre Konowaloff. The painting, valued at about $200 million, was at the center of a long legal battle over ownership that began in 2008. The decision affirms Yale’s ownership and ends the dispute.
artforum.com
Yale University won its legal battle over ownership of Van Gogh's The Night Café, 1888, after the US Supreme Court rejected an appeal, confirming Yale will keep the painting valued at about $200 million. The dispute traces back to a 2008 claim by Pierre Konowaloff that the work belonged to his family after alleged seizures during the 1917 Russian Revolution.
artlyst.com
Vincent van Gogh's The Night Café is involved in a restitution dispute with descendants of a Russian collector, Pierre Konowaloff. The US Supreme Court rejected his appeal for the painting, which is valued up to $200 million and housed at Yale University Art Gallery.
thenationalnews.com
Anna Seaman reports that Art Dubai, the region's largest art fair, saw 27,516 visitors across the week, with 5,142 in the Collectors’ Preview and 7,211 in the VIP Preview. The event featured artworks from Ai Weiwei, Faiq Hassan, Yayoi Kusama, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, Marwan, Nasreen Mohammedi, Jaume Plensa, among others, and noted substantial gallery interest and some sales; around a quarter of galleries sold out.
pizzicato.lu
Timothy Ridout, a British violist, won the 12th Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition held on the Isle of Man. He received £7,000, a London recital, and a viola bow from Bishop Instruments and Bows Ltd. Second prize of £5,000 went to Manuel Vioque-Judde of France, and third prize of £3,000 went to Wenhong Luo of China.
theviolinchannel.com
Timothy Ridout won the 1st prize at the 12th Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition, receiving £7,000 (US $10,000), a London recital, and a viola bow. Second and third prizes went to Manuel Vioque-Judde and Wenhong Luo. The competition was founded in 1980 and this year’s jury included Yuri Bashmet, George Caird, Wing Ho, Garth Knox and Thomas Riebl.
theviolinchannel.com
The Violin Channel reports a 16 9/16-inch Joseph Curtin modern viola stolen in Miami, Florida, on the night of March 18, 2016. The instrument, owned by a member of the Miami City Ballet Orchestra, was left unattended in a car; it is a Guarneri copy labeled Joseph Curtin, Toronto 1982 with serial number 8232, and was accompanied by an Ole Kaneström bow in a black Gewa case.
greatfallstribune.com
Traci Rosenbaum and David Murray report that Thomas Moran’s Castle Rock, Green River, Wyoming sold for $3.6 million at the Great Falls Mansfield Convention Center, a record for the event. Michael Duchemin of the C.M. Russell Museum comments on the sale’s impact and the room’s excitement.
slippedisc.com
The article reports that a viola and bow were stolen from a musician’s car in Miami, as shared by Greg Falkenstein. It includes the musician’s appeal for help from the local and broader community to recover the instrument and bow and to warn others about the theft.
ingleshayday.com
Ingles & Hayday report that a quartet of instruments by Jean Baptiste Vuillaume, consisting of two violins, a viola and a cello named after the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, sold at auction for £960,000 on 15 March. The sale was conducted by Tim Ingles, and the buyer was described as an Asian collector who values the set for its historical significance.
clevelandclassical.com
The BlueWater Chamber Orchestra performed a concert at the Breen Center in Ohio City on February 27 conducted by Charles Latshaw, featuring violinist Emily Cornelius and cellist Linda Atherton in Ellen Taaffe Zwilich’s Concerto for violin, cello and orchestra. The program also included Arriaga and Beethoven, with Martin Neubert and Cynthia Warren contributing oboe and English horn commentary.
news.artnet.com
Pablo Picasso. Artwork: Bust de Femme (Marie Therese) (1931). Sale context involves the Pelham Sale Agreement and a second sale to Gagosian and Leon Black. nearly $50 million negotiated by Pelham; reference to a $105 million sculpture in the headline. The article discusses legal filings in US District Court for the Southern District of New York and allegations of tortious interference by Diana Widmaier-Picasso and entities including Maya Widmaier Picasso, Olivier Widmaier Picasso, the Gagosian Gallery, and Pelham Europe.
news.artnet.com
Artnet News reports that forty art handlers and six auctioneers at Drouot in Paris are on trial for theft involving artworks valued at about $2.5 million, including pieces by Gustave Courbet, Marc Chagall, and Henri Matisse, plus a 2.08-carat diamond. The case, which began after an anonymous tip and has dragged on for seven years, led to a full staff replacement in 2010 and suspensions of executives; defendants face gang-related theft, conspiracy, and handling stolen goods charges.
nytimes.com
The article covers a dispute over a 1931 Picasso bust of Marie-Thérèse Walter, with Maya Widmaier-Picasso’s family selling and transferring ownership amid legal actions in France, Switzerland, and the U.S. The involved parties include Pelham Holdings, the Qatari royal family agents, Larry Gagosian, Leon Black, and Diana Widmaier-Picasso; the work was previously displayed at MoMA and is now with Gagosian during litigation.
benningviolins.com
Vijay Gupta, a violinist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, has acquired a Bergonzi-model violin crafted by Eric Benning in 2015, using Bosnian maple from the late 1940s and Northern Italian spruce from the 1920s.
news.artnet.com
Luca Giordano's The Calling of Saint Peter and Saint Andrew (1690) and Roeland Savery Still life of flowers (1615) were sold at TEFAF Maastricht; the former to a private European collector for €2 million and the latter to the Mauritshuis in The Hague for €6.5 million, all as part of sales reported by Colnaghi Gallery. The article notes TeFAF's leadership changes with Patrick von Maris taking over from Paul Hustinx and highlights Rembrandt’s The Unconscious Patient rediscovered, along with Picasso works and other Old Master offerings.
tarisio.com
The article discusses the Canada Council Musical Instrument Bank, its history since 1985, and how it supports young Canadian musicians through instrument loans. It mentions the 1729 del Gesù violin loaned to Yi-Jia Susanne Hou (recipient in 2003 and 2006), the bank's current holdings of 22 instruments and two bows, and notes about funding, the luthier Ric Heinl, and the open competition process for selecting recipients.
themoscowtimes.com
Vincent van Gogh's The Night Café, valued around $200 million and housed at Yale University Art Gallery since 1961, is at the center of a legal dispute brought by Pierre Konowaloff, heir to Ivan Morozov. The case traces Soviet nationalization policies and questions of international property rights as Konowaloff seeks to challenge Yale's title at the U.S. Supreme Court.
motl.org
The University of Oklahoma has agreed to return Camille Pissarro’s 1886 painting La Bergère Rentrant des Moutons (Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep) to Holocaust survivor Léone Meyer after a three-year legal dispute. The work, donated to OU by Clara Weitzenhoffer in 2000, was identified as Nazi-looted and will be transferred to Meyer and exhibited in France for five years, with subsequent displays alternating between OU’s Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art and France.
claimscon.org
Camille Pissarro’s 1886 La bergère rentrant des moutons, also known as La Bergère, is being returned to Léone Meyer after being looted during the Holocaust. The restitution began when Meyer’s relatives found the painting in the Claims Conference database of Nazi-looted art, and the University of Oklahoma agreed to return the work after provenance research and a related lawsuit filed in May 2013.
news.artnet.com
Austria's city of Linz appeals a verdict ordering €8.24 million ($8.96 million) plus interest to the heirs of Olga Jäger over the disappearance of a Gustav Klimt drawing and three Egon Schiele works. The case originated from a long-term loan to the Neue Galerie der Stadt Linz (now Lentos Kunstmuseum); the artworks could not be found when requested in 2006.
news.artnet.com
Phillips held its New Now sale on February 29, with an overall sell-through rate of 51 percent by lot and 60 percent by value. The evening sale total including premium was $1.7 million (low presale estimate $2.8 million) from 13 of 23 lots sold; the day sale totaled $2.7 million from 131 of 266 lots sold. Notable details include strong prices for some younger artists, with several noted around six-figure estimates not selling in the evening sale, and records achieved for younger art stars such as Petra Cortright, Trevor Paglen, and Alex Da Corte.
theartnewspaper.com
Orazio Gentileschi’s Danaë was bought by the J. Paul Getty Museum for $30.5 million (with premium). Frida Kahlo’s Dos Mujeres (Salvadora y Herminia) was purchased by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for an undisclosed sum. Ernst Ludwig Kirchner’s Street Scene in Front of the Hair Salon was acquired by Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden after being restituted.