NEWT TARGETS NEA
In a lurch to the right widely viewed as part of an effort to woo conservatives, House Speaker Newt Gingrich has vowed to eliminate the National Endowment of the Arts. Saying it is an elitist bureaucracy that promotes obscene and blasphemous works, Newt suggests that rich Hollywood types like Alec Balwin and Michael Ovitz should fund NEA. "Charges of elitism are preposterous," said NEA spokesperson Cherie Simon. "We provide access to excellent art all over the country." Whether the right wing can muster the 218 votes needed to wipe out NEA remains to be seen.
GUGGENHEIM FELLOWSHIPS, 1997
GUGGENHEIM FELLOWSHIPS, 1997
The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation has announced the winners of its fellowships for 1997, a total of 164 artists, scholars and scientists from among 2,876 applicants for awards totaling $4,890,000. Among the art-world winners:
Maryanne Amacher, sound installation artist, Kingston, N.Y.
Eleanor Antin, installation artist and professor, U. Cal. San Diego
Paul Bochner, painter; Valley Cottage, N.Y.
Gregg Bordowitz, filmmaker and Whitney Museum ISP faculty member
Norman Bryson, art historian, Harvard U.
Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe, painter, Art Center College of Design, Pasadena
Karin F. Giusti, installation artist, New York
Mirta Gomez Del Valle, photographer, Florida International U., Miami
Michele Hannoosh, professor of French, University College London (a new
edition of Delacroix's journal)
Anne Harris, painter and professor, Bowdoin College, South Portland, Me.
Yvonne Jacquette, artist, New York, and visiting critic, Penna. Academy,
Philadelphia
Melinda James, artist, Woodmont, Conn.
An-My Le, photographer, New York Judith Linhares, painter, New York
Charles Long, installation artist, New York
Mercedes Matter, artist, East Hampton, N.Y., and dean emeritus, New York
Studio School
Sheila McTighe, art historian, Barnard College (studies in Italian and French
genre art, 1580-1720)
Deborah Muirhead, painter and art professor, U. of Conn.
Cara Perlman, sculptor, New York
Russell L. Roberts, painter, Cambridge, Mass.
Allen Ruppersberg, artist, New York
Laurie Smmons, artist, New York
Denyse Thomasos, painter, New York, and professor, Rutgers U.
Trimpin, sound installation artist, Seattle
RESALE ROYALTIES IN EU
The European Parliament has voted to give
artists resale royalties throughout the 15-nation European Union. As things stand some
EU countries, notably Britain, do not
recognize a "resale right" and artists
receive no benefit when their paintings are
resold. Under the new proposal artists
throughout the bloc would be entitled to
the same level of royalty, set on a sliding
scale according to the selling price of
their work. Sotheby's and Christie's say the
resale right will force the art market to
move from London to New York and
Switzerland. Artists say that the new rule
would give them less money for resales in
countries like France and Germany, where
artists currently receive three percent and
five percent, respectively.
BRITISH BODY PARTS
The 41-year-old British sculptor (and
former butcher) Anthony-Noel Kelly, a
teacher at Prince Charles's
Institute of Architecture, has been
arrested in an investigation of the illegal
use of human body parts. Kelly is known for
his casts of head, feet and torsos, some
gilded with silver and gold. The police
raid on Kelly's home and studio came after
someone recognized a dead man in one of
Kelly's sculptures showing the man's head
with part of his brain cut away. Police
found 20 to 30 pieces of human bodies at
his studio. "It was sickening," a
detective told the Mirror. The artist
declined to comment.
ROTHSCHILD GRANTS
The Judith Rothschild Foundation has
granted a total of over $375,000 in more
than 25 awards ranging from $4,000 to
$42,000, in a program designed to stimulate
interest in the work of American artists
who have died within the past 20 years.
This is the second round of the grants that
were established upon the 1993 death of
abstract painter Judith Rothschild. Among
the projects: $10,000 for a documentary on
artist Ray Johnson; $25,000 to the National
Gallery of Art to acquire up to 16 works on
paper by Dorothy Dehner and organize an
exhibition; $15,000 for conservation of
abstract wood sculpture by Raoul Hague;
$35,000 for a Richard Pousette-Dart
retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum;
$10,000 for a Jack Smith retrospective at
P.S. 1 in Long Island City; and $42,339 for
an Artists' Estate Planning Conference and
handbook cosponsored with the Marie Walsh
Sharpe Art Foundation in Colorado Springs,
Colo.
OPEN STUDIOS
Speaking of the Sharpe Art Foundation, it
operates a studio program in New York City
at 443 Greenwich Street, 7th floor, and has
scheduled an open-studios session on
Thurs., Apr. 24, from 2 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Among the artists-in-residence are Carl
Fudge (seen last fall at Lauren Wittels),
Brad Kahlhamer (seen last fall at Bronwyn
Keenan), Portia Munson (her pink
installation was in "Bad Girls" at the New
Museum) and Glen Seator (he has the tilted
room in the Whitney Biennial).
IT'S GRAMERCY TIME
The fourth annual Gramercy International
Contemporary Art Fair, at the Gramercy Park
Hotel at 2 Lexington Ave. in NYC, is less
than one month away. It opens May 2, 1997,
from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m., and is on view May
3, 4 and 5 from noon to 8 p.m. Admission is
$5.
CITIBANK AWARD
The Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art
and the Citibank Private Bank have
announced a new Citibank Private Bank
Emerging Artist Award to focus on Southern
California artists who have not previously
had a solo museum show. The annual award --
set for the next three years, at least --
will consist of a show in MOCA's "Focus"
series, an acquisition for the collection
and a cash award of an unspecified amount.
The first winner is to be announced in
June. The six-member nominating committee
consists of MOCA curator Elizabeth A.T.
Smith; Otis Gallery director Anne Ayres;
artist Judy Fishkin; U. Cal., Irvine, art
historian David Joselit; collector and Walt
Disney tv president Dean Valentine; and
Citibank art advisory v.p. Jennifer Wells.
The four-person selection committee
includes MOCA director Richard Koshalek,
MOCA chief curator Paul Schimmel, and Smith
and Wells.
ICONS AT SFMOMA
"Icons: Magnets of Meaning," on view at the
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Apr.
18-Aug. 5, 1997, presents 12 everyday
objects as icons of contemporary culture
and benchmarks of current design. Organized
by architecture and design curator Aaron
Betsky, the show assembles nearly 300 items
and focuses on 12 everyday objects, and
themes, viz: Blue Jeans, the uniforms of
modernism; Lipstick, the masks of beauty;
Surfboard, plasticity in a world of flows;
Baseball Bat, body machines; BMW 325i,
speed and sex and steel; Minicams, you are
big brother; Kitchenaid Mixer, gadgets
galore; CBS Eye Logo, co-opting the
corporate; @, marking the electrosphere;
Luxor Hotel, slow buildings for fast space;
Sam Houston Tollway and Interstate 10,
iconic foundations; and SFMOMA, iconic
monumentality.
MENIL TURNS 10
The Menil Collection in Houston, Tex., is
celebrating its tenth anniversary and the
90th year of founder and patron Dominique
de Menil with a benefit dinner at the
museum Apr. 23 (that is expected to raise
$1 million for the Menil endowment--tables
go for $25,000 each, individual seats for
$2,500). The festivities include a preview
of "Georges Braque: The Late Works,"
organized by London's Royal Academy and
appearing in the U.S. only at the Menil.
WELCOME MSN ARTLINERS
The Microsoft Network is about to launch a
redesigned chat forum, called Artline, with
a special link to ArtNet. Welcome MSN
subscribers! Get in there and dish that art
dirt!
NASHER SCULPTURE TO DALLAS
Shopping-mall millionaire and sculpture
lover Raymond D. Nasher plans to establish
a two-acre sculpture garden in Dallas next
to the Dallas Museum. The $32-million
project, called the Nasher Sculpture
Garden, is scheduled to open in 1999. A
selection of the Nasher collection is on
view at the Guggenheim Museum till June 1.
SMOKE NEIMAN
Don Diego cigars now offers a brand named
after Abstract-Impressionist maestro LeRoy
Neiman, 69, with a portrait of the artist
by Tom Stabler on the band. Neiman started
smoking at age 12 in imitation of Clark
Gable, he told the New York Times.
BENDERSON BOOK
Edgewise press announces the forthcoming
publication of its second book, Toward the
New Degeneracy by Bruce Benderson. To help
defray costs, Edgewise publisher Richard
Milazzo is offering 50 copies, signed and
numbered by the author, for $50 each. Make
checks payable to Edgewise Press, 24 Fifth
Ave., Suite 224, NYC, NY 10011-8815.
WATTEAU IN CHICAGO
The Art Institute of Chicago has
authenticated a work in its collection,
Fete Champetre, as the work of Antoine
Watteau. The work had been attributed to an
anonymous "follower of Jean Batiste
Pater," a pupil of Watteau, and was badly
clouded with varnish. New X-ray analysis,
the museum said, proves the work to be by
the 18th-century master.
GORDON PARKS AT CORCORAN
The first retrospective of photojournalist,
writer and filmmaker Gordon Parks (b. 1912)
opens at the Corcoran Gallery in
Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 1997. The show,
which will tour to museums in eight more
cities (including the Museum of the City of
New York and L.A.'s California African
American Museum) features over 150
photographs and is organized by Corcoran
curator Philip Brookman and Deborah Willis,
collections coordinator at the Center for
African-American Culture and History,
Smithsonian Institution.
STANLEY SPENCER RETRO
The English Biblical symbolist painter
Stanley Spencer (1891-1959) is the subject
of a major traveling retrospective, "An
English Vision: The Paintings of Stanley
Spencer," at the Hirshhorn Museum, Oct. 9,
1997-Jan. 11, 1998. The show, organized by
Hirshhorn director James T. Demetrion and
British Council visual arts head Andrea
Rose, subsequently appears at the Chicago
MCA, Feb. 12-May 10, 1998, and the
California Palace of the Legion of Honor,
San Francisco, June 8-Sept. 6, 1998.
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