In The News Fall 2015

1. NEW YORK It’s not every day that an American artist receives an email alerting them that someone halfway around the world has just won an award for unauthorized and blatant reproductions of their own work. But that’s what happened recently to Mike Womack, who “out of the blue” received some intel via email regarding one Jeongwoo Hahn, a South Korean sculptor who scored $6,500 via Insa Art Space, a non-profit institution launched in 2000 in Seoul, and the opportunity to stage a solo exhibition at the venue. One small problem: Hahn’s creations were almost note-for-note fascimiles of work that Womack had debuted, in 2013, at ZieherSmith Gallery in New York (now Zieher Smith & Horton).More Information: http://blogs.artinfo.com/artintheair/2015/10/15/south-korean-copyist-wins-award-for-borrowed-ideas/?utm_source=BLOUIN+ARTINFO+Newsletters&utm_campaign=9e20b86bd5-Daily+Digest+October+16%2C2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_df23dbd3c6-9e20b86bd5-83005727


2. ROME (AFP).- Italy said Saturday that UNESCO has approved its suggestion to have the United Nation's famous Blue Helmets protect heritage sites around the world from attacks by Islamist

militants. "UNESCO has said yes to the Cultural Blue Helmets," Culture Minister Dario Franceschini said in a statement, adding that 53 countries voted in favour after the destruction of sites including Palmyra in Syria by the Islamic State group. More Information: http://artdaily.com/news/82247/United-Nations--Blue-Helmets-to-protect-world-s-heritage-from-Islamic-State--Italy#.ViVsfRCrRPM


3. HAVANA After ten months behind bars, artist Danilo "El Sexto" Maldonado has been freed from Cuban prison, reports the Associated Press.The artist was imprisoned in December, allegedly in retaliation for a politically-charged artwork involving two painted pigs. The piece mocked Cuba's president, Raul, and his predecessor and older brother, Fidel; according to Amnesty International, Cuban authorities stopped the artist on his way to Havana's Central Park to release the painted pigs.More Information: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/danilo-el-sexto-maldonado-released-by-cuba-343958


4. LONDON UK's Culture Minister, Ed Vaizey, has placed a temporary export ban on a Rembrandt

portrait worth £35 million ($54 million).The ban was announced in a news release published on the Government's website gov.uk, with an uncharacteristically alarming opening sentence that read: “One of Rembrandt's greatest late portraits is at risk of being exported from the UK unless a buyer can be found to match the asking price of £35 million." More Information: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/uk-export-ban-54-million-rembrandt-342098


5.LA ROCHELLE The port town of La Rochelle, France has paid tribute to two cartoonists who were killed in the attack on the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in January. Gargoyles in the likeness of cartoonists Jean Cabut and Georges Wolinski were unveiled on the town's 12th century Tour de la Lanterne after the historic tower underwent restoration, Le Figaro reported. More Information: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/charlie-hebdo-cartoonists-gargoyles-340417


6.CHARTRES (AFP).- An unholy row has broken out over the restoration of France's medieval landmark, Chartres Cathedral.State-funded work to return the interior of the towering 13th-century cathedral to its original creamy white hues has sparked a howl of protest from as far away as the US.Even the discovery of original decor has failed to placate shocked architecture lovers across the
Atlantic who have slammed the makeover as "irresponsible". More Information: http://artdaily.com/news/82291/France-s--irresponsible--makeover-of-medieval-landmark-Chartres-Cathedral-shocks-#.VifuihCrRPM


7. TECPATÁN (AFP).- A 16th century church submerged in a southern Mexico dam project 49 years ago has reappeared following a severe drought, drawing visitors by boat to gaze at the spectacular
ruins. The Apostle Santiago church, built by Dominican friars, vanished under water in 1966 when the hydroelectric dam was built in the Grijalva river. More Information: http://artdaily.com/news/82384/16th-century-church-emerges-from-water-in-Mexico-following-a-severe-drought#.Vi5vY66rS1s


8. JERUSALEM (AFP).- Israel on Thursday accused the UN's cultural body of fanning tensions in the region by approving a resolution that criticised the Jewish state for "aggressions" against Muslims seeking access to a Jerusalem holy site. The foreign ministry said in a statement that the UNESCO resolution "aims to transform the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into a religious confrontation" in an abuse of the UN agency's mandate. More Information: http://artdaily.com/news/82371/Israel-accuses-UNESCO-of--fueling-flames--with-holy-site-resolution#.Vi5w3K6rS1s

9. BOLANZO A team of hardworking Italian cleaners thought they were tidying up after a particularly wild opening party on Friday night at Museion, Museum for Modern and Contemporary Art in Bolanzo, Italy. The 300 empty champagne bottles, confetti, and cigarette butts, however, were actually part of an installation by Milanese artists Goldschmied & Chiari. More Information:https://news.artnet.com/art-world/janitor-throws-out-art-installation-347937


10.BERLIN (AFP).- Chinese artist Ai Weiwei said Monday his plan to create a Lego artwork can go ahead as donations of the toy poured in from fans after the Danish company refused his bulk order on political grounds. The maker of the children's toy sparked a social media uproar when Ai said it had refused to supply him directly as it "cannot approve the use of Legos for political works". Ai is China's most prominent contemporary artist. He helped design the Bird's Nest stadium for the Beijing
Olympics and his work has been exhibited worldwide, but he has also run afoul of Communist authorities. More Information:http://artdaily.com/news/82462/Chinese-dissident-artist-Ai-Weiwei-can-play-with-Lego-again-as-fans-answer-call-for-bricks#.VjE-La6rSb8


11.BERLIN (AFP).- With only two months to go before the copyright of Hitler's "Mein Kampf" expires, debate is raging over whether the anti-Semitic manifesto should again be published in Germany, where all reprints have been halted since the defeat of the Nazis.
More Information: http://artdaily.com/news/82507/Print-and-be-damned--Germany-agonises-over--Mein-Kampf-#.VjfNg66rRSw


12. BROOKLYN ‘…BUT WE CAN’T PAY YOU’: PERFORMANCE ART AND MONEY’S KNOTTY RELATIONSHIP
A year ago, in a former bank in Brooklyn, RoseLee Goldberg hosted a postmodern fundraiser featuring a “special food performance” by artist Jennifer Rubell. The event was to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Performa biennial, founded in 2004 by Goldberg, a scholar of performance art, to raise awareness of the art form. Meanwhile, across the East River from Performa’s feast, Sean Kelly Gallery was presenting the most recent exhibition of the world’s best-known performance artist, Marina Abramović. For the show, the artist had visitors don blindfolds and noise-canceling headphones and then wander for as long as they wished through a vast, empty exhibition space. More Information: http://www.artnews.com/2015/10/29/but-we-cant-pay-you-performance-art-and-moneys-knotty-relationship/