Hope You are Having a Wonderful Holiday Season!

Love the animated holiday cards that the Met Museum has sent out  the past few years. Museums are such an important part of my life. In that spirit, I hope you will visit your local museum many times in the new year. In yesterday's Washington Post, Sebastian Smee wrote,"Here’s a holiday gift idea: Take someone you love to an art museum."

Please read more at - "The no-pressure holiday gift you won’t even have to wrap" .

Getty Acquires Bernini Sculpture

Santa Monica, CA

The Getty Museum snaps up a Bernini bust, adding heft to L.A.'s Baroque holdings http://fw.to/azVqbSI 

The Art World's Day for Detroit

by Gregg Chadwick
Tyler Green at Modern Art Notes, along with art blogs and art sites across the globe will be concentrating today on the plight of the Detroit Institute of Arts.
Tyler Green writes, "In an effort to spotlight the collections at the Detroit Institute of Arts that would be lost if the threatened sale of art in collections at the DIA are sold, all day long  Modern Art Notes and many other sites will be spotlight art at the DIA. "

Sakyamuni
 Chinese Sculptor
late 13th/early 14th Century
wood with lacquer,gilding,and traces of color
11 3/4" x 88 1/8" x 6 1/2"
Detroit Institute of Arts

I heartily agree with Tyler that the more we can put a spotlight on the Detroit Institute of Arts rich collection, the more concerned - art lovers, historians, and the general public will be about the peril that the collection faces. 

Vilhelm Hammershoi
Interior With A Lady
21 5/8" x 20 7/8" oil on canvas 1901
Detroit Institute of Arts

Christopher Knight in the Los Angeles Times writes, "The premise is simple and elegant: Use the Internet to:

 a) spread the word to a diverse, international art audience about what could be lost if any sale goes forward;

 b) suggest that readers expand the process by posting their own links and images to social media sites such as Twitter and Instagram; 

and c) generate support for the Detroit Institute of Arts by asking readers to click through and buy a museum membership (an individual membership starts at $65)."

Diego Velázquez
A Man
20 1/4" x 15 3/4" oil on canvas 1623/1630
Detroit Institute of Arts

How can we help support the DIA? As Tyler Green suggests: "Share artwork on MAN and at other sites with your friends. If you live in Michigan, tell your elected officials that the future of Detroit is important to you and that you don’t support a fire sale of the city’s future."

 Best of all: Join us in becoming a member of the Detroit Institute of Arts.

The Detroit Institute of Arts  is a vital part of the city of Detroit and a conduit for the greater community, including the more prosperous suburbs, to interact. I love the DIA's   (@DIADetroit ) twitter profile description: 

Detroit Institute of Arts. Home to 1st VanGogh in US Museum, Rivera's Detroit Industry murals, & city's best mac-n-cheese. Let yourself go!

Remember, all day long, roughly every hour, many sites plan to post a new image from the museum's staggering art collection, which is among the half-dozen best in the United States. Please get involved - tweet, post, write and create today for Detroit.

To read more about A Day for Detroit, check out these stories in the Detroit Free Press , the Detroit News , and the Los Angeles Times. 

Here's a list of sites that have signed on to the project:

• Modern Art Notes
• MANPodcast.com
• Art F City
• Bad at Sports
• Artinfo’s In the Air
• Ed Winkleman
• Mary Louise Schumacher
• Greg Allen
• Two Coats of Paint
• The Art Blog
• Hyperallergic LABS
• Eyeteeth
• Art Practical
• Daily Serving
• Paper Monument
• Italy’s Secret Places
• ArtSmartTalk
• Chad Edward
• The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research
• WBUR’s The Artery
• Speed of Life 

On Twitter: @KnightLAT @greggchadwick @TylerGreenDC M.L. Schumacher ‏@artcity 

Hashtags: #DayDetroit #Detroit

The Indianapolis Turner vs the New Orleans Lorrain

Joseph Mallord William Turner ( April 23, 1775-December 19, 1851)
The Fifth Plague of Egypt
48" x 72" oil on canvas 1800
Indianapolis Museum of Art
photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Museum of Art

Spurred on by fellow artblogger, Tyler Green, the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Indianapolis Museum of Art are putting their paintings on the line over next weekend's Super Bowl between the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts.
I'm calling an improbable New Orleans victory over the Colts. In which case the Indianapolis Museum of Art will lend Turner's vibrant and mysterious The Fifth Plague of Egypt to the New Orleans Museum of Art.
If the favored Colts win, the New Orleans Museum of Art will lend Claude Lorrain's Ideal View of Tivoli to the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Check out Tyler's blog for the ultimate in museum director trash talk and mannered New Orleans (and Indianapolis) grace as well.

New Orleans Museum of Art director E. John Bullard summed up the good spirited rivalry to Tyler:

"Max is a gracious opponent. Thanks for accepting the wager of a Claude from New Orleans for a Turner from Indianapolis. But this is definitely the Saints year. They are the Dream Team and in New Orleans we know that dreams come true. Geaux Saints!!!"

Ars longa, football brevis?



Claude Lorrain (1600-1682)
Ideal View of Tivoli
117 x 147 cm oil on canvas 1644
New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans
photo courtesy the New Orleans Museum of Art

Architect Zaha Hadid's Animated Video of Planned Michigan State University Art Museum

Very nice 3D animated video of the planned Michigan State University Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum slated for groundbreaking on March 16, 2010. Opening in 2012.

Architecture by Zaha Hadid.


For more on the project: Michigan State University Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum

More on Zaha Hadid and her work at Zaha Hadid

L.A. Museums Free-For-All Saturday-Sunday, October 3 and 4, 2009.

MUSEUMS FREE-FOR-ALL
24 Los Angeles and Orange County Museums
Free Admission Days October 3 and/or 4, 2009

In a joint effort to present the arts and culture to the diverse and myriad communities in Southern California, the Museum Marketing Roundtable announces the fifth annual "Museums Free-For-All" Saturday-Sunday, October 3 and 4, 2009. The following museums - presenting art, cultural heritage, natural history, and science - will open their doors wide and invite visitors free of charge.*

Participating Museums:

• Armory Center for the Arts - Both Days
• The Autry National Center - Sunday, October 4th ONLY
• Bowers Museum - Sunday, October 4th Only
• California African American Museum - Both Days
• California Heritage Museum - Saturday, October 3rd Only
• California Science Center - Both Days
• Craft and Folk Art Museum - Both Days
• Fowler Museum at UCLA - Both Days
• The Getty Center - Both Days
• The Getty Villa**- Both Days
• The Grammy Museum at L.A. Live - Sunday, October 4th Only
• Hammer Museum at UCLA - Sunday, October 4th Only
• Japanese American National Museum - Saturday, October 3rd Only
• Los Angeles Fire Department Museum and Memorial - Saturday, October 3rd
• The Museum of Contemporary Art,
  Los Angeles (MOCA) - Sunday, October 4th Only
• Museum of Latin American Art (MoLAA) - Both Days
• Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County - Sunday October 4th Only
• Norton Simon Museum - Sunday, October 4th Only
• Orange County Center for Contemporary Art - Both Days
• Orange County Museum of Art - Both Days
• The Paley Center for Media - Both Days
• Santa Monica Museum of Art - Saturday, October 3rd Only
• Skirball Cultural Center - Sunday, October 4th Only
• The Studio for Southern California History - Both Days

*Regular parking fees apply. General museum admission only. May not apply to ticketed exhibitions.
**Timed tickets are required. Visit www.getty.edu.