Great moments in art

Speaking of art, I just started watching This Is A Robbery on Netflix about the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery in 1990. Very interesting. Never been solved. The stolen works have an estimated value of US$500m. Bob, being the art expert he is may want to weigh in on whether that value is worth it.

Always liked that nun many years ago giving her impressions of what the artist intentions were , very intense woman but loved art , Titan was a favourite of hers .

ExceedAndExcel wrote: Speaking of art, I just started watching This Is A Robbery on Netflix about the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery in 1990. Very interesting. Never been solved. The stolen works have an estimated value of US$500m. Bob, being the art expert he is may want to weigh in on whether that value is worth it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Stewart_Gardner_Museum_theft

WASHINGTON: Plans to keep secret the names of people who buy artworks painted by President Joe Biden�s son have been criticised as a �mechanism for funnelling bribes�.

Pictures by Hunter Biden have been valued at between $US75,000 ($100,000) and $US500,000 before a New York gallery sale, attracting widespread criticism that buyers might try to gain influence with the administration.

Mr Biden�s spokeswoman set out a plan for the gallery owner, Georges Berges, to keep the names of buyers confidential and weed out suspicious offers.

Hunter Biden, 51, has previously been accused of exploiting his name by taking a board role with a Ukrainian gas company while his father was supposed to be tackling corruption in Ukraine.

�A system has been established that allows for Hunter Biden to work in his profession within reasonable safeguards,� press secretary Jen Psaki said when asked if the White House was involved in drafting the plan to protect buyers� identities.

�He has the right to pursue an artistic career, just like any child of a president has the right to pursue a career.

�But all interactions regarding the selling of art and the setting of prices will be handled by a professional gallerist, adhering to the highest industry standards and any offer out of the normal course would be rejected out of hand.

�The gallerist will not share information about buyers or prospective buyers, including their identities, with Hunter Biden or the administration.�

Barack Obama�s former ethics chief said the arrangement was a �perfect mechanism� for bribery. Walter Schaub, director of the Office of Government Ethics until 2017, said: �They have outsourced government ethics to an art dealer. She (Psaki) mentioned industry standards. It�s an industry that�s notorious for money laundering. There�s no standards in that industry.�

Many art experts also questioned the valuations.

�How much of that value is due to the art itself? That�s easy: none of it,� said Jeffry Cudlin, a professor of curatorial studies at the Maryland Institute College of Art.

Always Bob.  You're confusing that publication with the middle-ground Washington Post.

ps: gotcha there Bob.    

Tlazolteotl wrote: Cy Twombly, Untitled (Bolsena) US$38.685 million

I actually don't mind this one. It looks a bit like the beige avalanche of half-baked ideas and fast scribbles that inundate social media these days. Either that or someone throwing out the garbage. Same thing really.

Brett Whitely is one modern artist I can understand. Kind of the anti-Ken Done for Aussies.

Here�s one you�ll like AA. Australian artist Peter Hill, horse owned by the guy who wrote the Slim Dusty song �Leave Him In The Longyard� Peter went out to the guys place and met the horse Baden, and painted him. It�s our idea of art  We couldn�t  fit it in the car, so he kindly delivered it a month or so later. We met him for lunch at a country pub and did the transfer.Top bloke, it was a big drive for him. It�s quite a large painting.

Edited by Sister Dot - 17 Jul 2021 at 12:57pm

The great Tom Burgess