A Spanish collector is facing prison time for allegedly forging at least 15 works by artists including Edvard Munch (1863-1944), Saul Steinberg (1914-1999), and Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997). Guillermo Chamorro, 67, was a respected collector who consigned artworks to auction houses across Europe.
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Last week, an oil sketch by one of the most important Baroque artists, Anthony van Dyck, has been sold at auction at Sotheby’s New York. Given that the work was found languishing in a farm shed in upstate New York, with bird droppings on its reverse, it is truly remarkable that it was sold for $3 million.
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The parent company of Masterpiece London, an annual multi-disciplinary art fair held at the Royal Hospital in Chelsea, has announced that the fair is cancelled. Masterpiece London was founded in 2010 and had come to be considered one of the highlights of the summer art calendar in London. However, the company that owns it – MCH Group – has released a statement saying that due to “escalating costs and a decline in the number of international exhibitors” the event is “not commercially viable this year.”
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Nearly two thousand years ago the eruption of Mount Vesuvius tragically engulfed the prosperous city of Pompeii and its inhabitants under volcanic ash. Archaeologists rediscovered the site in the 19th century, but it consequently suffered decades of neglect, flooding, and pillaging. After twenty years of intensive restoration, one of Pompeii’s most lavish homes officially reopened to visitors on Tuesday.
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Michelle Donelan, the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, has announced the Parthenon Marbles “belong here in the UK“. Despite reports suggesting the British Museum is close to agreeing a deal with Greece, Donelan insisted that the ancient sculptures should not be returned.
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The sale of a rare copy of the US Constitution has been halted by Sotheby’s just hours before it was due in auction. Sotheby’s have cited “strong institutional interest” as their motivation for postponing the sale, saying that they wish to “provide interested institutional parties with additional time to pursue fundraising efforts”.
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East Midland archaeologists were “gobsmacked” to unearth another trove of finds at the site of a Roman villa complex in Rutland. Two years after it was first discovered beneath a farmer’s field, the site has revealed a lavish barn conversion with a sophisticated Roman-style bath suite and mosaic.
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Visitors to Notre-Dame in Paris could be in for a “shock” when it reopens in 2024, promised the site’s restoration leader Jean-Louis Georgelin. Since the devastating fire, the cathedral has undergone an intensive €846 million (£727 million) renovation using some innovative – and controversial – conservation techniques.
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The family of Swedish abstract artist Hilma af Klint (1862-1944) have criticized a digital drop of NFTs based on the artist’s series Paintings for the Temple (1906-1915). The NFTs were produced by Stolpe Publishing, Acute Art and Pharrell Williams’ company GODA (Gallery of Digital Assets), not by the Hilma af Klint Foundation who owns the original paintings.
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Following a spate of recent attacks targeting artworks in museums across the globe by the activist group Just Stop Oil, 92 museum leaders have signed a statement addressing the issue. The co-signers said that they “have been deeply shaken” by the activists’ actions and emphasised the fragility of the artworks involved.
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