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The Headlines
HERITAGE STRIKES. Amid the escalating Middle East war, UNESCO World Heritage buildings in Tel Aviv’s White City district have been damaged by Iranian missile strikes, which killed one woman and injured many, reports the Art Newspaper. The buildings were built between 1935 and 1937 as part of an urban plan in the Bauhaus architectural style. Israel’s 1934-built Habima National Theater was also struck, while other arts institutions have closed and placed artworks in bomb shelters. This includes the Islamic Museum of Art in Jerusalem, which houses a rare collection of 11th-12th-century Persian silverware, originally found in a pot in a cave in western Iran. Earlier this week, Tehran’s Golestan Palace, a UNESCO-listed site, was also reportedly damaged by bombings from the US and Israel. In a statement released today, Reza Dabirinejad, director of the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, urged for the protection of cultural property during wartime, in keeping with the 1954 Hague Convention.
PRAYERS ANSWERED. In July, the Cologne Cathedral, a Gothic masterpiece and UNESCO-protected site, is going to start charging tourists general entrance fees to shore up its ailing finances, reports dpa. Other aging European landmarks, like the Notre-Dame de Paris, have been subject to similar, controversial suggestions for paying the costs of monument upkeep, restoration, and security. About six million people visit the German cathedral annually, but most are tourists, so charging them would go a long way in propping up the cash-strapped cathedral, whose reserves are depleted, according to Cathedral Councilor Clemens van de Ven. Worshippers and members of the Central Cathedral Building Association will be exempt from the fee, along with anyone praying, though it’s unclear how the latter will be monitored, or how much entry will cost.
The Digest
Scientific analysis by the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage of Belgium suggests a painted Pietà scene of Mary holding a dead Jesus was made by Michelangelo. However, other experts remain skeptical the work was truly made by the Renaissance master. [Le Figaro]
South African artist Zanele Muholi has won this year’s Hasselblad Award for photography. “For years, my work has been about visibility and resistance,” Muholi said in a statement. [ArtReview]
With the US becoming less welcoming to foreigners, China imposing business constraints, conflicts in the Middle East, Russia, and the ongoing effects of Brexit, France has emerged as a stable, welcoming, diverse platform for the arts. In one sign of this shift, French dealers are also making a large showing at this month’s TEFAF Maastricht art fair. [The New York Times]
Several artists say the Hole gallery in New York and Los Angeles is long overdue in paying them proceeds from sales, per usual. In other news reported by Kenny Schachter, the art collection of the late Italian industrialist Giovanni Agnelli is heading to auction at Sotheby’s or Christie’s. [Artnet News]
The Kicker
COOKING WITH CONSTANTIN BRANCUSI. Brancusi’s radical 20th-century sculptures are famous around the world, but less so is his talent as a chef. Apollo Magazine lets us in on the Romanian artist’s creativity expressed through food, and we are hungry for it. Turns out, illustrious visitors to Brancusi’s Paris studio, like Man Ray and Eugène Ionesco, were too. Some may have even loved his cooking as much as his art—after all, both shared a modernist simplicity and distilled boldness. Take painter Oscar Chelimsky, who remembers “chicken, broiled in his forging oven, which we would wash down with Asti Spumante, or it might be a roast leg of lamb … Everything he made was full of flavor, wholesome and thoroughly uncomplicated.” Whether Chelimsky was still talking about Brancusi’s food or his art arguably doesn’t matter much.
