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Impressionism
Silver, Unstandard
At Christie’s sale of Important Silver on October 19, the top lot was not a table service or a tea set but a pack of cards. The cards are exquisitely fashioned, thin enough to stack and play with, if not exactly to shuffle. Estimated at $150,000–200,000, they shot up to $554,500, selling to an English dealer who was bidding on behalf of a private collector who specializes in Renaissance art.
Talking Pictures: Grace and Beauty
Architectural historian Judith Dupré is the author of Skyscrapers (1996), Bridges (1997) and the New York Times bestseller Churches (2001). Her latest book, Full of Grace: Encountering Mary in Faith, Life & Art (Random House, $40), represents a new departure in her work. Divided into 59 brief chapters, each representing a bead of the traditional Marian rosary, this amply illustrated volume explores the Virgin Mary’s place in the Bible, in history, in theology and in the wider culture. Speaking with Art & Antiques, Dupré discusses her multifaceted approach to this pivotal Christian figure.
Escape to Freedom
When Beatrice Mandelman and her husband, fellow painter Louis Ribak, left New York for New Mexico in 1944, she knew she was leaving behind one of the world’s most dynamic hubs of cultural and intellectual activity—and the possibility of making a lasting mark there. Mandelman could not have predicted that World War II would end the following year, but she certainly knew that New York had become modern art’s axis mundi by the time she decided to move away.
Istanbul Goes International
As Turkish contemporary art takes its place on the worldwide stage, the market for it is getting so hot that collectors in Turkey are being priced out. By Abigail R. Esman Situated at the meeting point between Europe and Asia, the city of Istanbul has long been seen as a bridge between East and West….
The Sacred and the Sensual
Few Old Masters are as popular as the Early Netherlandish painters. Visit any major European or American art museum, and the corridors and rooms featuring the gentle works of Jan van Eyck, Hans Memling and Gerard David are filled with hushed, reverent admirers, faces as close to the protective glass as the guards will allow, drawn into a placid, cozy late-Gothic world. But moving along to the early 16th century, the paintings of Jan Gossart tend to give fans of the Flemings something of a jolt.
The Fanciful Forties
L’Enfant et les Sortilèges, a short opera by Maurice Ravel with a libretto by Colette, which premiered in Monaco in March of 1925, is about a naughty little boy who comes to regret his bad behavior. This coming to life was more than just a fiction; it was prophetic, because at that time furniture was about to acquire an extraordinary vitality in French society.
Neolithic to Nebuchadnezzar
Ancient Near Eastern art, also called Western Asiatic, is not as well-known as Greek or Roman art, but is a fascinating and very complicated field.
Mix Masters
The biggest museum news in the world this month is the opening of the new Art of the Americas wing at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. To make it shine in the snazzy new digs, the curators have re-thought, re-arranged and re-interpreted the MFA’s formidable American collection, a process that took a decade to complete.
Threads of History
In 1932, a New York engineer, Arthur Arwine, artfully recreated the plush atmosphere of a Turkmen yurt in his Sheridan Square apartment by draping colorful carpets on his walls, his furniture and, of course, his floors.
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