Turner masterpiece up for sale
Sotheby’s has announced that it will offer Turner’s Rome, from Mount Aventine (which has recently been on loan to the National Gallery of Scotland) at auction this December. The work entered the Rosebery collection in 1878 and hasn’t changed hands since. With ‘Late Turner’ now open in London, a Turner biopic on the way, and the Scottish referendum around the corner, they’ve certainly picked their moment.
Museum appointments: star curators take the top jobs
Daniel Baumann, curator of the Kunstmuseum Bern’s Adolf Wölfli Foundation, is to replace Beatrix Ruf as director of the Kunsthalle Zürich. And Jessica Morgan, Tate’s curator of international art, who oversaw this year’s Gwangju Biennale, will take the helm of the Dia Art Foundation in New York.
The Louvre is to get a revamp
The world’s most visited museum is going to get a makeover. The Louvre’s director Jean-Luc Martinez has announced his intention to completely overhaul the displays, in the most ambitious renovation programme since the 1980s.
Phillips moves to Mayfair
The auction house is setting up its European headquarters in London’s leafy Berkeley Square. The flagship space will be a grand affair, with double-height showrooms and exhibitions spaces designed by Aukett Swanke.
Theft in Vienna: major paintings taken from a villa
A 73-year-old collector got back from holiday this month to find her Vienna apartment stripped of 71 paintings. Many were by major Austrian artists such as Oskar Kokoschka and and Alfons Walde.
A suitcase full of Monet
When Cornelius Gurlitt died at home in May, his entire extraordinary hoard of art – some of which is believed to be Nazi loot inherited from his art dealer father – was bequeathed unexpectedly to the Kunstmuseum Bern. They can now add one more to the collection: a Monet landscape has turned up in a suitcase which Gurlitt inexplicably left behind after a stay in hospital. Will the trickle of new discoveries ever end?