Our daily round-up of news from the art world
Monarch of the Glen to stay in Scotland | Edwin Landseer’s Monarch of the Glen is to remain in Scotland following a campaign to acquire it for the country. The painting was offered for sale by its owner, drinks company Diageo, in November, provoking a fundraising drive. Diageo and the National Galleries of Scotland made an agreement whereby the former would accept an offer of £4 million, or half the painting’s value, from the latter. ‘We are thrilled that we have been able to secure this iconic work for the national collection,’ said Sir John Leighton, director of the National Galleries. ‘The enormous support from the public has been incredible with donations coming from all over the world and from the length and breadth of Scotland and the rest of the UK.’ For more on Monarch of the Glen’s cultural significance, see our previous coverage here.
Georgina Jackson to direct Douglas Hyde Gallery | Georgina Jackson is to succeed John Hutchinson as director of Dublin’s Douglas Hyde Gallery. Jackson became head of programmes and exhibitions at Toronto’s Mercer Union in 2013, and is replacing Hutchinson who stepped down after 25 years in the role. Founded in 1978, the Douglas Hyde Gallery is Ireland’s first publicly funded contemporary art space. ‘I’m honoured to be joining the Douglas Hyde Gallery and am looking forward to shaping its future,’ said Jackson. ‘Its location within the leading research university in Ireland—and at the threshold between the university and the city—marks an important and exciting space for contemporary art.’
Brooke Davis Anderson leaves Prospect New Orleans | Brooke Davis Anderson is to leave her role at the head of New Orleans’s upcoming Prospect.4 art festival to take up the directorship of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Anderson replaces Harry Philbrick, who left the PAFA last year to found Philadelphia Contemporary. The directorship of Prospect, which is scheduled to take place in November, will be filled on a provisional basis by deputy director for curatorial affairs Ylva Rouse.
Stolen Etruscan vessel to return to Italy | An Etruscan vessel that was stolen and offered for sale in a New York gallery is to return to Italy, reports the New York Times. Christos Tsirogiannis of the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research spotted the object for sale in a Manhattan gallery and identified it from a cache of documents seized from an Italian dealer convicted of trafficking in looted objects. The vessel, which is valued at around $250,000 was returned wilfully.
Recommended reading | In the New York Times, Roberta Smith welcomes the Whitney Biennial as a timely response to the current climate of political uncertainty. In the Guardian, Lanre Bakare speaks to Kerry James Marshall about his new show at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art. ‘… [w]hen most people go to a big museum like the Louvre, it reaffirms their idea of what real art is supposed to look like,’ he says. ‘And if you keep going to the Louvre and Tate Britain and you don’t see black people in those pictures, then you don’t think black people belong in those kind of pictures, which belong in a place like that. People need to start thinking that these pictures belong in those places, too.’