The Community's Art Gallery

[Witness]

https://i.imgur.com/HFBAkpo.jpg

[Witness]

Digital-only artwork fetches nearly $70 million at Christie's

LONDON (Reuters) - A digital artwork sold for nearly $70 million at Christie’s on Thursday, in the first ever sale by a major auction house of a piece of art that does not exist in physical form.

“Everydays - The First 5000 Days” is a digital work by American artist Mike Winkelmann, known as Beeple. It is a collage of 5,000 individual images, which were made one-per-day over more than thirteen years.

The sale of the work for $69,346,250 put Beeple in the top three most valuable living artists, Christie’s said in a tweet.

The work is in the form of a new type of digital asset - a Non-Fungible Token (NFT) - meaning it is authenticated by blockchain, which certifies its originality and ownership.

The market for NFTs has soared in recent months as enthusiasts and investors use spare savings to buy up items that exist online. Last month, a 10-second video clip featuring an image of a fallen Donald Trump, also by Beeple, sold for $6.6 million on an NFT marketplace called Nifty Gateway.

“Without the NFTs, there just legitimately was no way to collect digital art,” said Beeple, who makes irreverent digital art on themes such as technology, wealth and American politics.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-auct ... SKBN2B3275 (slideshow)

[Pyrrho]

Link:

[shemp]

Yeah, gonna quit my job and become a rich fuckin' artiste!

[Pyrrho]

Link:

Link:

[Witness]

https://old.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglev ... _flipbook/

[Witness]

https://i.imgur.com/ixNlRW3.jpg

Once upon a time, Ertan Atay, Digital, 2020

[shemp]

Frida Kahlo in the back seat, I presume.

[Witness]

↑ Yup. :)

[Witness]

Single pixel of digital-only art sold for more than $1.7 million at Sotheby's

https://i.imgur.com/dnFZq60.jpg

An online sale of a single pixel, as a part of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) by the digital artist Pak, sold for $US1.36 million ($1.76 million) at auction house Sotheby's.

A non-fungible token is a form of blockchain-based digital asset that has exploded in popularity in 2021, with prices soaring as collectors and enthusiasts rush to buy the items, which only exist in digital form.

An NFT called The Pixel — an image of a single pixel — was also up for auction, fetching $US1,355,555 million ($1.76 million) after a 90-minute bidding battle.

The artist is known only as Pak, with the Twitter handle @muratpak.

The pixel was a part of a total of $US16.8 million ($21.8 million) digital art sale, the auction house said on Wednesday (local time).

The NFTs in the collection are represented by animated images designed by Pak.

They are three-dimensional white and grey shapes on a black background, apart from the pixel, which is just a grey square.

The Sotheby's sale, called The Fungible Collection, had a complex structure, including a series of digital cubes that collectors could buy for $US500 to $US1,500 ($648 to $1,943) each, receiving a number of NFTs based on how many cubes they own.

The sale also included four limited edition NFTs that were awarded to the winners of specific tasks, including paying the highest amount for a Pak artwork on the secondary market and posting the hashtag #PakWasHere to the biggest social media audience.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-15/ ... /100070810

[shemp]

Fucking idiots.

[Witness]

Want to know if the Rembrandt hanging in your study was looted? Head to the lost art database (mostly German, but the artist's name is enough): https://www.lostart.de/Webs/EN/Datenban ... 1D25687.m0

[shemp]

[Witness]

https://i.imgur.com/7UU16kA.jpg


https://i.imgur.com/mDNpjJZ.jpg

Spoiler:

Washington & Lincoln.
https://old.reddit.com/r/interestingasf ... of_george/
https://old.reddit.com/r/interestingasf ... f_abraham/

[Witness]

Tiny Leonardo da Vinci bear sketch could fetch over $16M

https://i.imgur.com/pCLRZ2l.jpg

A tiny sketch of a bear by Leonardo da Vinci is expected to sell for over $16 million at auction.
The item is one of only eight Leonardo drawings left in private hands, according Christie's, the auction house organizing the sale.
Measuring less than 8 square inches, the drawing was made on pale pink-beige paper using silverpoint -- a technique, taught to Leonardo by his master Andrea del Verrocchio, that involves marking chemically treated paper with silver rods or wire.
The sketch has changed hands several times over the centuries -- in fact, it was once sold by Christie's for just £2.50 (about £312, or $439, in today's money) in 1860. Titled "Head of a Bear," it has since been displayed at major institutions including the National Gallery in London, Louvre Abu Dhabi and Saint Petersburg's State Hermitage Museum.
The $450 million question: Where is Leonardo da Vinci's 'Salvator Mundi'?
In a press release, the chairman of Old Master paintings at Christie's New York, Ben Hall, called the sketch "one of the most important works from the Renaissance still in private hands," adding that it had "been owned by some of the most distinguished collectors in the field of Old Masters across many centuries." Notable previous owners include painter Sir Thomas Lawrence and art collector Captain Norman Robert Colville.
The drawing, which includes the artist's signature, will go on display in Hong Kong later this month. It will then move on to London, where it is expected to fetch between £8 million and £12 million ($11.21 million to $16.82 million) at a July sale.

https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/l ... index.html

[shemp]

But what about the NFT?

[Witness]

‘Like a contest entry from a toddler’: David Hockney design for London Underground savaged by public

Simplistic design was shared on social media by London mayor Sadiq Khan

https://i.imgur.com/JqAInSD.jpg

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-ente ... 46196.html

Author's site: https://www.hockney.com/home

[Witness]

[Witness]

17th century European paintings found in roadside dumpster

https://i.imgur.com/pSwHrGr.jpg

Police are appealing for information on how two original paintings from 17th century European artists, ended up in a roadside dumpster in southeast Germany.
The framed oil paintings were found by a 64-year-old man at a highway service station in the Bavaria region last month. The man later handed the paintings to police in the western city of Cologne, the police department said.
Officers have launched an appeal for the owner of the paintings. An initial assessment from an art expert concluded the paintings were likely original works, police said.

One of the paintings is a smiling self-portrait of Italian artist Pietro Bellotti, dating back to 1665.

Bellotti is best known for painting portraits. According to the Galleria Canesso in Switzerland, the artist "worked for highly prominent families in Venice and beyond" including patrons such as Cardinal Ottoboni and the Governor of Milan.

https://i.imgur.com/NiAvB9F.jpg

The other painting is of a grinning boy in a red cap, date unknown, by the Dutch artist Samuel van Hoogstraten.
Hoogstraten was a painter and writer who trained under Rembrandt in Amsterdam, according to the Leiden Collection, one of the world's largest private collections of works from the Dutch Golden Age.
In the later part of the 17th century, the elite of Hague "lined up to sit" for Hoogstraten's portraits, said the Collection.

The artist also wrote an "Introduction to the High School of the Art of Painting," which was published the year he died, in 1678.
It includes reminiscences of his stay in Rembrandt's studio, and is what the UK's National Gallery called "a valuable source of information about Rembrandt's views on painting."

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/06/19/euro ... index.html

[Witness]

An Italian museum is using flesh-eating bacteria to clean Michelangelo's statues — because they're full of corpses

Nearly 500 years ago, Duke Alessandro de Medici was lured with the promise of spending the night with a beautiful widow, but instead met the end of a knife from an assassin — hired by his cousin — who stabbed him to death. The ruler of Florence's body was placed in his father's tomb.

Now? He's leaking.

Italian art historians and restorers noticed in 2019 that the marble statues in the Medici Chapel, which was commissioned entirely by Michelangelo, were starting to appear dirtier than usual. Staining had been recorded as early as 1595, but the tools to remove it didn't exist then.


An Italian museum is using flesh-eating bacteria to clean Michelangelo's statues — because they're full of corpses

By Alexandra Larkin

June 22, 2021 / 5:42 PM / CBS News

Nearly 500 years ago, Duke Alessandro de Medici was lured with the promise of spending the night with a beautiful widow, but instead met the end of a knife from an assassin — hired by his cousin — who stabbed him to death. The ruler of Florence's body was placed in his father's tomb.

Now? He's leaking.

Italian art historians and restorers noticed in 2019 that the marble statues in the Medici Chapel, which was commissioned entirely by Michelangelo, were starting to appear dirtier than usual. Staining had been recorded as early as 1595, but the tools to remove it didn't exist then.

In November 2019, Italy's National Research Council figured out what was behind the grime: Bodily fluids leaking from the improperly embalmed corpse of Alessandro de Medici, along with other compounds accumulated over time from glue and plaster. Alessandro's fluids had seeped into the statues of Dusk and Dawn that adorned his father's tomb.

Anna Rosa Sprocati, a biologist at the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, hand-picked from her catalog of more than 1,000 bacteria to test against the stains. They had successes and failures, with some of the bacteria eating not just the human remains, but the delicate Carrera marble, too. But the chapel's museum believed that bacteria would be more effective than harsh chemicals or abrasives.

Sprocati's all-female team picked the eight most promising bacteria and tested them on a gridded section behind the altar of the church. The ones that worked were then put on the tomb of Giuliano di Lorenzo, specifically the statues of Night and Day. The bacteria successfully cleaned Night's hair and eyes of accumulated residue.

https://i.imgur.com/Q6dUIvr.jpg

One of the statues stained by Alessandro de Medici's improperly embalmed corpse, before its bacterial bath.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/italy-medi ... -bacteria/

[Witness]

Creator of “Nothing” sculpture sues Italian artist for profiting from his work

GAINESVILLE, Fla. (WCJB) - A Gainesville artist who created an invisible sculpture is suing an Italian artist for profiting off his idea.

Tom Miller, a multidisciplinary performance artist, installed his sculpture called “Nothing” at Bo Diddley Plaza in 2016.

Now, he said an Italian artist is trying to sell a different “nothing” for 18 thousand dollars.

“The space in our world is legitimate to work with as an artistic product. So the idea is fashioning nothing into a sculpture, and that’s what the lawsuit is all about,” said Miller.

Miller’s “Nothing” was recognized by Alachua County Commissioner Robert “Hutch” Hutchinson when it was installed.

“When I saw that I thought ‘that’s exactly my idea’ and ideas are important in the world, and recognition for those ideas are important. So I simply wanted that attribution so I contacted him, he dismissed it away, and then I hired an Italian attorney,” said Miller.

He said living in the internet age, all it would’ve taken was a simple Google search for the Italian artist to see “Nothing” had been done before.

“If you Google ‘Tom Miller Nothing’ you can easily see I had this whole paradigm sorted out before before Salvatore Garau ever even thought of doing a sculpture of nothing.”

Miller said all he wants is credit for his work.

https://www.wcjb.com/2021/06/28/creator ... -his-work/

:roll:

[Giz]

Creator of “Nothing” sculpture sues Italian artist for profiting from his work

GAINESVILLE, Fla. (WCJB) - A Gainesville artist who created an invisible sculpture is suing an Italian artist for profiting off his idea.

Tom Miller, a multidisciplinary performance artist, installed his sculpture called “Nothing” at Bo Diddley Plaza in 2016.

Now, he said an Italian artist is trying to sell a different “nothing” for 18 thousand dollars.

“The space in our world is legitimate to work with as an artistic product. So the idea is fashioning nothing into a sculpture, and that’s what the lawsuit is all about,” said Miller.

Miller’s “Nothing” was recognized by Alachua County Commissioner Robert “Hutch” Hutchinson when it was installed.

“When I saw that I thought ‘that’s exactly my idea’ and ideas are important in the world, and recognition for those ideas are important. So I simply wanted that attribution so I contacted him, he dismissed it away, and then I hired an Italian attorney,” said Miller.

He said living in the internet age, all it would’ve taken was a simple Google search for the Italian artist to see “Nothing” had been done before.

“If you Google ‘Tom Miller Nothing’ you can easily see I had this whole paradigm sorted out before before Salvatore Garau ever even thought of doing a sculpture of nothing.”

Miller said all he wants is credit for his work.

https://www.wcjb.com/2021/06/28/creator ... -his-work/

:roll:

He did nothing for a commission in 2016?

That’s poppycock! I did nothing for a homework assignment way before that!

[Witness]

He did nothing for a commission in 2016?

That’s poppycock! I did nothing for a homework assignment way before that!

We all did – but did we get paid, uh?