Acquisitions and Exhibitions

Picture: BBC

This collection of renaissance silver looks like a great acquisition at the Ashmolean, although weirdly there doesn't seem to be anything on their website yet.  See the BBC for some initial details, disappointingly focusing on speculation about improper provenance.  It will complement the Ashmolean's strong collection of renaissance bronzes, which they present particularly well. 

 

The Ashmolean is exhibiting a selection of highlights from its first rate collection of drawings from May 25 to August 18.  It will be well worth a trip - wherever you live!  The Palais des Beaux Arts in Lille has a comparable collection of drawings, also strong in Raphael.  They are exhibiting a selection of highlights from the Wicar collection 12 April to 22 July, including 15 Raphaels.

Prado Acquisitions

The Prado website announces the donation of a rare group of Spanish gothic paintings.  Looks like a spectacular acquisition, and there are impressively comprehensive details in English, but it doesn't seem to say when they will be on display.  I hope I can see them when I go to Late Van Dyck next month.

Do they mean me?

Picture: Amazon

Observer editorial on the Manet show: "The advent of a blockbuster exhibition offers as much diversion for people who like being grumpy as it does for the art lover. So the delivery of a crateful of more than 50 of Édouard Manet's portraits at the Royal Academy of Arts in London this weekend has naturally been trailed with complaints about high ticket prices, populism and potential overcrowding".  It concludes, "When the circus comes to town, it is sometimes worth queuing up with your fellows, rather than simply grumbling about all the noise."

 

I find the stigmatisation of dissent as 'grumpiness' objectionable.  It's  symptomatic of the sycophantic strain in arts journalism that they depict debate as a clash between fun-lovers and miserablists.  It would be unthinkable to reduce a debate on any other social or political issue to that level - can you imagine ridiculing critics of education or health policy as merely 'grumpy'?  This editorial reveals low expectations of culture when it expects us to jump for joy at an exhibition simply because it juxtaposes some nice paintings in front of a big crowd. 

Manet Blockbuster

Picture: British Museum

On the opening day of the Royal Academy Manet show, the Guardian hosted a discussion on the merits of blockbusters, loaded with cliches and specious arguments.  The show at the RA is described as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity ... after all, it's almost two years since the last Manet blockbuster.  The craziest argument (against tough competition) is the claim that, "To create a blockbuster exhibition is quite a political statement, it says something broader than just 'Manet: a great artist'. It says – to a government that couldn't care less about the arts – that people love culture."*  I just don't know what to say to that.

 

Then there's the claim that, "If you go to a blockbuster you shouldn't necessarily think it's all about the art – it's about the crowd, too."  So you pay the RA £15 for the privilege of hanging out in a scrum?  You can do that on the London Underground, still for slightly less money than the RA charges. 

 

I like Manet and I live in London, but I don't think I'll go.  The RA puts on some of the crassest crowd-pleasers and draws the biggest crowds.  You never see very much.  I queued up for opening time to get a few quiet minutes at a recent exhibition, but the galleries were already mobbed with well-heeled invitees to private early-doors viewings.  I'm especially appalled that they're now offering a less crowded Sunday night viewing ('Enhance your visit') at £30 a head - double the normal rate - including a drink and an audio guide.  It would be worth paying to get a quiet view, but I don't believe that they will keep numbers sufficiently low, I want to see art not have a drink and I don't want an audio guide.  Above all I find it disgusting that they knowingly sell far more tickets than can be compatible with anyone seeing anything during the normal time slots.

 

* Thanks to Gareth Harris for flagging this quotation on Twitter, @garethhar

Philistines in Northampton

Picture: Northampton Borough Council

Horrid tale of deaccession plans in Northampton.  When the council heard that an ancient Egyptian statue was worth two million quid, it took it off display and put into storage at an undisclosed location pending sale "to a museum with more of a focus on Egyptology" according to an earlier BBC story.  Now they just talk of it meeting its reserve.  They want to 'reinvest' the cash in local history - a narrow and philistine proposal that is likely to mean £2m worth of storyboards and interactive displays.  How condescending to assume that local citizens will care only about their own backyard, that human civilisation in its widest sense is irrelevant to Northampton.

 

Jonathan Jones has written an excellent article in response, rightly criticising the parochialism of wanting to focus only on the story of Northampton - a story of "decline in intellectual ambition, cultural seriousness and global consciousness".

Overheard in the print room

Picture: BM

The British Museum must be the most open print room in the world.  Anyone with ID can just turn up and request anything, except for just a single restricted item (the Jacopo Bellini album).  I've recently spent three days there looking at Raphael drawings, but this was the first time that I saw more 'casual' visitors.  I was really impressed by the helpfulness of the staff, but I couldn't help be amused by some of what I overheard.  One visitor seemed to have wandered in by accident, and didn't have any idea what she wanted to see.  She was offered some 'greatest hits' ... maybe you'd like to see some Michelangelo?  She demurred!  Without batting an eyelid, the assistant offered some Pre-Raphaelites.  That turned out to be just the ticket.   

 

Although I'm grateful for unimpeded access, I confess to a frisson of fear when I see piles of Leonardo and Michelangelo freely handed out to any neophyte. 

More on Indemnities

There has been an interesting follow-up on government idemnity schemes over at Art History News. 

 

I'm also now on Twitter - Michael Savage@GrumpyArt