Goldin Photo Rekindles Art-Vs.-Porn Debate The controversy over Elton John's seized Nan Goldin photograph "resurrects a familiar debate about censorship: does the context of an image determine whether or not it breaks the law? In other words, does it matter that a photograph of a naked child is in a respectable art gallery - rather than in a seedy magazine or on an illegal website? Or is explicit child nudity - which is how many would categorise Goldin's picture - unacceptable and illegal, per se?" BBC 09/28/07

For High Return On Investment, Fund The Arts "Not many investments return $5 for every $1 put up - at least, not many legal investments. That eye-popping $5-to-$1 calculation comes from a new study of the impact of arts and cultural groups on the economy in Philadelphia and its Pennsylvania suburbs. Given the chance to reap such handsome returns while boosting a key asset to the region, state and local government officials should be more bullish than they are on the funding of arts and culture." Philadelphia Inquirer 09/28/07

Lazy Reporting Is A Threat To Great Art "I think maybe it's time to take a hard look at the conventions by which newspapers and online news outlets cover visual art stories. In fact, if you look at how visual art appears in the news over any length of time you will find essentially the same stories appear repeatedly. ... Bad reporting along these generic lines distorts understanding and can destroy our pleasure in great art." The Guardian (UK) 09/26/07

On The Vital Link Between Criticism And Creativity "Real creativity ... and real criticism share something that cuts to the heart of why art and literature matter to us: they are dynamic dialogues with what we've done before and what we will make in - and of - the future. As Oscar Wilde puts it: 'Surely, criticism is itself an art ... Criticism is, in fact both creative and independent ... The antithesis between them is entirely arbitrary. Without the critical faculty, there is no artistic creation at all, worthy of the name.'" The Guardian (UK) 09/27/07

First A Rotting Shark, Now Some Leaky Cows "Last year we revealed that Damien Hirst was to replace the rotting shark in his The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living.... Now the British artist is to repair his Mother and Child, Divided (1993),an installation of a bisected cow and calf in four formaldehyde tanks, in the collection of the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art in Oslo. The work is leaking and has been sent to the artist's studio in London for emergency repairs." The Art Newspaper 09/26/07

Mass MoCA Decides Not To Show Disputed Art The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art decided Tuesday to dismantle an uncompleted Christoph Buchel work without opening it to the public. A judge had ruled last week that MassMoCA could show the work, ignoring Buchel's objections. "Buchel, who has rarely spoken to the press, sent an e-mail to the Globe Tuesday night in response to the museum's move. Pointedly referencing his dispute with Mass MoCA over the project's budget, he offered to donate a 'permanent installation' that wouldn't cost anything to pull off. He concluded the email with an image of the plan -- a tweak of the museum's rooftop signage to spell out 'Mass CoMA'." Boston Globe 09/26/07

Who Owns Unfinished Art? So if artwork is unfinished it's not really by the artist? "A visit to any gallery will throw up plenty of examples of unfinished art. Last year's Velazquez exhibition at the National Gallery featured several pictures that the painter had not completed; they had great lacunae or only one level of paint. There is also a roaring interest in sketches, which are by definition not the finished work; the queues at the Victoria and Albert museum for the Da Vinci exhibition bore this out." The Guardian (UK) 09/25/07

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