Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Blood splatter and mud: all in a day's work for Vienna costumiers

(AFP) - In a few bright rooms near the Vienna Opera, an army of workers wield needle and thread, transform black felt almost magically into golden armour, and gleefully create blood splatter on fresh white shirts.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Vatican turns to art patronage roots for Venice Biennale

(AFP) - Half a millennium after Michelangelo, the Vatican is returning to its ancient tradition of art patronage with a biblical show at the Venice Biennale commissioned to revive the rapport between art and faith.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Art pick of the week: Worth1000

(Relaxnews) - Long-time bastion of image manipulation mischieviousness, the 12-year-old Worth1000 holds regular contests for image makers and fascinated observers to enjoy alike.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Arts agenda: Michael Landy's 'Saints Alive'

(Relaxnews) - Michael Landy's bold re-animation of classical art opens at the National Gallery in London, Boris Chaliapin's iconic portraiture for TIME magazine is aired at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, and contemporary conceptualist Cildo Meireles is installed at the Renia Sofia in Madrid.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Christie's art auction sells nearly half billion dollars

(AFP) - A blockbuster auction of Contemporary art in New York, including a record $58.4 million for a Jackson Pollock drip painting, fetched nearly half a billion dollars on Wednesday -- the biggest haul ever at an art auction.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Rare Van Gogh sketchbook copies up for unprecedented sale

(AFP) - Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum is selling a limited number of copies of the Dutch master's sketchbooks for the first time, providing rare insight into his life and the origin of some of his most famous portraits, the museum said on Thursday.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Records fall at Sotheby's contemporary art auction

(AFP) - A painting by Barnett Newman that Sotheby's described as an icon of Abstract Expressionism sold Tuesday in New York for a record $43.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Controversial British graffiti work up for sale again

(AFP) - A work by renowned British graffiti artist Banksy that was withdrawn from a controversial US auction is being put up for sale again in London, auctioneers said Saturday.

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Playwright Tom Stoppard goes back to 'day job'

(AFP) - Tom Stoppard is writing a new stage play. At 75, he says it might be his last because he is slower now and his "brain cells are dying in their trillions".

Art, Shows & Exhibitions
Impressionist 'chef' cooks up record art sale

(AFP) - An Impressionist oil painting depicting a chef in his whites has fetched a tasty $18 million -- the most ever paid at auction for a work by the artist Chaim Soutine.

Fermer