Dutch painter Judith Layster gets recognition in form of a google doodle

A SUMMARY OF THE MOST EXCITING ART NEWS FROM AROUND THE GLOBE

While we focus on Indian art, we can’t obviously function in a vacuum. It’s a small world and everything is connected, especially on the web. So, let’s train our spotlight across the world map to see what’s going on — from art trends to socio-political issues to everything that affects the great aesthetic global consciousness. Or, let’s just travel the world and have some fun!

Restoration of Piero della Francesca Nativity scene backfired

The National Gallery of London recently revealed the fruits of a three-year-long restoration of Piero della Francesca’s Nativity (1475). But the effort to fix areas of the badly damaged painting has received a less than enthusiastic response from some notable critics, who have claimed the restoration was botched. In a recent review, Jonathan Jones, a critic for The Guardian, went so far as to say that the National Gallery had “ruined Christmas” in their “clumsy and plodding, if not downright comical,” restoration. One thing is clear, however, and that is that the painting was in dire need of care. When the National Gallery first acquired this Renaissance masterpiece in 1874, the painting had splits in the panel. It had also been cleaned too extensively, resulting in the near-complete erasure of the heads of two shepherds in the background. The painting was in such poor condition that the Prime Minister of the time, Benjamin Disraeli, had to defend the purchase before Parliament. Read more on Art News.

Dutch painter Judith Layster gets recognition in form of a google doodle

Judith Leyster, one of the few female Old Masters whose work has been upheld alongside her male colleagues, is the subject of a Google Doodle today that’s intended to bring her more mainstream recognition. Leyster was active in the Netherlands during the 17th-century; she painted alongside Frans Hals, and for centuries, many art experts even attributed her work to his name. She only lived to be 50, but she is prized for her party scenes, whose inebriated revelers and lively musicians ended up defining that subgenre of painting during the era. The Doodle seems to allude to a ca. 1630 self-portrait by Leyster that is held by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and is now considered one of the most important images of a female artist at work. It is one of around 35 known paintings by Leyster. Read more at The Table Read.

Investigation of sexual misconduct allegations against Johann König was  legal

A regional court in Hamburg, Germany, ruled that it was legal for German newspaper Die Zeit to publish a report that revealed sexual misconduct allegations against dealer Johann König. As greater attention was paid to König and his Berlin gallery, whose roster has been reshaped in the months after the article’s publication, some in the German press cast doubt on the methodology behind the Die Zeit investigation. But the Hamburg Regional Court said this week that Die Zeit was allowed to publish the accusations against König because he was a public figure. “There is a legitimate public interest in being informed that an important and internationally active member of the cultural sector has been accused of repeatedly sexually harassing women,” the decision reads, according to the German press agency dpa. Details on the Title Press.

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