Tag: 07.27.00

Fort Worth’s Kimbell Museum has a stellar collection and reputation. But two of its board members have managed to pocket a rather large share of the museum’s money, paying themselves about $1.5 million a year for their board services. “At $750,000 and $747,000 each, as reported on the private foundation’s 1998 tax return, the Fortsons are paying themselves far more than they pay their museum director. They list their hours on the job as ‘full time’ even though they have a full-time and well-paid director in Potts, and Ben runs an oil business (albeit one that’s not doing too well these days).” – FW Weekly

London’s Victoria and Albert Museum has seen a dramatic fall-off in attendance in recent decades and it’s been overshadowed by the city’s other museums. Now it’s being criticized for its plans for a dramatic £80 million extension designed by Daniel Libeskind. One critic likens Libeskind’s revolutionary design to “the Guggenheim in Bilbao turned on its side and then beaten senseless with a hammer” (it is nothing of the sort)” Other “stick-in-the-muds will feel all the more justified in their belief that the V&A will be, as Dorment puts it, ‘visually raped’.” – The Guardian

The Guerrilla Girls – those champions of getting women some power in the art world – come to Philadelphia. “There’s just one problem. More so than probably any city in the country, Philadelphia has an art world run by women.” – Philadelphia Inquirer

A garden that flourished 350 years ago when India’s Taj Mahal was built may be rebuilt as a way of protecting the Taj from development. The big question is: what exactly, did the garden grow? – Chicago Tribune (NY Times News Service)