Tag: 09.20.00

The thieves who stole a Monet from the Polish National Museum replaced it with a cheap fake. So museum officials are not certain when the painting was stolen. – Ananova

A skeleton found beneath Florence’s Duomo 30 years ago has been identified as that of Giotto, the famed early Renaissance artist. – BBC

“The National Capital Planning Commission meets in Washington DC Thursday to give final approval to the $100-million project’s “finished” design, even though its thematic centerpiece is a complete unknown. This startling fact is a plain example of what a sham the review process for the World War II Memorial has been these past five years.” – Los Angeles Times

• DESIGN REVIEW: “That any monument could work in such a loaded context is doubtful. But it is hard to imagine one more insensitive to the spirit of the site. Pompous and unimaginative, St. Florian’s ring of towering archways and repetitive stone pillars smacks of the worst kind of authoritarian architecture. To build it would not only desecrate one of the world’s great democratic forums. It would do an injustice to the memory of those it is meant to celebrate.” – Los Angeles Times

The Brooklyn Museum of Art “unveiled a $55 million plan yesterday to transform the institution’s front entrance into a major civic plaza, with tiered seating, reflecting pools and programmable fountains flanking a modernistic new lobby of glass and steel.” – New York Times