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In this week’s Art World Roundup, we bring you news of the US Supreme Court’s ruling on the Guelph Treasure, an unusual painting by former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill heads to auction at Christie’s, and Spain secures the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection for the next 15 years. Also, quilts and other items made by the Gee’s Bend quilters are now available on Etsy, vindication for Nick Cave over an artwork in New York, and the Netherlands make a bold announcement concerning repatriation of cultural objects taken during colonial periods.

SCOTUS sides with Germany in Guelph Treasure case

The US Supreme Court has sided with Germany in a case brought on by the heirs of German Jewish art dealers. The case concerned medieval objects that are part of what is known as the Guelph Treasure. The Guelph Treasures were purchased in 1929 by a consortium of art dealers and after selling some works when the stock market crashed, the remaining works were sold in 1935 to the Prussian state, at the time controlled by Nazi powers. The heirs of these dealers sought out the recovery of the items claiming that the works were sold under duress. In 2014, they began the process of repatriation for the treasures currently housed in the Berlin Museum of Decorative Arts. After approaching the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, the German Advisory Commission for the Return of Cultural Property Seized as a Result of Nazi Persecution found that the sale of the works was done legally and that the heirs’ claim that the works were sold at a fraction of their value was in fact untrue. Following that ruling, the heirs, two of which are US citizens, turned to the US Supreme Court with an appeal. The court case was being carefully watched as a ruling that favoured the heirs could have influenced international law and led to an influx of repatriation cases coming to the US. The Supreme Court, though, stated in its 20-page opinion that the law of genocide, argued by the heirs, did not apply to this case as it was instead dealing with property only. The ruling means that future cases of restitution will likely continue to be held in the courts of their home countries.

Churchill painting heads to auction

What do US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Angelina Jolie have in common? A WWII era painting by former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The painting, the only one that Churchill painted during the war, was gifted to Roosevelt by the PM and is now being sold by Jolie at an upcoming auction at Christie’s. Titled Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque (1943), Jolie acquired the painting a decade ago after it was passed down from Roosevelt to his son Elliott Roosevelt. Churchill, who was an avid painter tutored by Irish artist Sir John Lavery, painted the work after the Casablanca Conference held in Morocco. Churchill put brush to canvas after Roosevelt was captivated by the mosque while in Marrakech. The country’s landscape would eventually inspire more than 40 works by Churchill but the painting owned by Jolie is made more significant due to the time in which it was created. According to Christie’s head of modern British art, Nick Orchard, the painting is “arguably the best painting by Winston Churchill due to the significance of the subject matter to him, and the fact that it highlights the importance of the friendship between the two leaders.” The painting holds a pre-sale estimate of £1.5 million to £25 million and will lead the March 1^st sale.

Major collection to remain in Spain

An agreement reached between the Spanish government and Baroness Carmen Cervera means the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection will remain in Spain for the next 15 years. The Baroness is the widow of Baron Hans Heinrich von Thyssen-Bornemisza. The two curated their collection which is housed at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum and spans seven centuries of work that includes artworks by Monet, van Gogh, Gauguin, Picasso, Lichtenstein, Rembrandt, Caravaggio, and Peter Paul Rubens, among others. A question mark over where the collection would remain appeared after a contract with the Spanish government, which had been extended a number of times, expired in 2016. However, for now the collection will remain and the state will have the option to purchase the collection after 15 years. “The [culture] minister has managed to agree a solid contract lasting 15 years, with the option for the State to purchase the collection at the end of that period,” the Spanish culture ministry said in a statement. “The annual fee is €6.5 million a year for a set of paintings and sculptures with a value of €1 billion.” The government acquired 775 artworks from the collection in 1993, and it now has the potential to grow by quite a lot in 2036.

Gee’s Bend quilters showcase their works on Etsy

The quilters of Gee’s Bend, Alabama make incredible works of art and keep a tradition of quilting that dates back to the 1800s alive and well. Since the early 2000s, the Gee’s Bend quilters have garnered the attention of the art world and since, they’ve made a name for themselves that has spread farther than many may have anticipated. Now, items made by the quilters, that exemplify their unique, irregular style, can be found and purchased on Etsy, the international e-commerce platform used by millions of makers. The launch coincides with Black History month in the US and has come about through a partnership between Etsy, Souls Grown Deep, an organisation working to preserve and promote southern African American artists, and Nest, a nonprofit that supports the “handworker economy.” Currently, nine Gee’s Bend artists are offering works, which range from a facemask to quilts large enough to engulf a king-size bed, and more are expected to join in the coming months.

“Truth prevailed!” -Nick Cave

In a unanimous vote, the zoning board of Kinderhook, New York finally put an end to a months-long dispute over a work by artist Nick Cave. With its decision, the board conceded that Cave’s work is in fact an artwork and not just a sign. The artwork, Truth Be Told, was at the centre of the matter for months after it was installed on the façade of Jack Shainman’s gallery. Large, black vinyl letters bearing the artwork’s name kicked up dust as locals and local government members alike argued that the artwork was actually just a sign and therefore violated town mandates. Facing the threat of $200/day fines, Shainman refused to remove the work. In an open letter, Cave wrote: “It is ironic that a work promoting truth-telling has been met with distrust and deceit. They are censoring the words of a Black man in a moment when our country, more so than ever, is divided on the basic principles of fact and fiction.” The letter has now been signed by more than 3,000 individuals and resulted in the artwork finding its next home at the Brooklyn Museum. The final hearing on the artwork was held on January 25 and many weighed in on the matter. In the end, Kinderhook board members decided that the installation was “displayed as a political message and art for a temporary period of time,” meaning that the town’s code “does not apply to regulate the exhibit as a sign.”

The Dutch government makes moves on repatriation

Moving forward in the fight to return items looted and stolen during colonial periods, the Dutch government has agreed to install guidelines to ensure that objects taken by the Netherlands will be returned. “Because of the imbalance of power during the colonial era, cultural objects were—effectively—often stolen,” said the Dutch government in a statement. “If it can be established that an object was indeed stolen from a former Dutch colony, it will be returned unconditionally. Cultural heritage objects that were stolen from a former colony of another country, or which are of particular cultural, historic, or religious significance to a country, may also be eligible for return.” The announcement comes after an October report commissioned by the culture ministry recommended the Netherlands to unconditionally return artworks and cultural items to their countries of origin. If the Netherlands makes good on this promise, they could become one of the leaders in the fight for repatriation. “The colonial past is a subject that still personally affects many people every day. This is why we must treat colonial collections with great sensitivity,” Ingrid van Engelshoven, the nation’s minister of education, culture, and science, said in a statement. “There is no place in the Dutch state collection for cultural heritage objects that were acquired through theft. If a country wants them back, we will give them back.”

In cities across the US, empty pedestals are what remain after statues memorialising the Confederate side of the American Civil War were toppled or removed in recent months. Thus, the question has come of what to do with those empty plinths, but Color of Change has created The Pedestal Project, a temporary AR fix to what they hope will become a long-term solution.

John Lewis, the late Civil Rights leader and former US congressman; Alicia Garza, co-founder of the Black Lives Matter Movement, author, and Principal of the Black Futures Lab; and Chelsea Miller, co-founder of the Freedom March NYC are each honoured through The Pedestal Project. AR statues of the three racial justice leaders can be viewed on Instagram as a filter that is shown against the sounds of speeches made by Lewis, Garza, and Miller.

Where memorials to the Confederacy and those with contentious pasts, including Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, once stood, anyone with an Instagram account can now envision a world where those who have fought and those who are fighting for racial justice and positive change are honoured.

Color of Change, which is the largest online racial justice organisation in the US, worked with artist Spencer Evans to create the AR statues. CGI brought to life the drawings Evans created with great intentionality and detail. Clothing, textures, facial expressions, and poses were all meticulously thought-through by Evans to “reference shared experiences rooted in identity and culture within the Black community.” The result is a series of powerful statues that create a impactful vision of what will be.

“In their time, white nationalist officials erected statues of Confederate leaders for a reason – to send a message about who should dominate this country, and to put Black people in our place,” Rashad Robinson, president of Color Of Change, said in a press release for The Pedestal Project. “In our time, Confederate statues continue to encourage white nationalists who are hell bent on resisting progress. It’s not enough to remove them, we must replace them with symbols of a just vision of America. But most importantly, every statue we change must go hand in hand with a statute we change. We cannot allow symbols like monuments to be a consolation prize — they must accompany real efforts to change laws and outcomes for real people, which is why we’re focusing on three of the many heroes fighting for concrete, anti-racist policy changes that will transform our country for the better.”

The Pedestal Project launched on the first day of February, which is Black History month in the US, and will be available indefinitely on Instagram (search @colorofchange in the filters section). If you aren’t near one of the plinths highlighted by the organisation, you can use the filters in your own city or even in your own home to experience the initiative. However, as more Confederate symbols are removed, leaving behind voided plinths, The Pedestal Project will update the map to include new pedestal locations. Color of Change is involved in the fight to remove such symbols as well, having spearheaded a petition that demands Confederate monuments be removed and replaced with “symbols of equality and progress.”

For the time being, these AR statues are temporary experiences, but Color of Change hopes that one day, these monuments will be made permanent in the places that once uplifted Confederate symbols. “Each city and state has its own laws about public monuments,” a spokesperson for Color of Change told Art Critique, “so the team will look to work with the right folks to get activists front and center in modern day history.”

One of the greatest portraits ever painted by Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli sold on January 28 at Sotheby’s New York for a record $92.2 million. In a sale that marked the first major auction of the year, Botticelli’s “Young Man Holding a Roundel” saw competitive transatlantic bidding between representatives in New York and London, with the final under-bidder bidding on behalf of a collector in Asia. Only one of three portraits left in private hands by this leading artist of the Italian Renaissance, known to many for his famous “Primavera” and “Birth of Venus,” the painting had attracted pre-sale interest from major institutional and private buyers alike. The price achieved makes it not only one of the most valuable portraits of any era ever sold, but also the second most valuable Old Master painting to ever sell at auction, second to Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi which sold for $450m in 2017.

Two bidders ultimately competed for the painting and Sotheby’s did not disclose the identity of the final buyer.

Christopher Apostle, head of Sotheby’s Old Masters department, New York, said, “This is not only an exceptional painting by Sandro Botticelli, it is also the epitome of beauty, and of a moment when so much of our Western civilization began. The sale’s result is a fitting tribute, both to the painting itself and all that it represents.”

George Wachter, Sotheby’s co-chairman of Old Master paintings worldwide, added, “As fresh today as when he was painted 550 years ago, Botticelli’s ‘Young Man’ has cast his spell over everyone who has seen him. While the price achieved is the second highest ever for an Old Master Painting, this is a work that transcends time and categories. Now we really do know the price of beauty.”

Sotheby’s exhibited it in London, Dubai, Los Angeles and New York ahead of Thursday’s sale. The price, which included the auction house’s fees, was the highest price paid for an old master since Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi sold for $US450m in 2017.

Leading up to the auction, “Portrait of a Young Man Holding a Roundel” had been on a world tour, having been exhibited first in London, then in Dubai, Los Angeles and New York City.

The Botticelli now stands alongside Francis Bacon’s “Inspired by the Oresteia of Aeschylus” as the second work to have gone beyond the $80 million threshold at auction since Sotheby’s launched the new live-streamed auction format in 2020. The January 28 sale also registered some of the highest number of participants ever seen in a Sotheby’s live-streamed auction, with 66 percent having registered online. Collectors of Old Masters also quickly embraced both livestream and online auction formats, with the category seeing record online activity last year, with double the number of online sales compared to 2019 and more than four times the aggregate online sales total.

United States Artists (USA) Fellowships are among the most prestigious art awards in the US that for 15 years have honoured and supported artists across a number of disciplines. Every year, creatives are recognised for their accomplishments and awarded a $50,000 unrestricted prize to be used however the recipient sees fit.

On Wednesday, the 2021 cohort of USA Fellows were announced. Those selected for the fellowship hail from all corners of the US and represent 10 disciplines: Architecture & Design, Craft, Dance, Film, Media, Music, Theater & Performance, Traditional Arts, Visual Art, and Writing. USA Fellows are each at different points in their career.

Unrestricted grants allow recipients the unique opportunity to use their awards in whatever way best suits their work, whether it be to fund an upcoming project, pay their rent, or support their families. Off the back of 2020, a year that proved strenuous for people all over the world, such direct support is more important than ever.

“We are grateful for every artist whose artmaking, music, writing, and more is helping us to navigate and cope through this harrowing time in our country,” United States Artists President and CEO Deana Haggag said in a press release. “The 2021 USA Fellows are a testament to the power of art in shaping the world around us and navigating its complexities. Artists do so much for our communities, and we are grateful to be able to support these sixty incredible practitioners and welcome them into the United States Artists fellowship.”

Support like that provided by United States Artists is critical to creatives as 2020 USA Writing Fellow Edwidge Danticat pointed out in the announcement of this year’s fellows. “Now more than ever,” said Danticat, “artists need this kind of support, not just for continuity, but for safety and survival.”

The 2021 USA Fellows are:

Architecture & Design

Jennifer Bonner / MALL
Walter Hood
Olalekan Jeyifous

Craft

Diedrick Brackens
Bisa Butler
Amber Cowan
Salvador Jiménez-Flores
Cannupa Hanska Luger
Tiff Massey
Erin M. Riley

Dance

Ishmael Houston-Jones
JanpiStar
Emily Johnson
Cynthia Oliver
Ni’Ja Whitson

Film

Faren Humes
Macha Colón
Stephen Maing
Darius Clark Monroe
Naima Ramos-Chapman
Jennifer Reeder

Media

Morehshin Allahyari
Stephanie Dinkins
Lauren Lee McCarthy
Mother Cyborg

Music

Martha Gonzalez
Edward “Kidd” Jordan
Tomeka Reid
Wadada Leo Smith
Mazz Swift

Theater & Performance

Jibz Cameron
Carmelita Tropicana
Christopher Chen
Sandra Delgado
Idris Goodwin
Mia Katigbak
Karen Zacarías

Traditional Arts

Ofelia Esparza
Nathan P. Jackson
Basil Kincaid
Kawika Lum-Nelmida
Carolyn L. Mazloomi
Geo Soctomah Neptune
Delina White

Visual Art

Njideka Akunyili Crosby
Lex Brown
rafa esparza
Maria Gaspar
Sharon Hayes
Carolyn Lazard
Daniel Lind-Ramos
Aki Sasamoto

Writing

Alexander Chee
Eve L. Ewing
Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
Dunya Mikhail
Elizabeth McCracken
Natalie Y. Moore
Danez Smith
Ocean Vuong

United States Artists, a Chicago based organization, was founded in 2006 in response to significant cuts to the National Endowment for the Arts. The USA Fellows programme is at the forefront of the organisation’s outreach, which has honoured creatives like painter and visual artist Howardena Pindell (2020 USA Fellow), dancer and choreographer Alice Sheppard (2019), fashion designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy of Rodarte (2009), and poet Claudia Rankine (2016). In response to the pandemic, United States Artists became a founding partner of Artist Relief, which oversaw the distribution of $20 million, directly supporting nearly 4,000 artists in need.