British-Indian sculptor Anish Kapoor has decided to leave the anti-Semitic graffiti on his installation Dirty Corner at the Palace of Versailles near Paris, but will cover it up, palace authorities said. “(The sculpture), which was recently vandalised, will be subject in the coming days to an intervention to hide the damage, under the artist’s supervision,” Palace of Versailles authorities said in a statement.
Harvard dorms get original masterpieces
Dorm life can be anything but classy, but Harvard University students are being offered the chance to rent valuable original prints of masterpieces by the likes of Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Andy Warhol. Under the Student Print Rental Program run by the Harvard Art Museums, students living in Harvard housing can pay $50 to rent an original print, said Jessica Diedalis, the curricular registrar at the Harvard Art Museums. Museum officials now curate a special collection for students of the Ivy League school, to select from on the first days of class each year. Of the 275 prints available, 177 have been claimed for this academic year, Diedalis said.
Bosnia reopens museum of treasures
Bosnia’s National Museum, a custodian of culture for a region torn by ethnic divisions, re-opened last week after a three-year closure, displaying treasures including a medieval Jewish book of Passover rites. After Bosnia’s divided authorities finally agreed on a way to finance the landmark Sarajevo institution, school children and citizens filled the chambers and garden that had been closed in 2012 for lack of funding. Its status has remained unresolved for years.
Van Gogh and Munch together at last
Norway’s Edvard Munch and Dutch master Vincent Van Gogh lived at the same time and both struggled to put their inner demons on canvas, but they never met in real life. A broad collection of their paintings, which greatly influenced modern 19th-century artwork, will hang side by side for the first time at an exhibit that opened at the Van Gogh Museum in the Netherlands last week. By juxtaposing works like The Scream, Munch’s best known painting of a tormented soul, against Van Gogh’s The Bridge of Trinquetaille, the creators explore similarities in their visions. Though they both spent time in Paris in the mid-1880s, their paths never crossed.