□ Wednesday, 2 Aug 2006

Staff suspected over missing Hermitage treasures
Precious silver and enamelware at St Petersburg's Hermitage Museum worth nearly £2.7m has disappeared and probably been stolen with the connivance of staff, its director confirmed yesterday. More...

□ Tuesday, 1 Aug 2006

Hermitage hit by mystery thieves
Thieves have stolen more than 200 items - with an estimated value of $5m (£2.67m) - from Russia's prestigious Hermitage art museum in St Petersburg. More...

□ Saturday, 29 Jul 2006

Exhibition Celebrates 400th Anniversary of Rembrandt
Selected primarily from Harvard collections, Rembrandt and the Aesthetics of Technique, an exhibition at the Busch-Reisinger Museum from September 9 to December 10, 2006, will invite visitors to engage intensively with nearly fifty drawings, paintings, and prints by the master, his pupils, and his contemporaries. More...

□ Friday, 28 Jul 2006

FIA Acquires Sculpture by Artist Jun Kaneko
The Flint Institute of Arts has just acquired a major ceramic sculpture by the renowned artist Jun Kaneko. The 6i 4i (human life-sized), monolithic "dango" (the Japanese word for dumpling) arrived at the FIA on Thursday, June 29, and was donated by Alan and Kelly Ginsburg in honor of the birthdays of Flint philanthropists and FIA supporters Art and Bess Hurand. More...

Klimt's golden girl draws crowds and debate
The world's most expensive painting has gone on view in New York, attracting huge crowds and fuelling an increasingly heated debate over soaring ticket prices across the city's cultural institutions. More...

□ Wednesday, 26 Jul 2006

Art provenance research still FAR BEHIND
Not according to a new report. "The survey found 140,000 objects that 'need provenance research,' far more than the 18,000 objects posted on the Nazi-Era Provenance Internet Portal maintained by the museum association. Most of the museums actively conducting provenance research have completed work on less than half the relevant items in their collections, only about 33% of the museums have a separate budget for the purpose and only about 10% have employed a full-time researcher, the survey says." More...

No evidence that Nazis took Courbet art
The Chicago Art Institute is protesting a caption and characterization of one of the museum's artworks in the New York Times. The museum says that contrary to a Times caption, there is no evidence that "a landscape painting by Gustave Courbet long owned by the Art Institute of Chicago was never found to have been confiscated by the Nazi regime in Germany during World War II." More...

Bog discovery hailed as Ireland's Dead Sea scrolls
Irish archaeologists are celebrating the discovery of their own Dead Sea scrolls after a bulldozer unearthed fragments of a psalter that may have lain in a bog for more than 1,000 years. More...

Americans Returned Looted Artifact To Iraq
American officials have returned an important artifact looted from the Iraq National Museum three years ago. "The headless stone statue of the Sumerian king Entemena of Lagash was turned over to the Iraqi government when Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visited Washington on Wednesday. The statue, which weighs hundreds of pounds, was taken by looters who slid or rolled it down the steps of the museum, damaging both the steps and other artifacts. More...

□ Tuesday, 25 Jul 2006

Chihuly's Glass Exhibit Was Damaged
Not one piece of Artist Dale Chihuly's Glass in the Garden exhibit at the Missouri Botanical Garden was damaged or broken after Wednesday night's massive storm, which knocked down trees, buildings and power lines. More...