Bidding for the best
LONDON. Condition, provenance and rarity were once again the key factors affecting the prices paid for Old Master paintings in Sotheby?s and Christie?s sales on 11 and 12 July. Anything with real wall power continued the year-long trend of fetching meteoric prices and it seems demand for the best commercial pictures is till insatiable. Once again Dutch and Flemish pictures led the way and if you are newly entering the Old Master market with big money this would be the most obvious area to start in. Anything of questionable quality or condition remained unsold. 20010720 GMT
French luxury-goods mogul retreats from the internet
LONDON. In 1999 the French luxury-goods mogul Bernard Arnault made a massive plunge into the then oh-so-fashionable internet sector, pouring over E500 million ($437 million; £308 million) into his privately owned investment fund, Europ@web. 20010720 GMT
Gehry designed museum planned for Biloxi, Mississippi
LONDON. The model for a 25,000 square-foot museum designed by Frank Gehry was unveiled on 12 July. This museum is not Guggenheim collaboration, but a privately funded campaign in Biloxi, Mississipi. The main gallery of the Ohr-O?Keefe Museum of Art will be dedicated to the work of the 19th-century US potter, George Ohr. 20010720 GMT
The buzzard has landed...
LONDON. A £40,000 tapestry stolen earlier this year, known as ?The buzzard?, has been discovered in a litter bin in Glasgow. 20010720 GMT
The fortunes of Aboriginal art outside Australia: ethnographica or art?
SYDNEY. When Australians with even the most glancing interest in art meet overseas visitors, Aboriginal art is invariably a pressing topic. Tourists routinely buy Aboriginal work from all sorts of vendors, ranging from airport shops to Aboriginal-owned cooperatives. But many Australians are deluded about the health of the international market for Aboriginal art, according to some experts. 20010720 GMT
Human traffic as art
BARCELONA. Slowly crossing back and forth across one of Barcelona?s busiest stretches of port is a cargo ship that contains people posing as illegal immigrants in its hold. Paid Pts 4,000 (£15.00) per day, they occupy the cramped airless space for the daily three-hour run of this latest intervention by Spanish artist Santiago Sierra. 20010720 GMT
National Gallery, Canberra: trouble for the Irish director
CANBERRA. In 1997 Brian Kennedy started as director of Australia?s National Gallery in Canberra (NGA) amid high expectations and at the end of a search that dragged on for several years and forced his predecessor, Betty Churcher, to stay on an extra year. 20010720 GMT
Robert Hughes, an Australian tragedy
LONDON. Feeling that a movie version of Oedipus Rex suffered for lack of a singalong tune, Tom Lehrer wrote a snappy little number about a boy who loved his mother. We need Lehrer back on the job, since it would require all his musical talents?and black humour?to rescue something from the latter-day tragedy of Robert Hughes. Perhaps something along the lines of ?I still call Australia home? despite pending lawsuits?. 20010720 GMT