Art & Design

Exhibit Featuring 20 Red Punching Bags Opens At LA Art Show

8:11am January 11, 2018

by Neda Ulaby

The punching bags hang in the gallery as apart of an interactive exhibit. Each bag bears the face of a controversial world leader. People are encouraged to punch the bags to release negative emotions.

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The Carter Burden Gallery in Chelsea only shows works by artists who are at least 60 years old.

This New York Gallery Has An Unusual Age Limit: No Artists Younger Than 60

8:11am January 11, 2018

by Susan Stamberg

Galleries and museums often cool to artists as they get older. Those artists keep working, but they aren't shown or bought. The Carter Burden Gallery aims to change that.

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The High Museum of Art in Atlanta has worked to make diversity a priority. In recent years, the museum has seen an increase in the percentage of nonwhite visitors.

How An Art Museum Is Reaching A More Diverse Audience

6:14am January 07, 2018

by Lulu Garcia-Navarro

The High Museum of Art in Atlanta has undertaken several efforts to increase the proportion of nonwhite visitors. Director Rand Suffolk tells NPR's Lulu Garcia-Navarro how they did it.

Arts

Christopher Marley's Dead Things

8:21am January 06, 2018

by Aaron Scott

Christopher Marley sees beauty in dead things: snakes, octopuses, bugs. Other people do too — his work sells in high-end shops and has been shown in art and natural history museums.

Since 1970, visitors to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City could pay what they wished — or what they were able.

The Met Is Set To Snap Nearly 5 Decades Of Pay-As-You-Wish Tradition

6:41pm January 04, 2018

by Colin Dwyer

Since 1970, New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art has not mandated an admission fee. Come March, that will change for out-of-state visitors — but critics haven't accepted the decision quietly.

In Lebanon, Mile-Long Artwork Is A Sign Of Peace

6:09pm January 03, 2018

Lebanese twins Omar and Mohamed Kabbani painted "salam" — the Arabic word for peace — in bright green across 82 rooftops in the northern city of Tripoli. NPR's Ari Shapiro speaks with Omar about the ambitious art project that can only be seen from the sky.

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Njideka Akunyili Crosby paints in her Los Angeles studio in September 2017.

Arts

MacArthur 'Genius' Paints Nigerian Childhood Alongside Her American Present

5:54pm January 02, 2018

by Karen Michel

Njideka Akunyili Crosby was born in Nigeria and moved to the U.S. when she was 16. Her large-scale paintings reflect her life in both countries.

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PHOTOS: Malick Sidibe Shows Mali's Youth With A Groovy 'Twist'

7:00am December 30, 2017

by Vicky Hallett

A Paris museum is showing the first major posthumous exhibit of work by the great photographer. As Sidibe himself once said, "I think photos are the best way of living a long time after you die."

Deadline Approaches For $10 Million Reward On Leads To Gardner Museum Paintings

4:49pm December 29, 2017

NPR's Robert Siegel speaks with Stephen Kurkjian, former investigative reporter for The Boston Globe, and author of the book Master Thieves, about the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum heist in 1990. The museum still hopes to get the artwork back and set a deadline on New Year's Eve for a $10 million reward on leads for the 13 missing paintings, that include works by Vermeer, Rembrandt, and Degas.

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In U.N. Art Exhibition, Syrian Artist Unpacks Refugees' Baggage

4:19pm December 26, 2017

by Deborah Amos

An art exhibition at the United Nations uses tiny models of refugees' former homes and the suitcases of refugees to tell their stories.

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