Good Morning!
- Restorer admits to painting Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in Rome basilica and complies with Vatican orders to erase it.
- Open letter demands curatorial independence at the Art Gallery of Ontario following decision not to acquire Nan Goldin artwork.
- Trump has plans to erect a controversial statue of Christopher Columbus on the White House grounds.
The Headlines
IT WAS HER. After repeatedly denying he had painted the likeness of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni onto a fresco of an angel in an ancient church he was tasked with restoring, artist and craftsman Bruno Valentinetti has changed his tune, and told La Repubblica, “Yes, it’s the prime minister’s face.” He nevertheless insisted his rendering was “similar to the previous painting.” Not similar enough. His overreach has drawn heated backlash from lawmakers who decried it as a form of “covert propaganda” at the Basilica of San Lorenzo in Rome and the Vatican has stated the church needs to stay out of politics. Sacred art exists for “liturgical life and prayer,” and cannot be “distorted or exploited,” stated the Vicar General of the Diocese of Rome, Baldassare Reina. The Vatican has already ordered a redo, prompting Valentinetti to erase his homage to Meloni. Meanwhile, experts are studying photographs of the original angel painting to serve as a more accurate model for a newly painted face.
COLUMBUS’S DAY. President Trump has announced plans to install a statue of Christopher Columbus outside the White House, on the south side of the grounds, after the sculpture was thrown into Baltimore’s Inner Harbor by protesters in 2020 and later repaired, reports the Washington Post. The statue was erected by President Ronald Reagan and has been the source of clashes between Italian American heritage groups in favor of keeping it in place and critics who see it as whitewashing Columbus’s record of brutal violence against Native Americans. A group of Italian Americans rebuilt the damaged statue, for whom “it’s not about Columbus ‘discovering America’ … it’s about the Italian immigrants who came here and looked to Columbus as a hero,” said Bill Martin, who helped rebuild the original sculpture. In other news of cultural interventions by the president, fallout continues over his abrupt announcement that he will close the Kennedy Center for two years of renovations. The Post reports on the chaotic impact this has had on performers and workers, including three Broadway tours, for whom it is “almost impossible” to reroute shows, amounting to financial losses that can force tours to shut down. Offering little reassurance about the Kennedy Center plans, Trump told reporters “I’m not ripping it down. I’ll be using the steel. So we’re using the structure, we’re using some of the marble and some of the marble comes down.”
The Digest
An open letter signed by 500 signatories, including numerous artists and several Jewish groups, is demanding curatorial independence at Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), after the institution decided against acquiring a new work by Nan Goldin. [ARTnews]
A Los Angeles couple is suing the city and Mayor Karen Bass for blocking their plans to demolish Marilyn Monroe’s former home, by designating it a historic cultural monument. [Los Angeles Times]
A new report by Tracfin has revealed a 112 percent jump in art trafficking alerts made over a period of three years. [Le Figaro]
The inaugural Aryanyani Pavilion in New Delhi, launched by nature and arts organization Aranyani, and designed by architecture studio T_M.space, boasts a curving structure whose roof is planted with over 40 native plants. Named Sacred Nature, the spiraling pavilion in Sunder Nursery park will remain open until February 20. [Dezeen]
The Kicker
VELAZQUEZ FAMILY FEUD. Historians have tended to portray the celebrated Spanish court painter Diego Velázquez as a discreet man whose private life was a picture of noble restraint. But as the Times of London reports, there was plenty of drama behind the scenes. Newly discovered documents reveal that his daughter, Francisca, and his protégé, Juan Bautista Martínez del Mazo, were embroiled in a scandalous affair that Velázquez tried to stop. Indeed, his daughter was only 14 at the time, and Mazo 27. Her perspective is sorely missing from records, but after unsuccessfully trying to hide her away in a convent, Francisca confessed to being engaged to Mazo, and the two were lawfully united in 1633. Mazo, after learning Velázquez’s techniques, eventually became the official court painter upon Velázquez’s death in 1660.
