February 19, 2015: Sotheby’s Partners with Car Auctioneer & UK Museum Visits on the Decline

Opening

In New York … Check out our neighborhood guide to tonight’s NYC openings.

In Los Angeles … John Currin opens at Gagosian Gallery; “Judith Eisler: Close-Ups & Two Shots” opens at GAVLAK.

In Milan … Yael Bartana and William E. Jones open at Galleria Raffaella Cortese.

Today’s Notable News

L.A. nonprofit the Mistake Room will honor artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien and Francesca von Habsburg, founder of Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, at its first biennial fundraiser on March 28th. Julien will show his 2013 installation PLAYTIME for the first time in the U.S. (via ARTnews)

Sotheby’s now has a 25 percent ownership in RM Auctions, the Ontario-based car auctioneer. The first RM Sotheby’s sale, highlighting a 1960 Ferrari estimated between $6-7 million, is set for March 14th in Amelia Island, Florida. (via artnet News)

Rosanne Somerson has been permanently appointed president of the Rhode Island School of Design after serving as its interim president since January 2014. (via the New York Times)

Although tourism figures suggest a high number of visits to UK government-sponsored museums and galleries in 2013-14, deeper analysis of the stats has exposed a 20 percent drop in UK visitors to the Tate Museum and the National Gallery since 2008-09. (via The Art Newspaper)

The contestation of the will of Cornelius Gurlitt prolongs the Kunstmuseum Bern’s controversial acquisition of over 1,600 works passed down from Gurlitt’s father, an art dealer of the Nazi era whose collection has been shown to include pieces looted from their Jewish owners. (via the New York Times)

Best of Instagram

Via @cooperhewitt: “#TBT Buckminster Fuller’s tetrahedrons and octahedrons installed in the library as part of ‘MAN transFORMs,’ the museum’s inaugural exhibition in the Carnegie Mansion in 1976. Curated by Austrian artist-architect Hans Hollein, the exhibition featured installations from international designers emphasizing the role that design has played in human history. The objective, according to Hollein, was ‘to produce a series of encounters that would unfetter the imagination.’ #cooperhewitt #buckminsterfuller”