This summer great plans and a lot of movement in Beijing, chosen as the capital for the Olympic games 2008, where athletes from all over the world are landing as well as a special team of sportsmen selected by Andy Warhol. Indeed, the Chinese city has decided to host, from the 26th July in the venue of the Faurschou gallery, a famous collection of portraits by Andy Warhol dedicated to some very notorious athletes.

New York, NY – Christie’s New York leads its fall season with the eighth edition of First Open on September 9, which includes over 230 lots of Post-War & Contemporary Art and is expected to realize in excess of $6-8 million. First Open displays another stunning array of works for this highly anticipated and successful sale. Highlights of the sale include an exciting assortment of paintings, sculpture, drawings and photographs from both well-known and emerging artists. With estimates ranging from $1,500 to $500,000, First Open is an exceptional opportunity to acquire works at a variety of price points, whether you are building an existing collection or starting anew.

Last 1st June the world of fashion came to a halt to commemorate the death of Yves Saint Laurent, the French fashion designer considered one of the greatest fashion creators of the twentieth century who started his career at the Christian Dior maison to then found the homonymous label (Yves Saint Laurent) with his life and business partner Pierre Bergè.
His mark in the world of fashion and luxury remains recognizable and his name will always be symbol of style, becoming symbol of sophisticated but also innovative elegance.

One of the most famous works of art from twentieth-century history has greatly moved art lovers. Pablo Picasso’s painting the “Guernica” is sick and its conditions are serious although stable: this was the diagnosis given by experts at the Reina Sofia museum in Madrid, who in these days have been carrying out a last check-up on Picasso’s work. An analysis that will allow to understand more thoroughly its damage, its genes, the hidden curiosities about its life.

Title: Art of the Royal Court: Treasures in Pietre Dure from the Palaces of Europe
Location: NEW YORK - Metropolitan Museum
Description: This is the most comprehensive exhibition to date on the tradition of hardstone carving (pietre dure) that developed in Italy in the 16th century and subsequently spread through Europe.
Start Date: 2008-07-01
End Date: 2008-09-21

Last 8th July Christie’s auctioned among its Old Masters some recovered treasures, whose traces had gone lost. Besides the rediscovery of Jean-Antoine Watteau’s masterpiece “La surprise”, sold for 12,361,250 pounds, 3 drawings by Goya have re-emerged, after 131 years of not knowing anything about them.
At first, it was believed that the three recovered drawings by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (1746-1828) could have fetched a profit equal to 2 million pounds, then they were sold individually and totalled a much higher amount, the same that happened for Watteau’s painting.

The fifth annual report by Federculture has confirmed a trend that is now evident in our country. Italy’s cultural and artistic wealth is being held back by a decision-making slackness and by a shortage of adequate resources. Despite the driving strength of Italian products with a strong component of creativity, investments in the cultural field are really limited. What is missing is a link between creative industry, culture and market which favours competitiveness.

From 1st July to 21st September 2008, the Metropolitan Museum in New York is housing the works by great English artist Turner. It is the greatest retrospective organized on the painter in the USA, displaying 140 of his works between paintings and water-colours.
The production has been organized in both a chronological and a thematic sense, with the purpose of showing the artist’s entire stylistic course, from his immature and academic works to his affirmed and revolutionary pictorial writing, from the themes to the places he held dearest.

The importance of the online market is increasing in the whole world. The most famous auction houses already started investing in this sector at the end of the nineties. Not only for the realization of websites that were more aware of clients’ needs but also with regard to online auctions and the possibility of buying and selling through internet.
Although the initial results were not quite satisfying, in the last years the sector has grown significantly for importance. At the moment profits from this sector are not comparable to traditional sales (and most probably never will be), however we must recognize that the world is evolving in this direction and the online market will definitely take on more and more.