China’s Terracotta Army constructed in different places

Found in 1974, China’s Terracotta Army of 8,099 clay warriors and horses, were buried with Emperor Qin Shihuang around 210 - 209 BC and were meant to protect the emperor in the afterlife. Well it turns out that the horses and warriors were constructed in different locations, based on analysis of pollen found in fragments of terracotta that were collected from the clay figures.

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/01/29/terracottaarmy_arc.html?category=archaeology&\1guid=20070129091500

Mali relics recovered in France

Over 600 ancient artifacts from Mali have been taken into custody by French officials. Artifacts ranging from a few thousand to one million years old were confiscated at the Charles de Gaulle airport.

For more info: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6314481.stm

Linkspam

Just cleaning out my Delicious links . . . sorry if I already posted some of them.

Docuticker
- San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and Columbus, Ohio, are Tops in Cultural Vitality Rankings
- Artistic Creation and Intellectual Property – “We analyze artistic markets considering three key distinctive features that have been overlooked by the standard analysis on intellectual property.”
- Canada’s Culture Gateway, Culture.ca “Redesigned and Refreshed”
- Bigger European Digital Library? Tell Me More! & Council Conclusions on the Digitisation and Online Accessibility of Cultural Material and Digital Preservation - Need Humanities be so Useless? Justifying the Place and Role of Humanities as a Critical Resource for Performance and Practice

General
- Hannah's Art and Culture Blog
- BBC Arts Central
- Humble Voice Launches Gorgeous New Artist Community
- Sonic Art Weapon: Ravezooka

Harvard Analysis Casts Doubt on Works Said to Be Pollocks

A yearlong scientific analysis by the Harvard University Art Museums of three paintings discovered in 2003 and considered to be possible works by Jackson Pollock has found that some of the pigments used in the paints were not patented or commercially available until long after Pollock died in 1956.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/30/us/30pollock.html?ex=1327813200&en=09118961667cc58d&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

smARThistory

Personally, this is my favorite Art History blog for instruction. I think these instructors are very innovative and their resources are great supplements for class sessions. Check out some of the videocasts and podcasts they have done at http://smarthistory.blogspot.com/

The Sacred Cave of Roman Founders Found!

Archaeologists say they have unearthed Lupercale—the sacred cave where, according to legend, a she-wolf nursed the twin (Romulus and Remus) founders of Rome and where the city itself was born. A richly decorated vault encrusted with mosaics and seashells was found and leads archaeologist to belive that they have found the famous cave.

For more info, check out: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/01/070126-rome-palatine.html

Visualization Graph of Artists, Writers, Thinkers

This visualization graph was featured on BoingBoing. It plugs itself as a "Genealogy of Influence," showing the connections among 500+ of " the most influential writers, artists, philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians of Western culture."

I found it a bit hard to navigate on the fly -- the lines get kind of tangled. But I'd love to have this on a poster as a conversation piece.

MN Find Set to Shake Up Migrational Timelines?

The recent discovery of crude stone tools in Walker, Minn., that could have been used as long as 15,000 years ago has raised questions for archaeologists, historians, preservationists and the city.

(The contributors of this blog are from MN -- hence the excitement.)

Rembrandt sells for $25.8 million!

Auction house Sotheby’s has sold a rare work by Rembrandt depicting the Apostle James in prayer on Thursday for $25.8 million!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070125/ap_on_en_ot/art_rare_rembrandt

New Olmec city found in Mexico

A new 2,500 old Olmec city has been found in Mexico. Zazacatla is influenced by the Olmecs, and has been discovered hundreds of miles away from the Olmecs' Gulf coast territory.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070126/ap_on_sc/mexico_olmec_city

Steve

In my opinion, every art librarian (or even artY librarian) in the world should be contributing to Steve -- and this excitement is just from reading about it. Steve is billed as "the first experiment in social tagging of museum collections." And, like page 41 of the latest Library Journal points out, it's not intended to replace, but to supplement traditional cataloging.

"Steve” is a collaborative research project exploring the potential for user-generated descriptions of the subjects of works of art to improve access to museum collections and encourage engagement with cultural content. . . Together, working within steve, we hope to learn more about how to improve access to museum collections. We want to explore user-contributed terminology, collected on the Web, as a way to address these gaps. User-created descriptions could provide museums with missing subject-based information for their collections databases and make our on-line resources more useful. We’re collaborating to develop a shared open-source tool that enables the collection of user terminology and facilitates its analysis.

Melissa's new book review!

Checkout Melissa’s latest book review in Library Journal:

Aho, Melissa. Review of Michael B. Oren, “Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present.” Library Journal, January 2007, Vol. 132, No. 1, p124-125.

8th century shipwreck from the Early Islamic Period found

An 8th century shipwreck, believed to be the only ship from the Early Islamic period discovered in the entire Mediterranean region, was discovered off Dor Beach, Israel.

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/526733/#imagetop

Communities and the Arts

Some reports looking at the contribution of the arts to community vitality:

A new report, Museums and Galleries in Britain: Economic, Social and Creative Impacts, by Tony Travers of the London School of Economics, finds that “the UK’s museums and galleries could, with greater capacity to expand and improve, allow this country to be a world leader in creativity and scholarship.”

The report, jointly commissioned by the National Museum Directors’ Conference (NMDC) and the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), analyses a number of Britain’s leading museums and galleries in terms of visitor numbers, economic impacts, civic functions, and contributions to the country’s creativity and educational performance.

Also . . .

A first-of-its-kind comprehensive statistical portrait of cultural vitality — ranging from community festivals to financial contributions — finds metropolitan areas on both coasts and in the Midwest earning top honors. Developed by an Urban Institute research team, the portrait’s seven measures illuminate the intersection of arts, culture, and community well-being.

The San Francisco region ranked number 1 on three of the measures (each reflecting activity per 1,000 residents): nonprofit arts organizations, artist jobs, and employment in commercial and nonprofit arts establishments. Washington, D.C., was tops in nonprofit arts spending and contributions. Metropolitan Los Angeles led in commercial arts establishments, while Columbus, Ohio, had the most nonprofit community celebrations, festivals, fairs, and parades.

Ancient Chinese Relics Found

Over 1,100 ancient Chinese relics have been unearthed due to construction for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070118/sc_nm/olympics_china_relics_dc

13,000 to 14,000 year old tools found in Minnesota

Stone tools believed to be about 13,000 to 14,000 years old have been found in Walker, Minnesota. Archaeologists found more then 50 stone tools and other objects when digging. While the jury is still out on the artifacts, they could end up being the oldest found tools in Minnesota and North America.

http://wcco.com/local/local_story_012071945.html

Writing with the Inca Khipu

The new January issue of Wired, Issue 15.01, has a great article about the Inca khipu (aka knotted strings) and how they might indeed be a written language (kind of).

Check out the magazine or you can also read the online version at http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.01/khipu.html

Festivals and Whats On When

If you are looking to do some traveling this spring like me, and hope to see some museums/festivals/art-markets in the process, you might like these sights. They help you find out what activities are happening in which regions.

Festivals.com -- "Celebrating life"
Whatsonwhen.com -- "Global event guide"

Facelift for gates at Taj Mahal

Indian archaeologists are giving a facelift to two major gates at the Taj Mahal. 150 artisans will work for about 3 months on the renovations.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070109/wl_nm/india_taj_dc_1

Wonders of the World: The Buildings of 2006

ResourceShelf has a link to the Business Week article as well as the slideshow . . . Architectural Wonders 2006.

Culture & Travel Magazine

The second volume of Culture & Travel Magazine, Nov/Dec 2006, is on newsstands now. Big in size and scope, with lots of beautiful photos.

Take a look at these interesting articles on:

Modern Mexican architecture
Belgian artist Francis Alys in Mexio city
Gustave Flauber’s trip with Maxime De Camp down the Nile with photos from the Metropolitan Museum of Art

And other articles cover wine, Mexico, Scottsdale Arizona, Mexican Baroque, Romania, Germany, Miami, Paris suburb architecture, etc.

Archaeology Magazine for January/February 2007

The new Archaeology Magazine for January/February 2007 is out and some interesting articles include:

*Top 10 discoveries of 2006 (can you guess them…): if you guessed Peru’s Temple of the Fox and China’s ‘Guess Worker’, you could be correct!

*Buried Tablets from Bronze Age Syria

*Digital modeling for submerged Neolithic riverscapes

*Hiking with Hannibal (the general, not the fictional serial killer)

*Peru’s Mummy Dogs

*Georgian fort destroyed by the British (back in 1815)