CAA News Today

Each week CAA News publishes summaries of eight articles, published around the web, that CAA members may find interesting and useful in their professional and creative lives.

Wikimedia Art Database Breaks Copyright Law

Sweden’s highest court has found Wikimedia Sweden guilty of violating copyright laws by providing free access to its database of photographs of artworks without the artists’ consent. Wikimedia, part of the nonprofit foundation that oversees Wikipedia, among other online resources, has a database of royalty-free photographs that can be used by the public for educational purposes or the tourism industry. (Read more from Art Daily.)

How Creative Capital Replaced the NEA and Taught Artists to Be Ambitious

Creative Capital is such a big deal in the art world that it even affects the lives of artists who don’t receive its awards. This grant-making organization, based in New York but serving artists nationally, was created in 1999 to counter the economic loss to artists when the NEA killed the majority of its individual artist grants. (Read more from the Stranger.)

How Do I Handle a Backlash against My Art Review?

I wrote a negative review about a show on my blog and received a considerable backlash to it. I eventually took the post down and feel like my entire art scene has blacklisted me. How do I write negative criticism in a small, intimate art community without upsetting everyone? (Read more from Burnaway.)

When Your Art Bleeds You Dry

Art should be ennobling or give us pleasure or, in Picasso’s words, wash “the dust of daily life off our souls.” But sometimes art makes people nervous and worried. Not necessarily because of the content but because it needs to be protected, conserved, and insured—and all those things cost money. (Read more from the New York Observer.)

Art in the New Plutocracy

In 2010, a cadre of muckraking activists started a project called Artigarchy. Its aim was to investigate the relationship between rising inequality and rising art prices, not merely to identify key individuals but to expose institutional relationships, for example, between banks and museums. How do the institutions of the art world shape and actually harm society? (Read more from the Chronicle Review.)

Will the Monograph Experience a Transition to E-Only?

The scholarly literature incorporates a number of different material types. Reference publishing and collections have perhaps been transformed more than any other content type. Why should a database be issued in print format at all? (Read more from the Scholarly Kitchen.)

Does It Count for Tenure?

I am starting a new tenure-track job in the fall. I have a journal article from this past year and another one coming out this spring. Will they count toward my tenure case at the new job? (Read more from Vitae.)

An App That Pushes Aside the Art-World Curtain

The process of buying and selling art has a reputation for opacity, but a new mobile app that promises to instantly provide price data could help open the market. The free app, called Magnus, uses digital-recognition technology similar to that of Shazam, which “hears” music to provide song titles, and Vivino, which reads wine labels and reveals ratings and restaurant markups. (Read more from the New York Times.)