— Illinois Budget Cuts Threaten Chicago Museum: The Illinois State Museum Chicago Gallery may close due to cuts proposed in Governor Bruce Rauner’s 2015 budget. The institution’s $6.29 million operating budget has apparently been chopped. Ed Paschke, Jim Nutt, Gladys Nilsson, Karl Wirsum, and Miyoko Ito are among those represented in the museum’s permanent collection of 150 works, which will head to storage should the center be shuttered. [Chicago Magazine]
— Does $4.5 Million Simco Lawsuit Exaggerate Dealer Impact? Art-world observer Greg Allen has taken a closer look at the suit brought by dealers Stefan Simchowitz and Ellis King against Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama. Allen’s post gives close scrutiny to Simchowitz’s claims regarding his impact on Mahama’s career. Of particular note in the complaint filed by Simchowitz and King is the characterization of Mahama — who was selected for Okwui Enwezor’s Venice Biennale, among other honors — as an artist with “little, if any, recognition in the Western art world” before he was discovered by the pair. [Greg.org]
— Takashi Murakami’s Private Collection Will Go on View in January: Japanese art-world icon Takashi Murakami will show his private collection of artworks at the Yokohama Museum of Art for the first time ever in January — an exhibition that will include plenty of quotidian ephemera like beer mugs, fantasy figurines, and antiques. Much of the collection “looks like garbage,” the artist told The Art Newspaper, emphasizing its eclecticism and wide span. Yet the trove of more than 1,000 objects also includes masterpieces by the likes of Anselm Kiefer, whose 2010 “Merkaba (chariot)” will be among the pieces on view (and which the artist recounts he purchased on an installment payment plan from his own dealer, Larry Gagosian). [TAN]
— Segerstrom Center Launches $68 Million Fundraising Effort: Los Angeles County arts organization Segerstrom Center has announced a major, $68 million effort to raise funds for a planned renovation and to cover the costs generated from past fundraising efforts that fell short of goals — though $42 million has already been raised. Architect Michael Maltzan has been hired to create a “town square” atmosphere, wherein outdoor spaces will host free public events. [LAT]
— Frank Gehry Reveals Sunset Strip Renderings: Following up on the March announcement that Los Angeles real estate developer Townscape had hired Pritzker-winner Frank Gehry to design its massive multi-use complex at the eastern gate of the famed Sunset Strip, Gehry’s firm released renderings that show a 333,600-square-foot complex in his signature geometric style. The 2.6-acre site, currently home to a strip mall and a midcentury bank building, will be redesigned to house five distinct structures that contain 249 residential units. [Architectural Record, Artforum]
— Philanthropist Marion “Kippy” Boulton Stroud Passes Away: Philadelphia-bred arts patron Marion Boulton Stroud committed suicide on Thursday, which comes as tragic news for those who knew the 76-year-old philanthropist and worked with her. Stroud is most famous as the founder of Philly’s Fabric Workshop, which has hosted and commissioned pieces from renowned artists like Louise Bourgeois, Marina Abramovic, and Claes Oldenburg. [Artnet]
— Aristophil, the beleaguered French investment fund that amassed the world’s largest private collection of manuscripts, is liquidating its assets after a court judgment. [TAN]
— The Metropolitan Museum of Art will stay open until midnight for the last weekend of its record-breaking “China: Through the Looking Glass” exhibition. [ARTnews]
— A new analysis of Sandro Botticelli’s “Portrait of a Lady known as Smeralda Bandinelli,” c.1470-5, by experts at the Victoria and Albert Museum has disproven a “longstanding myth” regarding the work’s modification by a later owner, the Pre-Raphaelite painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti. [Artdaily]
