The Guggenheim museum will remain in Bilbao for the foreseeable future. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation announced yesterday that it was renewing the agreement is has with the Basque museum until 2034. The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao has welcomed almost 17 million visitors and staged over 140 exhibitions since it opened in 1997; and has had much success over the 17 years that is has engaged with the public. In fact the museum success quickly triggered the redevelopment of the formerly decrepit port area of Bilbao and bolstered tourism in the entire Basque Country.

The regeneration of the area and the economic evolution of the country was coined the “Guggenheim effect" soon after to describe this museum-led process.

Leonardo da Vinci always impressed on his students the importance of depicting nature accurately. He wrote: “Painter, you should know that you cannot be good if you are not a master universal enough to imitate with your art every kind of natural form.” Indeed, his own paintings and drawings of the natural world are as scientifically accurate as they are beautiful.

Five centuries on, scientists and art historians are trying to work out to what extent Leonardo had a hand in both versions of "Virgin of the Rocks" – the one in the Louvre, in Paris, and the replica in the National Gallery in London.

What sets so-called atemporal painting apart from painting that might be less kindly characterized as derivative or regurgitative? In her catalog essay for “The Forever Now,” a 17-artist exhibition which opens at the Museum of Modern Art on December 14, curator Laura Hoptman traces the definition of atemporality to sci-fi novelist William Gibson, for whom the term captures “a new and strange state of the world in which, courtesy of the Internet, all eras seem to exist at once.” While some might lump such a phenomena under the larger banner of postmodernism, Hoptman does not. “Unlike past periods of revivalism, such as the appropriationist eighties, this super-charged art historicism is neither critical nor ironic; it’s not even nostalgic. It is closest to a connoisseurship of boundless information, a picking and choosing of elements of the past to resolve a problem or a task at hand.”

Only a quarter of Britons believe that the Elgin Marbles, the ancient sculptures that once decorated the Parthenon temple in Athens, should remain in London's British Museum, according to a poll published Tuesday.

Half of the respondents to the YouGov survey published in the "Times" said the artifacts, also known as the Parthenon Marbles, should be returned to Greece, with a quarter undecided.

But a slim majority backed the museum's controversial decision to loan the works, which were taken from the Parthenon by British diplomat Lord Elgin in 1803, to Russia's State Hermitage Museum.

Fondazione Prada, an Italian institution dedicated to contemporary art and culture, will unveil its expanded headquarters in Milan in May 2015. Established by the fashion power couple Miuccia Prada and Patrizio Bertelli in 1993, Fondazione Prada focuses on art, cinema, design, architecture, and philosophy. Instead of exhibiting studio work, the foundation helps artists produce site-specific projects that they have always dreamed of constructing. Fondazione Prada has organized exhibitions with a swath of celebrated artists, including Anish Kapoor, Dan Flavin, Louise Bourgeois, John Baldessari, and Walter de Maria.

Fondazione Prada has selected OMA, the firm co-founded by the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, to helm the expansion project, which will turn a former industrial complex from the early twentieth-century into Milan’s largest contemporary art gallery.

Art dealer Helly Nahmad has gotten out of jail, well, if not free, at least unexpectedly early.

Mr. Nahmad, 36, has been released from federal prison five months into the one-year-and-one-day sentence he received for operating an illegal gambling business from his Trump Tower home.

The art dealer, scion of the billionaire Nahmad family of Monaco, has been transferred to a halfway house in the Bronx after being incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Facility in Otisville, N.Y., since June, his lawyer confirmed today.

In 1964, Cincinnati’s Swedenborgian Church of the New Jerusalem was razed for the construction of a highway. The spiritual home to followers of the 18th-century Swedish scientist and theologian Emanuel Swedenborg, the church was built in 1902, at which time it received the gift of seven stained-glass windows produced by Tiffany Studios, the pre-eminent American producer of stained and art glass, under the direction of the firm’s founder and head, Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933). Unlike many Tiffany windows that perished when their buildings faced the wrecking ball, these were preserved. For decades they sat in crates, hidden away in basements and garages of parishioners, and eventually a barn in Pennsylvania. Only when the barn began to leak in 2001 did a newly appointed minister open the crates. To her astonishment, that which was lost was found again—and even covered with decades of grime, the unique Tiffany beauty of all seven windows, each emblazoned with a life-size stained-glass angel, made a powerful impression.

On Sunday, December 7, a fire swept through the Galerie Canesso, on the rue Laffitte in central Paris, destroying part of its library, documents, and offices. The gallery specializes in Italian Old Master paintings from the Renaissance to the Baroque. The fire was caused by an electrical fault, said Véronique Damian, an art historian who works with the gallery’s founder Maurizio Canesso.

“This was a great loss for us but fortunately no paintings were damaged,” Damian said in a telephone interview.

The documentary maker and writer Hannah Rothschild is to become the first woman chair of the National Gallery, it was announced on Monday. She will head the board of trustees when the businessman Mark Getty – grandson of the oil tycoon J Paul Getty and son of the philanthropist Paul Getty – steps down at the end of his term on August 10, 2015.

Rothschild, a trustee since 2009, said: “From a very young age, the National Gallery has been a source of inspiration and solace.

A man who punched a hole through an £8million Claude Monet painting has been jailed for six years and banned from all galleries - despite claiming he collapsed onto it due to a heart condition.

Andrew Shannon strolled calmly into the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin before attacking the 1874 work "Argenteuil Basin with a Single Sail Boat," which was left needing two years of repairs.

The 49-year-old, who later underwent a quadruple heart bypass, denied deliberately tearing the painting and told police he had felt dizzy and lost his balance.

Steven Holl Architects has been selected to design a new extension to one of India’s oldest museums, the Mumbai City Museum, also known as the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum. Selected over OMA, Studio Mumbai Architecture, Zaha Hadid and four others, Holl is now the first architect ever to be chosen through an international competition to design a public building in Mumbai.

“The winning design was distinctive for its sculptural and calligraphic qualities,” stated the official press release. “It proposes a simple volume, which is enlivened by deep subtracting cuts, creating dramatic effects of light and shade. Its central feature is a reflecting pool in a new garden courtyard between the old and new buildings. The scheme will establish a cultural campus around the Museum in this growing district within Mumbai.”

Yesterday it was reported that a bronze sculpture by Medardo Rosso had been stolen from Rome's Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna. In a bizarre turn of events, the sculpture has subsequently been found, in the museum, inside a storage locker for public use near the entrance.

The news was first reported by "Corriere della Sera," which informed that the artwork—a rare masterpiece by Rosso, entitled "Bambino Malato" (1893-95)—was located by the police yesterday afternoon.

Investigators claim that the lockers had been carefully inspected after the theft took place last Friday afternoon. So they are working with the hypothesis that the thief had a change of heart and returned the sculpture at a later time.

Art Basel’s 13th edition in Miami Beach closed Sunday, December 7, 2014, amidst strong praise from gallerists, private collectors, museum groups and the media. Highlights of the show included the introduction of the new Survey sector, which brought 13 art-historical projects to the fair, including many rare works never before exhibited in an art fair context; and Art Basel's staging with Performa of Ryan McNamara's "MEƎM 4 Miami: A Story Ballet About the Internet" at the Miami Grand Theater. Solid sales were reported across all levels of the market and throughout the run of the show. Featuring 267 leading international galleries from 31 countries, the show – whose Lead Partner is UBS – attracted an attendance of 73,000 over five days. Attendees included representatives of over 160 museum and institution groups from across the world – and a surging number of new private collectors from the Americas, Europe and Asia.

Following a 100 percent reapplication rate for the Galleries sector and with new galleries coming from across the world, the list of exhibitors was the strongest to date in Miami Beach, firmly solidifying the show's position as the leading international art fair of the Americas.

Boston College has announced that it will relocate its McMullen Museum of Art to an expanded facility on its Brighton campus thanks to a sizeable gift from the McMullen Family Foundation. The museum, which is named in honor of the parents of John J. McMullen -- a Boston College benefactor, trustee, and collector -- has occupied the same mixed-use building on the University’s Chestnut Hill campus since its founding in 1993.

The new venue, a Roman Renaissance Revival mansion from 1927, was designed by local architects Maginnis and Walsh. The mansion housed Boston’s Cardinal Archbishop for decades and was acquired by the college ten years ago as part of a large purchase of property from the city’s Archdiocese. Once the 7,000-square-foot addition is completed, the building will boast approximately 26,000 square feet -- nearly double the institution’s current exhibition space. The Boston-based architecture firm DiMella Shaffer Associates is helming the expansion project. 

An architect who has offered to buy and restore a controversial Orange County, N.Y. government building, designed by Paul Rudolph but panned by many as an eyesore, presented detailed plans Friday for his proposal to turn it into an arts center.

The county has been debating whether to demolish the building, which had been used as its government center, or perhaps renovate it. The architect, Gene Kaufman, a partner at Gwathmey Siegel Kaufman Architects in New York City, had previously announced that he hoped to restore the building. The plans presented Friday to Orange County leaders gave his detailed vision of what he hopes to do.

The Clark Art Institute received the 2014 Apollo Award for Museum Opening of the Year during presentation ceremonies held in London on December 3.

The award, presented by Apollo, the noted international arts magazine, recognizes major achievements in the art and museum worlds.

The Clark received the award in recognition of its distinctive success in combining new construction, a subtle renovation of its existing facilities, and a significant rethinking of its landscape to create a unified new campus. Other museums nominated for the 2014 Museum Opening of the Year award included the Aga Khan Museum, Toronto; the Imperial War Museum, London; the Musée du Louvre’s Eighteenth-Century Decorative Arts Galleries, Paris; and the Mauritshuis, The Hague.

The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art will display rarely-exhibited tapestries from the eighteenth century in its soaring Morgan Great Hall during the final phase of the museum’s five-year, $33 million renovation. The large, intricate tapestries-which depict the saga of Greek hero Jason-will be on view through April 2015, at which point the Great Hall will be transformed in preparation for the Sept. 19 grand reopening of the Morgan Memorial Building.

The Jason Tapestries are enormous in size-ranging in height up to 14 feet, and in width up to 24 feet-presenting a challenge for curators in exhibiting them on a regular basis.

Acquired by the State through public subscription in 1920, the painting "The Painter's Studio" (1854-1855) by Gustave Courbet is a universal masterpiece that is part of France's cultural heritage. After surviving more than a century of turbulent history, this 22 meter canvas is now in need of restoration.

As this treasure belongs to everyone in France, the Musée d'Orsay is once again calling on the generosity of the public to help finance its restoration and to enable as many people as possible to participate in this project, beyond the traditional patrons.

As an exception, the work is being restored at the exhibition site and visitors are able to follow the progress of the experts' work on a day-to day-basis, over several months.

Christmas came early for the Woodruff Arts Center, which announced Friday morning that it has received a $38 million grant from the Woodruff Foundation.

The largest gift in the Midtown art center’s 46-year history includes $25 million in endowment matching funds — including support for full-time musician positions with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra — and $13 million for capital improvements. Those capital funds, which do not require a match, will support a complete renovation of Alliance Theatre performance, education and public spaces.

The renovation will be so major for the Alliance spaces in the Memorial Arts Building, which have not significantly changed since the building opened in 1968, that the theater will have to secure a temporary home for at least one full season.