OLD NEWS

GROUNDHOGS ARE STILL HIBERNATING by Mary Holland
<https://tinyurl.com/5awtdbhh>
Woodchucks, also called Groundhogs, are celebrated today but that celebration goes unnoticed by both male and female Woodchucks, for they are still hibernating under the ground, with hearts that are beating just four times a minute and body temperatures hovering around 40°F.
Not until late February or March do male Woodchucks begin to stir and emerge from their burrows to defend their territory and to locate females. After their curiosity is satisfied, they go back to their dens and sleep until females awaken in March or April, at which time mating takes place.
Look for signs of emergence in two or three weeks, when dens occupied by males will have tell-tale dirt around the entrances and often well-traveled trails leading away from them. _NaturallyCurious

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LOVE
<https://tinyurl.com/7u9w4nde> _DavidShrigley

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23. GULLAH SWEETGRASS BASKETS by Rainey Knudson
<https://tinyurl.com/bdhamwzt>
There’s something anxious, almost frantic, in the way old-fashioned crafts have come back into vogue. We’ve a generalized desire for handiwork, to attempt to sink into tasks wholly unmediated by machine or screen.
Which makes the classic sweetgrass baskets made by the Gullah communities of the South Carolina and Georgia barrier islands all the more remarkable. The baskets have endured, seemingly indifferent (are they indifferent?—it seems so, from the outside) to the winds of fashion and technological change. After Emancipation, these extraordinary objects morphed from agricultural tools to tourist art, and have been highly desirable souvenirs from Charleston and Mount Pleasant since the 1930s. But the Gullah communities have been making them for centuries, and they come from a West African tradition of basketry used in rice farming that goes back thousands of years. In short: they long predate any recent craft revival.
To make even a simple, palm-sized basket takes an hour using a sharpened spoon handle or cow rib, compressing the sweetgrass, smelling the fresh hay scent for which it’s named. The large, elaborate baskets can take weeks of intense concentration and work. The best examples are waterproof, they are so tightly woven; their forms, undulations, and patterns limited only by the imagination of the basket weaver. It’s astounding that generations of Gullah/Geechee families, through necessity and rigorous discipline, preserved a local, handmade—even, one might say, mindful—technique that could so easily have been lost. The baskets remind us that there are no easy shortcuts to excellence. _TheImpatientReader

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THE MOUNT WASHINGTON POST
<https://tinyurl.com/2tsauzd2> _LisaAnneAuerbach

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THINKING ABOUT THIS PUNGENT PAINTING TODAY,
for no particular reason:
Jan Miense Molenaer,
"The Five Senses: Smell," 1637,
from the Mauritshuis collection
<https://tinyurl.com/5n83z63m>
Relatedly: "Smell,"
one in a series of paintings
depicting the five senses
by 17th-century Flemish artist
Michaelina Wautier
<https://tinyurl.com/2bjr2hvm> _MichaelLobel

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THE BIG BEAUTIFUL BRANDING OF THE ART WORLD’S STRIKE by Jesus Christ
<https://tinyurl.com/y6dwwwfb>
Good job, Art World! Friday, January 30, 2026, will go down in history as the moment when the Trump administration changed! No more ICE! No more Border Patrol! No more raids! (Unless it’s the ones the galleries contemplated calling on the street vendors.) No more public executions! No more Stephen Miller! Why? Because the galleries closed for one day (and made sure to tell everyone they were also going to be open on Saturday) for what seemed to be an Instagram-organized general strike. To the barricades! Oh, wait, they just gave themselves the day off, whereas other workers can’t, and most people outside a certain online circle never heard of a strike at all. Useful and not at all insular! But at least you can feel good about yourself, and gave your gallery assistant some design work.
On Thursday, the closure notices on started as a trickle, and then a lemming-like avalanche of heavily-branded Instagram posts announcing each gallery’s shuttering pummeled everyone’s feed. I had never seen such FOMO, and I’m Jesus. What was remarkable to me, looking down from Paradise, was that the posts were designed to perfectly reflect the gallery’s brand identity, usually with their logo in case you forgot. Always be branding! A quickly hashed-out informative post would not do. As the black square of protests past was way too restrictive of the need to express their distinctive solidarity, January 30 became the Art World’s time to shine. This is performative activism, after all! Most were vague, some were aggressively vague, but all were tastefully done.
So I literally did the Lord’s work and created a taxonomy of design trends that emerged in the gallery’s closure posts on . Let’s take a look at some of the best, shall we?
MOST LUXURIOUSLY SPACED
<https://tinyurl.com/3nesbzbb>
<https://tinyurl.com/3jrywpue>
<https://tinyurl.com/4zby8r7v>
<https://tinyurl.com/yurd9w42>
<https://tinyurl.com/ar5w5ryx>
MOST AGGRESSIVE
<https://tinyurl.com/ydfevude>
<https://tinyurl.com/mpfvbzs4>
MOST LIKE A HARVARD RECOMMENDATION LETTER
<https://tinyurl.com/4ye6ytwm>
MOST UNSOPHISTICATED BECAUSE THEY CENTERED THEIR TEXT LIKE PEASANTS
<https://tinyurl.com/23cnessk>
<https://tinyurl.com/2tdch3u3>
MOST TRYING TO STAND OUT WITH A CURVEBALL RIGHT-ALIGNED LOGO
<https://tinyurl.com/924spwas>
<https://tinyurl.com/32jan8bc>
MOST TRYING TO STAND OUT BY ALIGNING TEXT EVERY WAY POSSIBLE
<https://tinyurl.com/3he87t97>
MOST BLUE
<https://tinyurl.com/3hh9nj9r>
MOST GREEN
<https://tinyurl.com/mryze4s7>
MOST LOOKING LIKE A BANK
<https://tinyurl.com/22bbpw9v>
MOST “DON’T FORGET ABOUT US NON-PROFITS!”
<https://tinyurl.com/556ja2ax>
MOST CONFIDENT THAT THEIR FONT IS ENOUGH OF A LOGO
<https://tinyurl.com/42njvnry>
MOST RESPECTED BECAUSE WHY NOT TAKE YOUR SHOT
<https://tinyurl.com/47f5v5mu>
Jesus of Nazareth (c. 6–4 BCE – c. 30–33 CE) was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader, the central figure of Christianity, believed by Christians to be God’s Son and the Messiah, born in Bethlehem to Mary and Joseph, raised in Nazareth, who taught about God’s kingdom, performed miracles, and was crucified in Jerusalem by Romans, then resurrected, changing world history. They are currently a contributor to Filthy Dreams. _filthydreams

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STRUCTURAL INSTABILITY KEVIL, KY
<https://tinyurl.com/26zf68j3> _RuralIndexingProject

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TRIBECA GALLERIES DISCUSS REPORTING STREET VENDORS
<https://tinyurl.com/2bbesbwb>
Art galleries and cultural organizations across the country are shuttering in solidarity with immigrants amid violent crackdowns. Many public gestures of support are unfolding in New York City, but two weeks ago, a group of Tribeca galleries met to discuss asking the city to address an influx of street vendors in the area,
On January 15, months after federal agents descended on Canal Street in a targeted vendor raid, representatives for a group of galleries near Lower Manhattan’s Canal Street met at Alexander Gray Associates to discuss “safety” and “accessibility” issues associated with local street vendors on Broadway,
An email sent to local galleries by a PPOW staff member tasked with taking notes for the meeting encouraged galleries to file complaints with 311 to “increase the likelihood of a response” from the city. Gallery representatives who attended, according to the email, discussed drafting a letter “asking for support” related to street vending, which would later be sent to city officials.
“A few of us got together yesterday to initiate a conversation regarding the issues of safety and accessibility associated with the increased number of vendors on Broadway (and the surrounding area) and agreed that the best course of action is to address the city as a unified group,” the email said.
<https://tinyurl.com/3ntyxtau>
In the initial email circulated between the Tribeca galleries, they agreed to meet again
“Over the past year, neighbors along lower Broadway have been discussing mobility challenges on the corridor,” Gray said in an email to Hyperallergic. “Increasingly, sidewalk congestion has made it difficult for individuals in wheelchairs, elderly residents, families with strollers, and others to navigate the area.”
Gray said the gallery “oppose[s] ICE enforcement practices and any actions that harm immigrant communities.” Gray did not respond to a question about whether he had filed 311 complaints against the vendors.
According to a publicly available spreadsheet, 12 Tribeca galleries expressed interest in “joining the next meeting or signing the letter once it is ready.” Among those listed were Nino Mier Gallery, anonymous gallery, Marian Goodman, Andrew Edlin Gallery, Andrew Kreps Gallery, Asya Geisberg Gallery, DIMIN, Matthew Brown, Michael Lisi Contemporary Art, and Tara Downs.
NYPD still issues criminal tickets to vendors, placing them in danger of arrest — and possible ICE targeting — if they do not show up to their court date for any reason. _Hyperallergic

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ANDREW WYETH, GROUNDHOG DAY, 1959
<https://tinyurl.com/5dv4ntbx> _JesseLocker

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COLLECTORS STEVE TISCH AND JEAN PIGOZZI NAMED IN LATEST EPSTEIN FILES
<https://tinyurl.com/4n7w8ksv>
The latest batch of documents released by the Department of Justice as part of the Epstein Files Transparency Act includes references to two leading art collectors, Steve Tisch and Jean Pigozzi. The DOJ’s library of documents have been added to over the past several days, with the latest update occurring on Saturday, January 31.
The documents, primarily in the form of emails sent around 2013, appear to show convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein connecting Tisch, a film producer and co-owner of the New York Giants, with multiple women. The news was first reported on by the Athletic.
In one email chain, from April 2013, which has the subject line “Ukrainian Girl,” Tisch asks Epstein if he knows any information about his “assistant’s friend,” who he recently had lunch with. Epstein replied that he “will get all the info,” with Tisch later saying “pro or civilian?” Epstein replies at one point, “civilian, but Russian, and rarely tells the full truth, but fun.”
In a different set of emails, from May 1, 2013, Tisch and Epstein correspond about meeting up that evening. At one point, Tisch writes, “Can I expect ‘trouble’?” Epstein replies, “I can invite the russian [redacted] to meet if you like?” Tisch writes back, “Is she fun?” Later in the chain, Epstein writes, “she is free after 1030 she said, you can meet her, you can come over first.”
In an email chain from May 15–16, 2013, Tisch asks a woman whose name has been redacted if she would be interested in meeting in Boston. Tisch doesn’t receive a reply and forwards the correspondence to Epstein, who replies, “she is traveling. not sure when she returns to florida. she is a micro biology major and is still in university, so i doubt that she could travel during the week, but we’ll see. you should also make it clear that you will orgaznie her ticket.” Tisch later writes back, “Never heard back from her / Oh well…”
In a 2017 email chain, Tisch writes to Epstein, asking how he is and that he hopes Epstein is “having a great Summer.” Epstein replied, “Come visit.” Other documents point to Tisch inviting Epstein to Giants games as well as other meetings over meals.
In a statement sent to the Athletic about his affiliations with Epstein, Tisch said, “We had a brief association where we exchanged emails about adult women, and in addition, we discussed movies, philanthropy, and investments. I did not take him up on any of his invitations and never went to his island. As we all know now, he was a terrible person and someone I deeply regret associating with.”
Tisch is also a major collector of contemporary art, having appeared on Top 200 Collectors list from 2016 to 2024. A 2016 New York Times article revealed that he had created a 4,5000-square-foot private museum to host his collection in the backyard of his Los Angeles home. Michael Govan, the director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, where Tisch is a trustee, curated the initial hang. In 2011, he also donated funds to help LACMA acquire Christian Marclay’s 24-hour video work The Clock (2010).
Pigozzi’s connections to Epstein are currently circulating online via a 2009 email between Epstein and publicist Peggy Siegal, in which Siegal writes, “Just left Ghislaine’s townhouse…after party for film. Bill Clinton and Jeff Bezos were there…Jean Pigozzi, director Mira Nair…etc.”
The correspondence, also made in 2013, between Epstein and Pigozzi ranges from emails in which Pigozzi asks if Epstein is planning to visit the south of France that summer to emails where the discuss the appearance of different women. In the latter email chain, Pigozzi wrote, “I like the red head. Seem fun and smart.” Epstein replied, “german jew.” Pigozzi then replied, “I like her / No tits. Small problem / Did Leon like her ?” (Pigozzi appears to be referring to fellow art collector Leon Black, whose connections to Epstein have been well documented.)
In another email chain, Pigozzi responds to an email from Epstein in which he sent an image (the image is not reproduced in the file): “Looks amazing / Can’t see any girls ???”
The documents also include a 2010 email chain between Pigozzi and “Gmax,” most likely Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s longtime associate who was convicted of child sex trafficking in 2021. “Gmax” asks Pigozzi if he is planning to sell his properties in Panama and France, adding “If so price. Have potential interested party”; Pigozzi asks for a phone call before writing that the France property is 22.5 acres and that it “MUST BE OVER EURO 300M,” while for the Panama property, his asking price would be “OVER $ 150 M JUST THE ISLAND 270 ACRES.”
In a phone call, Pigozzi told that he did not remember any correspondence between him and Epstein about a “red head.” Regarding the prices for his Panama and France properties, he said he was not interested in selling it at the time, adding “I gave him some ridiculous price.”
Of his connections with Epstein, Pigozzi said, “I never had anything to do with him and girls. Zero. Nothing. I also regret that I met him and Ghislaine.”
Pigozzi told that he found his work in the art world a more interesting topic of conversation than “these stupid emails. I don’t find it so fascinating.” Pigozzi is a major collector of African art, with a focus on photography from the continent. He first started collecting in 1989 after seeing the Centre Pompidou’s influential “Magiciens de la Terre” exhibition that year.
In the decades since, he has amassed thousands of works from more than 160 artists from 22 sub-Saharan African countries, according to the collection’s website. The collection is currently based in Geneva but does not have a permanent exhibition space, though he told he is currently at work building a space in Cannes.
In 2019, Pigozzi donated 45 works of contemporary African art to the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The gift included pieces by Seydou Keïta, Romuald Hazoumè, Bodys Isek Kingelez, Moké, Chéri Samba, Ambroise Ngaimoko/Studio 3Z, and Frédéric Bruly Bouabré. At the time, MoMA called the donation “transformative” as it would make the museum “a unique institutional leader in this aspect of contemporary African art.”
Pigozzi’s holdings include dozens of photographs by Keïta, many of which are currently on view in a survey of the late photographer’s work at the Brooklyn Museum. The Jean Pigozzi African Art Collection is specifically thanked in the exhibition’s credits. _Maximilíano Durón _ARTnews

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RUSSIAN POET-FUTURIST VLADIMIR GOLZSCHMIDT HYPNOTIZING A CHICKEN. 1923
<https://tinyurl.com/yyucf7tc> _RabihAlameddine

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JEFF KOONS ATTENDED DINNER PARTY AT JEFFREY EPSTEIN’S HOUSE
<https://tinyurl.com/3hcn9jbp>
Artist Jeff Koons attended a dinner party organized by Jeffrey Epstein in 2013, years after the financier was first convicted of soliciting sex from a minor, according to emails released by the Department of Justice (DOJ) last week.
In 2013, Epstein specifically requested that Koons attend a September 4 dinner party at his Upper East Side residence, an invitation Koons and his wife accepted via email. According to correspondences released by the DOJ last week, the dinner's guest list also included director Woody Allen and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Neil Gershenfeld. In an August 30 email, Epstein told his former personal assistant Lesley Groff that he had asked Gershenfeld, who collaborated with Koons on the sculpture "Liberty Bell" (2006–14), to invite the contemporary artist.
In a statement sent through his gallery, Gagosian, Koons confirmed that he attended the party.
“Upon the invitation of a professor at MIT, Neil Gershenfeld, my wife Justine and I attended a dinner at Jeffrey Epstein’s house," Koons said. "Beyond attending the dinner, I did not have a relationship with Epstein."
At the time of the dinner party, Epstein had already served 18 months in jail after pleading guilty in 2008 to charges including soliciting prostitution from a minor in Florida. Epstein made a plea deal with United States prosecutors that gave him immunity from federal charges, which became public information in 2009. By 2012, the financier had reportedly turned to philanthropy to counter "bad press" about his sexual crimes.
<https://tinyurl.com/ypvayjxp>
Last week's released documents include other emails in which Epstein and affiliates make references to the dinner attended by Koons. Relaying information from Epstein to an individual whose name is redacted, Groff wrote in one message that a "girl," whose name is blacked out in the documents, was also expected at the party.
"Jeffrey wants to make sure you know there is a dinner being planned for Sept. 4th," Groff wrote in the email, sent on August 30, 2013. "Woody Allen is coming, this girl [redacted]...we are flying in Neil Gershenfeld from Boston..and as you see below, JE asked Neil to invite Jeff Koons... I do not know who else is going yet..."
In another email chain about the dinner party, Epstein and Groff discussed a woman whose name is also redacted.
“OK to email her and ask her to come for an interview?” Groff asked Epstein.
Epstein replied: “No interview. She is coming for dinner with Woody and Leon. I also asked Neil to invite Jeff Koons.” (Epstein is likely referring to billionaire financier and Museum of Modern Art trustee Leon Black, who made payments of over $150 million to Epstein. Black has denied any wrongdoing related to his association with Epstein.)
<https://tinyurl.com/3z3dcp67>
On September 3, a day before the dinner, an individual apparently working for Epstein told a recipient whose name is redacted to learn more about Koons ahead of the party.
"Jeffrey wanted me to let you know Jeff Koons will be coming to the dinner on WEd. night along with his wife, Justine. Jeffrey thought you could ‘Google’ him before coming," the apparent Epstein affiliate wrote.
The redacted recipient replied that they had just arrived in New York, apparently from a foreign country.
“Thank you so much for your letters, dear [redacted]! I will certainly Google to get to know more about Mr.Koons!” the individual responded. “I've just arrived to NY this afternoon and I still don't have a new phone card to use in states. I have only my [redacted] number. But anyway, tomorrow I will get in downtown to present myself at school office and I will try to get my new phone number so that I could let you know it.”
<https://tinyurl.com/4fnsfemr>
Though the fact that Epstein tried to visit Koons’s studio was included in an investigation from the Wall Street Journal in 2023, the revelation that the artist attended a dinner at the convicted sex offender’s home years after his conviction had not been previously reported.
The new information comes from the most recent tranche of so-called “Epstein files,” some 3 million additional documents published on Friday, January 30, over a month after the missed deadline set by Congress. The batch of files initially exposed the identities of dozens of Epstein’s victims, including minors, prompting outcry from survivors and advocates. _Isa Farfan_Hyperallergic

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GROUNDHOG DAY 2026 by William Poundstone
<http://tiny.cc/fggy001>
Los Angeles is the city of the future.
—David Geffen, Los Angeles Times, Oct. 4, 2018
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We’re a much younger metropolis than New York. Our institutions are still very young and developing.
—Michael Govan in Vogue, Sep. 2, 2025
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Anyone who doesn’t think of Los Angeles as an arts capital of the world at this point just isn’t paying attention.
—Time Out Los Angeles, Jan. 16, 2026
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Although Eli Broad’s original vision of Grand Street becoming a cultural hub and economic driver for Downtown LA has not fully happened (yet!), it is closer to becoming one that it was a decade ago.
—Forbes magazine, Sep. 21, 2025
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Los Angeles is now the contemporary art capital of the world.
—Eli Broad in The New York Times, Oct. 12, 2017
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It is hard to believe that Los Angeles didn’t really have a contemporary art museum before LACMA opened in 1965. Over the years the William Pereira designed campus meant to invoke an “art acropolis” with gleaming modernist buildings… created no excitement and no cohesion.
—Forbes magazine, July 10, 2025
<http://tiny.cc/gggy001>
Los Angeles isn’t an egghead place, and no one expects the local civic museum to do Nobel-caliber scholarship.… Museums in Southern California compete with the best weather in the world and hundreds of miles of sandy beaches…
—Brian T. Allen, National Review, July 29, 2021
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This decade has seen Los Angeles cement its place as, no question, the cultural equal of New York.
—Jason Farago, The New York Times, Sep. 12, 2018
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Looking back at his tenure here, [LACMA Director Earl. A.] Powell sees himself as having been in Los Angeles during a time the city came of age culturally.
—William Wilson in Los Angeles Times, Aug. 5, 1992
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Presumably the Los Angeles Museum dreams of itself as a West Coast counterpart of New York's Metropolitan.
—The New York Times, Nov. 6, 1966
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Given the location of [LACMA], the population it serves and the resources of this population, which has already been proved, plus the excellent start in the nature of the collections, the opportunity is unique to create the kind of museum which the Metropolitan is for New York or the Philadelphia Museum is for Pennsylvania.
—LACMA press release, June 19, 1965
<http://tiny.cc/kggy001> _LosAngelesCountyMuseumOnFire