Writer Louis Menand is in this week’s issue of The New Yorker, reviewing the recent restoration of Mark Rothko’s Harvard Murals using a specially designed lighting system, and the small crowd that gathers each day to watch as the murals’ lights are turned off.  “You can still see the bones of the murals, the formal architecture—Rothko’s floating blocks, made to resemble portals in these pieces—but the glow is gone,” he writes.  “As one observer put it, when the lights go off, comedy turns into tragedy.” (more…)

A collection of thousands of works by abstract painter Arthur Pinajian, discovered in a Long Island cottage, have been appraised at over $30 million dollars.  The works, which were uncovered in 2007 when the house was purchased by new owners.  Some have recently sold for $500,000, and 50 are currently on view at Manhattan’s Fuller Building.

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