The Digest. 12.21.07.

At the Pulse Art Fair. Photo by celso_nyc.

• Paintings by Picasso and Candido Portinari stolen from the São Paulo Museum of Art. (Via ArtForum.)
• From the Department of It’s-off-It’s-on: Exhibition of Russian-held art will make it to England after all.
• Detroit is an open canvas.
• Hong Kong: The Jan Brady of contemporary Asian art.
• Art Criticism of the Week: “Like P.T. Barnum, Salvador Dalí, Muhammad Ali and Cirque du Soleil, Matthew Barney is not known for understatement.”
• Frank Gehry: Not-so-hot, according to Fortune.
• The Day in Planned Makeovers: The Public Library and Governor’s Island in New York, and the Gardner Museum in Boston.
• Where authoritarianism and architecture intersect: Fidel Castro says he wants to live as long as Oscar Niemeyer.
• Afghan treasures to go on tour in the U.S., starting at D.C.’s National Gallery in May.
• Pakistani artist Gulgee found murdered in his Karachi home. (Via ArtForum.)
• Fake is the new real: All about the fakers in Dafen, China, in one and two parts (the latter one via Off Center).
• Newsflash: Beauty in art is dead. Also dead: high culture. Even deader: Photography.
• A public service message: Don’t dump your paint. (Via Ekosystem)
• On the Internets: Lowbrow pioneer Robert Williams.
• And speaking of lowbrow: Is Princess Di art? Who the hell knows. But she sure sells tickets.
• New book: Dave Ellis and Doze Green’s Shaft.
• Just in time for Xmas: Skullphone merch.
• Because Manhattan really could use more retail: Is the closing of the Oliver Kamm gallery an indicator of a coming art bust?
• Visual Nuggets: The work of Ala Ebtekar.
• I ♥ The Holidays: “With a Rebel Noel.”
• Separated at Birth: Architect Charles Renfro and comedian Charles Nelson Reilly.
• A visual tour of the Cloisters.
• “It doesn’t say Cox, unless I say it tastes like Cox.”
• Urinal of the Day.
• In Sydney: Emily Kame Kngwarreye at the Mary Place Gallery.
• In S.F.: All Star Hustlaz at White Walls Gallery.
• In Queens: New York States of Mind at the Queens Museum of Art.
• In Chile: Art takes the bus.
• Your moment of Christmas cheer: ‘80s Dallas edition.