The Digest. 05.12.08.

Switchblade, by Peter Gronquist. (Courtesy of Peter Gronquist.)

• What she said. Though, between you and me, I’m thinking of renaming the award the Lars Ulrich Intellectual Property Hysteria Prize.
• In related news: gratuitous shots of Gallery 303-related stuff on Look, See and Heart as Arena. Plus: understanding Fair Use, courtesy of AFC.
• The heart-warming tale of two stoners and the douchebags that try to keep them down.
• Today’s is-the-art-market-gonna-crash? story is brought to you by the Independent.
• And in a swing of the pendulum, the Guardian reports that the street art market is hot, hot, hot. (Via AJ.)
• Despite so-so sales, the Denver Post thinks that Art Chicago is much improved.
• Sotheby’s now catering to Russian oligarchs by selling art wares at a high-end Moscow mall.
• Art prices are high because making art has become more expensive, claim artists and their galleries. That’s what happens when art becomes musical theatre.
• Son of Schnabel. (Via AO.)
• The Day in State Law Prudery: Indianapolis Museum of Art, along with ACLU, sue over Indiana state law that would require them to register as a porn purveyor because their collection features nudes. (Via MAN.)
• Will they have a Ricky Ricardo room? Commission to study the feasibility of a national Latino museum in D.C. (I do not have a good feeling about this.)
• The Art Institute of Chicago charges another museum $2 million to borrow 92 paintings.
• Oakland Museum to begin work on a serious makeover.
• Former Navy officer now selling Iraqi contemporary art.
• Photo Essay: Geometry in painting. In keeping with the theme: The work of John Belingheri.
• Fear of a Black Planet: Fine arts commission in D.C. asks artist to make statue of MLK less “confrontational.”
• Gag-o-rific subway ad for the School of Visual Arts in NYC.
• Ansel Adams: The stories behind the pictures, as told by his former assistant.
• Looks like the apocalypse: Volcanic explosion-meets-lightning in Chile.
• Bob Dylan’s gonna have an art show.
• An exhibit about L.A.’s Chicano punk scene at the Claremont Musem.
• Republican convention manager forced to resign after mag reveals that he consulted for Burmese junta, work that involved “a PR campaign to burnish the junta’s image, drafting releases praising Burma’s efforts to curb the drug trade and denouncing ‘falsehoods’ by the Bush administration that the regime engaged in rape and other abuses.” (Via Eyeteeth.)
• Rojo magazine’s website now has art videos. Check out Living Paintings by Robert Seidal to see a trippy-cool light show. (Via Juxtapoz.)
• Plastic bag shelter.
• Is Calatrava’s downtown train station in NYC getting cost-cutted into boring blandness? Probably.
• The architectural photography of Cristóbal Palma.
• Don’t miss! Wonderful talk by James Howard Kunstler on crap-ass city planning in U.S. ‘burbs: “There’s not enough Prozac in the world to make people feel okay about going down this block.” Plus: “Please stop referring to yourselves as consumers.” (Via ackackack.)
• A building with mirrored exteriors: Hotel Aire de Bardenas by Monica Rivera & Emiliano López in Spain.
• Graff of the Day: Loser in New Jersey, in one and two parts. Well done!
• Free Daze: Graffiti artist gets 28 month-sentence, $20,000 fine in Scottish graffiti case.
• Shepard Fairey’s gonna get a big museum show at Boston’s ICA next year. (Via Art21.)
• Frackin’ cool graffiti animation video from Blu. (Via Ekosystem.)
• Spray paint can pillows.
• Juicy rumor of the Day: Are Banksy and Nick Walker the same person?
• Transparent Post Its.
• Your moment of Beckett meets Joyce on a golf course.