The Digest. 04.26.09.

A nymph takes a satyr to task at the National Archeological Museum in Naples; Herculaneum, circa 1st century A.D. (Photo by C-M.)

• Hilarious!! Damien Hirst, the man who brought the world the diamond-encrusted skull, says that the recession will be good for artists: “The reason why you make art is not financial… It’s not about how much something is worth or how much it costs, it’s about whether it’s good or not.” Plus: Win a painting by Hirst. For reals. (@theartmarket, AO.)
• More on the Brandeis/Rose Museum smackdown: the museum’s trustees ain’t happy.
• These days, rich people are trying to sell their art as quietly as possible.
• Vanity Fair has an interesting book excerpt about the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre. (AO.)
• Trippy stop-motion of Tokyo.
• Dot Earth, a NYT blog dedicated to the limits of what the Earth can take. Underlying message: Stop making babies. This isn’t gonna end well.
• Photo Essay: The work of Danny Lyon.
• Chinese public health posters.
• Artists spent the weekend rubbing out illegal billboards in NYC. More here and here. (@bhoggard.)
• Chaka, on tagging, in a lengthy profile in the L.A. Times: “I wasn’t doing anything artistic. It was just getting my name up there.”
• Today’s Street Art, swine flu edition: Roa in Belgium.
• An interesting video profile of José Parla, a.k.a. Ease, on how the layers of the city inspire his work.
• The Day in Graffiti Merch: Dondi Stussy tees. And architectural merch: A Princess Zaha floor lamp.
• A Texas legislator wants to treat graffiti as organized crime. Um, don’t you clowns need to be doing stuff like fixing the economy and getting people health care? (Gracias, Johnny.)
• A frilly chair. Me like.
• ¡Architecture world smackdown! Prince Charles versus Everybody!!! More here.
• Speaking of things Prince Charles would hate: Photos from the Rem Koolhaas/Prada Transformer launch in Seoul. The building kinda looks like a satellite that crash landed into Earth. Life Without Buildings tries to figure the thing out.
• More ruminating about “showy” architecture. (Arts Journal.)
• Your moment of John Waters, on smoking in theatres. Plus: The John Waters art tour. (AFC.)