Roundup: Greece angling for Parthenon Marbles, Texas gun art controversy, MOCA board member working for Trump

The Parthenon Marbles, removed from the historic Greek site in the early 19th century by Lord Elgin, on view at the British Museum in 2002.

May 9, 2016 9:23 AM PT

Greece is making a renewed move for the Parthenon Marbles. The Museum of Modern Art is offering buyouts. A board member for L.A.’s Museum of Contemporary Art is going to work for Donald “Build the Wall” Trump. Plus, a gun sculpture is censored at a Texas university, gender in museums, Moscow’s terrible art, a history of female robots and the historic photography of L.A. forefather Charles Lummis. There’s a ton to read in today’s Roundup:

— New York’s Museum of Modern Art may have just received a $100 million gift from David Geffen, but the institution is nonetheless offering buyouts in advance of its expansion and renovation.

— At a Texas university, where campus carry laws will soon allow students to brandish weapons in school, a student’s gun sculpture is not allowed.

— Museum of Contemporary Art chief curator Helen Molesworth talks about gender imbalance in museums. Related: The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s chief digital officer, Sree Sreenivasan, says he will not participate in all-male panels.

— Greece’s cultural authorities are working on new legal avenues to have the Parthenon Marbles returned from England, including a possible appeal to the United Nations.

A view of the British Museum in London, which is facing an ethics investigation.

— A couple of British museums face ethics investigations on whether they allowed a sponsor — BP — to have undue influence on their affairs.

— From the Department of Further Art Patron Hijinks: The uber-wealthy and highly esteemed Sackler family, whose name adorns wings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the British Museum, owe part of their fabulous wealth to the controversial painkiller OxyContin. Plus, art scion Steven Mnuchin, who sits on the board of the Museum of Contemporary Art here in Los Angeles, is going to be Donald Trump’s finance chairman. (More on him here.) Which makes me wonder if MOCA, a public institution in a city that is half Latino, needs to think long and hard about its relationship to Mnuchin.

— Technical problems are holding up the Guggenheim Museum’s golden toilet. Greg Allen parses the complex details of manufacturing a pooper out of gold.

— Sort of related: One of the highlights at this year’s Frieze fair in New York was an ass — and by ass I mean donkey.

— The Japanese artist who made a kayak in the shape of her vagina had some of her work (figurines inspired by her vagina) declared “pop art” by a court. But she is still guilty of distributing obscene images.

— “A cross between This American Life and the movie Her.” SFMOMA’s new museum app sounds like it is earnest and terrifying. Or terrifyingly earnest?

— Speaking of which, California Sunday has a sweet photo essay of works from SFMOMA’s collection of photography.

An installation by artist Maurizio Cattelan at the Frieze Art Fair in New York last week.

— Will a Hollywood talent agency’s investment in the Frieze Art Fair signify a possible West Coast version of the fair? No one is saying just yet.

— KCET’s Artbound premieres on Tuesday (I’m hosting!) with a new one-hour documentary devoted to the life and legacy of L.A. forefather Charles Lummis, journalist, preservationist, activist, man about town. Part of what made Lummis so influential was his early embrace of photography, and he was key in recording numerous indigenous communities on his journey west from Ohio. This post gathers some of his most striking images.

— In related news: D.J. Waldie has a pretty terrific essay on the meaning of the journey to California, be it the westward crossing of the 19th century or the northbound journeys Mexican and Central American immigrants make today.

— How Pershing Square achieved its current state of homeliness.

— “Why Moscow has suddenly been filled with tacky, terrible art.” (ArtsJournal)

— Lobbying for a bike-friendly crossing at the San Diego-Tijuana border.

— Curbed has a timeline of LAX improvements. Though I’m not sure I’d list the opening of Rock & Brews as an “improvement.” I would have taken a Yum Yum Donuts instead.

— “Although these A.I. helpers talk like women, they are still not exactly programmed to know what a woman would say.” A history of men who build female robots.

— And last, but not least, your moment of “men praying bitchily in Western art history” (contains salty language).

Find me on Twitter @cmonstah.