Irving Penn.

The company that makes Legos has landed at the center of a social-media firestorm after Chinese artist Ai Weiwei complained that it refused to supply a bulk order of the toy bricks for his art.

Ai said he wanted to use the bricks for an exhibition on free speech at Australia’s National Gallery of Victoria. The museum attempted to place an order but was told by the company that it “cannot approve the use of Legos for political works."A post on Ai’s Instagram account said:

"As a powerful corporation, Lego is an influential cultural and political actor in the globalized economy with questionable values. Lego’s refusal to sell its product to the artist is an act of censorship and discrimination.”

A free-speech advocate who was imprisoned by the Chinese government, Ai suggested that Lego was acting under pressure from authorities. The privately held Danish company recently announced that a Legoland theme park will open in Shanghai. 

In response, fans of the artist flooded Twitter and Instagram with offers of Legos, and Ai said he was setting up drop-off points for donations. He also posted a picture of Legos that had been left inside a car on a street in Berlin, where he is serving as a visiting professor at the University of the Arts.

Fans Flood Artist Ai Weiwei With Offers Of Legos

Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

BEIGEL BAKE - DAMORIE

If you ever spot a line outside of an eating establishment while walking down Brick Lane, you are most likely approaching a piece of history in the area called Beigel Bake. Without the line of people standing outside of it or the crowd within, it would be easy to miss this beloved bakery due to its simple banner and interior design, but what Beigel Bake lacks in these areas, it makes up for it with its tasty, freshly baked bagels, or in this case beigels. Maybe the restaurant’s simple design has to do with the fact that it is one of London’s oldest bagel shops, which blends in with the air of nostalgia that fits many of the shops in Brick Lane. Whatever it is, it’s obvious that Beigel Bake is enormously popular in this area. The bakery opened in the neighborhood in the 1970s, while there was still some Jewish people living in Brick Lane. Although the area is now populated by Bangladesh immigrants, Beigel Bake is a reminder of the once massive Jewish presence Brick Lane had. What makes Beigel Bake so great is not only its fresh bagels or the fact that it is open 24 hours but its the variety in which they serve them that makes them unique. The fact that their most popular dish is a bagel with salmon and cream cheese makes this all true. So if you’re having a bagel craving stop at Beigel Bake but get there early because there will most likely to be a line. 

8 About Art: Alanna Martinez

Your Twitter bio states “ask me about art & pasta anytime” so we must ask: For the love of pasta, what’s your favorite pasta dish?

Pasta is a beautifully versatile food, you can go so many ways with it, but my favorite pasta dish is about as simple as it gets. For the pasta itself: this dish goes best with shells (cocciolettte), campenelle, or penne. Add a whole lot of unsalted butter—at least a tablespoon—or you can substitute olive oil. Then, a generous amount of pecorino romano cheese. Then some pepper, and salt if you don’t think it’s salty enough already. Then enjoy! Simply put: pasta with butter and cheese. You can’t go wrong.

Do you have a personal background in the arts? How did you get started?

I grew up in the art world. My father is an artist, and I grew up in his studio. I went to an arts high school in Manhattan where I had a traditional conservatory-style education—drawing, oil painting, watercolor, basic anatomy, etc. After basically doing four years of art school in high school I was hesitant to do another four years at the college level, but I wasn’t ready to stop studying art all together, so I chose to attend a liberal arts school where I focused on photography, sculpture, and art history. While in undergrad, I ran the school’s visual arts publication, so after I graduated I looked for publishing opportunities in the art world and landed an internship at an art magazine. And that’s where I fell in love with art writing.

If so, what’s your favorite medium to work in?

I love the freedom of sculpture. In undergrad, I hit a point with photography where I started exploring video and installation in my work, and thankfully my professor suggested the following semester I sign up for a sculpture class to see if would open up new possibilities for my work. I was blown away by just how much it did.

Today, there are a lot of artists on Instagram. Are you seeing this trend? Any must follows you recommend?

Instagram is a great medium for artists to show off their work in the studio, and give people a view of how they see the world. I follow a lot of galleries, institutions, and artists, but I’ve also discovered a lot of comic artists and illustrators through Instagram and fallen in love with their work.

Are there any cities with an up and coming art market we should know about?

Plenty—though there are more up and coming regions than cities. Really, the Internet has widened the market exponentially. You can be a collector anywhere, and having a foothold at major fairs all over the world is becoming all the more important. Cities with multiple fairs, or new biennials are definitely ones to watch.

What’s your all-time favorite museum that you frequent?

The Met. It’s my favorite museum in the world. Something about it feels like home, even though there’s a massiveness to its collection and halls that makes me feel like I’ll never be able to know every inch of it. My favorite room holds the Panoramic View of the Palace and Gardens of Versailles, painted by John Vanderlyn between 1818 and 1819. While it’s meant to transport you—through minute detail and photographic realism—to the palace’s gardens, there’s something surreal and otherworldly about the palate and wide-angled perspective.

Any can’t miss art events happening this summer in NYC?

Works by French artist Pierre Huyghe are all over the city this summer, and not to be missed. His roof garden commission is currently on view at the Met—where visitors will also have a breathtaking and unique view across Central Park—and his sculpture Untilled is up in MoMA’s sculpture garden, in addition to screenings of his film The Host and the Cloud. I’m also excited personally to see the Brooklyn Museum’s “Rise of Sneaker Culture” and “FAILE” exhibitions.

Any advice for those interesting in breaking into the art market as a writer?

See as much art as you can, read everything being published by outlets you’d want to write for, and remember that tearing people down is not a critic’s main job. Instead, be open to discovering what’s new and exciting and sharing that with others.

Elizabeth Taylor

‘Flannel flowers and brass tray’, 1931 - Grace Cossington Smith (1892–1984)

A History of True Detective’s New Theme Song, ‘Nevermind’

Going into the premiere episode of True Detective season two, we knew the answers to almost all of the show’s most basic, production-based mysteries: who’d star, who’d direct, and where the season would be set. But there was still one crucial piece of the puzzle missing: Who would sing the theme song? As we learned, the answer to that question turned out to be pretty awesome: none other than Leonard Cohen.

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Such a painful experience. These were a set of drawings of #Jewish kids after they were rescued from concentration camps. #OldJewishCementery #Prague #Praha #jewishquarter #History #cometogether (at Old Jewish Cemetery, Prague)

Synagoga and Ecclesia in Our Time – Joshua Koffman

Eduardo Terrazas First Solo UK Show at Timothy Taylor

Eduardo Terrazas Possibilities of a Structure: Grid 1.4.12, 1974-2015, Wool yarn on wooden board covered with Campeche wax 35 ½ x 35 ½ in.

From Life? or Theater? by Charlotte Salomon