Art Outlook: 29 January

Some of the stories and discussions we’ve spotted online this week

Size matters: Tate reveals its BP sponsorship figures

Tate has revealed the details of its controversial sponsorship deal with BP, and the figures are far lower than many expected. BP gave an average of £224,000 a year over a 17-year period, amounting to a total of £3.8million. A ‘considerable sum’, or an embarrassingly bad deal?

Five-day strike at the National Gallery

The ongoing dispute between the National Gallery and around 250 of its staff looks set to end in industrial action next month. The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union voted in favour of a strike in response to the gallery’s privatisation plans.

Self-censorship debates as the V&A withdraws an image of the Prophet Mohammed

The Victoria and Albert Museum removed an online image of one of its collection items amidst security fears in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks. It’s not the only organisation that’s been nervy recently: Jillian Steinhauer called out some other recent incidents of self-censorship on Hyperallergic today.

Boris lures the Smithsonian to London

London could be the site of the Smithsonian’s first international outpost. The US institute intends to open a venue in east London’s planned ‘Olympicopolis’ cultural quarter following an invitation from the city mayor Boris Johnson. Will the Guggenheim be next, and should Londoners be happy about it?

World Economic Forum calls out the art market

Money laundering, tax evasion, insider trading and price manipulation…the economist Nouriel Roubini painted a damning picture of the art market at Davos this week. Is it time to introduce better (or any) regulation?

Tutankhamun’s botched beard

The world’s most famous pharaoh ended up with glue on his beard after a rushed repair job at the Egyptian Museum. The long beard on Tutankhamun’s famous masked was fixed in place with too much epoxy last summer, but thankfully conservators believe it can be rectified.

Lead image: used under Creative Commons licence (CC BY-SA 2.0)