Italian court lifts loan ban on Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man

Our daily round-up of news from the art world 

Italian court rules Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man can travel to Louvre | Leonardo da Vinci’s drawing of a man with Vitruvian proportions will be allowed to travel to the Louvre in Paris, an Italian court has ruled. Last week the court temporarily blocked the work from leaving the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice, after an appeal launched by non-profit organisation Italia Nostra claimed it was too fragile to travel and that the lighting in the Louvre could damage it. The Louvre’s Leonardo exhibition is due to open on 24 October.

Brooklyn Museum offers Bacon Pope at Sotheby’s | The Brooklyn Museum in New York is deaccessioning a painting by Francis Bacon from its collection. Estimated to fetch between $6m–$8m, Pope (c. 1958) will go under the hammer at Sotheby’s sale of contemporary art in New York next month. Although the museum did not disclose exactly how it would use any funds raised from the sale, a spokesperson said that ‘as part of ongoing collection review, we’ve chosen to sell this particular work and use the proceeds to more sharply focus on institutional collection priorities’.

Carlos Celdran (1972–2019) | Carlos Celdran, the Filipino artist and activist, has died at the age of 46. Born in Makati in Manila, Celdran later studied at the Rhode Island School of Design before moving to New York. Celdran returned to Manila in 2000, founding his own tour-guide company, launching the Manila Biennale in 2018 and making provocative performance pieces – the most controversial of which featured the artist interrupting a mass in Manila Cathedral to protest against the Roman Catholic Church’s position on contraceptive health, which resulted in his arrest and conviction. Facing imprisonment, he moved to Spain in early 2019, where he lived in exile until his death.