Roundup: Sculptural butts at the Turner Prize show, MOCA’s awkward curation, the Wildensteins on trial

Van Gogh was lost but now he’s found. The new Turner Prize exhibition at the Tate Britain has a big booty. And the Wildenstein family — the noted art dealing clan — has its dirty laundry being aired in court. Plus: MOCA Los Angeles crosses a curatorial line, the Seattle museum that needs to wake up and art inside an abandoned mental hospital. Here’s the Roundup:

— Stolen Van Gogh paintings found in the safe of a suspected mobster in Italy. Sky News

— Islamic extremist is given prison time for destroying historic mausoleums in Timbuktu, the first case of an individual being tried at the Hague for war crimes related to cultural destruction. The Art Newspaper

— The Wildenstein family’s tax evasion trial opens a window onto a secretive art-dealing dynasty. Interesting fact: The women are PO’d. New York Times.

— San Francisco’s Mexican Museum may have a shiny new building on the rise. But it is missing a curator. Not good. San Francisco Chronicle

— MOCA has a show on view in which the curator is the owner of the vast majority of the works on view. Not cool, says Times critic Christopher Knight. Art critic Hunter Drohojowska-Philp also reports. Los Angeles Times, KCRW

— And critic Jen Graves says that Seattle’s Henry Art Gallery, an important museum connected with the University of Washington, is asleep at the wheel curatorially: “Wake up, Henry!” she writes. “Your alarm is going off and it’s starting to give the rest of us a headache.” The Stranger

— A new study shows that Latino art is underrepresented at the College Art Assn., the principal professional organization for arts scholarship in the U.S. ARTnews

— “Effortlessly casual space is studded with high-end artwork that rotates often, while the pricey digs give way to smoked meats and plenty of down home flair.” Manuela, the fancy-pants new eatery inside Hauser Wirth & Schimmel is now open. Get nibbling, art world! Eater

— Whose is bigger? A look at Glenstone, the expanding private collection in tony Potomac, Md. The Art Newspaper

— I like big butts and I cannot lie: Critic Adrian Searle reviews the new show of Turner Prize nominees. The Guardian

British artist Anthea Hamilton’s “Project for a Door” at the 2016 Turner Prize exhibition at Tate Britain.

(Carl Court / Getty Images )

— Artist Paul Chan’s Badlands Press has launched a series called “Files” that features downloadable artworks that, literally, come in a file. Among the first: The notes that L.A. artist Martine Syms allegedly took while supposedly helping Kanye West prepare for his 2015 VMA speech. Could be yours for only $150. ARTnews, Badlands Unlimited

— An exhibition has taken over an abandoned mental hospital in Jefferson Park. LAist

— Zak Smith and John Mejias’s art podcast has a timely interview with artist Mary Reid Kelley, who just won a MacArthur Fellowship, in which the artist, and her husband and collaborator Patrick Kelley, talk about poetry, video, classical mythology, the issue of credit and what it means to be from the South. Good listen. We Eat Art

— Speaking of podcasts: A wonderful, poignant feature about podcasting from prison — with embedded audio clips. California Sunday

— R.I.P Suzan Strauss, L.A.’s “Lava Lady.” Antebellum

— In the housing-starved Bay Area, one community’s arguments for sustainability are pushing out the possibility of any new housing. Citylab

— Tijuana’s coming condo boom. San Diego Union-Tribune

— This is very important: New York’s Socrates Sculpture Park has a monument to Christopher Walken. Time Out New York

— Since we’re on the subject of entertainment: As Hollywood’s love affair with Latin American drug traffickers continues unabated, Gustavo Arellano looks at why stories about narcos resonate among Latin American audiences. OC Weekly

— And last but not least, your moments of small, knit dolls playing ukuleles and singing in Japanese. The week is already better. U900’s YouTube

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