wnyc.org / 93.9fm / am 820

Looks like the Guggenheim Foundation is about to confirm a new director — Richard Armstrong. Armstrong takes over for Thomas Krens, who led the museum for nearly 20 years. Krens turned the Guggenheim into an international brand, with splashy exhibitions and a network of museums from Venice to Bilbao…and one soon to open in Abu Dhabi.

Here’s a wry little video piece from Spanish performance artist Blanca Oraa - turning down Krens’ offer for a solo show:

And here she is, apologizing:

Art critic Lee Rosenbaum (a.k.a culturegrrl) is a regular commentator for WNYC. Listen to what she has to say about the Guggenheim’s future director, who spent the last 12 years as director of the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh.

And then, across town: MoMA. The museum says after an exhaustive 6-month search, they’ve decided to promote from within — they made Ann Temkin the new Chief Curator for Painting and Sculpture. Temkin was behind the crowd-pleasing Color Chart show. Check out Jim Lambie’s ZoBop video from that show:

Lee Rosenbaum says that Temkin will have big shoes to fill:

And the last little museum tidbit: Remember the Olympics? Seems like a million years ago to you maybe, but not to Zhang Hongtu. His painting, “Bird’s Nest, in the Style of Cubism” was supposed to appear in a show sponsored by a German marketing group in Beijing, just in time for the games.

But it got rejected by Chinese authorities at customs. Now it’s back in NYC, at the Queens Museum of Art. Zhang said he meant to be provocative with the painting. Here he is explaining all the “8’s” that show up on the piece:

The piece will be up as part of a group show that will open at the QMA on September 28.