By Hook or By Crook

Robert E. Lucky Jr. was arrested in 1999 for accepting $21,000 in exchange for an original by renowned primitive artist Clementine Hunter and never delivering the painting.

He, along with two others were recently indicted for a forgery scheme beginning in the year 2000, where Lucky authenticated and sold fake Hunters allegedly painted by his co-conspirators.

Pictured, "Baptismal", courtesy of the Lousiana State Museum.

Blogger Finds Check

Greg Cook, publisher of the "New England Journal of Aesthetic Research", an internet-based arts journal has been awarded a $30,000 Creative Capital/Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant, which was funded by Andy Warhol's estate and created by his will.

Of the 26 honorees this year, Mr. Cook is the only active blogger.

"Mail Art": Interactive or Manipulative?

In April of 2009, English artists Lenka Clayton and Michael Crowe sent an abstract letter to all 467 resident of an Irish seaside village. Last week, all 620 registerd homeowners on Polish Hill in Pittsburgh also received letters from the artists.

None of the letters had return addresses and each were fairly bizarre. For example, one tells the recipient that all of their refrigerator contents were switched with identical items in Ben Affleck's and another purports to include one of Elton John's hairs.

The artists told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that they hoped it would spur interaction between neighbors and on their blog, where they have posted photos and videos of the letters, they say the "art work consists solely of the discussions between the recipients".

Naturally when these unexplained letters started flooding the neighborhood, residents turned to their civic association, who ran updates on their neighborhood news site and it was there, a filmmaker revealed that she had recently produced a short video about the artists and their project ("Writing Letters to Everyone in the World") for Smithsonian Magazine and links to other press started to appear.