Giuseppe De Nittis (1846-1884)

“Italian Light: Skies and Waters” is now open at New York’s Italian Cultural Institute, curated by Marco Bertoli. It features a number of landscape paintings from the 19th and early 20th centuries, focusing on the use of light and often on painting en plein air. Featured are Antonio Fontanesi and Giuseppe de Nittis.

The Mystical Marriage by the Piedmontese painter, and the Cain and Abel by the Neapolitan Baroque painter Giordano, led the auction on Friday, selling for €211,200 and €192,000 respectively under Ader's hammer. 

Villa Verdi, near Busseto in the Emilia-Romagna region in 1848, was the composer’s home from 1851 until his death in 1901. Currently owned by four siblings, the descendants of Maria Filomena Verdi (who was raised as Verdi’s daughter), it will likely be auctioned off after disputes about what to do with it. (Guardian)

The sculptor, a prominent figure of Arte Povera, was elected as a foreign associate member of the venerable institution during yesterday's session. He will occupy the chair of the Senegalese artist Ousmane Sow, who died in 2016.

The Parisian gallery will be selling part of its stock at the Hôtel Drouot over two days. An opportunity for the two dealers to share their passion for Old Masters and the 19th century once again.

In 2016, experts determined the violin was almost certainly sold under duress or seized from German Jewish music supplies dealer Felix Hildesheimer. The German Government’s Advisory Panel recommended the current holder – a music education organization – pay the dealer’s grandsons €100,000. They have refused. (NY Times)

Italian sculptor Giuseppe Penone, pioneer of the Arte Povera movement, has gifted more than 200 works on paper to the Castello di Rivoli Contemporary Art Center. Ranging from autographed notes to architectural renderings, this collection offers insight into Penone's nearby outdoor sculptural works. (The Art Newspaper)

Artist Giuseppe Penone just donated 350 drawings to the Centre Pompidou and 310 to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. This double donation marks the Italian artist's special attachment to these institutions. A relationship which, as far as Beaubourg is concerned, began as soon as the museum was founded in the 1970s.

A flurry of preemptions and an exciting atmosphere accompanied the partial dispersion of the Talabardon & Gautier Gallery collection at Drouot.

Internationally coveted, this rare violin made in Cremona in 1736 was acquired by a musician on June 3 at Aguttes, in Neuilly. Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarnerius, known as "del Gesù", is considered one of the greatest violin makers in history. Only 150 of his instruments are still in existence.