Master of Art International

The Danner Memorial Window sold for £ 9.78 million, setting a new auction record 

A stained-glass Tiffany window originally designed for an Ohio church has sold for £ 9.78 million at auction. 

The Danner Memorial Window fetched more than £ 3.92 million over the upper limit of its estimated value when it went on sale at the New York branch of Sotheby’s. This is the first time the window has come to auction in 24 years and the sale sets a new auction record. 

The dazzling window, which stands at 16 feet high, was the result of a collaboration between acclaimed artist Louis Comfort Tiffany – son of Tiffany & Co. founder Charles Lewis Tiffany – and Agnes Northrop, one of the firm’s leading designers. 

The window, previously owned by billionaire art collector Alan Gerry, was sold to an anonymous bidder over the phone. 

A similar work from Tiffany Studios is on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The museum acquired Garden Landscape, designed in 1912, a three-part window designed by Northrop, last 2023.

Hong Kong displayed 2,500 panda sculptures to capitalize on a local bear craze

Thousands of giant panda sculptures to greet residents and tourists in Hong Kong, where enthusiasm for the bears has grown since two cubs were born in a local theme park.

The 2,500 exhibits were showcased in a launch ceremony of PANDA GO! FEST HK, the city’s largest panda-themed exhibition, at Hong Kong’s airport. They will be publicly displayed at the Avenue of Stars in Tsim Sha Tsui, a popular shopping district, this weekend before setting their footprint at three other locations this month.

Hong Kong’s tourism industry representatives are upbeat about the potential impact of housing six pandas, hoping to boost visitor numbers even though caring for pandas in captivity is expensive. Officials have encouraged businesses to capitalize on the popularity of the bears to seize opportunities in what some lawmakers have dubbed the “panda economy.”

The organizer of the exhibitions also invited some renowned figures, including musician Pharrell Williams, to create special-edition panda designs. Most of these special sculptures will be auctioned online for charity and the proceeds will be donated to Ocean Park to support giant panda conversation efforts.