French Toast: To a CV that already includes Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters, chief curator, and Whitney Biennial co-curator, our own Philippe Vergne can add another: “Hottie.” Mpls.St.Paul magazine included the “French Fox” in its new rundown of “High-Profile Hotties.”
Tate tracks: Tate Modern has launched a cool new project in which they ask musicians to respond musically to art on view. A new track will be posted each month (so far, only one project has been completed, the Chemical Brothers’ soundtrack to Jacob Epstein’s 1913-1914 sculpture Torso in Metal from ‘The Rock Drill), and bands including Klaxons, the Landscapers, and Roll Deep will participate in coming months.
Land, Art: On December 11 and 12, the Royal Society of Arts and the London School of Economics presents No Way Back?, an interdisciplinary enquiry on the environment by leading artists, philosophers, architects and others. Former Walker visual arts fellow Max Andrews has edited the book, LAND, ART: A Cultural Ecology Reader, to be published in conjunction with the event (and available for sale in December through Cornerhouse). It features contributions by Thomas Hirschhorn, Winona LaDuke, Jimmie Durham, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Nobel Prize-winner Wangari Maathai, Bruce Sterling, former Walker chief curator Richard Flood (who writes on Richard Prince), and others.