Over at The New Republic, Jed Perl says that the Met's "Pen and Parchment: Drawing in the Middle Ages" is one of the most original shows he's seen in 7 years: 

 

The entire show fits into three galleries, but what galleries they are! [The curator Melanie] Holcomb has gathered books and manuscripts from museums, libraries, and religious institutions in Europe and the United States. And it is in these bound volumes that the signal graphic achievements of the Middle Ages are to be found. Everybody, of course, knows the illuminated manuscripts of those centuries, with their dazzlingly colored pages, finished to a jewel-like shimmer. Holcomb's great idea has been to set those works aside for the time being, and focus instead on what have traditionally perhaps been regarded as humbler fare. These are the pictures done with black or brown or sometimes colored ink, many of which have, at least at first glance, a more casual, more informal character. Such works, she argues, put us in touch with the medieval artist's most immediate impressions and responses. I think she is absolutely right.

 

[More here]

 

David Shrigley's mixtape. Rick Poynor profiled the illustrator for Print in our May/June 2006 issue. 

 

The Courtauld Institute in London is considering drastic cuts to its three archives of images. More than three million images are kept in the Somerset House and are currently open to the public every weekday, for 10 pounds a year. The collections include the Witt library, which holds approximately two million photographs and reproductions; the Conway Library (one million); and the Photographic Survey, which covers 600 collections. 

[The Art Newspaper]

 

15 billboards that don't belong next to each other. (How many of these are intentional, though?)

[Buzzfeed]

 

The Times discovers "new vintage," an aesthetic that's "chockablock with Edwardian-style portraits, heraldic devices and mounted antlers." The lovely Hovey sisters get their picture. 

 

Former Print managing editor Todd Pruzan created a narrative for a golf ball bank on Significant Objects this week. It sold for $14.50. Right now, you can bid on a porcelain statuette of the Baron Von Blaueheimer holding a peace dove.

 

And J. Penry has updated his site with an awesome collection of pet portraits.