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In a closely watched case in the art world, American artist Richard Prince won a federal appeals court order Thursday holding that he did not infringe the copyrights of a photographer by incorporating his images into 25 paintings and collages. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York reversed a lower court's finding that Prince must hand over artwork using the photos to Patrick Cariou, whose pictures of Rastafarians in Jamaica were incorporated into art, exhibited in 2007 and 2008.   "These twenty-five of Prince's artworks manifest an entirely different aesthetic from Cariou's photographs," U.S. Circuit Judge Barrington Parker wrote. The court battle has been considered a test to what extent the appropriation of artists' works is protected from claims of copyright infringement. The appeal drew friend-of-the-court briefs from a wide range of parties, from the Whitney Museum of American Art to Google Inc, which warned the lower court's ruling

Enlisting the drama of Prokofiev and the elegance of Tchaikovsky, St Petersburg's new Mariinsky theatre staged a gala opening on Thursday designed to silence critics of the starkly modernist building erected in the heart of Russia's imperial capital. The $700-million glass and limestone building, which critics have dubbed the "Mariinsky mall", glowed in the night sky, its glass and metal walkways humming with excited voices as the select crowd of 2,000 found their seats.   Just opposite, across a canal, the 19th century original opera house, one of the great showcases of Russian culture which became home to the Kirov opera and ballet companies in Soviet times, stood silent for the evening. "We need breathe life into the theatre. We want it to live, so that people are attracted and can feel the charm of modern technology. Then it will shine in all its glory," President Vladimir Putin told the guests, who included leading Russian businessmen. Calling th

With a billion dollars worth of art on offer at their spring auctions in New York, Christie's and Sotheby's are looking to the post-war and contemporary works to drive the market this month. The sales of the newer works are expected to exceed those of the once-dominant Impressionist and modern field by anywhere from 50 to 100 percent, according to estimates.   While both Christie's and Sotheby's have a pair of Impressionist or modern paintings valued at $20 million or $30 million-range, both houses' contemporary sales feature at least three works that are expected to fetch $30 million to $40 million, and possibly more. Records are likely to fall for artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat and Gerhard Richter, who already holds the record price for a work by any living artist at auction. "The supply of $30-million-plus paintings and high-quality material is far greater than what you can find in the Impressionist and modern field," said Brett Gorvy, Chri

With their black leather, studded jackets, ripped jeans, bondage trousers and messages of rebellion and anarchy, punks from the 1970s probably never envisioned that a major museum would be celebrating their influence on fashion 40 years later. But the Costume Institute of The Metropolitan Museum of Art is doing just that with a new exhibition, "Punk: Chaos to Couture," that opens on May 9 and runs through August 14. It includes 100 punk styles and ranges from the mid-70s at Vivienne Westwood's and Malcolm McLaren's London boutique and images of The Sex Pistols to examples of punk's impact on haute couture and designers such as Alexander McQueen, Helmut Lang, Miuccia Prada and John Galliano.   Films and music from the era and a re-creation of the graffiti-covered toilet at New York's CBGB punk rock club, where Blondie, the Ramones and Talking Heads played, add to the gritty authenticity of the exhibit. "Punk was all about celebrating the individual,

The spring auctions got off to a strong start on Tuesday with Sotheby's solid sale of Impressionist and modern art which took in $230 million, led by a $42 million Cezanne still life and a $26 million Modigliani portrait. A year after Sotheby's set the world auction record for any work of art with its sale of Edvard Munch's "The Scream" for $120 million, it managed a sale of works by Picasso, Rodin and Monet that saw 85 percent of 71 lots on offer finding buyers and came in just under its high pre-sale estimate of $235 million.   Calling its offerings "an extraordinary group of material," Simon Shaw, New York head of Impressionist and modern art for Sotheby's, said "it's very satisfying to see that the market agreed with us." "If anyone needed a signal that the Impressionist market is not just alive but thriving, this sale provided the evidence," Shaw added. The once-dominant Impressionist market has been eclipsed in re

A record was set for French artist Chaim Soutine on Wednesday at Christie's auction of Impressionist and modern art, which met expectations with a total of just under $160 million. The tightly edited sale of 47 works exceeded Christie's auction a year ago by more than $40 million, but the earlier evening featured only 31 lots. Still, an impressive 94 percent of the works on offer found buyers which officials said was its best sell-through rate since 2006.   "We saw high demand for blue-chip names such as Picasso and Monet," said Brooke Lampley, Christie's New York head of Impressionist and modern art. "But we also saw an educated marketplace for rarities like the Soutine and Chagall," she added, referring to the evening's two top-priced works. Officials also pointed to global presence, saying more than 30 countries participated in the auction which totaled $158.5 million, near the middle of expectations of about $130 million to $190 million.

Actor Leonardo DiCaprio, the star of the new film "The Great Gatsby," and his foundation have teamed up with Christie's for a charity auction next week to benefit environmental causes. Thirty-three works, many created for and donated to the auction by some of the world's top artists, will go under the hammer on Monday in New York at The 11th Hour Auction, which aims to raise as much as $18 million to protect the last wild places on Earth and their endangered species.   "A lot of the works of this quality have never been at auction. We have what we believe are conservative estimates," Loic Gouzer, international specialist at Christie's and the head of the sale, said in an interview. "It is going to be the biggest one-time environmental fundraiser ever," he added. Zeng Fanzhi's "The Tiger," an oil on canvas, Bharti Kher's "The Skin Speaks a Language Not Its Own," a work on fiberglass, and Mark Grotjahn's &qu