Monday’s Art Notes

Indian artist Surya Prakash puts the final preparations on an ecologically friendly idol of the Hindu god Lord Ganesh at his workshop in Hyderabad on August 29, 2011. Prakash made the 17 ft. tall idol for the upcoming Ganesh festival starting September 1 by using 30,000 papercups with help of five workers to create awareness by making ecologically friendly Ganesh idols to minimize harm to the environment when they are thrown in the rivers. Photo by Noah Seelam/ AFP/ Getty Images

*

In New York, Hurricane Irene caused the cancellations of all Broadway shows over the weekend, and affected many off-Broadway shows as well, via the Los Angeles Times.

The weather also affected weekend movie box offices, with sales 23 percent lower than this time last year, via Reuters.

And the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s summer season finale was called off at Tanglewood, the first time a concert there has ever been cancelled in 75 years, via The Boston Globe.

*

The Chinese government has ordered that its country’s music downloading sites remove many Asian and American pop music artists from their offerings in order to protect its youth from vulgarity, via TIME.

*

In Florence, scientists are investigating whether a da Vinci fresco was hidden behind another work by fellow renaissance artist and early art historian Giorgio Vasari, via The New York Times.

*

The New York Times sheds some light on the numerous thefts this year from European homes, museums and auction houses of an unusual commodity: rhino horns, which, on the black market, are currently more valuable than gold or illegal drugs.