Small is Beautiful

Andy Warhol

I remember this litho - it was done when I was a student at the University of Washington School of Art as part of printmaking class as a portrait assignment.

"Andy Warhol." Lithograph. Edition of 5. 4x5 inches, circa 1980

Dear Ebay: I told you so!

“Sir,” said the Ebay Support person on the phone, “We’re Ebay, and we’re pretty sure that no one can hack into our system.”

A few months ago, she was responding to my alarmed phone call, as I was pretty sure that someone was hacking into Ebay’s software and system to manipulate the online auction giant and further “hide” already hidden fake auctions designed as a smart phishing effort via Ebay’s apparent ironclad software.

As you may have read recently, a few days ago Ebay requested that all of its users change their passwords. This was as a result of a data breach in which “hackers figured out eBay employee credentials, which helped them gain access to the eBay database.”

Ebays admits now that “email addresses, phone numbers and other details were hacked.” 

But I have evidence from the recent past that hackers also potentially may have manipulated the Ebay auction software to use the auction site as a phishing vehicle.

This is how it all started, and here submitted for your consideration:

On January 27, 2014, I was sitting in Glen Echo while my son was in his music class. I was bored and surfing the net and logged onto Ebay. To my surprise I noticed almost a dozen messages in my Ebay inbox. I write “to my surprise,” because whenever I get an Ebay-generated message (either from Ebay or from an Ebay user sending the email from their Ebay account) I have a rule that automatically forwards it to my personal email account.

That’s exhibit (a) – There were multiple messages from Ebay users to my account, all dealing with the same 3-4 Ebay auctions and messages that were never forwarded to me. If I hadn’t logged onto my Ebay account, I would not have seen them... until it was too late! By the way, all auctions were about to end - they were seven day auctions and all were in day 5 or 6.

All the messages referred to the same assorted “auctions” that had been posted as if coming from my account. I have the word "auctions" in quotes because none of the auctions were mine, and also because all of them were cleverly designed to phish people out of their money. I quickly responded to all the emails warning the users that the auctions were a scam and had nothing to do with me.

The fake auctions had been created without my knowledge and had also somehow circumvented the Ebay notification system that sent an email to my account each time that a real auction lot is created under my account.

That’s exhibit (b) – Someone was able to create an Ebay listing under my account and at the same time prevented the Ebay software from notifying me that a new lot had been created.

The fake listings offered tech goods at ridiculous prices, such as Apple MacBook Pro Retina 15.4" GeForce, or a new Samsung 65" 3D Smart TV.

The hacker had cleverly inserted his email address (4iph55@gmail.com) into the image of the item being offered, highlighted it in yellow, and requested that interested bidders contact him directly prior to bidding. The incoming emails that were in my Ebay inbox (but not being forwarded to my regular email) were from interested bidders wanting to know why they needed to contact the person offering the lots. From reading the threads it was easy to see why…

The phishing scam artist was asking interested parties to wire him money directly, instead of bidding through the Ebay system. When users balked at this, and instead bid the “normal” way via the Ebay lot, he was then able to generate a fake Ebay email from checkout@ebayprotection.com to every single bidder, announcing to the victim that they had won the auction and requesting payment. He also offered next day UPS shipping at no additional cost.

Pretty cool uh? Dude is able to ship a 65" flat screen TV via next day UPS at no additional cost!

I immediately reported the fake auctions to Ebay, and they immediately cancelled them. Subsequently, throughout all this process, I was reporting all of these issues to Ebay via email, and receiving canned email responses from them. I then tried several times to report the issue via telephone, but each time I was assured by the Ebay telephone operator that there was no way that what I was describing could actually have taken place. They told me to change my password (Nevermind that I use really hard passwords: 16-20 mixed characters, and change them several times a year), but refused the logic of the events, or could not explain the technical reasons why these lots had all been posted without generating emails to me, or how the emails to my Ebay account had not been forwarded to me, and even more important --- and the key evidence of hacking into Ebay’s software: why these listings were not visible as my listings in MyEbay!

Exhibit (c) – The hacker was able to create listings using my account and yet they were not listed in MyEbay as my listings.

Working with some of the Ebay users who were nearly scammed, I was also able to piece together the identity of the scammer.

Name: Victor Stan Cornel
Email: 4iph55@gmail.com
Address : Al Solidarnisci Nr. 118/2 00-140 Warsaw Poland.
Bank Name : Millenium Bank
Bank Address : ul.Stanislawa Zaryna 2A 02-593 Warszawa Poland.
IBAN : PL 16 1160 2201 0000 0002 4729 3383
SWIFT : BIGBPLW

I passed all this information to Ebay, who ignored it… at least as far as I know, since I never received a response from them. I also contacted Millenium Bank in Poland and advised them of the issue. They promptly replied to me and passed that they were sending my email to the “right unit of our bank” and advised me to “report it to law enforcement bodies.” And thus I reported the whole event to Interpol, since this phishing mutant apparently lives (or at least has a bank account in Poland). I also tried a dozen ways to report to Google that a phishing scheme was being run from a Gmail account; not sure if I was successful.

Every single thing that I’ve written here has been exhaustively reported to Ebay. When the first telephone operator dismissed me, I called back, got a different operator and reported it all over again from scratch. When that also failed, I did it a third time.

After that I gave up.

And then a few days ago I read about the Ebay system breach. It apparently happened a while back, but Ebay just confirmed it.

Do you think these that two issues are related?

And this is why...

In the past I've harped as to the danger of grouping the Hispanic or Latino vote into one block, as if all people from the twenty-plus nations south of the border and in the Caribbean are all alike and all think alike.

Spanish is a perfect example... Below is an image of something being sold in a local Supermarket which caters to Central American shoppers... The item being offered is "chocho" - which I have no idea what this is, but I do know, that this is also the Puerto Rican slang for, ahem... a woman's private parts and easily a word forbidden on Spanish language radio on the island.

I Googled the word in Google Images, just for fun, and got a boatload of porn.

But here's a Central/South American "chocho"... cough, cough...

Dress for Success Benefit

Happy Memorial Day!

American Flag by Jonathan S. Woods, which was part of Artomatic 2012

DC Judge rules in favor of DC gallery

From DC's Charles Krause Reporting:

After two years of threats, refusing to meet with me or even tell me the nature of the complaints they had received, the Solo Piazza Condominium Board  where I live filed suit on March 16 to shut down the gallery I opened in December 2011.

The issue before the Court was whether an art gallery was an "accessory office use" permitted by the condominium's by-laws, which I was bound by when I purchased my apartment seven years ago. In letters to my attorney, Benny Kass, and to me before the suit was filed, the board changed its story a number of times about why it  was so opposed to allowing me to operate the gallery---especially after it learned that I had obtained a permit from the DC government giving me the right to do so.

Nonetheless, the board clearly expected to win the suit, allocating only $500 for legal fees in the building's 2014 budget (because the bylaws say that if the board has to go to court to enforce the bylaws and wins, the co-owner who loses has to pay both his own legal fees and the condominium's legal fees as well).

Pushing its luck even further, the board filed a motion for summary judgment shortly after it filed its complaint, arguing that since an art gallery  is obviously not an "office," the judge should execute summarily; obviously, they were thinking the judge would make short work of my gallery, not their credibility.

As it turned out, however, the only thing that was obvious about the board's complaint and its motion for summary judgment was that neither they nor their attorney had bothered to do the most basic legal research to determine how the word "office" is defined.  

What my attorneys at Kass, Mitek & Kass discovered, much to their surprise and very much to their credit, was that the word "office" had never been litigated before-- in which case the DC courts rely on Webster's Unabridged Dictionary to define legally undefined words for them.

And sure enough, Webster's defines "office" as "a place where a particular kind of business or  service for others is transacted."

So, dear friends and art aficionados, the judge denied the board's motion for a summary judgment and, instead, ruled in my favor. It's official: my home is now an office and my office is now a place where I can show and sell art that might not otherwise have a home if DC Superior Judge Michael O'Keefe hadn't found that the condo board where I have my home, my gallery and my office hasn't a clue what the bylaws mean nor the wit to look in a dictionary before they file a mean-spirited and expensive lawsuit contending that an art gallery isn't an office and therefore isn't a permitted "accessory office use" of my home office which, by the way, is located in a section of Washington that's an officially designated arts zone.

Is this the end? Probably not. But it's a good beginning.

Read the review of their current exhibit by Mark Jenkins in the WaPo here.

The Lilith

"The Lilith." Watercolor on Paper. 7x5 inches matted and framed to 10x8 inches.

Congrats!

To DMV artist Tim Tate, winner of the 2014 Brilliance Award. Details here.

Opportunity for Artomatic 2012 Artists

Artists who participated in Artomatic 2012 are invited to exhibit in Artomatic Takes Flight opening July 25 in The Gallery Walk at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. 

They'll send an email soon with details about the call for entries, online artist registration at noon on May 31, art drop off on the evening of July 18 and the morning of July 21 at the airport, and the reception on July 25.

2015 Maryland Individual Artist Awards

The 2015 Maryland Individual Artist Award guidelines and application are now available. Applicants must be full-time Maryland residents. The funding categories for 2015 include: 

• Non-Classical Music: Composition
• Non-Classical Music: Solo Performance
• Playwriting  
• Visual Arts: Crafts 
• Visual Arts: Photography   

All applications must be submitted online. Applicants can click here  to access the guidelines and application. The deadline for 2015 applications is 4:30 PM on Thursday, July 24, 2014.

The Maryland State Arts Council and Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation will offer three webinars for prospective Individual Artist Award applicants that will:

  

• Address applicant eligibility, discipline categories, and work sample formats;
• Provide instructions on how to complete the online application; and
• Provide information on the submission of digital images for visual artists

Advance registration is required.

To register, please follow the link listed next to your desired webinar date.  

WEBINAR 1: June 19, 2014
2:00 PM - 3:30 PM

https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/533270558 

  

WEBINAR 2: June 21, 2014 

10:00 AM - 11:30 AM 

https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/676216598

WEBINAR 3: June 25, 2014 

10:00 AM - 11:30 AM 

https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/831610854 

  

An instructional video to assist artists with the application process and work sample preparation guide is also available online here. 

Questions about Fellowships or webinar registration?

Please contact Kimberly Steinle-Super at kimberly@midatlanticarts.org 

(e)merge art fair deadline approaching!

(e)merge art fair NOW ACCEPTING GALLERY, 

ARTIST APPLICATIONS ONLINE

The fourth edition of the (e)merge art fair will take place October 2-5, 2014, in Washington, DC, at the Rubell Family’s Capitol Skyline Hotel.

The DC region is home to one of the nation’s wealthiest, youngest, most highly educated populations. (e)merge provides inside access to a rapidly expanding cultural market with immense economic power.

EXHIBITOR PROSPECTUS (CLICK HERE)

ONLINE APPLICATIONS ARE NOW BEING ACCEPTED

GALLERY PLATFORM APPLICATION (CLICK HERE)
The Gallery Platform application deadline is May 30 and notifications will be sent out in June.

Additional information on the EXHIBITOR SERVICES page: CLICK HERE

For additional questions/information: info@emergeartfair.com

In Bethany Beach...

Don't sign your next contract without reading this‏...

Contracts are everywhere. Whether you are a struggling artist, world renowned photographer or a gallery owner, you will be inundated with contracts from art dealers, agents, exhibitors, publishers, ad agencies, museums as well as non-art industry members like landlords and contractors. If contracts are supposed to make sure that both parties fulfill their obligations, then why are there so many …

Read more

Send off Luncheon

The Prince George's African American Museum & Cultural Center at North Brentwood in conjunction with the Museums Connect Program, will host a Luncheon on June 7 from 11:30am to 2pm at the College Park Marriott and Conference Center.

The Luncheon is to honor the teen emissaries from the Museum's Culture Keepers program at the Suitland School for the Visual and Performing Arts who journeyed to Sao Paulo Brazil as part of the Department of State's Museums Connect program.  They will share their trip, the experiences they had and the historical research and art projects they produced with their counterparts in the Afro Museo in Sao Paulo. 

Guests will also enjoy the live Steel Drum music played by young students from Pan Jamboree and the wares of talented Arts District vendors for sale.

Luncheon Tickets will be available on line beginning Monday April 28th on the Museum website at PGAAMCC.ORG.

Luncheon Tickets are $45.00 - They encourage Table sponsors of $450 for groups of 10.  Because so many wish to support the wonderful work of these highly talented students, and they can only accommodate 220 guests, they encourage early ticket purchase.

Local artists are invited to display art work for sale during the luncheon. The cost per table for art displays are $100.

For more information contact: Ms. Tracey Jones, Director of Media and Public Programs at ttjones@pgaamcc.org

ART FAIRS: AN IRRESISTIBLE FORCE IN THE ART WORLD?

Want to go to a panel discussion and reception held by the Fine Arts Committee of the New York State Bar Association Entertainment Arts & Sports Law Section?

Tuesday May, 27th from 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM Followed by a Wine and Cheese Reception 

Are brick and mortar art galleries the loss leaders in an art world, potentially spiraling beyond viable limits? More than ninety art fairs now define the rhythm of globalized art business. This development has profoundly altered the relationships amongst artists, gallerists, and collectors. 
The panel will explore and critique the impacts and challenges – legal, ethical and business – of the rise of art fairs. This is part of an initiative to create dialogue amongst lawyers, artists and emerging and established art professionals working in the primary or secondary markets.

Cost for the event is $15 including reception.
Registration is here. 

Panelists:

Gallerist Elizabeth Dee will report on the chances and risks that the art fairs impose, in light of the ambitious expansion that her gallery has recently embraced and her perspective as co-founder of Independent, New York.

Attorney Richard M. Lehun of Stropheus Art Law will examine the plethora of ethical and business issues that art fair participants confront.

Attorney Nicholas M. O'Donnell, a litigation partner at Sullivan & Worcester LLP, will present on the legal issues that art fairs carry with them.

Gallerist Edward Winkleman will offer an overview of the research he is conducting on art fairs in preparation for his upcoming book "Selling Contemporary Art: How to Navigate the Evolving Market" (Allworth Press).

The panel will be moderated by attorney, educator, mediator, and arbitrator Judith B. Prowda, Faculty at Sotheby’s Institute of Art and author of Visual Arts and the Law: A Handbook for Professionals (Lund Humphries 2013).

Heard on Univision

Every once in a while there's a commercial in Univision, where the voice over (in Spanish of course) has a "fake" accent - that is, the voice over is in Spanish as it would be spoken by a stereotypical American person who has learned Spanish.

But it is not a "real" accent, but a fake accent.

It's rather odd.

Language USA

Details here.

Help Fund Elise's Wedding

So... I've romanced the stone and pulled the first litho proof of this new set of 10 signed and numbered Frida Kahlo portraits. It is matted in a white, pH-balanced acid free museum mat and then framed under glass in an austere black wood frame to a 16x12 inches size. 

Want it? 

Then help fund my daughter Elise Campello's wedding and send her an offer via email and the highest offer by May 25th gets it! As the first proof, this piece is thus unique.

Email her here.

Nazi Art Hoarder Dies: So Who Gets the Art?

Cornelius Gurlitt, the infamous son of a Nazi art dealer, died on Tuesday at the age of 81. Gurlitt shocked the world when German police found 1,280 works from venerated artists like Picasso, Chagall and Matisse, in his Munich apartment, many of which were believed to be stolen Holocaust-era Nazi loot. The German government had been holding the works, researching their provenance in an attempt to return them to their rightful owners but Gurlitt been fighting to have these works returned to his possession. Unless proven otherwise, the works remain Gurlitt’s property. With very little progress made in discovering the provenance of these works, legal pressures had been building to return the works to Gurlitt.

Read the fascinating article here.