Iz The Wiz, a graffiti legend since the 1970s, died of heart failure in Florida last night. He started in NYC and went all-world. Blogue has details and a retrospective of his art.

A street artist in Russia was arrested by the secret service, interrogated, and beaten after he made this piece showing Vladimir Putin as a woman. In Russia, politicians, cops, and vandals are all equally insane criminal badasses. [via Daily Mail]

One of the most popular pieces at Art Basel this week? A work by Takashi Murakami and Pharrell Williams featuring "a miniature ketchup bottle, a can of Pepsi, a pair of sneakers, a cupcake, a condom, a bag of Doritos and a bottle of Johnson & Johnson baby lotion," all of which are made out of gold and "encrusted with 26,000 inlaid diamonds, rubies, sapphires and emeralds" that had been supplied by imprisoned bling king, Jacob the Jeweler. The piece ended up selling for $2 million to two collectors who intend "to share it." So, yes, there really is someone out there who is the proud new owner of half of a jewel-encrusted bag of Doritos. Congrats? [NYT, Marketwatch]

Hello, it's a big new art show by zillionaire street artist Banksy, an artist who does not suck—his first show since his crazy robot monkey show in NYC last year. Let's look, shall we?

Who taught 89-year-old neo-Nazi killer James Von Brunn how to use the internet? Isn't it weird how much of a net presence he had, for a century-old lunatic? We have his (surprisingly postmodern) art and his weird forum posts.

Based on the VIP preview yesterday and the early round of sales today, it looks like Art Basel is not, repeat not, going to tank thanks to the craphole global economy. The Art Newspaper reports that spirits are high, big-name buyers such as Steve Schwarzman, Wilbur Ross, and Eli Broad are all on hand and ready to buy, and the art is the best it's been all year. "I'm not saying the bull market is back," says Sandy Heller, the art adviser who caters to art-collecting tycoons like hedge funder Steve Cohen. "But I'm saying the art market needed a good fair and this is it." Heck, Brad Pitt dropped a mil on a Neo Rauch painting yesterday.

It seems a handful of downtown art galleries have decided to close up for the summer "to take advantage of the downturn and its lower rents," and plan to simply pick up where they left off and resume operations in the fall. Now there's an idea for those of you who are bored out of your minds at the office and would love nothing more than to take a really long vacation and return to work in September:

Pancake painter-to-the-stars Dan Lacey has completed yet another work of art suggested by you, the celebrisexually-obsessed readers of this blog. Today: Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford wrestle nude, on a pancake. You can buy this thing!

These posters were plastered over some Faile art in an unidentified city: "Kill Bill: A Roaring Rampage of Revenge. The Feel Good Movie of the Year." Bill: ranting about these on air will only add to their powers of attraction.

In a shocking breach of the integrity (ahem) his fans have come to depend upon, it turns out Perez Hilton might not have phallically doodled on celebrity pictures alone. He uses one or more ghost writer/sploogers. And he might have been a secret.

We knew Michael Gross's exposé of the Metropolitan Museum of Art would ruffle feathers. It's juicy stuff, clearly. But we didn't expect it would be banned. But that's what seems to be happening. The Independent reports that Amazon's British arm has stopped selling Gross's Rogues' Gallery "for fear of action from a libel tourist," namely Annette de la Renta, the museum vice chair and wife of designer Oscar de la Renta, who has threatened Gross with a libel suit. The ban isn't limited to foreign retail outlets, however.

This is an oil painting, by Scottish artist Peter Howson, that a nude Madonna and her now ex-husband Guy Ritchie sat for back in 2005. It is being auctioned off in Glasgow, and is expected to go for some £22,000. Image via Getty.

Want to meet Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor?

The Way We Live Now: Moaning, creatively. Artists are poor. More so! But credit cards are now a responsible financial option. I think we've solved all of our problems!

[A visitor attends a press preview for the new exhibit "Francis Bacon: A Centenary Retrospective," opening May 20th at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. The collection celebrates the British artist's 100th birthday; image Getty]

The Way We Live Now: Sick of it all. You work and work to stay positive and then one day you come across some superrich asshole whose yacht's decorated in endangered animal skins. Screw it.

Christie's auction of postwar and contemporary art last night turned out to be a considerably more upbeat affair compared to the mood at Sotheby's lackluster sale on Tuesday. The Christie's event roped in $93.7 million, a little bit less than the $104.5 million high estimate, and only five of 54 works failed to find buyers. And Larry Gagosian continued his shopping spree. The dealer beat out two other bidders for Lichtenstein’s "Frolic," paying $6 million, a new record price for the artist. [NYT]

Hedge fund manager Dan Loeb hasn't had the easiest time as of late. Heavy losses forced him to dismiss a number of employees at the end of 2008 and the $5 billion he managed a year ago had dwindled to $1.8 billion last month. But Loeb is nothing if not crafty and he's since come up with a handful of way to cut costs and raise cash. He started renting out his jet on an hourly basis a few months ago, and he put an extra $5.5 million in his pocket when he sold off his carriage house in the West Village back in March. And now he's done it again.

Peter Brant is in the middle of a messy divorce with his wife Stephanie Seymour. But that didn't keep him from the opening party for his new private museum this past weekend. A long list of art world A-listers headed over to his 53-acre estate in Greenwich on Saturday to have a look around The Brant Foundation Art Study Center. (And despite all the personal drama as of late, Brant looked "dashingly handsome," according to the Journal.) Seymour wasn't present, naturally. Not physically, at least. But guests walking around the space did get to see Maurizio Cattelan's sculpture of a naked Seymour clutching her breasts, which, as the WSJ's Jeffrey Podolsky observes, "pokes out like a pair of deer's antlers over the fireplace" in Brant's library. He's not kidding. The rather striking piece of art that Brant will always have to remember Seymour by is below.

We noted those stickers going up around town with timely phrases like "Enjoy Subprime Lending" and "Enjoy Credit Crunch" a few months ago. It's still unclear who's responsible for the guerrilla art campaign. An interview with "EnjoyBanking," one of the people involved, says it's the work of "a diverse cross-section of talent from New York's creative economy—visual artists, writers, economists, photographers, historians, musicians, and filmmakers." But additional cities will be getting stickers of their own soon, and a website dedicated to the project—enjoybanking.com—launches in June. [Art21.org via AnimalNY]