Monster Mash: Norton Simon painting still questioned; UCLA faculty fight back; Riccardo Muti takes new post

 -- Court ruling: The rightful ownership of a work of art depicting Adam and Eve, currently at the Norton Simon Museum, is still up in the air despite a court decision Wednesday on art that was looted during the Holocaust.

-- Rallying point: UCLA faculty have launched an online campaign to save the university's arts library from the chopping block.

-- Creative gathering: The India Art Summit, the country's largest contemporary art fair, is without  one of India's most famous painters due to fears of attacks by Hindu extremists.  

-- Cutting back: Christie's reportedly has abandoned plans to start an art-investment fund and lending division.

-- Star turns: John Lithgow and Jennifer Ehle will star in a new play by Douglas Carter Beane opening February at New York's Second Stage Theatre.

-- In the works: Architect Santiago Calatrava discusses his plans for the new transportation hub at New York's Ground Zero site.

-- Moonlighting: Conductor Riccardo Muti will take the top spot at Rome's opera house while continuing to serve as music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

-- Something different: Novelist Margaret Atwood has created a one-hour theatrical production as part of her new book tour.

-- Art controversy: Scholars are denouncing a new stash of Frida Kahlo paintings as fakes.

-- Flexibility: The Sacramento Ballet has found creative ways to deal with the economic recession.

-- Live forever: The trailer for the upcoming movie "Fame" is now online.

-- David Ng

Photo: A gallery at Norton Simon Museum. Credit: Al Seib / Los Angeles Times