Best opportunity to catch up on the latest international art buzz

Last year, new British art made the scandal sheets by outraging New Yorkers when it was shown at the Brooklyn Museum. But months before that, many of the same artists seen in the Big Apple were part of a show right here in the Mile High City. Unlike the exhibit in New York, Contemporary British Artists came and went at the Denver Art Museum without raising nary an eyebrow. Before politics distracted us from the primary aesthetic experience, it was possible to see the work of British youth, from the notorious Damien Hirst to the cerebral Jason Martin, just like back East. Also in the show, which was organized by DAM curator Dianne Vanderlip in collaboration with former assistant curator Jane Fudge, were many older artists -- notably the neo-pop pair Gilbert and George. The show was clearly one of the best -- and obviously one of the most timely -- of a raft of British Invasion shows the DAM has put on in the past few years.