Far from London's beaten tourist track, a group of visitors is staring keenly at the graffiti-covered gates to an abandoned construction site.

Their guide, Karim Samuels, points out the black-and-white images of two young faces, and behind them, a piece of street art by Britain's most famous and enigmatic street artist, Banksy.

The high-end art market is weathering Europe's economic storm, with London auctions this week netting more than 280 million pounds ($440 million) as international bidders snapped up high-profile works.

Sales of Impressionist, modern and surrealist art at rival auctioneers Christie's and Sotheby's saw several pre-sale estimates shattered.

Ayyam London launched at its new location at 143 New Bond Street on 25 January 2013, the solo exhibition of work, Shooting the Cloud, by influential Lebanese artist and architect Nadim Karam, a press release said Thursday.

Renowned for his public art and work in urban regeneration, Nadim Karam’s exhibition at Ayyam London compromised a series of new paintings, rich in color and presented a playful, almost satirical, perception of love and war.

French President Francois Hollande on Wednesday presented France's highest honor, the Legion of honor, to World Jewish Congress chief Ronald Lauder, praising him as "a man of peace, culture and commitment".

"Since 2007, you have been the president of the World Jewish Congress, which brings together representatives of Jewish communities from 100 countries, you criss-cross the world and you carry a message of tolerance and peace," Hollande said in a ceremony at the Elysee Palace in Paris, where he bestowed the medal on the American.

Hundreds of millions of people across China are squeezing into packed train carriages and buses to travel home for the Lunar New Year, in the world's largest annual movement of people.

A total of 3.4 billion trips will be made over the holiday period, official media estimates, including hundreds of millions of migrant workers in booming cities who journey to the countryside to spend the season with their families.

U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Maura Connelly visited Tyre yesterday to promote the protection of cultural property and visit project sites under the Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation, the U.S. embassy said on Wednesday.

During her visit, she met with the Mayor of Tyre, Hasan Dbouq, the head of the Union of Tyre Region Municipalities, Abdul Mohsen al-Husseini, Dr. Ali Khalil Badawi, Director of Antiquities for South Lebanon with the Ministry of Culture, and members of the Tyre Municipal Council.

The writers of the Beat Generation, who shocked America with their bohemian lifestyles and upended literature half a century ago, are celebrated in a new photo exhibit by one of their most famous members, Allen Ginsberg.

The New York exhibition, "Beat Memories, the photographs of Allen Ginsberg," comes just after the release of the movie "On the Road," which has received generally good reviews for its dramatization of Jack Kerouac's famous 1957 book of the same name.

A portrait of Pablo Picasso's lover Marie-Therese Walter sold in London on Tuesday night for £28.6 million ($45.0 million, 33.3 million euros), Southeby's auction house said.

The colourful and curvaceous "Femme assise pres d'une fenetre" (Woman sitting by a window), painted in 1932, was sold at a crowded salesroom to an anonymous telephone buyer, a Sotheby's spokesman said.

A replica of Michelangelo's Renaissance sculpture David that was erected suddenly last summer is unnerving residents of a Japanese town, with some calling for the naked masterpiece to be given underpants.

Okuizumo town in western Shimane prefecture received five-metre (16-foot) replicas of David and of Greek treasure the Venus de Milo, as donations from a businessman who hails from the area.

Parents in education-obsessed South Korea spent 19 trillion won ($17.4 billion) on extra classes for their children last year, seeking any edge in the hugely competitive race for a coveted college place.

The 2012 figure, published by the education ministry on Wednesday, includes cost for after-hour cram schools, private tutoring or online courses, and was equivalent to about 1.5 percent of the country's gross domestic product.