This is the year that ARTINFO's art news and gossip blog IN THE AIR kicked into overdrive, churning out posts at a faster rate than a studio full of assistants doing Damien Hirst's spot paintings. While we had a tough time picking favorites among this year's 1,800-something blog stories (!), we spotted 10 especially colorful and unique posts that merit another gander. Here, then, are our picks for the best of the year, from the ridiculous to the sublime:

BEST ADVICE: "10 Pieces of Advice for Artists From Jerry Saltz’s Keynote Speech at Expo Chicago"

Native Chicagoan and New York magazine art critic Jerry Saltz gave the keynote address at the inaugural Expo Chicago art fair, and our own Julia Halperin was on hand to boil his advice down to its essentials. These range from the inspirational ("Don’t define success by money, but by time") to the cautionary ("Envy will eat you alive"). Incidentally, this is also one of the very few blog posts we know of that has been transformed into a work of art all its own (William Powhida did his own take on Halperin's version of Saltz's speech, and it was shown at the recent Seven art fair in Miami).

BEST LIST: "Top 10 Names for Larry Gagosian’s Forthcoming Upper East Side Eatery"

After learning that mega-dealer Larry Gagosian was planning to open a restaurant at 980 Madison Avenue, the building that houses his gallery's Upper East Side location, we offered him 10 possible, pun-filled names for said establishment, including "Rachel Whitebread" if a bakery, and a Jewish deli called "Carsten Challah."

MOST HATED: "Damien Hirst’s Giant Nude Statue Ready for Public Installation Despite Locals’ Complaints"

The inhabitants of Devonshire's seaside town of Ilfracombe were inexplicably unenamored with Damien Hirst's 70-foot-tall statue of a nude pregnant woman brandishing a sword with her inner organs and fetus exposed when it was installed at the water's edge in October. Citizen complaints to the town council deeming it "inappropriate, a monstrosity, tasteless, ugly, vulgar and not in good taste," among other things, and our commentors seemed to agree.

WEIRDEST: "Winterthur Museum Recovers Rare 18th-Century Snuff Box it Had Lost"

Though we were not alerted when it first went missing, the explosive news of the Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library's recovery of an 18th-century silver snuff box (found in a place "where it had not previously been") was met with a profound collective sigh of relief.

MOST CONTROVERSIAL: "Resurrected M. Wells Diner Opens at MOMA PS1 Tomorrow"

Though the news of the beloved Long Island City diner M. Wells's reopening at MoMA PS1 wasn't controversial in itself, readers took exception to the menu's inclusion of horse meat steak tartare, leaving a whopping 77 comments including one from horse trainer Trish Jones, who wrote: "I am a horse trainer and I agree horsemeat should be considered unsafe to eat."

BEST CORRECTION: "Site of Julius Caesar’s Assassination Found"

While recounting the discovery by a team of Spanish researchers of the exact spot at the Torre Argentina archaeological site where Gaius Julius Caesar was assassinated, we briefly and incorrectly claimed that his killer, Marc Antony, had appeared alongside Marlon Brando in the 1953 film "Julius Caesar," leading us to add the following clarification: "Marc Antony could not have appeared in the film as he had passed away in August 30 BCE."

BEST CELEBRITY: "Usher Buys a Louis Vuitton Waffle-Maker as New Fair The Miami Project Sees Strong Sales"

This year's Art Basel Miami Beach week was filled with news of celebrities' art purchases, but none of them demonstrated the fine taste exhibited by R&B singer Usher, who bought Andrew Lewicki’s “Louis Vuitton Waffle Maker” (2012) from the Charlie James Gallery booth at the Miami Project.

MOST VIRAL: "Watch Clayton Cubitt’s So-Called “Art Videos” of Women Having Orgasms While Reading"

While not entirely unexpected (the internet, after all, is first and foremost a vehicle for the dissemination of adult entertainment), readers' unceasing interest in video artist Clayton Cubitt's "Hysterical Literature" series — in which women read aloud from books until, due to the activities of an unseen agent working underneath their table, they have orgasms — was genuinely, um, breath-taking.

BEST CATS: "Mice at the Museum: Meet the Hermitage Museum’s 65 Feline Guards, Now With Video!"

In our unending quest to chronicle the animal kingdom's contributions to the art world, no creatures have come across more nobly than the team of 65 cats that patrols the State Hermitage Museum in a never-ending campaign to rid the venerable institution of mice.

BEST "BEAST JESUS": "Feast Your Eyes on This Chocolatey 'Beast Jesus' Cake"

The biggest (art) meme of 2012 — amateur art restorer Cecilia Gímenez's comically poor restoration of a 19th-century fresco titled "Ecce Homo" — took many forms, but none managed to be simultaneously delicious and repulsive so well as the terrifying "Beast Jesus" cake that was served at a Halloween party.

*** BONUS *** BEST DONALD FRAZELL COMMENT: "Breaking: L.A. MOCA Will Not Replace Paul Schimmel as Chief Curator"

Without a doubt IN THE AIR's most prolific commenter, artist and internaut Donald Frazell (or "D. Frizz," as we call him around the office) penned some real zingers this year — and more than his share of inexplicable rants about "contempt art" — but none was nearly as funny as his answer to the rhetorical question, "How many curators does it take to hang a piece?" on a story about the Los Angeles MOCA-Paul Schimmel debacle.

For more breaking art news throughout the day and year, 
check ARTINFO's In the Air blog.