Sunday, July 31st, 2011
The NYTimes on the relationship between the Met Museum and its new acquisition of the Marcel Breuer building, home to the Whitney Museum of Art [AO Newslink]
Archive for July, 2011
Sunday, July 31st, 2011
Gagosian Gallery quietly releases info on its representation of the visual art of recording legend Bob Dylan [AO Newslink]
Go See – Beijing: Lucian Freud and David Dawson at Faurschou Beijing until August 14th, 2011
Saturday, July 30th, 2011
David Dawson, David and Eli in progress, 2004
The relationship between master and apprentice is evident in the works from painter Lucian Freud and his assistant David Dawson now on view at Faurschou Beijing through August 14th. Dawson has worked as Freud’s assistant since 1991 and has been one of the few people allowed to photograph Freud in his studio as he works. The exhibitions pairs Freud’s painting David & Eli, (2003-04) with ten photos taken by Dawson at Freud’s studio between 2004 to 2006.
Installation view of Lucian Freud and David Dawson at Faurschou Beijing
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Saturday, July 30th, 2011
Banksy iPhone App available for mapping all known Banksy works [AO Newslink]
AO On Site – NY: 'Ai Weiwei: New York Photographs 1983-1993,' at Asia Society through August 14th, 2011
Friday, July 29th, 2011
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Ai Weiwei, Washington Square Park Protest (1988), all photos courtesy of Three Shadows Photography Art Centre and Chambers Fine Art, via Asia Society.
Art Observed was on site at the Asia Society’s Ai Weiwei retrospective, which comprises over 200 photographs taken by the artist in some of his most pivotal years. Between 1983 and 1993, Weiwei documented protests of system, political, gender, and artistic. The show is a collection of black and white photographs, numbered simply and elegantly. The titles are Weiwei’s own, scrawled at the bottom of each piece. A visitor follows Weiwei through his life in the East Village. “New York Photographs” chronicles Weiwei’s interest in transformations, as they manifest through the artist’s perspective, and closes August 14.
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Ai Weiwei, Robert Frank & Allen Ginsberg (1989)
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AO On Site Photoset – New York: “Ostalgia” at The New Museum through September 25th, 2011
Thursday, July 28th, 2011All images installation views from “Ostalgia” at The New Museum, courtesy of Ian Hassett for Art Observed.
AO was on site for the opening of The New Museum‘s “Ostalgia”, curated by Massimiliano Gioni. Named after the German noun for longing and the noun for East, Ost, this group show presents a plethora of artworks created under the structure of the erstwhile Soviet Union; during its subsequent downfall in the late 1980s-early 1990s; or during the sociopolitical, economic, and ethnic readjustment in Eastern Europe after the late communist integration was shattered. Comprised of work by an intergenerational roster of both eastern and western artists, “Ostalgia” attains a particular interplay of perspectives, modeling the navigation of the galleries’ spaces after a combination of geographical and chronological elements inherent in the works; where the questions imply the answers, and the fleeting memories dissolve and reemerge in a myriad of revisitations and documentations.
More story and images after the jump…
Wednesday, July 27th, 2011
Augmented Reality App replaces billboard ads with art, will feature street artists Ron English, John Fekner, PosterBoy, Doctor D and Ox [AO Newslink]
AO On Site – London: ‘Jake or Dinos Chapman’ at White Cube Mason’s Yard and Hoxton through September 17th, 2011
Wednesday, July 27th, 2011
All images installation views of Jake or Dinos Chapman at White Cube, 2011. Courtesy Coco Bayley for Art Observed.
Jake and Dinos Chapman – The Chapman Brothers – reinstated themselves in the London art scene last week, across the twoWhite Cube galleries. Both the Mason’s Yard and Hoxton gallery spaces are used in this double act, double venue exhibition. The show, Jake or Dinos Chapman, runs from the 15th of July to September 17th and is alarmingly extensive. The brothers are infamous for their elaborate teasing, deliberate vulgarity, and mocking of aestheticism- this show is no different. However, for the White Cube exhibition, Jake and Dinos Chapman, who have consistently worked together professionally and are known as a gruesome twosome double act, have this year separated and worked alone. Using different studio spaces, they have been working independently on the content of this exhibition, only having revealed their pieces to one another a few weeks ago.
More text and images after the jump…
AO On Site – New York: Performance by Mykki Blanco & Pablo Picasso at The Journal Gallery, Brooklyn, Saturday July 23rd, 2011
Tuesday, July 26th, 2011
Pablo Picasso plays at The Journal Gallery, all images by Stefan Idowu-Bello for ArtObserved
On Saturday night, Art Observed was on site at The Journal Gallery in Williamsburg for a night which began with a poetry reading from New York based poet, Michael David Quattlebaum Jr., (who goes by Mykki Blanco) who read from his debut book ‘From the Silence of Duchamp to the Noise of Boys.’ The poems are a personal retrospective of the author questioning his rebellious youth, which lead to him running away, and eventually finding a spiritual awakening in New York. Mykki Blanco embraced the sweltering city heat by standing bare chested in front of the crowd, wearing only a floral floor length skirt and a complimentary flower behind his ear.
more images and text after the jump…
Monday, July 25th, 2011
Dasha Zhukova, partner of über-collector Roman Abramovich, head of Garage Center, Moscow, to launch fashion-art magazine in September called ‘Garage’ [AO Newslink]
Go See – London: Takashi Murakami at Gagosian Gallery Britannia Street through August 5th
Monday, July 25th, 2011Currently on view at Gagosian‘s Britannia Street gallery in London is an exhibit of recent paintings and sculptures by Takashi Murakami. The artist is renowned for his “Super-flat” style which employs traditional Japanese painting techniques and compositions to create a mixture of historical and contemporary subject with elements of animé, Pop, and otaku content within a flattened representational picture-plane. In these new works he presents his ambivalence over the legacy of cosmopolitan painter Kuroda Seiki, an artist known for bringing yÅga or Western-style painting to Japan durin the Meiji period.
More text and images after the jump…
Go See – Zurich: “Vignettes of Life” by Rodney Graham at Hauser and Wirth through July 30th
Monday, July 25th, 2011
Rodney Graham, The Green Cinematograph (2011), via Hauser and Wirth
Currently on view at Hauser and Wirth is Vignettes of Life, an exhibition of major new works by Canadian artist Rodney Graham. Featuring three new monumental light boxes and one film, the artist disguises himself as a series a motley characters and thus fuses with various art forms, genres and personae. Graham is known for examining the complexities of Western culture by artistically appropriating certain subject matter working with such diverse media as photography, film, installation, music and text.
Rodney Graham, The Green Cinematopgraph (2010), via Hauser and Wirth
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Go See – London: “New Paintings and Sculptures” by Yayoi Kusa at Victoria Miro through July 29th, 2011
Monday, July 25th, 2011Currently on view at Victoria Miro Gallery is New Paintings and Sculptures by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. The works on display reveal the artist’s preoccupation with the infinite and the sublime through giant sculptures of colorful tulips, dogs, a doll, a pumpkin and self-portraits. Kusama employs repetitive and playful patterns, a technique the artist has used since her earliest works dating back to the 1950s. Incorporating pop aesthetics within surreal renditions of everyday natural environment, the works recreate a dream-like landscape. Victoria Miro presents the artist’s surreal and imaginative creations. Located inside and outside the gallery, they set forth an altered and otherworldly reality to be determined by the spectator.
More text and images after the jump…
Sunday, July 24th, 2011
NY Times reports on Doug Aitken’s exploration of alienation in the modern age in new installation “Black Mirror,” featuring Chloë Sevigny [AO Newslink]
Go See – Paris: Joe Bradley’s “Duckling Fantasy” at Almine Rech through July 30th, 2011
Sunday, July 24th, 2011
Joe Bradley, Duckling Fantasy (2011) installation view, courtesy Almine Rech.
Joe Bradley’s “Duckling Fantasy†is currently on show at Paris’s Almine Rech Gallery. The exhibition consists of new, somewhat large-scale paintings from oil, oil sticks and pencils, that continue Bradley’s interest in color and dirt.
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Saturday, July 23rd, 2011
The Economist: Asia accounts for quarter of global auction revenue, “lion’s share is made up of art,” painting is most desirable medium [AO Newslink]
Saturday, July 23rd, 2011
New York’s Metropolitan Museum announces record attendance (5.6 million), fiscal year includes blockbuster exhibitions “Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty” and Picasso [AO Newslink]
Saturday, July 23rd, 2011
Gagosian Gallery now represents critically acclaimed Chinese painter Zeng Fanzhi [AO Newslink]
Go See – New York: Willem de Kooning ‘The Figure: Movement and Gesture’ at Pace, through July 29, 2011
Saturday, July 23rd, 2011
Willem de Kooning, via The Pace Gallery.
Midtown New York’s Pace Gallery is hosting its first exhibition of art by Willem de Kooning, of which it gained exclusive representation in the fall. Like much of the late artist’s own work, “The Figure: Movement and Gesture” is focused on and around the human body, as it is translated by different methods and techniques of representation. The show closes on July 29.
More text and images after the jump…
Friday, July 22nd, 2011
Leigh Morse, director of Salander-O’Reilly Galleries, dealer for Robert DeNiro (who testified), to serve prison sentence and pay $1.65 million restitution for fraud [AO Newslink]
Friday, July 22nd, 2011
Emmanuel Perrotin, dealer of Murakami, Cattelan, on taking risks: “People imagine it must be easy for me now, but every day is more difficult…you’re still only as good as your last show” [AO Newslink]
AO Breaking News – Obituary and News Summary: Lucian Freud dies at the age of 88 in London
Thursday, July 21st, 2011This Wednesday, Lucian Freud passed away in his London home at the age of 88. According to Mr. Freud’s dealer, William Acquavella of Acquavella Galleries, Freud suffered a brief illness before his death. Freud’s career is characterized by his thickly-painted portraits of friends and family, which brought forward and repositioned the genre of portraiture in the twentieth century.
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