Archive for February, 2013
Thursday, February 28th, 2013
ARTNews sat down with the current head of the Tate Modern, Chris Dercon, to discuss his career, overseeing massive additions to the museum, including its new performance space The Tanks, and his personal philosophy to curating. “Today, to be really cool and sexy is to be sharing,” he says. “Inclusivity instead of exclusivity. Let the private collectors in the private museums do the exclusivity game.” He said. (more…)
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Thursday, February 28th, 2013
Since February of 2011, Sotheby’s stock valuation has been on a slow decline, signaling a potential downturn in the global art market. Earnings per share, recorded last year at $2.46, are now down to $1.68, and sales are projected to fall 9.4%, caused in part by a weaker asian market than 2011’s record setting year. Analysts are comparing the current state of the art market to the dot com bubble of the the early 2000’s. “It hearkens back to what the Japanese were doing with buildings in New York in the late 1980s.” says Yale University lecturer Vikram Mansharamani. (more…)
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Thursday, February 28th, 2013
In the face of a $40 Million cut as a result of Congress’s budget stalemate, the Smithsonian Museums are prepared to maintain their normal hours, vowing to find their way around the cuts in more creative ways. The museums will absorb the cuts through delays in maintenance and construction, as well as other internal adjustments. “We think we have a plan that allows us to squeak through to the end of this fiscal year. But we can’t sustain this,” Said Dennis Kelly, Director of the National Zoo. “At the end of the fiscal year, if we’re still in this mode, the entire Smithsonian is going to have to rethink all of our priorities.” (more…)
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Thursday, February 28th, 2013
St. Petersburg’s State Hermitage Museum has been announced as the location for next year’s Manifesta 10 exhibition. The biennial exhibition of contemporary European art will see mark its 20th anniversary, as well as its first version of the event in Russia. “With the arrival of Manifesta, the Hermitage will highlight its traditions: its roots within the epoch of Catherine the Great and her passion for the contemporary art of her time, and the role that the museum’s collections and exhibitions have always played in the artistic life of Russia. We see contemporary art is a natural, albeit intricate, development of these age-old traditions.” Says Hermitage Director Mikhail Piotrovsky. (more…)
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Thursday, February 28th, 2013
The notoriously reclusive painter David Hockney has reportedly snubbed repeated attempts to grant him the Freedom of the British city of Bridlington, where he has lived and worked for many years. Local officials in the East Yorkshire town have also attempted to name a town gallery after him, but abandoned the effort when they could not establish contact. “Unfortunately, we have not been able to obtain any response from Mr Hockney regarding the renaming of a gallery at The Spa or indeed in relation to the granting of the Freedom of Bridlington and I have to conclude therefore that this is something which does not appeal to him.” Said Nigel Pearson, chief executive of Bridlington. (more…)
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Thursday, February 28th, 2013
Julie Mehretu, Mind Breath and Beat Drawings (Installation View), via Marian Goodman
Marian Goodman Gallery in Paris is currently exhibiting a new series of works by painter and illustrator Julie Mehretu. in a show which Mehretu described as a ‘self-ethnographic project,’ involving a dissection of her identity as an artist through a free abstraction of her personal creative practice. The show is Mehretu’s first solo exhibition in France.
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Wednesday, February 27th, 2013
The Brooklyn Museum announced today that it will hold an ambitious retrospective for the secretive art collective Bruce High Quality Foundation this summer. The show, titled Ode To Joy: 2001-2013, will include a broad number of works (“under 17,000″ according to a BHQF representative) from the collective’s decade of creative activity, and will document their ongoing practice of satire, political commentary, and exploration of contemporary America. (more…)
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Wednesday, February 27th, 2013
Following the success of the massive 2011-2012 arts initiative Pacific Standard Time, the J. Paul Getty Trust has announced a follow-up festival, to run in 2017. Titled Los Angeles and Latin America (or L.A./L.A. for short), the show will explore the Latin American ties to the Los Angeles art scene, and the cross-pollination of ideas and cultures as a product of these roots. “The fact that nearly half of the population of Los Angeles has roots in Latin America is so profound that it warrants a major exhibition and research project with accompanying publications,” said Getty Trust head James Cuno. “These are complicated roots, over many generations, and relationships between the U.S. and those antecedent countries have changed considerably over time, so we want to be respectful of those complexities.” (more…)
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Wednesday, February 27th, 2013
Alex Turnbull, a musician and filmmaker who once fronted the British punk band 23 Skidoo, is releasing a documentary chronicling the life of his father, sculptor William Turnbull. Titled Beyond Time, the film details Turnbull’s highly regarded career alongside his family life, as well as his relentless creative drive. “Bill cared if people didn’t like his work,” Alex says. “But do you change what you do if they don’t? No. That was Bill.” (more…)
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Wednesday, February 27th, 2013
Zhang Xiaogang, Beijing Voice (Installation View), Courtesy of PACE Beijing
PACE Beijing is currently exhibiting a selection new works by Chinese painter Zhang Xiaogang, showcasing the artist’s interpretations of Chinese identity, memory and relation. The exhibition, part of PACE’s annual Beijing Voice’s event, is the first stop on the artist’s work in a global tour which will also include PACE exhibitions at their locations in New York and London. (more…)
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Tuesday, February 26th, 2013
Artist Peter Beard’s wife, Nejma Beard, spoke with New York Magazine in its new issue, detailing her efforts to help reclaim his reputation in the art market. Beard, who was a close friend of Andy Warhol, has seen a resurgence in popularity in the last several years, and his wife’s efforts have helped to set new auction records for his work on the open market. “Now that art is almost entirely a commodity,” Peter Beard writes, “I’m glad to be, shall we say, commodious.”
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Tuesday, February 26th, 2013
In an unprecedented move, French President François Hollande has cleared Édouard Manet’s 1863 painting Olympia to leave the French capital for the first time since it was given to the nation in 1890. The painting will travel to Venice for this year’s Biennale, where it will sit beside Titian’s The Venus of Urbino, which itself is legally unable to leave Italy. “We want to show how Italian cultural models influenced Manet,” says Guy Cogeval, director at the Musée D’Orsay, where the Manet masterpiece has been on view for over 100 years.
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Tuesday, February 26th, 2013
After announcing the construction of a performance dome in the Rockaways this spring, MoMA PS1 has taken more steps to aid in the New York neighborhood’s relief, calling for video proposals on how to create a sustainable waterfront. Twenty-five proposals will be selected by a panel including Klaus Biesenbach, Niklas Maak, and Hans Ulrich Obrist among others, and presented at the new dome in the Rockaways this April. (more…)
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Tuesday, February 26th, 2013
Angus Fairhurst, Un-titled (Installation View) via Sadie Coles HQ
Sadie Coles HQ‘s current exhibition by the late Angus Fairhurst (1966-2008), Un-titled, explores notions of “doing and undoing, absence and presence, thinking and feeling.” Culling from Fairhurst’s broad body of sculpture, painting, collage and photography, the show is a testament to the artist’s brief but impressive output.
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Monday, February 25th, 2013
Trevor Paglen at Metro Pictures (Installation View), via Metro Pictures
American artist, geographer, and author Trevor Paglen’s first solo exhibition at Metro Pictures has opened this month, a selection of large color prints and black-and-white diptychs related to his ongoing project, The Last Pictures. Compiling a striking collection of photographs from across the wide spectrum of human experience, Paglen creates a static document of mankind, flung into the Earth’s orbit.
Trevor Paglen opening at Metro Pictures (Installation View), via Daniel Creahan for ArtObserved
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Sunday, February 24th, 2013
It was 100 years ago this week that the first Armory Show brought the avant-garde of Europe to the United States, turning conceptions of painting and art-making on its ear. Lasting only four weeks, the show offered American art-goers some of the first glimpses of work by Picasso, Edvard Munch, Duchamp, and many more. (more…)
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Sunday, February 24th, 2013
Aki Sasamoto, Talking in Circles Talking (Installation View), via Soloway Gallery
“My grandfather died when I was fourteen and became an abacus. In the way ice turns into water, he became this object he left behind.” So begins the performance of Japanese artist Aki Sasamoto’s Talking in Circles Talking, an immersive performance and installation at Soloway Gallery in South Williamsburg. Exploring the notions of value and vibrancy at play in the space between human relationships and physical objects, Sasamoto effectively fuses personal discourses with her surrounding environment.
Aki Sasamoto, Talking in Circles Talking (Installation View), via Soloway Gallery (more…)
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Saturday, February 23rd, 2013
In a new twist, New York’s now defunct Knoedler Gallery, which has faced several lawsuits in the past few years for selling forged works attributed to Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and others, is now being sued by its investor David Mirvish for failing to sell two authentic works. The gallery shut down after allegations of selling a fake Pollock for $17 million came to light, effectively breaching an agreement between Mirvish and the gallery to sell two Pollock masterpieces. “David Mirvish, one of the world’s foremost art collectors, fervently believes in the authenticity of the works and is determined to receive that to which he is entitled,” said Mirvish’s lawyer, Nicholas Gravante Jr. (more…)
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Saturday, February 23rd, 2013
Christie’s Deputy Chair Amy Cappellazzo appeared on Bloomberg TV this week, discussing the weeklong online auction of works by Andy Warhol to benefit the Warhol Foundation, as well as sharing some of her favorite works from the auction. “There’s a very beautiful 60’s unique print of Marilyn Monroe’s lips, which I think is just spectacular.” She says. (more…)
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Saturday, February 23rd, 2013
Vanity Fair Magazine sat down with curator and dealer Vito Schnabel (son of artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel), to talk about finding his way into the art world, his recently opened group show “White Collar Crimes” at Acquavella Galleries, and his practice as a curator: “It’s very personal; it’s just what I like and what I’m drawn to and what I get enthusiastic or excited about, and what I feel like working with or putting my time into.” (more…)
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Friday, February 22nd, 2013
Billionaire hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen has donated a selection of works to the Museum of Modern Art, including paintings by Cy Twombly, Ed Ruscha and Martin Kippenberger. The gifts come while Cohen is currently under investigation by the U.S. Government for allegations of insider trading. (more…)
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Thursday, February 21st, 2013
Sarah Lucas, Sitation Classic Pervery (Installation View), via Sadie Coles
In February 2012, Sarah Lucas opened her first Situation exhibition in a project space above Sadie Coles headquarters in Burlington Place. This was the beginning of a project that Lucas has continued as curator and artist ever since. Her most recent installation, Situation Classic Pervery, was a continuation of this project.
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Thursday, February 21st, 2013
The rapidly skyrocketing rent prices in New York’s Chelsea neighborhood is driving out many of the galleries that brought the area to prominence a few years earlier. The neighborhood’s rapid growth has attracted a number of high-profile clients that have caused fierce competition over much higher rent prices, and middle-sized galleries are feeling the pinch. “The mid-range galleries are going to just vanish from Chelsea,” says gallerist Magdalena Sawon of Postmasters Gallery, effectively eliminating “anything radical or experimental.” (more…)
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Thursday, February 21st, 2013
26 Years after his death, the art market for American painter Jean-Michel Basquiat is at an all-time high, with the artist’s works totaling over $161 million in sales last year. According to online art database ArtNet’s index generation system, his remarkable growth puts him in the top 10 artists by volume sold in 2012, and gives his work a sell through rate of 85%. (more…)
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