A new rule in Venice will block temporary and pop-up exhibitions from running the full length of the Venice Biennale, Art Newspaper reports. (more…)
A Boston man has admitted to stealing several Andy Warhol works and selling fake versions online. “The buyer removed the paintings’ frames and found no Warhol Foundation authentication stamps and noticed that the canvasses and staples looked new,” prosecutors said. (more…)
The NYT visits The Met’s Alice Neel exhibition this week with Jeff Neal, who the artist painted as a child for a work now on view in the show. “I always thought it was going to come back to me,” Mr. Neal said. “I would dream about it, and then I would ask Allen about it. He said, ‘No, hadn’t heard anything.’ I would see her on the news and say, ‘Wow, I wonder what happened to my painting.’” (more…)
Oscar Tuazon, Natural Man (2015/2021), via Luhring Augustine
Currently on view at Luhring Augustine’s Tribeca exhibition space, artist Oscar Tuazon has compiled a presentation of all new sculptural works, united under the title PEOPLE. Continuing Tuazon’s investigation of hybridized forms and construction through fusions of natural material and human technological developments, the show pushes fusions of minimalist abstraction and natural elements, making up a series of constantly changing morphologies and addressing notions of the natural systems of growth and decay. (more…)
The New Museum has announced the latest iteration of its Triennial, postponed until October due to the pandemic. Organized by Margot Norton, the Allen and Lola Goldring curator at the New Museum, and Jamilah James, the senior curator of The Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, the show is titled Soft Water Hard Stone, borrowed from a Brazilian proverb about perseverance: “soft water on hard stone hits until it bores a hole.” (more…)
After years of complaints and critiques, the city of Venice has finally banned cruise ships from docking in the lagoon. “It’s a fair decision that has been awaited for years: the Council of Ministers approves a decree that establishes that the final landing of big ships in Venice must be outside the lagoon, as requested by Unesco,” says culture minister Dario Franceschini. (more…)
John McCracken, Untitled (Red Block) (1966), via David Zwirner
Currently on view at its uptown exhibition space, David Zwirner is presenting an exhibition of works by William Eggleston and John McCracken, the first time the artists have been featured together, through a selection of works that explore color and light in their respective artistic visions. Expressing a natural interest in the forms and lines of the American landscape through documentation and precise geometries, the show is a fascinating exploration of the pair’s respective aesthetic visions.
William Eggleston and John McCracken, True Stories (Installation View), via David Zwirner
The NYT visits the Canal Street Research Association this week, a project on Canal Street that has served as a home for a series of exhibitions and performances during its short run. “When we first walked past, we were like, oh my God, there’s a Relational art project,” said Tom Finkelpearl, the city’s former commissioner of cultural affairs. (more…)
Cory Arcangel, /roʊˈdeɪoʊ/ Let’s Play: HOLLYWOOD (2017-21), via Greene Naftali
Over the past two decades, few artists have taken such a continuously engaging pathway through the history and culture of digital media in all of its forms in the same manner as Cory Arcangel. Hacking into the systems and software that define our networked lives, he introduces glitches and misfires that reveal the perils of technological dependence. For his debut solo exhibition at Greene Naftali, he continues this practice, amplifying and enhancing themes he has honed over two decades, using the structures and social mores of digital platforms as his primary artistic material.
Cory Arcangel, /roʊˈdeɪoʊ/ Let’s Play: HOLLYWOOD (2017-21), via Greene Naftali
A piece in the NYT this week asks if the current fascination with NFTs is actually a bubble ready to burst. “We’re in a frenzy of speculation. I don’t know how long these prices will be sustainable,” says Robert Norton, head of blockchain art company Verisart. “We’re living in a moment of collective hysteria.” (more…)
Matthew Ronay, Eight Tissues One Hand (2020), via Miguel Abreu
In 2007, at its location at 36 Orchard, Miguel Abreu Gallery mounted Regroup Show, an exhibition meant to highlight the then burgeoning scene of artists showing together and side by side in the Lower East Side. Exploring the diverse modes of working and broad range of expressive capacities of this talented group, the show was a striking inquiry into just how one might understand shared space, and sharing space.
The Getty Museum announced that it has acquired a painting by Artemisia Gentileschi from an undisclosed seller. The work will go on view when The Getty reopens to the public. (more…)
Showing the stark drop in attendance caused by Covid, the annual Art Newspaper museum attendance report shows a 77% drop in attendance at the world’s 100 most- visited art museums. (more…)
The US 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Friday that Andy Warhol did not make fair use of a Lynn Goldsmith’s portrait of Prince when he produced his own series of images of the musician. “The Prince Series retains the essential elements of its source material, and Warhol’s modifications serve chiefly to magnify some elements of that material and minimize others,” wrote Judge Gerald Lynch. “While the cumulative effect of those alterations may change the Goldsmith Photograph in ways that give a different impression of its subject, the Goldsmith Photograph remains the recognizable foundation upon which the Prince Series is built.” (more…)
The sale of a Banksy work depicting a child playing with a superhero nurse has raised £16.7m for UK health services. “As a charitable gift it ensures our staff have a say in how money is spent to benefit them, our patients and our community and is a fantastic way to thank and reward them for the sacrifices they’ve made,” says David French, interim chief executive officer of University Hospital Southampton Trust. (more…)
San Francisco is weighing the possibility of a $1000 monthly grant for artists in the city. “The arts are truly critical to our local economy and are an essential part of our long-term recovery. If we help the arts recover, the arts will help San Francisco recover,” Mayor London Breed said in a statement. “This new program is an innovative effort to help our creative sector get through this challenging time, and come back even stronger and more resilient than before.” (more…)
A piece in the New York Times this week documents the rarely seen photographic work of Ray Johnson. “I felt it was a hidden treasure, and at some point it would be revealed,” says dealer and estate manager Frances Beatty. “If you know Ray Johnson, you know that he never did anything casually and without intention. It was all of a piece.” (more…)
Artist Gary Simmons is heading to Hauser & Wirth, finding a new home with the mega-gallery as his longtime representative, Metro Pictures, closes shop. “Over the past 30 years, Gary has achieved an incredibly rare alchemy of feeling with his paintings, installations, sound works, and sculptures,” says Marc Payot, president of Hauser & Wirth. “Simultaneously depicting and erasing—a process that in itself suggests the strange, willful impermanence of American culture—he’s created a powerful artistic language to express the personal and collective experience of Black Americans.”
The Serpentine Galleries have removed the Sackler name from its North Galleries. “We recently introduced new way-finding terminology to help visitors distinguish between the two galleries. These terms will appear on the website and on all marketing materials,” a spokesperson said. (more…)
The Louvre has put its full collection online, allowing users around the world to browse and view works easily from a digital database. (more…)
A piece in the New York Times this week reports on the return of the Gwangju Biennale, one of the first art world events to reopen as the pandemic continues. “It’s been a long journey,” says curator Defne Ayas. (more…)
Roni Horn, Wits’ End Mash (Elvis has left the building), v.1 (2019) via Hauser and Wirth
Artist Roni Horn has spent the past four decades questioning accepted notions of identity and meaning, thwarting closure and opening up new possibilities of perception through her expansive body of work across mediums. This relentless approach to her craft, exploring modes of perception and language as expressed through nuanced, subtle material inventions, takes center stage here in a show of recent work at Hauser & Wirth in New York. Compiling a selection of drawings described as “a kind of breathing activity on a daily level,”the show welcomes an engaging continuation of her interest in speech, written text, and understanding.
Sotheby’s will have a 1982 Basquiat as a centerpiece of its May 12th auction in New York, estimated to sell for $35 million–$50 million. “In Versus Medici, Basquiat melds the political and art historical as he consciously stages a reckoning with the Westernized ideal of visual culture and was intent on mastering and commandeering the accepted ‘rules’ of art history in order to break them,” says Grégoire Billault, Sotheby’s New York head of contemporary art. (more…)
