Matthew Barney, Case BOLUS -A value (sweetloaf)/ O value (sweetloaf), – JIM BLIND (andro.) -rec. majora -rec. minora (1989-91), All images are by Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed.

Reflecting back on his relentlessly shape-shifting, enigmatic career and ever-evolving material practice, Gladstone Gallery has re-staged Matthew Barney’s Facility of DECLNE, the artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery, shown for the first time in 1991.  While the iconic Cremaster Cycle stands as Barney’s emblematic body of works, the show offers an intuitive reflection on the artist’s initial works, presenting the New York art world a with rare opportunity to trace his initial works leading up to the monumental series, and to explore the threads that would later weave and wind their way through the complex and multi-faceted narrative of the film series, particularly his interest in systems of visual, subliminal and rhetorical structure and their orchestration both as performative operations and constructed series of images. (more…)

Matthew Barney is interviewed in the New York Times this week, as the artist prepares to open an exhibition of River of Fundament and its surrounding works at MOCA.  “In many ways, the real leads the artificial in ‘River of Fundament,’ ” he says. “I’ve always had an interest in colliding the natural and artificial, but I think what makes this work different from what I’ve done before is that the natural is foregrounded.” (more…)

Mark Manders, Room with Reduced Chair and Camouflaged Factory (2003) , via Art Observed

Compiled from over 100 works in the Guggenheim Museum’s personal collection, the current exhibition at the uptown institution, Storylines: Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim, feels like something of a victory lap for the museum, following up on its excellent On Kawara exhibition with an extended show of contemporary works that spans the last thirty years, and which uncovers a broad curatorial focus at the core of its collection.  Emphasizing a nuanced interest in the narrative as a core unifying element for disparately realized works, objects and assemblages, Storylines pulls from diverse practices to portray the often challenging representative missions that contemporary artists set for themselves. (more…)

Alexandre Singh, The Humans (Still) (2013), via Sprüth Magers 

Sprüth Magers London is currently presenting The Humans, an exhibition documenting the creation and the staging process of Alexander Singh’s play of the same name. Commissioned by Witte de With of Rotterdam and Performa 13 of New York, The Humans marks a tour-de-force in Singh’s career as a visual artist. Blending modern theatre with Greek tragedy, performance art and installation; this three-hour play tells the story of two characters–Tophole and Pantalingua– two vagabond spirits that are striving to prevent the creation of the Earth. Believing that the Creator of such an Earth could only be a vain and self-centered maniac, the duo finds themselves amongst Humans with all of their obnoxiousness and mischievousness–among them sculptor Charles Ray.

Alexandre Singh, Vernon Montgomery Spruce (2014), via Sprüth Magers

(Read More)

Volunteers are needed as extras for a film collaboration between artist Matthew Barney and composer Jonathon Bepler, entitled River of Fundamental. The filming will take place on Saturday, June 29^th at the Brooklyn Navy Yards, and volunteers will be needed for a 10-hour period. Requirements for the position include a willingness to get your feet wet, enclosed shoes and vocal participation. In return for involvement, volunteers will receive a box lunch and a limited-edition, signed, and numbered t-shirt. (more…)

ArtInfo has posted a feature profiling the early professions of a number of high-profile artists, offering a look at how they made a living before becoming art world mainstays.  The list includes Mark Rothko (delivery boy), Yves Klein (judo master), Matthew Barney (model), and James Turrell (cattle rancher), who famously said: ““I don’t know if it’s harder to make a living as an artist or a rancher.” (more…)

Art Club 2000, Untitled (Conran’s I) (1993), Courtesy of The New Museum

Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star, on view now at The New Museum, is a look 20 years into the not-so-distant-past, using 1993 (and the works produced and shown within that calendar year) as a critical reflection point into recent art history and practice.

(more…)

As part of a Juxtapoz Magazine-benefit auction for the Ride It skatepark in Detroit, artist Matthew Barney has designed a special edition skateboard, tipped with a chunk of graphite. Part of Barney’s ongoing “Drawing Restraint” series, the design allows riders to literally inscribe their movements across a terrain. (more…)

Matthew Barney‘s nearly four story replica of Norman Mailer’s home  is floating down the East River for a project called “River of Fundament”.  The artist is working on a film that takes Mailer’s 1983 novel “Ancient Evenings,” as its departure on a floating monument.  The cast includes Paul Giamatti, Maggie Gyllenhaal and scenes include gold-streaked zombies, Mailer’s son slicing open a cow carcass to find a surprise fetus, and a gold 1979 Trans Am disinterred from Newton Creek. (more…)

Image: Sean Daly, Shaun Regen, Kathryn Bigelow, and John Loga via Vogue

Shaun Caley Regen opened her new location in Los Angeles last night at 6750 Santa Monica Boulevard, in a newly developing section of Hollywood, just east of Highland Avenue. The new space was designed by architect Michael Maltzan, creating a museum-like exhibition venue.

Image: Regen Projects’ inaugural exhibition via Regen Projects

(more…)

Next Thursday, Phillips de Pury will auction the Maybach 57 featured in Kanye West and Jay-Z’s Otis video, which was directed by Spike Jonze. The proceeds of the car’s sale (which has been on a genuinely rough ride as depicted in the music video) will go to Save the Children. A charitable donation has been planned since the video’s completion, with the closing caption: “The vehicle used in this video will be offered up for auction. Proceeds will be donated towards the East African drought disaster.” At the time of the video’s release, East Africa was deep in famine, as a result of the worst drought to hit the region in 60 years.

(screenshot)

(more…)

–>
Drawing Restraint 15 (2007) by Matthew Barney, Photo: Neville Wakefield, via Schaulager

Currently on view at Schaulager in Basel is “Drawing Restraint” presenting sixteen performances by American artist Matthew Barney. In each enactment the artist leaves traces in an atmosphere of self-inflicted psychological and physical restraints. The result of such performances are sculptures, vitrines, drawings and videos all of which are juxtaposed against North Renaissance art.

More text and related links after the jump…. (more…)

Field, Ai Weiwei.  Ming Dynasty-patterned Chinese ceramic structure in front Art 41 Basel’s entrance, with White Cube‘s Jay Jopling in the background, sitting at the fountain.

Art 41 Basel begins this week in Switzerland.  The international art show, featuring approximately 300 galleries and 2,500 artists, coming from 30 countries and every continent, will take place from June 16 to June 20.  Media include painting, drawing, sculpture, installation, photography, video, and editioned works.  Over 60,000 gallerists, art collectors, art dealers, artists, curators, and reporters will flock to the banks of the Rhine, at the border between Switzerland, France, and Germany, to view the works of established masters and up-and-coming talents alike.

More images and text after the jump… (more…)

All photographs by Oskar Proctor for ArtObserved

Currently on view at Hauser & Wirth New York is “Else,” the first exhibition in the United States devoted exclusively to the drawings of Roni Horn.  The show, composed of six new large-scale works up to eight by ten feet in size, will remain on view through June 19, 2010 at 32 East 69th Street.

The new works lend themselves to multiple viewing angles: from far away they appear as densely-packed thumbprints and dissipating hearts. A closer look reveals involved diagrams reminiscent of tesselations and multiplying cells. The heavily textured images are composed of cut paper, red painted lines, and the artist’s fractured pencil notes. Ever aware of the material, the stamp of the paper manufacturer feature prominently on the outer edges of several works. The intricacy and density of the compositions are contrasted with the artist’s simple, large scrawled signature, which floats, relaxed, detached from the rest in a sea of oaktag.

Björk at Friday night’s opening

More text, images and related links after the jump…

(more…)

Honoree Gabriel Orozco (with Matthew Barney behind) at BOMB magazine’s 29th Anniversary Gala & Silent Auction at the National Arts Club, New York   All photos by Oskar Proctor for ArtObserved

Last night, BOMB magazine kicked-off their 29th Anniversary Gala at the National Arts Club in New York with a Silent Auction. Since the magazines’ founding in 1981, its pages have featured over 900 interviews comprised of 1,800 artists’ voices. Many of the featured artists contributed works to last night’s auction which featured both renowned and emerging names such as Alex Hubbard, Joan Jonas, Nan Goldin, Alex Katz, Julie Mehretu, Roxy Paine, Guy Maddin, Richard Serra, Joel Shapiro, Carrie Mae Weems, most of whom were in attendance. At 7.30pm, attendees were called to honor 4 individuals whose work and vision speak directly to BOMB’s mission of creative excellence. Rob Pruitt raised slices of toast to Honorees Cecily Brown and her husband, the New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff.  Brice Marden introduced the next Honoree artist Gabriel Orozco while Matthew Barney toasted honoree Nancy Spector, curator of Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim.  Along with Rob Pruitt’s generous offerings of slices of golden toast, the honorees were presented with “Pink Bomb” awards created by sculptor Tom Otterness.

Brice Marden introducing Honoree Gabriel Orozco

More photos and related links after the jump…..
(more…)

–>
SEKU: Here at the Center of Pain is Radiance (2010), by Matthew Barney, via Sadie Coles

Currently on view at Sadie Coles in London are new drawings by Matthew Barney in correlation with his project “Ancient Evenings,” a performance work in partnership with composer Jonathan Bepler. Intimate and delicate, Barney’s drawings allude to each of the seven acts emphasizing in particular the themes of mythology, death, rebirth, and reincarnation. The works are based on Norman Mailer’s erotic and allegorical novel Ancient Evenings (1983) which re-envisages ancient Egyptian mythology and the seven passages of the soul after death: Ren, Khu, Sekhem, Ba, Ka, Khaibit, and Sekhu.

–>
Djed: The Case for Saving Detroit (2010), by Matthew Barney, via Sadie Coles

More images, text and related links after the jump…

(more…)

The Hirshhorn Museum with proposed “bubble” in Washington, D.C. via Washington City Paper

A high-tech, futuristic design for a meeting hall in the Hirshhorn Museum at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., is making headlines this week across the art community. The proposed “bubble” would constitute dimensions of 145 feet and swell out like a balloon from the primary structure, inflating during the months of May and October and collapsing for the duration of the year. Advocating for the design, Hirshhorn Museum Director Richard Koshalek insists that it will not detract from the museum’s most valuable possession: its art [Washington Post].

Fernando Botero via Art Daily

Fernando Botero criticizes the art awarded by the $50K prize bearing his name, and the administrators of the prize decide to cancel it as a result [ArtDaily]

to stay apprised of the latest relevant news of the art world…

(more…)

A glimpse of the Sol LeWitt mural, ‘Swirls and Whirls,’ being constructed in the Columbus Circle subway station, via NY Times

A mural designed for the Columbus Circle subway station in New York by Sol LeWitt in 2007, just before his death, is nearly complete [NY Times]

In related, Turner Prize winner Richard Long designs the cover for the London Tube Map [FAD]
The Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid has seen visitor numbers quadruple since the opening of its Henri Matisse exhibit [Art Daily]
Following the success of earlier Beyond Limits exhibitions, Sotheby’s announces its fourth contemporary sculpture exhibit at Chatsworth including works by Henry Moore, Marc Quinn, Zhan Wang, among others [Auction Publicity]

Jeff Koons via the Telegraph UK

Jeff Koons sits for lunch with the Financial Times and discusses his love of inflatables and how the custody battle for his son has affected his work [Financial Times]
MoMA’s PS1 in Queens will soon reprise its Greater New York exhibit, which will be its 3rd [LindsayPollack]
On Miuccia Prada and her still to be built €25 million, 20,500 square meter Prada Foundation in a south Milan industrial complex [ArtNewspaper]
Sotheby’s CEO William Ruprecht sells 5% of his equity holdings; he retains a 1% stake in the company [Barron’s via Art Market Monitor]

The Starns Brothers’ cover for the fifth anniversary of T Magazine, via NY Times

T Magazine celebrates its fifth anniversary with specially designed covers by Mike and Doug Starns, Jeff Koons, Francesco Vezzoli, Jenny Holzer, and Frank Gehry [NYTimes T Magazine]
Christie’s abandons its plan to establish an art-investment fund and a lending division [Bloomberg]
In related, Leibovitz creditor Goldman Sachs has stepped in to help negotiate the photographer’s financial troubles with Art Capital Group [Artforum]
The recession in the art world has not stopped bartering of valuable works between contemporaries [TimesUK]

Creative Time’s short shorts for sale at Creative Time

Creative Time is selling limited edition short shorts, and the campy video is here [CreativeTime via Artnet on Twitter]
On collecting phenomenon Herb and Dorthy Vogel’s gift of 50 works to 50 US States [Wall Street Journal]
Interpol allows online access to its 34,000 work database of stolen art [ArtDaily]
In related, roughly 1,000 Alberto Giacometti counterfeit sculptures seized in Germany [GlobeandMail]

Dasha Zhukova via Style.com

Dasha Zhukova, rumored pregnant with 2008 top collector Roman Abramovich’s child, as new editor of Pop magazine has a Damien Hirst work on the cover [NYMag]
Russian oligarchs invest enough money in the Constructivist and Suprematist art of the beginning of 20th century to provoke forgeries, more than half of items bought of these movements are reported to be inauthentic [The Independent]
In related, as Princeton Architectural Press claims to have discovered Frida Kahlo’s lost archive, scholars involved with the artist’s work refute the possibility of it being authentic [GuardianUK]
A new high intensity x-ray developed by Cornell University has already revealed a lost NC Wyeth illustration [ArtInfo]

Stephen Power’s Hold My Own Iverson’s Arm

2007 Fulbright Scholar Stephen Powers, known as ESPO, is completing his Love Letter project, comprised of murals by multiple artists stretching across his home town of Philadelphia that can be seen from one train [A Love Letter For You]
Shepard Fairey calls his decision to graffiti-proof the brick walls of his studio personal preference and rebutts claims of hypocrisy [Street Level] and separately he is to unveil a large scale mural produced by the gallery Country Club at Art Basel Miami Beach [ArtDaily]
Are Museums crossing the line by granting curatorship to corporations? [The New York Times]

Terence Koh’s window display at Opening Ceremony which reads “The Whole Family” via this hearts on fire

Terence Koh sends a very Terence Koh letter regarding his latest project with Opening Ceremony, a window installation [Hint]
On the relatively accessible yet potentially financially rewarding decision to invest in the works of MA students [The Guardian]
The Bortolami Gallery building is up for sale at $6.1 million by collector Adam Lindemann as Stefania Bortolami prepares to move to another location in Chelsea [Lindsay Pollack]
Matthew Barney and Bjork buy a four bedroom townhouse in Brooklyn Heights listed for $4.2 million [NYMag]

A sculpture of horses and a carriage at Versailles by Xavier Veilhan via artcollc

On September 13, Xavier Veilhan will follow in Jeff Koons’s footsteps by bringing contemporary sculpture to the Chateau de Versailles [ArtCoLLC]
On the lack of transparency in the art market reflected in this year’s Art Basel [Economist]
An interview with Chuck Close in which he discusses how his perceptive disabilities are reflected in his work [Wall Street Journal]

A still from Deadpan by Steve McQueen via the GuardianUK

Beginning July 1st, Creative Time will present Turner Prize winner and current UK Venice Biennale representative Steve McQueen’s Deadpan on the MTV screen in Times Square [Creative Time]
Parkett Art magazine marks 25 years this June 25th in Chelsea, NY [EFlux]
Conceptual artist Dan Graham is speaking at 192 Books in Chelsea, New York on Wednesday, July 1 [192Books.com]

Trafalgar Square’s empty fourth plinth, which will host Antony Gormley’s ‘One & Other’ via Guardian UK

The first round of participants have been announced for Antony Gormley’s living statue project: ‘One & Other,’ on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth in ondon [BBC]

A previous installation of Terracotta Army via VisitStHelens

In related, Anthony Gormley sets up his 40,000 figure “Terracotta Army” in a Devon, UK barn [TelegraphUK]
Dartmouth receives a $50 million donation to support the visual arts [Dartmouth]
Architect Richard Meier is designing major expansion for the Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills [LA Times]

Picasso’s ‘Le Moulin de la Galette’ owned by the Guggenheim, allegedly sold under Nazi duress, via Artnet

Judge issues written memo chastizing MoMA and Guggenheim and heirs of Nazi victim for secret settlement over two Picasso paintings in restitution case [Bloomberg]
The Whitney kept it festive this week for its annual Art Party and auction in West Soho, New York [Park Avenue Peerage]
Behind the scenes shots of the making of Banksy’s Bristol exhibition [The WorldsBestEver]

‘Screentest’ for designer Adam Kimmel’s new campaign via Hint

Black and white films and stills by Andy Warhol’s long-time assistant Gerard Malanga from Designer Adam Kimmel’s look book, exhibited at Thaddeus Ropac gallery, feature art world figures Matthew Barney, Francesco Clemente, Ryan McGinley, Dan Colen, Aaron Young and Nate Lowman [AdamKimmel]

Still from Brett Gorvy’s interview with Andy Warhol’s assistant, Gerard Malanga, via Christie’s

In related (to the Kimmel story), Christie’s Brett Gorvy speaks Gerard Malanga on Warhol’s ‘Death and Disaster’ series [Christie’s via Art Market Monitor]

Moody’s, which currently has Sotheby’s bonds below investment grade placed its debt on review for a possible downgrade [Bloomberg] More on the damage to Sotheby’s profits here [ArtNewspaper]
Guy Bennett, co-head of Christie’s Impressionist and Modern art department worldwide, resigns [NY Times]
Christie’s begins more salary cuts [Bloomberg]
Citing financial difficulties, Bellwether Gallery closes after a ten year run [Art Fag City]
the Art Institute of Chicago lays off 20 staff members [Chicago Tribune via Artsjournal]
With its endowment down by 18%, the Solomon R. Guggenheim museum will lay off 25 full-time staff [CrainsNewYork]
Art museum attendance in the US is down 23%-26% [ArtReview]
And a summary on the methods New York galleries are using to deal with the recession [NYTimes]

The Deste Foundation released this “preview” image days before “Blood of Two,” took place on Hydra Island. Via [The Moment]

Matthew Barney and Elizabeth Peyton collaborated, for the first time, on an unusual exhibition this week. “Blood of Two,” a site-specific instillation, acted as an inauguration of sorts for the Deste Foundation’s move to their new “mysterious yet evocative”  location: Slaughterhouse, a project space on the Greek Island of Hydra.  Preceding the event was an exclusive dinner for the artists, collectors and curators, hosted by the founder of the foundation, art collector and Greek billionaire Dakis Joannou.

Related Links:
Arty Party, A Postcard from Hydra [The Moment]
Now Viewing, Blood of Two [The Moment]
Arty Party | A Postcard from Hydra [TheMoment]
Nobody Does it Better [Art Info]
The Deste Foundation [Deste]
Elizabeth Peyton at The New Museum [Art Observed]

(more…)

Kate Moss by Damien Hirst is the new cover of Tar Magazine (anagram for “art”) [NY Times]
–>
Art funds launched in 2008, such as the London-based Art Trading Fund, are shelved due to failure to raise required funds [ArtNewspaper]
–>
Art:21, Art in Twenty-First Century is now available for free on Hulu [Hulu]

Russian Artist Andrea Molodkin, previously cited by AO here, prepares for Venice Biennale [Financial Times]
–>
Jeff Koons is speaking at Strand Books tonight at 7:00-8:30 in New York [Via FAD]
–>
New York Old Masters dealer Lawrence Salander is indicted and pleads guilty in $88 million charge [Bloomberg]

A look inside Rome’s MAXXI designed by Zaha Hadid via c-monster

A preview of the MAXXI in Rome, $108 million art museum designed by Zaha Hadid [c-monster]
–>
Adam Lindemann, financier, collector and author of Collecting Contemporary launches a new book from Taschen: Collecting Design [ArtInfo]

–>
Flash Art’s current cover featuring a portrait of Barack Obama by Marlene Dumas via Art Fag City

Marlene Dumas’s portrait of Barack Obama is the cover of Flash Art [Art Fag City]
–>
Madonna’s art collection is estimated at £80 million pounds [TimesUK]

A selection from the site via The World’s Best Ever

A timeline of modern & contemporary art artists by movement, school, style, period, theme & art prize [The-artists.org via The World’s Best Ever]
–>
Richard Serra to receive honorary degree from Pratt Institute at its 120th Commencement on May 18th [MediaBistro]

Interview with photographer Nan Goldin on why she is auctioning some of the curiosities she has collected [TelegraphUK]
–>
SFMOMA announces plans for a future expansion, doubling gallery space [SF Chronicle]

–>
A preview of SANAA’s design for the 2009 Serpentine Pavillion via Architect’s Journal

SANAA, the Japanese architectual duo behind the New Museum, release first glimpse of design for the 2009 Serpentine Pavilion [Architect’s Journal]
–>
Jim Dine donates 40 drawings influenced by Greek and Roman sculpture to the Morgan Library [Artinfo]

Julian Schnabel’s Picasso Femme au Chapeau will soon be sold by Christie’s [New York Times]
–>
The Mugrabis, a high impact, market-making collector family, may be addicted to the game of art [The Observer]

Installation view of Matthew Barney’s ‘Ancient Evenings: Libretto’ via Gladstone Gallery

On view now at Gladstone Gallery in Brussels is Matthew Barney’s ‘Ancient Evenings: Libretto,’ a series of drawings from the seven act opera that Barney is developing with Berlin-based composer Jonathan Bepler.  The opera is based on Norman Mailer’s novel Ancient Evenings, set in ancient Egypt chronicling the journeys of the dead, reincarnation, and the gods. The opera follows the seven stages the soul passes through after bodily death according to Egyptian mythology.  Barney replaces the human body with that of the 1967 Chrysler Imperial that figured heavily in his film Cremaster 3, displacing the ancient mythic landscape of the Nile and pyramids for an industrial contemporary setting.  The exhibition includes very detailed drawings of characters in the opera as well as a number of copies of Mailer’s book which Barney has reworked.

Matthew Barney – Ancient Evenings: Libretto [Gladstone Gallery]
Matthew Barney – Ancient Evenings: Libretto [Look Into My Owl]
Ren Master [Interview]

(more…)

Francois Pinault via the TheLuxeChronicles

In February 2009, works from Francois Pinault’s collection coming to Moscow’s Contemporary Culture Centre “Moscow Garage” [RussiaIC]
Hirst’s $100 million diamond encrusted skull to begin its world tour in … Amsterdam [NYSun]
MoMa selects a Chief Curator of Painting from in-house [NY Times] and, the Guggenheim may soon appoint a new Director from Carnegie Museum [NY Times]
The Jeff Koons-in-Versailles debate continues on [TimesOnline]
Matthew Barney is on Ovation TV, airing Wednesday [OvationTV via C-Monster]
New on the global art scene Roman Abramovich’s girlfriend, Dasha Zhukova, basically summarized [Wall Street Journal]

Blood Moon Ausar performing at Matthew Barney’s party via Super Touch

Last Saturday, infamous artist Matthew Barney held an out of the ordinary party at his studio in Queens, NY. His party featured free performances by death metal bands such as Inquisition, Dagon, Krallice, Copremeis, and S.M.E.S, expressing the artist’s passion for black metal. To add to the provoking ambiance, several Hawaiian style pigs on skewers, hand roasted and carved by Barney himself, served the hungry guests.

NYC: Matthew Barney’s Black Metal Pig Roast [Super Touch]
Matthew Barney Hosts Black Metal Pig Roast [Cremaster Fanatic]
View more pictures from the event by Jae Saam Trio on Flickr

(more…)