AO Art Observed™

‪ French-Canadian eatery M. Wells will reopen at MoMA’s PS 1, after recently closing its acclaimed Long Island City location [AO Newslink]

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All photos by Caroline Claisse unless otherwise noted.

Representing the United States in the Venice Biennale 2011 is artist duo Allora & Calzadilla. Based in Puerto Rico, the real-life couple Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla‘s work is deeply political, though they would have you think otherwise.

The exhibition, entitled “Gloria,” features six newly commissioned works. It is curated by Lisa Freiman, chair of the contemporary art department at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the institution the U.S. State Department entrusted with the selection. The organizing committee is the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice. Previous representatives of the U.S. are Bruce Nauman (2009) who won the Golden Lion for his country, Felix Gonzalez-Torres (2007), Ed Ruscha (2005), and Fred Wilson (2003).

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Francis Bacon, “Portrait of Henrietta Moraes” (1969). All pictures courtesy of Helly Nahmad Gallery.

New York’s Helly Nahmad Gallery is currently showing the first comparative assembly of works by the painters Chaim Soutine and Francis Bacon. Connections between Soutine, whom de Kooning famously called his “favorite artist,” and Bacon, the subject of two Tate Modern retrospectives in his lifetime and one in 2008, have never before been examined by an exhibition at a museum or gallery. SOUTINE/BACON closes on June 18.

Chaim Soutine, “Autoportrait” (1918).

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Installation view of Andy Warhol: Motion Pictures at The Museum of Modern Art, 2010.

Currently on view at the MoMA is a tightly curated sampling of Warhol’s Screen Tests, shot between 1964 and 1966, as well as his films: Kiss, Sleep, Empire, Eat, and Blow Job. The show was conceived of in 2003 by MoMA curator Mary Lea Bandy and was exhibited as Andy Warhol: Screen Tests. After moving to Berlin’s KW Institute for Contemporary Art in 2004, the show traveled internationally for five years as facilitated by PS1 Director Klaus Biesenbach.  All films have been transferred to video for the installation but there is still something archival—“filmic,” as Bisenbach says—about the footage.

Andy Warhol. Screen Test: Edie Sedgwick (1965). 16mm film (black and white, silent). 4 min. at 16fps. © 2010 The Andy Warhol Museum

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Henri Matisse The Moroccans, 1916. Image via MoMA.

Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913-1917, at the Museum of Modern Art, features almost 120 paintings, drawings, prints, and sculptures completed by Henri Matisse within the span of four years.  1913 marks a turning point in Matisse’s evolutionary career: in the twilight of WWI, the artist made a profound move toward conceptual distortion.  He worked in German-occupied France while his brother was in a prison camp and his mother was behind enemy lines–conditions he deemed the “methods of modern construction” that altered the course of his artistic and personal development.

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Untitled by Richard Diebenkorn, 1950. All images via Artnet unless otherwise noted.

Currently on view at Greenberg Van Doren Gallery, New York, is an exhibition titled “Richard Diebenkorn: Paintings and Works on Paper 1949-1955″. Organized in cooperation with the Estate of Richard Diebenkorn, this exhibition features thirty-six works on paper  of this well-known American artist, whose early work is associated with Abstract Expressionism.

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The Bull, state VII (Le Taureau), Pablo Picasso, December 26th, 1945. Lithograph, Museum of Modern Art, via the MoMA.

“Picasso: Themes and Variations,” at the Museum of Modern Art on West 53rd Street, presents 123 prints from the museum’s collection, representing the major developments in Pablo Picasso’s work and providing insight into decades worth of artistic experimentation.  The exhibition explores the artist’s creative process, following his prints from the early 1900’s Blue and Rose periods through his Cubist discovery.  The collection spans almost 20 themes, including animals, saltimbanques, and mistresses.

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Robert Ryman at PaceWildenstein Gallery at 32 E 57 Street in New York.  Installation View.  All images via PaceWildenstein Gallery unless otherwise noted

Currently on view at PaceWildenstein Gallery is “Robert Ryman: Large-small, thick-thin, light reflecting, light absorbing” – the exhibition of thirty new paintings of the renowned minimalist American artists. Executed in Ryman’s signature monochromatic palette the paintings on display measure ten to thirty square inches and represent a wide gamut of experimentation in materials, including wood, MDF board, aluminum, and stretched cotton. The works appear strong and indestructible, although painted on the paper-thin material Tyvek. In addition to traditional graphite and ink, Ryman employs such painterly materials as acrylic varnish, enamel and epoxy. To hang the paintings to the walls, the artist will use regular staples, which are a traditional integral part of his aesthetics.

Robert Ryman at Pace Wildenstein. Installation View

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A photo taken with a mobile phone, although picture-taking was prohibited during the exhibition via NY Times

When Tino Sehgal‘s work took over the Guggenheim Museum in New York on January 29th it was a quiet experience. There were no opening parties, no fuss and none of that Art World glitter to make one jump from exuberant excitement.  The walls of Frank Lloyd Wright’s majestic rotunda were stripped bare and seem to have newly acquired a long lost naïveté.  The lobby still brimmed with crowds of people clustered around the impenetrable center. The Kiss unfolded, rolled and scattered itself in a graceful poise of a feline. The subtly choreographed sequence of animated poses referenced erotic works from Rodin, to Courbet, to Jeff Koons. Occasionally, a couple or a small group of visitors would creep closer for a brief encounter or settle in contemplative thought on the floor of the proposed stage.

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New MOCA Director, Jeffrey Deitch. Via LATimes

More on  MOCA’s new director, Jeffrey Deitch, who brings his more business-oriented background to the Museum in LA: [Bloomberg] Deitch’s contract with the museum has certain safeguards against conflicts of interest that might arise from his foot in the business world– among the new rules, Deitch must notify the museum’s board of anything he adds to or sells from his collection. [LATimes]

Eli Broad and his Broad Art Foundation reveal that they are considering 3 different Westside locations on which to build and endow a museum for his art collection. The third site was recently revealed as being a ten-acre parcel on the campus of West LA College in Culver City.  [LA Times]

Works by Picasso and Henri Rousseau have been stolen from a private villa in the South of France, marking the country’s second major art robbery in that week– (work by impressionist painter Edgar Degas was stolen from the Cantini Museum in Marseilles only days before). [FT]

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Eberhard Schrammen, “Maskottchen (Mascot)” (c. 1924), in “Bauhaus 1919-1933″ at MoMA. Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin Photo: Gunter Lepkowski © Estate Eberhard Schrammen

Complementing the Maholy-Nagy exhibition in Frankfurt showing at Shirn Kunsthalle through February 7, 2010, New York’s Museum of Modern Art is celebrating the early-20th century Bauhaus collective in a show which runs in the Joan and Preston Robert Tisch Gallery through January 25, 2010. This presentation of the highly influential German school comprises 400 works, many of which have never before been exhibited publicly in the United States. Drawn from both private and public collections, including 80 works from MoMA’s holdings, the show also features 150 pieces from the three German Bauhaus collections, Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin, Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau, and Klassik Stiftung Weimar. The exhibition comes to MoMA after an earlier version at Berlin’s Martin-Gropius Bau, which showed from July 22 to October 4, 2009.

Vasily Kandinsky, “Schwarze Form (Black form)” (1923), via MoMA. Private collection. Courtesy Neue Galerie New York. Photo: Jeffrey Sturges © 2009 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris

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“Mobile Matrix” in situ at the Mexico City Library where the work was installed in 2006. Via NY Times

On Tuesday evening of December 15th, in the smaller of the two Titus theaters at the Museum of Modern Art, Ann Temkin enthusiastically beckoned Gabriel Orozco to take the stage. The premise of the followed conversation was, of course, the recently opened retrospective of Orozco’s lifetime body of work. At 47, the Mexican artist seemed grave and stoic in his words, although that may have been the fatigue of several weeks of preparation for the launch of the exhibition taking a toll.

Behind the Scenes: Gabriel Orozco. The artist talks about his long evolving relationship with the Museum of Modern Art and the experience of participating in a retrospective exhibition. Via MoMA

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Performa 09 party via Artinfo

-To benefit Performa 09, party designer Jennifer Rubell invites 600 guests to “Creation” held at X Initiative in Chelsea in New York, where 3,600 drinking glasses, a pyramid of unshelled peanuts and 2,000 pound hillock of honey-soaked ribs were among the excess of food being served (Performa 09/ Food for Thought) [The Moment]

-In related, To mark the start of Performa 09 MoMA invited Fischerspooner to stage a show (Performance Art Enters the Museum) [Artinfo]

-In related, At Haunch of Venison in New York Marina Abramovich, Leandro Erlich, Mickalene and Rob Wynn pair with NYC pastry chefs to create performances; cakes were served by topless models (Kreemart or Cream Art Performance at Haunch of Venison) [NY Art Beat]

-Bikes used by Lance Armstrong and with frames designed by contemporary artists fetch $1.3 million at auction in Sotheby’s, among them Damien Hirst’s sold for $500,000 (Armstrong’s Tour de France Bikes Fetch $1.3 Million at Auction) [Bloomberg]

To stay apprised of most of the relevant art news for this past week… (more…)

Barbara Kruger’s installation at the Lever House on Park Avenue in New York via Lever House Collection

Whether we realize it or not, our daily lives are filled with multitudes of graphic and visual information. While reading a newspaper, watching television, walking on the street past countless advertisement, we constantly absorb information. It is this aspect of social and public sphere that Barbara Kruger exploits in her current installation at the Lever House in New York. A project commissioned by the real estate  mogul Aby Rosen, whose collection features such names as Jeff Koons, George Condo, John Chamberlain, Keith Harring, and Barnaby Furnas, holds tight to its message of “an image is worth a thousand words.” The text as art exhibition, titled “Between Being Born and Dying” runs through November 21st, 2009.

Related links
Barbara Kruger “Between Being Born and Dying” installation [Lever House]
Barbara Kruger Bio [PBS]
Barbara Kruger at Lever House [Lindsay Pollock]
Helvetica at 50 [BBC News]
50 Years of Helvetica exhibition [MoMa]

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The First Annual Art Awards via Guggenheim.org

Last night, October 29, marked the inauguration of a new annual art event: Rob Pruitt presented The First Annual Art Awards at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New Yorkin association with the city’s oldest alternative art space, White Columns.

The awards were conceived by artist, Rob Pruitt, as a performance-based artwork; for the occasion he recruited the characters of Index Magazine’s wry satirical web series, Delusional Downtown Divas. The New York Times have reported that “…the Divas schemed to infiltrate the art establishment by any means possible. In one segment they pitched a tent in the Guggenheim, doing their laundry in the lobby fountain.”

Jeffrey Deitch and Kembra Pfahler at The First Annual Art Awards at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum via style.com

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Head of a Muse, Raphael via Guardian UK

-Offered for the first time at public auction as part of Christie’s Old Masters sale, Raphael’s drawing “Head of a Muse”- a study for a figure in one of his Vatican frescoes, if it achieves its estimate £12-16million, will break the auction record for an old master drawing currently held by Michelangelo’s and Leonardo da Vinci’s works [Guardian UK]

-As art collectors become more cautious with their purchases, dealers at Frieze and FIAC fairs put works on reserve, among them $40 million Mondrian allegedly put on hold for Bernard Arnault [Bloomberg]

-Ms. Temkin, the chief curator of painting and sculpture at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, introduces unexpected changes, unframing certain paintings and subjecting the almost sacralized permanent collection to frequent renewal [The New York Times]

“Your Mercury Ocean” Skateboard by Olafur Eliasson via aarting

-Another collaboration between Mekanism and Olafur Eliasson results in a 13-ply deck 3d patterned skateboard with a mirror coating [aarting]
-In related, Olafur Eliasson commissions by the mayor of Copenhagen to design a bridge for the Danish capital; the artist shares his plans for a transparent bridge in a close vicinity to the water [The Art Newspaper]

- The survey carried out by the Art Fund, the UK’s independent art charity, shows that despite the substantial drop in public funding and investment income, a figure that proves to grow in the context of economic fall is the number of visits to museums [Art Knowledge News]

-In the midst of economic uncertainty, gallery Matthew Marks, which represents artists such as Jasper Johns, and Peter Fischli and David Weiss, plans on expansion with a new space on the West Coast [The New York Times]

To stay apprised of most of the relevant art news for this past week… (more…)

Three Color Curl (CMY: Irvine, California, August 24th, 2008, Fuji Crystal Archive Type C). 2008. Walead Beshty via MOMA

A vanguard showcase of contemporary photographers – Walead Beshty , Daniel Gordon, Sara VanDerBeek, Carter Mull, Leslie Hewitt, Sterling Ruby – is currently on view at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. An annual program that aims to bring cutting-edge artists to the attention of novelty-craving public has acquired a new thematic dimension. As the Associate Curator and the organizer of New Photography 2009, Eva Respini observes that this year’s select artists come from varied backgrounds and most “actively work in other disciplines” and draw inspiration from “drawing, sculpture, video, and installation.” The exhibit runs through January 11, 2010.

Related links:
New Photography 2009 Press Release [MOMA]
Pictures Generation Roundtable: After Materiality and Style [Art in America]
Artists that Push the Boundaries of Photography [PDN Pulse]
Tate Triennial 2009 [Frieze Magazine]
Who is Sterling Ruby? [Frieze Magazine]
Words Without Pictures Review [ArtForum]
Art in Review: Leslie Hewitt [NY Times]
The Whitney Biennial 2008: About the Artist – Leslie Hewitt [The Whitney]
Daniel Gordon [ArtForum]
Sara VanDerBeek Review [ArtReview]
Marc Foxx Gallery: Carter Mull

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‘Mark Leckey in the Long Tail,’ Amy C. Elliott © 2009

Last weekend was the fifth performance in the Museum of Modern Art’s Performance Exhibition Series.  British artist Mark Leckey, who won the Turner Prize last year, gave the North American premier of ‘Mark Leckey in the Long Tail,’ described as ‘part lecture, part monologue, and part living sculpture.’ The Long Tail is an idea originally described by Wired’s Chris Anderson, which explains business and broadcast distribution adhering to a 20-80 Pareto curve, with the top 20% of items vastly more popular.  As the Internet disseminates media and corporate hegemony, countless niches have opened up and been made readily accessible to consumers. Companies like Amazon.com and Netflix are able to offer more items at lesser volumes.  Those niche interests represent the Long Tail.

Leckey’s talk applied the theory of the Long Tail to his own research of images. Beginning with a photo of a Felix the Cat sculpture in an NBC studio, Leckey explained how he was able to discover the origins of the photo and the meaning behind its mise-en-scène through exploring varied, and often quite small, communities online.

Performance 5: Mark Leckey [MoMA]
Mark Leckey [Gavin Brown's Enterprise]
The Long Tail [Wired]
Interview with Mark Leckey [Rhizome]
Mark Lecky in the Long Tail at MoMA [ArtReview]
Mark Leckey Wags the Long Tail [Artinfo]
Mark Leckey in a Long Tail World [Frieze]
Arts Watch [The Lowdown]
An American Tail [ArtForum]
Mark Leckey wins UK’s 2008 Turner Prize [ArtObserved]

‘Mark Leckey in the Long Tail,’ courtesy Amy C. Elliott © 2009

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Kirsten Dunst on the set of a production by Takashi Murakami in collaboration with McG via aarting

Tate Modern’s “Pop Life: Art in a Material World,” features a video that is a collaboration between McG – famous Hollywood director, and Murakami – Japan’s king of pop art: starring actress Kirsten Dunst on the streets of Akihabara in Tokyo for “Turning Japanese” by rock band The Vapors [The Wall Street Journal]
A 1984 work by Chinese artist Li Keran sold for $940,000, the most for a print at a Hong Kong auction, where bidding led by mainland buyers has taken many prices several times above estimates [Bloomberg]
Sotheby’s Asia sales in Hong Kong revealed that demand for Chinese paintings, while firm, is mixed; as the market is still vulnerable, less pricey, quality pieces were the ones to realize numbers higher than their estimates [Reuters]
Works including those by Renoir, Pollock, Degas and Rembrandt stolen from the home of a retired Harvard Medical School professor and collector, and his business partner; only authentic pieces were taken, leaving behind impeccable reproductions [Boston Globe via Art Market Monitor] in related Uncooperative and unable to produce evidence that the stolen art existed, Angelo Amadio and Dr. Ralph Kennaugh, become suspects of the theft to which allegedly they are victims [ArtDaily]

Tracey Emin via Guardian UK

Discouraged by British government’s top rate tax, Tracey Emin threatens to abandon England for France where she claims the politicians understand the importance of supporting culture and art [Guardian UK] in related At the London’s Frieze Art Fair, in the booth of New York’s Lehmann Maupin Gallery, Tracey Emin, known for her confessional artwork, is offering to make customized artworks based on answers to fifteen personal questions [Artinfo]
Fanjul paintings nationalized by Cuba in an exhibit in Museo del Prado in Madrid involve legal consequences as the Museum is being investigated by the US department of state for illegal trafficking of a work of art owned by US citizen confiscated by Cuban government [The Art Newspaper]
Turner Prize exhibit at Tate Britain in London this time startles the viewers with the lack of now expected blood, outrage and other shock factors [Bloomberg]
The Bloomberg administration makes an announcement of its plan to give nonprofit cultural groups access to gallery and theater space in city owned properties and help artists develop business plans [Crain's Business]

Donald Judd concrete constructions in Marfa Texas via Hip-Ster-Krit

6 of 15 concrete constructions built by Donald Judd in Marfa Texas required repair and conservation work, October 10th the works will once again be open to the public [Artinfo]
A look at the Chinese Gao brothers who are shocking their country with brave, politically challenging art works, such as a life-size sculpture of Mao whose body is only reunited with his head on ‘special occasions’ [The New York Times]
When most artists’ prices are decreasing in a recession, a few go up: Italian Maurizio Cattelan is one of those who thrive in the tough economic times, an analysis of his work reveals some truths on the variables of the art market [The Economist]

Damien Hirst posing in front of his work via ARTblog +

A portrait of Damien Hirst built through an interview: his influences, unusual artistic paths (such as painting) and mediums to come, and a subjective depiction of the artist’s personality [Times Online] in related Hirst tells BBC that he will not be producing large scale installations and will rather concentrate solely on painting by applying oil to the canvas with his hands, something he has been secretly doing these recent years [BBC] and in related the FT reports that Hirst lays off much of his staff, closes two studios and is actually making paintings himself; while the galleries give no comments on the unsold works worth millions [Financial Times]
As art fairs struggle to retain exhibitors, a new modern and contemporary fair in Abu Dhabi signs up forty-eight names, including PaceWildenstein, Gagosian, Acquavella and White Cube [Lindsay Pollock] related 50 paintings from the New York Guggenheim Museum to be shown in Abu Dhabi [Arts Abu Dhabi]

‘Fuego Flores’ by Jean Michel Basquiat via Auction Publicity

Sotheby’s October Contemporary Art Auction, estimated to realize in excess of £9 million, will include works by leading artists, such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Anish Kapoor, Andy Warhol, Chris Ofili, Damien Hirst, Gerhard Richter, Antony Gormley and Yan Pei-Ming [Auction Publicity]
Following in the footsteps of Anselm Kiefer and Toni Morrison, Umberto Eco has been named the next guest curator at the Louvre; the show “Vertige de la Liste” (Vertigo of Lists) will revolve around his chosen theme “the list” [Artinfo] in related news, talks are underway to open a McDonald’s restaurant and a McCafé at the Louvre next month [Telegraph]
An art dealer from Stockholm, Sweden has been accused of faking works by heavyweight modernists including Georges Braque, Alberto Giacometti, Edvard Munch, and Egon Schiele [Artnet]

Child of lonely – performance by Terence Koh October 6 at Thaddaeus Ropac Gallery, Photo Olivier Zahm via purple DIARY

Terence Koh prepared his first solo show at the Parisian gallery Thaddaeus Ropac, which takes a form of an imaginary opera in eight acts, the first act taking place October 6, 2009 [The Art Newspaper]
The four artists shortlisted for Turner Prize 2009 are: Enrico David, Roger Hiorns, Lucy Skaer and Richard Wright; the winner is to be announced December 7th [Turner Prize 2009]
Jerry Saltz writes about new galleries emerging despite the economic crises, provides a list of new galleries to see and comments on the effects of the recession on the female artists [New York mag]

The current state of the building to house Sperone Westwater and the computer rendering of it via Lindsay Pollock

A concrete foundation is rising at the site of the future Sperone Westwater gallery designed by the British architect Sir Norman Foster on the Bowery; the 10 story building will rise only one block away from New Museum [Lindsay Pollock]
As opposed to expanding outside their home in LA, Tim Blum and Jeff Poe open a new 21,000 square foot space conveniently located in front of their existing gallery on South La Cienga Boulevard, Los Angeles [Los Angeles Times]

Jacket designed by JR via The World’s Best Ever

A jacket from JR’s Face2Face Project comes in a limited edition of only 100 [The World's Best Ever] in related A video interview with JR in Paris about his project Women are Heroes, which allows the viewers to call a number and hear an interview with one of the chosen women for the project [Vernissage TV]
An interview with Dasha Zhukova that notes her easy acceptance in the art world [Guardian UK]
28 as opposed to 40 exhibitors had pulled out of the Frieze Art Fair, yet despite the equally disappointing numbers, many lesser known, but in no way inferior galleries, will get a shot at the famous art fair [Telegraph]

Miranda July via Vice

Miranda July creates a series of photographs to imitate and bring attention to the extras in iconic movies [Vice]
An Italian professor, Dr Seracini, has been working on technology that can enable the search for the largest painting Leonardo da Vinci ever painted – The Battle of Anghiari, a work he believes to be hidden underneath the frescoes in Florence’s Palazzo Vecchio [The New York Times]
MoMA received an unexpected gift this month – an estate, estimated to be worth more than $10 million, belonging to the late Michael H. Dunn, a bachelor from Derby, Vermont [The New Yorker]

A detail from Monet’s “Water Lilies” triptych via NYTimes

After a 7-year long absence, the Museum of Modern Art has brought its Waterlilies back along with an interesting recent acquisition and two paintings on loan from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The breathtaking triptych still holds the power to engulf the viewer in its transcendent and meditative quality. The accompanying paintings complete the experience by physically surrounding one in their lightness of color, spontaneous and sometimes pensive stroke, and a velvet-like surface that suggests a deeper psychological imprint of Monet, who worked on these particularly large pieces for years towards the end of his life. The exhibition, occupying a specially intimate gallery space, will be on view until April 12th, 2010.

Related Links:
MoMA Homepage
Moanin’ With Monet [ArtNet]
Serenade in Blue [NY Times]
Water World [New Yorker]
Monet’s Water Lilies Light Up MoMA [NY Sun]
MoMA Presents… [Art Daily]

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One third of Monet’s famous triptych, ‘Water Lilies,’ via NY Times

This fall, New York’s two most venerable art museums will each each spotlight famous paintings by two old masters. The Museum of Modern Art is exhibiting all three paintings of Claude Monet’s ‘Water Lilies’ triptych together for the first time in eight years.  Also in the exhibition is a single large painting, also entitled ‘Water Lilies,’ as well as three smaller studies.

At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has lent Johannes Vermeer’s most famous painting, ‘The Milkmaid,’ in celebration of the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s voyage up the river that would bear his name. This is the first time in 70 years that the painting has been exhibited in the United States, and it joins the Met’s five paintings by Vermeer as well as works by a small number of other Dutch artists.

‘Monet’s Water Lilies’ runs September 10, 2009-April 12, 2010 at the Museum of Modern Art, and ‘Vermeer’s Masterpiece “The Milkmaid”‘ runs September 10-November 29, 2009 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, both in New York.

Monet’s Water Lilies [MoMA]
Vermeer’s Masterpiece ‘The Milkmaid’ [Metropolitan Museum]
Serenade in Blue [NY Times]
Moanin’ With Monet [Artnet]
Nieuw Girl [Art Market Monitor]
Vermeer’s ‘The Milkmaid’ on View at a New Exhibition at Metropolitan Museum of Art [Art Knowledge News]

Vermeer’s ‘The Milkmaid,’ via Art Knowledge News

Gilbert & George’s ‘Great Expectations,’ via MoMA

On view through October 5, 2009 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York is ‘In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960-1976,’ an exhibition that examines the beginnings of conceptualism and the role that international travel – in this case, particularly between Amsterdam and Los Angeles – played in shaping the movement. The exhibition includes ten American and European artists, from heavy-hitters such as Sol LeWitt and Lawrence Weiner, to the mythologized, like Bas Jan Ader and Stanley Brouwn, to lesser-known and peripheral figures such as Charlotte Posenenske. The focal point is the now-defunct but highly influential Amsterdam gallery Art & Project. Founders Geert van Beijeren and Adriaan van Ravesteijn gifted the museum 230 works in 2007, which make up the majority of the 75 works that appear in the exhibition.

Sol LeWitt’s ‘Area of Amsterdam Between Leidseple Jan Dibbets’s House and Kunstijsbaan Jaapeden,’ via MoMA

Related Links:
In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960–197 [MoMA]
MoMA Trumpets Amsterdam’s Role as Hub of Conceptual Art [Art21]
Amsterdam as Hub for Globetrotting Conceptualists [NY Times]
Conceptual Motion [New Yorker]
Whatsits and Thingamabobs [NYObserver]
In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960 – 1976 [ScribeMedia Art Culture]
In & Out of Amsterdam at the Museum of Modern Art [Art Critical]
Conceptual artists from Amsterdam and Los Angeles go dutch at MoMA [TimeOut NY]
Looking at MoMA’s “In & Out of Amsterdam” [Hrag Vartanian]
On Text & Art [Jen Bekman]
Stunning and Flat [After Art News]

Bas Jan Ader’s ‘Art & Bulletin 89,’ via MoMA

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“Camp Forestia” (1996) by Peter Doig. Via NY Times.

On view now until early 2010, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) has opened the Judith Rothschild Foundation Contemporary Drawings Collection, which was originally acquired in 2005. The exhibit features over 2,500 contemporary works and surveys “various methods and materials within the styles of gestural and geometric abstraction, representation and figuration, and systems-based conceptual drawings.” Artists showcased in the exhibition include Lee Bontecou, Joseph Beuys, Donald Judd, Hanne Darboven, Elizabeth Peyton, John Currin, Amelie von Wulffen, Mona Hatoum, Lucy McKenzie, Paulina Olowska, Nate Lowman, and more.

“Untitled” by Kai Althoff (2004). Via NY Times.

Related Links:
Compass in Hand: Selections from The Judith Rothschild Foundation [MoMA]
Video – Compass in Hand: Curator Christian Rattemeyer discusses the exhibit [MoMA]
MoMA Pushes the Envelope in Works on Paper [NY Times]
Compass in Hand: Selections from the Rothschild Foundation [Art in America]
Compass in Hand: Art Review [ArtSlant]

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