Ugo Rondinone, drifting clouds (Installation View), via Sam Covern for Art Observed.

Currently on view at Gladstone Gallery, artist Ugo Rondinone has opened a show work that spans a broad range of his creative output over several years.  Mixing together his practice in installation, sculpture, drawing and performance, the show sees Rondinone reanimating commonplace objects—such as tree branches or window frames—in his signature approach towards the Neo-Romantic. (more…)

The Bass in Miami Beach. Photo by Robin Hill : Courtesy of The Bass.

Located in the center of Miami Beach’s rapidly expanding art and architectural hub, The Bass Museum has finally reopened after an ambitious renovation spearheaded by principal architect David Gauld. The $12 million renovation and expansion, which adds 4,100 square feet to the existing 8,700 square feet exhibition space, as well as a brand new 5,200 square feet wing for educational programming, is the second major renovation the museum has undertaken since opening in 1964. The Bass (which was originally named the Bass Museum of Art) went through an expansion of 16,000 square feet in 2001 under the creative consultancy of Japanese architect Arata Isozaki, whose team then had included Gauld. In the new space, the New York-based architect’s vision suggests commitment to authenticity, while expanding towards new horizons in the museum-going experience. The additions of new programmable space merges with the building’s monumental integrity and refined Art-Deco façade, allowing a sophisticated vision of a global contemporary art museum under the welcoming dome of a landmark institution that has catered to local residents in Miami Beach for decades.

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Ugo Rondinone, the sun at 4pm (Installation View), via Art Observed

Ugo Rondinone returns to Gladstone Gallery this fall for an exhibition of recent works, culling together a body of works that mark the artist’s engagement with the natural world through four separate series of work.  Bearing the names of various natural forces, Rondinone’s mountain, sun, waterfall, and cloud pieces capture a particular vantage point in modern humanity’s engagement with the world around it.

Ugo Rondinone, the sun at 4pm (Installation View), via Art Observed

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Ugo Rondinone’s Seven Magic Mountains installation in the Las Vegas desert has been vandalized, the city’s local news reports.  “Yes, we are very upset about this vandalism,” says Amanda Horn, the director of communications at the Nevada Museum of Art. “It is something we knew was a risk when we installed an art display on public lands.” (more…)

Ugo Rondinone, clouds + mountains + waterfalls at Sadie Coles HQ (Installation View), via Art Observed

Sadie Coles HQ is currently presenting a vibrantly colorful exhibition, clouds + mountains + waterfalls, by Swiss born artist Ugo Rondinone, an artist already recognized by his idiosyncratic and often whimsical works in a wide range of media. Rondinone, whose oeuvre has been subject to numerous exhibitions and national museum shows globally since the mid ‘80s, here presents three independent yet narrative-driven and interconnected series of pieces, following the artist’s signature bright color palette and fascination with natural landscapes and materials.

Ugo Rondinone, clouds + mountains + waterfalls at Sadie Coles HQ (Installation View), via Art Observed

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Nine massive stone sculptures by Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone have been installed in Rockefeller center this week, a collaboration between the artist at New York’s Public Art Fund.  Titled Human Nature, the primitivist sculptures each way 17 and 1/2  tons, and were installed by crane.  “My first thought was how big,” said Keith Douglas, managing director for Rockefeller Center. “He was saying ‘huge colossal sculptures,’ and I’m thinking, ‘In comparison to what?’ and multiplying times nine.”  (more…)

Ugo Rondinone, Pure Moonlight (Installation View), via Almine Rech

Almine Rech Gallery Paris is currently hosting its 7th installation of work by the Swiss-born Ugo Rondinone, exploring the interplay of time and creative practice on the artist.  Titled Pure Moonlight, the show consists of a series of Rondinone’s concentric “date paintings,” as well another set of small-scale candle sculptures.

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Ugo Rondinone – Nude (2012), Cycladic Art Museum

Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone has built a reputation for himself as an artist who doesn’t stay in one place very long.  Exploring a variety of themes through panting, installation, video, sculpture and drawing, Rondinone seems to use his art as a way to explore context, shaping his exhibitions and pieces to interact with their location on a metaphorical level.

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All installation images courtesy Gladstone Gallery by David Regen, copyright the artists.

The Spirit Level is a large multimedia group show currently on display at both of the Gladstone Gallery locations in Chelsea. New York-based artist Ugo Rondinone curated the show with the intention of tapping into various levels of consciousness with both sexual and surreal imagery. With a rather dark and visceral edge, the work spans a variety of mediums: painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, and installation. Between the two galleries, a total of 19 artists are represented including Martin Boyce, Ann Craven, and Sam Gilliam.

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Ugo Rondinone, ERSTERJUNIZWEITAUSENDUNDELF (2011). All images courtesy of Almine Rech Gallery.

New Horizon is the sixth solo exhibition by Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone at Almine Rech Gallery Brussels. For the first time since 1997 the artist’s iconic “horizon paintings” are being presented along with a series of watercolors. The now New York-based multi-media artist has continually questioned the relationship between viewer and artwork as well as the role of the artist and his place in the world. This series of works offer an entry point into the artist’s personal meditations around these inquiries while challenging the notion of public versus private domains.

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Beatriz Milhazes, O Moderno, 2002 (est. $1-1.3 million, realized $1.1 million), via Phillipsdepury.com

Phillips de Pury’s Contemporary art evening sale on Monday night at their new space in the Claridge’s Hotel, London realized $17 million for 27 of 31 lots sold. The sum (which includes fees) fell within presale estimates of $16.4-27.3 million despite the withdrawal of a high priced Cindy Sherman, reportedly because another version of the work sold at Art Basel earlier this month. The equivalent sale last year at Phillips realized just $6 million and nearly half the lots offered went unsold.

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The audience at SculptureCenter’s Lucky Draw 2011. All images courtesy of SculptureCenter.

Last Wednesday, Art Observed was on site at SculptureCenter’s Lucky Draw in Long Island City. Of the events in New York’s spring benefit circuit, Lucky Draw stands out for its rapid paced, chance-dependent operation that lends the event an element of excitement and guarantees that each ticket holder brings home a piece of art. Even though the auction format gala keeps it casual by omitting a formal dinner or seating order, anticipation leads up to a quick raffle draw that replaces the traditional art world bidding process. Every ticket purchased guarantees the lucky philanthropist a piece of art as decided by the raffle’s random draw and not the highest bidder. However, SculptureCenter knows the anxious collector’s soul and lets the event begin with a traditional search for the three highest bidders, who are then allowed to bypass fate and pick the first three works of art.

SculptureCenter volunteer carrying an Olaf Breuning piece 

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Detail, nude (xxx), 2010. All images courtesy Gladstone Gallery.

Currently on view at Gladstone Gallery is nude, an exhibition of cast wax sculptures by Ugo Rondinone. The seven life-size figures, which occupy the gallery in various moments of repose, are made from a mixture of wax and earth pigments. Rondinone’s work has been described as perverse and grotesque to pretty and breathlessly romantic; this exhibition seems to fit into the final category, reflecting on poignant expressions of the human condition.

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Cover of the catalog for last night’s Contemporary Art auction at Phillips de Pury & Co showing Thomas Schutte’s Doppelkopf (1994), via Phillipsdepury.com

Last night’s Contemporary Art auction at Phillips de Pury & Co reinforced uncertainties regarding the present state of the Contemporary Art market, as the sale earned just £3,963,450 against the pre-sale estimate of £6,075,000-8,575,000 (totals realized include buyer’s premium, estimates do not). Of 45 lots offered only 24 found buyers, leaving 47% of the lots unsold. For comparison, last year’s Contemporary Art Auction at Phillips earned £5.1 million.

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Ugo Rondinone with two of his works in lower Manhattan, 2007, photo by Charlie Samuels via artnet

Currently on view at Aargauer Kunsthaus, in conjunction with the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y Léon and Galerie Eva Presenhuber, is “The Night of Lead”, the first comprehensive exhibition of Udo Rondinone’s oevre in his Swiss homeland in eleven years.  New and recent works of painting, small and environmental sculpture, video and sound installation cover two floors of the gallery with a surrealist sensibility that speaks more to a tone of poetic metaphor than to a grope toward the unconscious.

Ugo Rondinone, The twenty-third hour of the poem, 2010, wax cast, pigments, 55 x 32 x 32 inches, © Ugo Rondinone via Aargauer Kunsthaus

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SculptureCenter’s annual fundraising event, Lucky Draw 2010. All images via SculptureCenter.

AO was on site for Lucky Draw 2010, a spirited annual benefit thrown by SculptureCenter to raise money for its exhibition program.  This year’s event set a new record for the highest gross, bringing in over $120,000 to the non-for-profit arts institution located in Long Island City, New York.

Volunteers moving a work by Kerstin Brätsch and Adele Röder (DAS INSTITUT)

On April 13, 2010, as ticket holders surveyed the offerings and made lists of their top picks, no one seemed to worry that the event’s unlucky date would disturb anyone’s luck.  The room was abuzz with excitement: unlike most art auctions, in this event the order in which the artworks are selected is determined by a lively and suspenseful random drawing.  The ticket price, at $450 a head, draws both novice and experienced collectors.

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Still Life Bread (2009) by Ugo Rondinone, via Sadie Coles

Now on view at Sadie Coles in London is Ugo Rondinone’s ‘Nude.’ The Swiss artist displays new sculptures from his ongoing ‘still.life.’ series. Objects such as tree trunks, walnuts, potatoes and other objects normally found in still-life paintings are cast in lead-filled bronze and displayed throughout the gallery.

for more images, report and relevant links read more….

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The Royal College of Art Secret Postcard fundraiser via The Guardian

-The Royal College of Art’s Secret 2009 event has 2,500 postcards for sale for £40, made by artists including Anish Kapoor, Grayson Perry and Yoko Ono.  Though buyers don’t know who the artist is until after they buy. [Times UK]

-Penelope Curtis has been appointed director of Tate Britain, the first woman to hold a directorship at Tate. [Guardian]

-Tracey Emin opens a new exhibition in New York, that, while popular, comes nowhere near the levels of sales or attendance she normal receives in Britain. [NY Times]

An artist’s rendering of Olafur Eliasson’s ‘Cirkelbroen’ bridge to be built in Copenhagen via Artinfo

-Olafur Eliasson has designed a bridge to be completed by 2012 in Copenhagen’s harbor. Called ‘Brikelbroen,’ the bridge is comprised of five circles that take pedestrians on a winding path rather than straight across. [Artinfo]

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

“Untitled (77/23 — Bernstein)” (1977) by Donald Judd sold for $3,218,500 against an estimate of $4.0 million, via ArtInfo

PHILLIPS DE PURY’S CONTEMPORARY ART SALE, New York, Thursday, November 13th

Total Lots Offered: 51, originally 56
Total Lots Sold: 30
Total Sales Value: $9.6 Million
Total Sales Pre-Auction Estimate: $23-$32 Million

Before Phillips de Pury’s Contemporary Art sale began in New York on Thursday evening November 13th, five works were withdrawn, including John Currin’s Standing Nude from 1993 (est. $500–700,000), pictured below, Richard Prince’s Untitled (Tire Planter) from 1999 (est. $120–180,000), and an Anselm Kiefer work. Total sales were $9,608,700, which was less than half of the low estimate of $23 million. By way of comparison, a comparable Phillips sale a year ago fetched $42.3 million. In the end, 41% of the lots (21 lots) were unsold (51% unsold by value) and those that did sell did so at below estimates. Anything estimated to sell at more than $1 million was either withdrawn or went unsold. In attendance were collectors such as Adam Lindemann, Stavros Merjos, Stefan Edlis of Chicago, Maria Baibakova, Mera and Don Rubell, Zurich dealer Doris Ammann, and executives from the Russian luxury goods giant Mercury Group which, as covered by Art Observed here, recently purchased the Phillips de Pury auction house.

Despite the dismal outcome of the totals, Phillips de Pury’s in the end appeared prescient versus its competitors Sotheby’s and Christie’s who both got crushed by over guaranteeing works in a down market, by contrast, Phillips guaranteed none of the 51 works offered, save for a single neon text 2005 sculpture by Kendell Geers, which had a low estimate of $60,000 and sold for $56,250. In a comparable sale last November, Phillips guaranteed about half the lots.

$9.6 Million at Phillips De Pury [ArtNet]
Phillips Sale Totals Less Than Half the Low Estimate [New YorkTimes]
Phillips Goes with the Downward Flow [ArtInfo]
Hirst Painting Flops at ‘Brutal’ New York Art Auction [Bloomberg]

more story and pictures after the jump…

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Installation View via Matthew Marks Gallery

Painting: Now and Forever, Part II remains on view through August 15 as a joint exhibition at Matthew Marks Gallery, 522 West 22nd Street and Greene Naftali Gallery, 508 West 26th Street. The show is a reprisal of one held ten years ago, but from a different angle. The artists in the current show are Kai Althoff, Cosima von Bonin, Merlin Carpenter, Mathew Cerletty, Wojciech Fangor, Katharina Fritsch, Gelitin, Isa Genzken, Poul Gernes, Daan van Golden, Jack Goldstein, Rodney Graham, Wade Guyton, Richard Hawkins, Mary Heilmann, Sophie von Hellermann, Charline von Heyl, Ull Hohn, Sergej Jensen, Mike Kelley, Ellsworth Kelly, Karen Kilimnik, Martin Kippenberger, Michael Krebber, William Leavitt, Michel Majerus, Bjarne Melgaard, Laura Owens, Blinky Palermo, Stephen Prina, R.H. Quaytman, Ugo Rondinone, Paul Sharits, Josh Smith, Reena Spaulings, Lily van der Stokker, Atsuko Tanaka, Paul Thek, Anne Truitt, Kelley Walker, Christopher Wool, and Katharina Wulff.

Painting: Now and Forever, Part II [Artcal]
Painting Now and Forever, Part II at Green Naftali [Flavorpill]
Painting: Now and Forever, Part II at Green Naftali and Matthew Marks [Design Boom]
Painting: Now and Forever, Part II, in collaboration with Green Naftali Gallery [Matthew Marks]
Painting: Now and Forever, Part II [Village Voice]

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From “99¢ dreams”, Doug Aitken via Galerie Eva Presenhuber

Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich is pleased to announce two simultaneous solo shows by Ugo Rondinone and Doug Aitken. Both Rondinone’s “Twelve sunsets, twenty nine dawns, all in one” and Aitken’s “99¢ dreams” will run until August 2, 2008. While one artist creates sculptures and one photographs, there is a common thread between the two. Each artist touches upon the simplicity of day-to-day life, infusing a sense of longing or yearning for something.

DOUG AITKEN, “99¢ dreams” [ArtNews]
Doug Aitken at Galerie Eva Presenhuber, “99¢ dreams” [ArtNet]
Ugo Rondinone- Twelve sunsets, twenty nine dawns, all in one. [ArtNet]
Galerie Eva Presenhuber: Doug Aitken, Ugo Rondinone [Galerie Eva Presenhuber]

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