Installation view. All images via Gagosian Gallery.

In Urs Fischer’s latest exhibition at Gagosian’s Davies street gallery in London, the artist has created a life-sized wax model of Russian collector Dasha Zhukova. This is the next installment in a series made by the artist in which art-world figures are converted into giant candles and then burned slowly, until they are reduced to wax drippings. Previously making works of artists Julian Schnabel and Rudolf Stingel, and dealer Bruno Bischofsberger. Though Zhukova requested she be the next art figure turned wax candle, Fischer hesitated because, up until this point, he has only portrayed men. Ultimately, however, on Monday, September 10^th, the wick at the top of the wax figure of Dasha Zhukova’s head was lit, and will continue to burn until the sculpture is reduced to a puddle of melted wax, coinciding with the show’s closing on November 3^rd. (more…)

Urs Fischer, PLAY with Choreography by Madeline Hollander (Installation View), via Art Observed

Over the past several years, few artists have moved so effortlessly across media and concepts like Urs Fischer.  From kaleidoscopic, cartoonish abstractions to surreal sculptural assemblages on to patient, gradual evolutions of form and space on canvas, his work perhaps best characterized by its willingness to never stay in one place for too long.  This relentless invention finds a new outlet in PLAY, a new sculptural work at Gagosian Gallery in New York, created in collaboration with Madeline Hollander. (more…)

Urs Fischer, Sōtatsu (detail) (2018)New York, Artworks © Urs Fischer, Photo Rob McKeever

Throughout the career of Swiss artist Urs Fischer, space and form have long worked in lock step with acts of repetition and iteration, allowing his myriad approaches towards studio process to create ever-evolving forms and bodies of work that change as much from piece to piece as they do series to series.  For his most recent body of works on view now at Gagosian Gallery‘s uptown location, the artist takes this interest to a natural conclusion, creating a series of panel-based paintings that draw on a gradual evolution in the painter’s improvisations on single images. (more…)

Andy Warhol, 20 Pink Maos (1979), via Phillips

Complementing the offering of new works across town at Regent’s Park, Phillips London has opened a week of auctions around Frieze Week, closing out its 30-lot sale this evening with a consistent sale, seeing 6 of the evening’s 30 lots go unsold to reach a final tally of £17,867,750. (more…)

Urs Fischer, officeguy (2016), via Art Observed

Entering Gagosian’s fifth floor exhibition space on the Upper East Side, one is greeted with something of an exercise in phenomenological affect.  Smelling faintly of bacon (the artist stipulated that several slices must be cooked in the gallery space each morning), the space is adorned with sweeping brushstrokes on each of the walls, and topped with a series of aluminum panels, bearing cartoon icons twisted into abstract geometric arrangements.  The result is a twisting, surreal environment that feels as surreal as it looks. (more…)

Robert Rauschenberg, Tablet Series (1974)

Currently on view at Luxembourg and Dayan, the group exhibition In The Making seeks to shed light on the often overlooked, yet crucial creative dialogue between the artist and their assistant or assistants in the studio.  Organized by Tamar Margalit, the exhibition, which runs through April 16th, unfolds in a manner similar to a family tree, connecting infamous or remote dots in New York art scene after the 1950’s through shared studio spaces, practices, and the informal education process that often occurs in the relationship between artist and their hired team. (more…)

Urs Fischer, Bruno and Yoyo (2015), via Vito Schnabel Gallery

Vito Schnabel has taken over the lease at the former St. Moritz home of Bruno Bischofberger Gallery, marking the curator’s first permanent gallery space with an exhibition of new work by Urs Fischer, as well as a public installation at the nearby Kulm Hotel by Sterling Ruby.  The pair of exhibitions are a strong next step for the curator, paying homage to the history of Bischofberger’s space while emphasizing Schnabel’s vision for a gallery engaged with the broader landscape of his new home. (more…)

Urs Fischer and Tara Subkoff are profiled in New York Magazine this week, as the couple reflect on Subkoff’s new film #Horror, which premiered this week in New York, and documents the fraught emotional relations of young children.  “One of the things I love about the movie is its harshness — the harshness of the girls against the other girls, the harshness and brutality, which is not a male brutality,” Fischer says. “The movie reminds me a little of Stand by Me — as a romanticized girl version. Basically, I see your movie as the contemporary-girl version of Stand by Me.” (more…)

Sara Friedlander

RxArt‘s annual benefit gala took place Tuesday night at Stephan Weiss Studios in the West Village, honoring Swiss artist Urs Fischer. The ceiling was decked out in colorful elephant mobiles designed by the artist, tying into RxArt’s mission of transforming the often sterile halls of children’s healthcare facilities and hospitals into engaging visual environments for young patients.

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Urs Fischer, TBD (2014), via Sadie Coles HQ, All images © the artist; courtesy Sadie Coles HQ, London

A collection of new paintings by Swiss artist Urs Fischer are currently on view at Sadie Coles HQ in London. Marking a departure from the artist’s more flashy exhibitions of subversive installations and sculptures, this is the first time Fischer has devoted himself strictly to large-scale paintings. (more…)

Urs Fischer (Installation View), photo by Stefan Altenburger, © Urs Fischer, Courtesy of the artist and The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles

Occupying both the Grand Avenue and the Geffen Contemporary spaces at MOCA, Swiss-born, New York based artist Urs Fischer presents his first U.S. retrospective, culling from his diverse and unique body of work to fill both spaces with an overwhelming display of sculptural pieces and grandiose immersive environments.

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Urs Fischer, Problem Painting (2011). All images via Gagosian Gallery.

In his first exhibition with Gagosian Gallery Swiss-born, New York-based artist Urs Fischer presents a group of large-scale paintings and sculptures in the exhibition Beds and Problem Paintings. The installation at Gagosian is comprised of three parts: a series of paintings, a duo of fabricated beds, and a grouping of boxes reminiscent of the artist’s 2009 Service à la Française.

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David Altmejd, The University 1 (2004). Images courtesy The Brant Foundation Art Study Center / Farzad Owrang.

For sculptor and installation artist David Altmejd, structure continues to play an integral role to the exhibition layout as well as the conceptual art itself. Currently on view at The Brant Foundation in Greenwich, Connecticut, the chronological and aesthetic diversity of the showcase lends itself to many labels, potentially defined as a small-scale retrospective or a massive installation. Altmejd explained on a tour of the exhibition that he intensively sought the corporeal as cognitive—the use of the human body as an artistic commentary.

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All photos on site for Art Observed by Samuel Sveen.

In 2007, Urs Fischer used a jackhammer to tear up the floor of Gavin Brown’s enterprise in Chelsea, leaving the room an enormous pit of dirt. With his return to the gallery for a joint show with Cassandra MacLeod, Fischer has sought to “build” on the past show both literally and theoretically. The press release refers to the “inverted pyramid of excavated earth,” the natural next step of invention being a flat surface above the earth—the table, with which Fischer has filled the three gallery spaces. Paintings by MacLeod cover the walls of the gallery, making for an intriguing dialogue between the two artists’ work. Stacks of tables, some three or four high, perhaps even offer a better view to the paintings mounted high above.

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Mircea Cantor’s work in FIAC 2011, image by Caroline Claisse for Art Observed, all photos by Art Observed unless otherwise noted.

By the close of FIAC on Sunday evening, some 68,000+ visitors had come through the fair.  These attendance figures represent a 6% increase from the previous year, reports the New York Times.  Housed this year in the exuberant Grand Palais, the fair showed strong sales from the get go. Despite the global economic downtown of recent years, the atmosphere was effervescent. French, American, and German galleries dominated the space (55, 26, and 21, respectively), but participants from Brazil, Turkey, and South Africa showed a strong presence at the fair for the first time. New York newcomers Matthew Marks, Eleven Rivington, Andrew Kreps, Michele Maccarone and Friedrich Petzel did well, and Pace Gallery made a comeback after a long absence. Compared to Frieze the week before in London, many fair-goers felt that the Parisian fair was riskier in content, creating a more exciting and eclectic display of artworks.

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Antoine Dorotte’s Una Misteriosa Bola (2011). All photos on site for Art Observed by Caroline Claisse.

Just a stone’s throw from the Grand Palais, the host site of FIAC 2011, sculptures abound at the Jardin des Tuileries. Works include those by Urs Fischer, Antony Gormley, and Navid Nuur.

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Vincent Mauger, La somme des hypothèses (2011)

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Artist Zhang Enli with A Bunch of Balls (2009-2011). All photos on site for Art Observed by Jen Lindblad, unless otherwise noted.

Currently showing at Hauser & Wirth in New York is a new body of work by celebrated Chinese artist Zhang Enli. Comprised of twenty new paintings and one sculptural group, the story he tells is one of cultural relocation—namely, the artist’s move twenty years ago from a small provincial town in northern China to Shanghai, where he now lives and works. Wherever we go we carry objects—ordinary objects that remain present and constant in our lives. All of the objects Zhang depicts are real, found in and around his studio: empty cans, a carpet, an umbrella, pipes, metal and rope netting. Familiar enough to be accessible but reduced enough to be seductive, Zhang considers the objects carefully, stripping them to their essence. His quiet, subtle paintings bear almost no resemblance to the bold, political work of his Chinese contemporaries. “I want to strip the object to the bone,” he says, “just leave what it actually is. If you leave a glass on a table, it leaves a watermark. That mark is what I want to express.”

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The New York Times surveys this summer’s selection of outdoor sculpture in New York City [AO Newslink]

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All photos by Caroline Claisse.

Currently on view at the Punta della Dogana, housed in the magnificent Palazzo Grassi, is “The World Belongs to You.” Curated by Caroline Bourgeois, the exhibition brings together artists from different generations, geographical locations, and practices to explore history and current realities.

The Punta della Dogana became the official exhibition space of Francois Pinault‘s private collection in 2006, when he purchased the building from the city of Venice. It now houses works from internationally renowned contemporary artists such as Jeff Koons, Urs Fischer, Maurizio Cattelan, and Takashi Murakami.

Urs Fischer’s violet piano at Punta della Dogana.

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Andy Warhol, Self-Portrait, 1963-64 (est. $20-30 million, realized $38.4 million). All images via Christies.com.

Christie’s nearly white-glove sale of of Post-War and Contemporary art on Wednesday night brought in more than twice as the equivalent sale at Sotheby’s on Tuesday evening. Sixty-three of sixty-five lots sold for a whopping $301.7 million, giving the sale a sell through rate of 95% by lot and 99% by value. The total beat the high presale estimate of $299 million despite the fact that a Rauschenberg combine estimated to fetch between $12-18 million was withdrawn from the sale. Wednesday night’s results were the best the auction house has seen for a Contemporary evening auction since May 2008 (that sale realized $331 million). Bidding went on for about two hours, approximately fifteen minutes of which was spent on a single lot. Two telephone bidders chased Andy Warhol‘s blue self-portrait, one on the phone with Brett Gorvy of Christie’s and the other with Philippe Segalot, formerly of Christie’s. The audience laughed as bidding escalated in $100,000 increments and cheered each time one contender took a bigger leap ahead. In the end Gorvy’s buyer was triumphant and paid $38.4 million for the four-part piece, which was estimated to fetch between $20-30 million. The sale was a record for a Warhol portrait (self or otherwise) at auction.

Mark Rothko, Untitled No. 17, 1961 (est. $18-22 million, realized $33.7 million)

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Jeff Koons, Pink Panther, 1988 (est. $20-30 million), via Sothebys.com

This week Sotheby’s, Christie’s, and Phillips de Pury will hold Contemporary art auctions in New York. After an anemic week of Impressionist and Modern art sales, the auction houses hope to broker nearly half a billion dollars of Contemporary art. On Monday Sotheby’s will offer forty-three lots during two parts of a three part sale of the collection of Allan Stone (consisting mostly of works by Wayne Thiebaud and Willem de Kooning), followed by their fifty-nine lot Contemporary art evening sale on Tuesday. The next night Christie’s will offer sixty-six works expected to fetch at least $230 million. The week ends with Phillips de Pury’s fifty-one lot sale that carries an estimate of $85-120 million.

Andy Warhol, Sixteen Jackies, 1964 (est. $20-30 million), via Sothebys.com

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Subodh Gupta, Untitled, 2011, oil on canvas. All images courtesy Hauser & Wirth.

Opening tonight at Hauser & Wirth New York is an ascetic new exhibition by Indian artist Subodh Gupta. The artist, who is often referred to as “The Damien Hirst of Delhi,” earned his nickname from a dazzling sculpture of a skull entitled Very Hungry God (2006). He is the leader of a group of Indian artists whom mega-curator Hans Ulrich Obrist frequently heralds as art world game-changers, and his works regularly fetch auction prices over 1 million USD.

In contrast to this glitzy reputation, “A glass of water” is shockingly subdued. The exhibition takes its name from a work in which a metal drinking cup rests atop a table, filled to the brim with fresh water. Its origin and constant replenishment remain a mystery. The tension created– that the cup may overflow at any moment, from a visitor’s step or breath– “serves up a rich metaphor for the almost unbearable tension between luxury and depletion, accumulation and deprivation, acquisition and exhaustion that are the daily diet of exploding international culture,” explains the exhibition statement.

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New Museum Spring Gala After Party 2011

Art Observed was on site at the New Museum‘s annual Spring Gala After Party in the financial district on April 6th. More than 40 floors above Manhattan, the room was a mixture of art world insiders, socialites and fans, including Hope Atherton, Urs Fischer, John Waters, Gavin Brown and Jen Brill, with music by DJs Harley and Cassie and a performance by the band Hess is More.

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Urs Fischer, Untitled (Lamp/Bear), 2005/2006, via Wall Street Journal

Untitled (Lamp/Bear), a 23-foot, 16-ton sculpture of bright yellow teddy bear slumped beneath a Bakelite lamp, will be on display at the Seagram Building (375 Park Avenue, at 53rd St) through September 2011. The piece, by Swiss sculptor Urs Fischer, is a highlight of Christie’s Post-War and Contemporary Art auction, and began its life as a 1-foot teddy bear, which was then scanned three-dimensionally with lasers in Switzerland and cast in bronze in Shanghai. Christie’s will be auctioning the installation on May 11th.

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