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Curtis Kulig, Love Me (Steel) (2011). All photos on site for Art Observed by Daniel Creahan.

Over and over again, the two words, “Love Me,” are repeatedly scrawled on the canvasses of Curtis Kulig, the street artist best known for emblazoning this simple cursive ‘throw-up’ all over New York City. Viewed next to the faux-LED crosses and blatant consumerist imagery of his long-time friend and supporter Skullphone, they begin to take on a hint of desperation, a plaintive plea in a world inundated with brand-names and electronic simulacra. While the two artists have supported each other for over 7 years, Scripture, now showing at the Mallick Williams and Co. Gallery in Chelsea, is the first documented collaboration between the two artists. Regardless of the precedent, however, the installation sees Kulig and Skullphone pursuing techniques that the artists have explored in past work.
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Tom Sachs interviewed in the Wall Street Journal, in advance of his takeover of the Park Avenue Armory this Spring and upcoming show at Sperone Westwater on the Bowery [AO Newslink]

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‪‬Tate Britain to explore “the impact of Picasso’s art on British art” this February, exhibition will include English National Ballet residency [AO Newslink]

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Frank Stella, Double Mitered Maze (1967). All images on site for Art Observed by Ana Marjanovic.

Paul Kasmin gallery hosts Geometric Variations, an exhibition assembling Frank Stella’s square-shaped canvases from the 1960s and ’70s, including Concentric Square, Mitered Mazes and the Benjamin Moore series. According to the press release, the exhibition explores the “historical importance” of Stella’s canvases. Contextualizing them within Western art history discourse, H.H. Arnason pointed out that Stella’s art represents a median between the “modernism advocated by Greenberg, and Minimalism.”

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Performa opens November 1 in New York with Elmgreen & Dragset work Happy Days in the Art World, featuring Joseph Fiennes [AO Newslink]

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Cologne sentences German art fraud ring to 15 years in prison for painting 14 works sold as masterpieces by such artists as Max Ernst, Fernand Léger and others [AO Newslink]

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‪‬Hewlett-Packard signs 10 year lease for Chelsea Art Museum building on Hudson River with ‘special’ plans [AO Newslink]

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Damien Hirst Legend (2011) and Myth (2010), via The Guardian

Damien Hirst has moved on to dissecting mythical creatures in his most recent public showing at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire, UK, part of a Sotheby’s selling exhibition of monumental sculpture. From Legend, the winged horse with exposed bones and muscles, to Myth, a partially skinned unicorn, Hirst continues his exploration of anatomy, as well as “the relationship between science and religion,” (The Guardian). “It’s kind of like exploding a myth to make it real,” Hirst explains.

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‪‬Marni Kotak artfully births Baby X in Bushwick Microscope Gallery, awards herself and new son 10 foot trophies [AO Newslink]

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Sliding down with canvas mat in Carsten Höller’s Untitled (Slide), 2011. All photos on site for Art Observed by Nicholas Wirth.

Carsten Höller‘s 40-foot-high, 102-foot-long transparent metal slide—a “pneumatic mailing system”—awaits the daring visitor at the top floor of the New Museum. Surveying eighteen years of the artist’s work, The Experience exhibition is organized “experientially,” as opposed to chronologically, moving from a low-speed mirrored carousel down the slide to realistic albeit neon animal sculptures, disorienting architectural interventions, a sensory deprivation pool, and the artist’s simple yet highly effective upside-down goggles. The series of interactive environments function like science experiments, designed “to explore the limits of human sensorial perception and logic through carefully controlled participatory experiences,” as the exhibition’s press release explains.

Installation view, fourth floor.

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Installation view of George Segal’s Woman on a Park Bench (1998) and Roger Hiorns’ Untitled (2008) in September 11, MoMA PS1, 2011. Photo: Matthew Septimus.

For an exhibition dedicated to the memory of September 11, 2001, September 11 at MoMA PS1 is conspicuously void of images from the tragedy 10 years ago. There are no day-after headlines, no lists of missing persons, no photos of crumbling towers filled with smoke and terror. Instead, curator Peter Eleey approaches 9/11 with more than 70 works by 41 different artists, the works created for reasons wholly separate from, and many before, 9/11/01—only 1 piece was made as a direct response to the tragedy. “Horrific, yet familiar, images of the attacks and their aftermath are embedded in our memories,” says the press release. “This exhibition considers the ways in which 9/11 has altered how we see and experience the world in its wake.”

Installation view of Jeremy Deller’s Unrealized Project for the Exterior of the Carnegie Museum (2004-2011) and Felix Gonzalez-Torres’ “Untitled” (The End) (1990) in September 11, MoMA PS1, 2011. Photo: Matthew Septimus.

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Nowness presents a city of moving images with Doug Aitken’s new video work, Altered Earth.  Says Aitken, “I felt like I was holding the earth in my hand.” [AO Newslink]

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Michelangelo Pistoletto, Lavatore – impalcatura (2008-2011). All images via Simon Lee Gallery.

His second exhibition at Simon Lee Gallery, Michelangelo Pistoletto uses a process-as-product aesthetic to address themes of production, labor, and inevitably, deconstruction. The exhibition, titled Lavoro (Italian for to work or to operate), displays objects of construction as a means of revealing the art inherent to the tools that produce it, revisiting the artist’s fascination with ideas of assembly and process, and the socio-political implications thereof.

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‪‬Ai Weiwei to be named WSJ Innovator of the Year in Art, Marina Abramović to accept on his behalf at MoMA award ceremony this Thursday [AO Newslink]

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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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The Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, designed by Frank Gehry, is placed on hold with aspects of construction halted [AO Newslink]

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Banks Violette video interviewed on his process and the origins of and conceptual drivers behind his work [AO Newslink]

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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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Musicians play in front of a work by Alex Katz at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris, where the painter’s show Face The Music runs through November 19th, 2011. All Photos by Caroline Claisse for Art Observed

Thursday evening, October 20th, Parisian galleries across the city participated in what is called Nocturne des Galeries (Galleries Night Out). Hosted by FIAC, the event is an opportunity to survey the French art scene, as well as to “step up the commitment and increase the visibility of galleries focused on 20th century furniture conceived by architects and and contemporary design work.” The galleries are divided into five different sections: Louvre/Saint Germain, Champ Élysées, Eastern Paris, Louise Weiss, and Marias, which boasts the largest number of galleries. Art Observed was on site for openings at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Galerie Chantal Crousel and Emmanuel Perrotin.

Xavier Veilhan, opening of Orchestra at Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin through November 12.

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Crowds outside the Grand Palais on the public opening of FIAC, October 21, 2011. All photographs for Art Observed on site by Caroline Claisse.

After two days of previews, FIAC opened its doors to the Paris public on Friday, October 21st. Jill Silverman, Director of Paris/Salzburg-based gallery Thaddaeus Ropac, tells Art Observed that the fair presents “a very good cross section of European collectors.” FIAC is one of the most nationally-focused art fairs, boasting a solid 32% of French exhibitors, whereas last week’s Frieze in London had only 25% British galleries. American presence increased this year with several New York galleries making their debut at the fair: Matthew Marks, Eleven Rivington, Andrew Kreps, Michele Maccarone and Friedrich Petzel. After a 30+year absence, Pace Gallery made a comeback to the fair. Works by seasoned veteran Damien Hirst are exhibited at both White Cube and Gagosian. Anish Kapoor also has work spread across the fair, whose gargantuan installation Leviathan filled the entire interior of the Grand Palais earlier this year. Lisson is showing one of his signature colored concave mirrors in fire-engine red; Kamel Mennour has wine-red, Galeria Continua has green, and Kukje/Tina Kim has purple; all have different price tags. Sales have been strong thusfar; Pace Gallery’s Arne Glimcher told Artinfo, “We had sales right off the bat, it was really fascinating. I hadn’t anticipated this kind of rush, especially in this economy, where Europe is not in as good of shape as America. But I think we have the right artists.” He added, “FIAC is certainly an enormous cut above Frieze.”

Michelangelo Pistoletto, Two Less One (2011) at Galleria Continua

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‪‬Damien Hirst designs label for 20-year-old Somerset Cider Brandy as a favor to Alice Temperley, 10 years after being asked [AO Newslink]

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Zeng Fanzhi, Bacon, 2010

Now on at Gagosian Gallery Hong Kong is a large exhibition of paintings by Chinese artist Zeng Fanzhi. Known for his representations of the human figure, this show presents many key works from the past twenty years of his career. Fanzhi’s work explores the transformations within post-Cultural Revolution China, specifically the developments in art and the art market. His paintings tackle the evolving role of Chinese history and tradition within contemporary society, and his expressionistic style makes clear that this is not necessarily a smooth transition. The paintings are tactile and frenzied both in style and subject matter. Since first being represented by Gagosian in July, this is Fanzhi’s first show at the Gagosian Gallery Hong Kong.

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Thomas Houseago, Lying Figure (Mother Father) 2011. Via Art & Architecture Journal Press.

On Vassivière Island, What Went Down is Thomas Houseago‘s first exclusively sculpture exhibition in France, at The Centre International d’art et due Paysage de L’ile de Vassivière. Both the building and its surroundings are filled with large, monumental sculptures inspired by the Vassivière landscape. Curated by Chiara Parisi, the artist creates with plaster, bronze, and wood, applying traditional ‘high-art’ materials to sprawling, awkward, masculine forms. Houseago has described his work as unskilled, saying “I could talk for hours about Michel Foucault, but I couldn’t draw. So I feel like I’m in a punk band. I’m completely unskilled. I feel like I just have to do it.”

Thomas Houseago, Large Lamp I (Snake Island) (2011). Via AAJP

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The Mound (2011), left. Triptych (2011), right.

Lisa Yuskavage is currently showing her third solo exhibition at David Zwirner Gallery. In a mix of early French Impressionism (a la Manet) and Dali-esque Surrealism, Yuskavage captures the languid, voluptuous figures of the female body through a feminist lens. The artist also takes on themes of landscape, time, and plot, in a way that extends her visual resonance.

Art Observed on site for the opening

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