William Kentridge’s proposed installation on the banks of the Tiber River in Rome is turning to Kickstarter to aid in its conception and execution.  The project, spearheaded in collaboration with THE OFFICE performing arts + film, will enable Kentridge to execute his charcoal drawings as power washed icons on the banks of the river.  “Given the extraordinary scope of Kentridge’s Triumphs & Laments, we wanted to invite the global community to engage with this epic public art project to help bring it to fruition,” says Rachel Chanoff, founder and director of The OFFICE.  (more…)

The Dia Foundation has added two new board members this week, as it continues to work towards rebuilding a strong presence in downtown Manhattan.  The new members are James Murdoch, chief executive at 21st Century Fox and son of Rupert Murdoch, alongside Jane Skinner Goodell, the former television reporter and anchor, the wife of N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell. (more…)

Monika Grzymala, Raumzeichnung (outside/inside) (2016), via Lisson Gallery

Working in close collaboration with The Drawing Room, Lisson Gallery’s has brought together a selection of pieces that explore the more conceptual reaches of the drawing process, not only exploring drawing as a condition of ideation or practice for smaller works, but as a method of experiencing, and segmenting, space itself.  Titled Line, the show is a strong investigation of space and memory, time and flow, extended “off the page,” as the press release reads. (more…)

Christie’s is filing a multi-million dollar lawsuit against Jose Mugrabi, after the dealer and collector missed a $13 million payment on a Basquiat work he bought at auction last year.  The lawsuit, including fees and interest on the payment, will top $37 million.  “We repeatedly attempted to resolve this matter with Mr. Mugrabi,” said a company spokesperson.  “Unfortunately, our efforts failed, and Christie’s felt it had no other alternative but to litigate.” (more…)

Vanity Fair reports on the increasingly heated conflicts over the estate of Melva Bucksbaum, the late vice chairwoman of the Whitney Museum, whose will is currently being challenged by her husband, Raymond Learsy.  Learsy claims he is entitled to half of Bucksbaum’s fortune, leading to fierce clashes with her children. (more…)

Aby Rosen has partnered with Jeff Koons and Groundswell, a New York community mural organization, to present a youth artists initiative at his SoHo project, 11 Howard.  The towering mural piece was created during after-school art programs led by Misha Tyutyunik.  “This is a very creative team of young artists, and it’s rare to see a group with such a unified vision. I’ve enjoyed working with the artists during the conception of their idea,” Koons said. (more…)

Gerhard Richter has harshly criticized a move to close the Museum Morsbroich in Leverkusen, Germany, and to sell its collection.  “A public art collection is not a financial investment that can be plundered depending on the cash situation,” he says.  “It is a piece of art history and represents the cultural memory of its trustees.” (more…)

Morten Skrøder Lund, Untitled (2016), via Art Observed

LTD Gallery is presenting the first U.S. Exhibition of painter Morten Skrøder Lund’s paintings on Polyethylene Vinyl Acetate (PEVA), dwelling on notions of time, composition and the interaction of paint and ground. (more…)

The Robert Rauschenberg Foundation has announced plans to allow the public fair use access to images the artist’s works.  “In keeping with Rauschenberg’s legacy, the Foundation is always looking to identify challenges and then provide solutions,” says Christy MacLear, CEO of the Rauschenberg Foundation. “Traditional notions of copyright and attempts to control images have proven incompatible with the nature of the digital age. (more…)

Anish Kapoor is drawing controversy this week, after the artist was granted exclusive artist rights to the Vantablack pigment, a paint that absorbs over 99% of light.  “I’ve never heard of an artist monopolizing a material,” says another artist, Christian Furr. “We should be able to use it. It isn’t right that it belongs to one man.” (more…)

The Met’s new website launch is profiled in Fast Company this week, noting its approach towards the digital landscape of modernity.  “People ask me: What is your biggest competition?,” says Sree Sreenivasan, the Met’s chief digital officer. “Is it MoMA? Guggenheim? Our competition is Netflix. Candy Crush. It’s life in 2016.” (more…)

Jake and Dinos Chapman have opened a pop-up store, titled “Fucking Hell,” in the heart of Amsterdam’s Red Light District.  The store contains a number of interesting art works and projects.  In one corner, a visitor can buy an original drawing by Jake Chapman, tattooed on their skin.   (more…)

John Baldessari is interviewed in the New York Times this week, as the artist opens his new show at Sprüth Magers in LA, and reflects on his career.  “I was going to be an art historian once,” he says. “That was early on, in the early ’70s, when I thought being an artist wasn’t very dignified. I thought being an art historian, I could be called Dr. Baldessari, and that would be better.” (more…)

Bonhams has laid off eight employees in its Hong Kong offices, including deputy chairman Magnus Renfrew.  The decision was cited as part of a “restructuring,” with Renfrew noting that he was “surprised and disappointed” by his layoff. (more…)

Michael Riedel, Untitled (Description Field “Art Material”; rer), (2015), via David Zwirner

Set to open this week, the Armory Show is returning to New York City for its 22nd year, setting off the dense selection of exhibitions, fairs, parties and programs of Armory Week 2016.  With a number of shifts in location and scheduling for this year’s selection of events, the week should see a new face on familiar proceedings. (more…)

The Calder Prize 2005-2015 (Installation View)

The Calder Prize 2005-2015, now on view at Pace Gallery in London, explores the influence of artist Alexander Calder in relation to the work of six contemporary artists, each of whom were awarded a prize in the former’s name.  Now through March 5, the five winners of the Calder Prize to date are featured in conversation with Calder’s own work.  The artists awarded the Calder Prize are seen to be continuing Calder’s legacy by imagining new and innovative directions for sculpture, among them Tara Donovan (2005), Žilvinas Kempinas (2007), Tomás Saraceno (2009), Rachel Harrison (2011), Daren Bader (2013), and Haroon Mirza (2015). Working in impressively divergent media, the artists are united by their common vision to push the limits of material through variations on space and time in their work, a point that unifies them with Calder’s vision.   (more…)

Richard Aldrich, Untitled (2014-2015), via Rae Wang for Art Observed

Richard Aldrich‘s wide-ranging stylistic and conceptual practice over the past twenty-plus years has spanned any number of formats, from sparse abstraction to minimalist exercises in process painting, often subverting these established schools through momentary inflections of wit and comic interpretation.  Yet at the core of Aldrich’s practice is an effort to push beyond mere stylistic variation and a good sense humor, often using his practice and its shifting material grounds to explore a wide range of both techniques in image-making, as well as processes in each work’s construction on an intuitive level.

Richard Aldrich, Time Stopped, Time Started (Installation View), via Rae Wang for Art Observed

(more…)

The Art Market Monitor reports on Sotheby’s 2015 earnings report today, noting relatively flat gains countered by strong increases in the company’s internal finances.  Marion Maneker also notes that the company’s stock price continues to benefit from the ongoing buyback program. (more…)

Maya Widmaier-Picasso has been ordered to pay legal fees of 25,000 euros, about $28,000, in her case with representatives of the Qatari royal family.  The court also rejected a plea to void a seizure order for the bust at the center of the ongoing cases over her father’s sculpture. (more…)

Doug Wheeler, Untitled (1969/2014), via David Zwirner © 2016 Doug Wheeler

The work of Doug Wheeler is an exercise in embodiment and space, perhaps more so than many of his Light and Space compatriots.  Rather than merely exploring the sensations of seeing and perceiving space, Wheeler pushes beyond this sense of expanded optics and its cognitive effects, often exploring how this sense of space is reflected onto broader sensations of the body.  Encasements, the third solo exhibition by Wheeler in collaboration with David Zwirner, continues this work, showing a body of smaller-scale works that work in a strikingly harmonious series of interactions throughout the gallery. (more…)

Lee Ufan, From Line No. 800117 (1980), all photos via Art Observed

Blum & Poe’s close ties to the history and proliferation of Asian art in the United States cannot be ignored, having advocated for and built a market around Japanese and Korean artists like Takashi Murakami and Lee Ufan during the 1990’s.  Since then, the gallery has become an inextricable link between the continents, a point explored in the gallery’s most recent exhibition, Dansaekhwa and Minimalism, currently on view at the gallery’s Culver City location.

Kwon Young-woo, Untitled (1982), via Art Observed (more…)

Performa has announced a new Board of Directors, including artists Rashid Johnson as Vice Chair and Shirin Neshat as a newly appointed Director.  “My first experience with Performa was during the Performa 13 Biennial, when I worked with Performa to restage LeRoi Jones and Amiri Baraka’s 1964 play Dutchman in the 10th Street Russian-Turkish Bath House. I was impressed by Performa’s artist-first approach and their hands on involvement in helping realize my vision,” Johnson said.  “I look forward to helping continue the great legacy Performa has earned and helping it to grow as a resource for artists and a vehicle for producing and showcasing innovative performance-based works.”  (more…)

The 9th Berlin Biennale has announced its locations for this summer, including the Akademie der Künste, the European School of Management and Technology, the Feuerle Collection, the Blue-Star sightseeing boat by Reederei Riedel, and KW Institute for Contemporary Art.  The Biennale will be curated by DIS, and focuses on “the virtual as the real, nations as brands, people as data, culture as capital, wellness as politics, and happiness as GDP.” (more…)

Paris’s FIAC satellite Officielle has been placed on hold by organizers Reed Exhibitions, following complaints over low sales figures and a difficult location at last year’s event.  “We were not unhappy with our sales at the 2015 edition, we sold rather well and cleared a small profit. But it’s true that we did not feel like we were [in the majority],” says Gallerist Bernard Ceysson.   (more…)