The Whitney Museum is naming its new Meatpacking District building after collector and philanthropist Leonard Lauder, following a dinner last night at the museum where Lauder was also awarded with the inaugural Whitney Collection Award.  “Leonard Lauder is one of the greatest benefactors in the Whitney’s history,” says Director Adam D. Weinberg. “I cannot express how grateful we are to Leonard for his exceptional generosity, leadership, and devotion.” (more…)

Tony Cragg, Untitled (2015), all photos via Quincy Childs for Art Observed

The opening hours of Art Basel Hong Kong have come and gone at the Hong Kong Convention Center this week, as the Asian art world descending on South China’s bustling metropolis for the first hours of high-profile sales. The fair saw strong international attendance during the VIP Vernissage, with Brooklyn Museum Director Anne Pasternak, Tracey Emin, Cai Guo Qiang, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Julia Peyton-Jones all spotted walking the aisles of the fair during its opening day, as were Mariko Mori, Hernan Bas, and Owen Wilson. (more…)

Damián Ortega, Paisaje 2 (2016), and Gabriel Orozco, Blind Signs (2013) via Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

The collective exhibition “xylañynu. taller de los viernes” curated by Guillermo Santamarina, brings together recent works by five artist friends and close collaborators: Gabriel Orozco, Abraham Cruzvillegas, Damián Ortega, Gabriel Kuri and Dr. Lakra. Thirty years ago they started meeting at Gabriel Orozco’s house in Ttlalplan to create a kind of alternative art school which became their “Friday Workshop”. Hosted between 1987 and 1992 by a then 25-year-old Orozco slightly older than his peers, the workshop embodied an experimental meeting place, which allowed each of them to investigate and progressively give form to their own artistic language. The latent synergy and embedded connections between their creative processes is for the first time displayed at their Mexican Gallery Kurimanzutto.

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Outside of Art Los Angeles Contemporary at Barker Hangar, via Art Observed

Art Los Angeles Contemporary opened its doors this past evening at the Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, bringing the city’s art scene, as well as many from New York, London and further afield to the sunny haze of the California metropolis.  The fair, which has seen increasingly high praise over the past years, saw strong attendance and packed aisles in the early hours as visitors occasionally paused to look towards the sound of planes taking off just overhead.

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Donald Judd, Untitled (1979), via Rae Wang for Art Observed

Over the course of his sculpting career, Cor-ten steel remained a consistent source of inspiration for Donald Judd, its variance in texture, hue and responsiveness to light offering the artist a malleable yet solid framework to continue his investigations in spatial interaction, light and time throughout his pieces.   Taking this material fascination as its starting point, David Zwirner is presenting a series of pieces from across the artist’s career, joined together by his use of Cor-ten, and underscoring the metal’s complementary characteristics when applied towards Judd’s aesthetic project. (more…)

Tony Tasset, Deer (2015)

Positioned outside of the Bass Museum of Art on Collins Ave between 21st and 22nd Street, Collins Park’s wide sidewalks and meandering pathways make for the perfect centralized location for Art Basel Miami Beach’s annual sculpture park, positioning a selection of 24 works across the park grounds for interested viewers and visitors.  This year’s selection continued the event’s annual public outreach with a group of works that included scrolling video pieces (Rikrit Tiravanija’s confounding traffic notifications screen) and massive neons (courtesy of Sylvie Fleury), positioned against hyperrealist sculpture (Tony Tasset’s massive Deer) and other minimalist pieces.

AO was on site at the park, and captured this photoset from the install.

Athena Papadopoulos, Two Serious(ly) (young) Women, (Hubba Hubba Trouba and Ouchy Waa Waa Mama) (2015) (more…)

Charles Harlan at JTT, photos via Sophie Kitching and Andrea Nguyen for Art Observed

Moving down the beach from the Deauville to the Fontainebleau Hotel this year, the 2015 edition of NADA seems to be making moves in every way to establish the fair brand beyond the more fraternal, relaxed atmosphere that came to define its previous years in Miami Beach.  Taking up space in the hotel’s “Sparkle Ballroom,” the fair offered expanded space for both exhibitors and browsers, but still held some of the Deauville’s retro charm, as pictures of Frank Sinatra dotted one entrance.

John McAllister at James Fuentes

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Julie Schenkelberg at SiTE:LAB

Positioned south of the Convention Center at 10^th and Ocean Dr., the Untitled Art Fair returns to its prime beach real estate this year, bringing with it another year of tightly-curated booths, installations and special projects. It’s a refreshing change of pace from the bustle of ABMB, complemented by the fair’s signature tent design, which boasts wide aisles and spacious booth for exhibitors that gave the exhibition a distinctly relaxed air, while offering ample light to emphasize the works on view.

Dominique Petrin at Galerie Antoine Ertaskiran

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Roy Lichtenstein at Gagosian Gallery

The doors opened this morning on the 14^th edition of Art Basel Miami Beach, as the VIP Preview saw collectors, dealers and artists flocking to the Miami Beach Convention Center for another year. The fair, which this year boasts a sizable 267 exhibitors spread across the Convention Center’s sprawling floor plan, saw strong early attendance, and sightings of Eli Broad and Melissa Chiu wandering the fair in the early hours, while advisors and consultants sped past, locked in negotiations. (more…)

Work by Pawel Althamer at Unrealism, via Rae Wang for Art Observed

With the Miami Beach Convention Center opening its doors this morning, the early arrivals to Art Basel Miami Beach decamped to Miami proper this past evening for a series of openings and exhibitions in the city’s thriving Design District. Spread across a several block radius, the neighborhood’s simultaneous hosting of the ICA Miami’s temporary installation space (which opened just one year ago during Miami Art Week 2014), the joint Larry Gagosian/Jeffrey Deitch exhibition, and a number of other projects made it a central location for the first major night of Art Week Events. (more…)

BHQF Presents Arcadia, via Art Observed

Last week, the ever-shifting collective Bruce High Quality Foundation kicked off its annual fall fundraiser in style, opening the doors at Industry City in South Brooklyn for an evening of performances, music, and art, including a new show of works by the artists who have long remained focused expressly on the Bruce High-Quality Foundation University, a free, experimental art school in the East Village. (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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FIAC 2015, all photos by Andrea Nguyen for Art Observed

Having established itself as the second leg of Europe’s fall tour of art fairs, following hot on the feels of Frieze London, Paris’s FIAC fair has built itself into one of the art calendar’s more impressive exhibitions, and is now expanding even further, pushing for a place as one of the market’s premier selling events.  Boasting an attendance list of 175 galleries from 23 countries, the 42nd edition of the fair continues Paris’s push for a place in the international fair circuit that matches its century long prominence in the modern and contemporary avant-garde.

FIAC 2015 (more…)

Tracy Emin, You Made Me Feel Beautiful again! (2015), at White Cube, all photos by Andrea Nguyen for Art Observed

As the weekend arrived, Frieze London shut its doors on another week of strong sales, live projects and installations taking up the yards of Regent’s Park, with the fair reporting an impressive 260% increase in attendees during the VIP hours.  Even after the rush of buyers in the fair’s early hours, sales continued steadily through the rest of the week, concluding yesterday as the last vistors left the space. (more…)

Cy Twombly, Untitled (2006), via Phillips

The sales have concluded tonight at Phillips London, as the auction house capped a procedural yet impressively consistent outing, seeing a white glove sale where all 36 lots sucessfully found a buyer, bringing a final total tally of nearly £32 million for the night. (more…)

Mark Leckey, Inflatable Felix (2014) at Galerie Bucholz

The doors have opened on Frieze 2015 in London, bringing the art world en masse to Regent’s Park for the 13th edition of one of the fall’s biggest selling events.  The exhibition, which capped its “VIP” day last evening, saw viewers flocking to its long, loping hallways to browse the works on view. (more…)

 Ai Weiwei, Bench (2004), via Faurschou Foundation Copenhagen

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei is currently presenting an exhibition of collected works that span the artist’s long career, encountering and documenting the artist’s countless conflicts, arrests and vocal critiques of the Chinese regime.  As a social activist, the artist’s work reflects the history and challenges of China in the 21st Century, placed alongside his own reflection and perception of his home country.  His work is intended to act as a form of intervention, and to encourage social change within the contemporary art sphere, while reflecting on China as the product of its vastly deep historical reserves.  This practice, and its history against the backdrop of contemporary China is illustrated in detail at Farschou Foundation this year, as the institution presents Ai Weiwei: Ruptures. (more…)

A selection of works by Fanny Allie, via Art Observed

Bushwick Open Studios has come and gone in the North Brooklyn arts hub, with another year of exhibitions and projects spread across the sprawling industrial landscapes of the borough closing to strong attendance.

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Jimmie Durham, On The Island of Burano Women Make Lace Hopefully (2015), all photos by Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

The American-born artist and poet Jimmie Durham presents a site-specific project entitled Venice: Object, Work and Tourism at the Fondazione Querini Stampalia during the 56th Venice Biennale. The exhibition features a series of subtle yet vibrant sculptures, which incite our perception of commonplace objects and everyday materials. Stone, glass, brick, wood, water, words, gold, leather, paper, metal, shell, and plastic are thus collected, displaced and assembled by the artist, distilling a new physical language.

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Josh Reames at Johannes Vogt, all photos via Art Observed

NADA New York returned to the edge of the Lower East Side, drawing a diverse, hip crowd to the Basketball City complex. Free in price, NADA once again brought high-quality exhibitors and young artists, combining art from regional and international galleries alongside NYC Downtown heavy hitters.  This year’s preview event was an engaging alternative to the bright lights and high prices of Frieze. Embodying the social, communal nature of the city’s young arts scene, NADA’s Preview day was filled with with conversation, friendly jokes and familial reunions.  Maintaining the lightness of art openings opposed to the serious air of sales oriented art fairs, the galleries, their friends and artists will spend this weekend sipping drinks out of plastic cups while a roster of interdisciplinary performances, conversations and events take place. (more…)

Santa Maria della Misericordia church converted in THE MOSQUE: The First Mosque in the Historic City of Venice (2015) by Christoph Büchel, all photos by Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

Historically, there have been no mosques in the city of Venice.  Despite the port city’s history as an open gateway to the East and a point of trade that facilitated new cultural, artistic and scientific developments to spread across Europe from trade with the Ottoman Empire and beyond, the city has never permitted the construction or reconstitution of a site of worship for its Muslim population.  Today, in the heated political climate that surrounds international conflicts, not to mention the recent Italian (and, at large, European) controversy regarding immigration from Syria, Lebanon and other regions in North Africa and the Middle East, the prospects for a dedicated Islamic worship site seems even less likely.  For the time being, however, the Venice Biennale has changed this scenario, as the Swiss-born, Iceland-based artist Christoph Büchel opened his frankly-titled installation THE MOSQUE: The First Mosque in the Historic City of Venice this month. (more…)

Céleste Boursier-Mougenot, Rêvolutions (2015), French Pavilion, via Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

Running concurrently with the Central Pavilion’s curated exhibition, the respective National Pavilions on view at the Giardini and Arsenale are one of Venice’s defining aspects.  Featuring important solo exhibitions for both emerging and career artists, carefully-curated group shows and special projects, each pavilion’s focus allows the international perspective of the Biennale to truly take shape. (more…)

At the entrance to the Biennale’s Central Pavilion, via Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

The Central Pavilion in Venice’s Giardini is the second site for All the World’s Futures, the main curatorial project around which the Biennale centers itself.  Featuring another series of artists spread out inside the exhibition space’s remarkable white facade, the exhibition continues its investigation of debris and late capitalism through a more playful, yet equally critical set of works from its counterpart at the Arsenale. (more…)

Ibrahim Mahama, Out of Bounds (2015), via Sophie Kitching for Art Observed

The first open hours have come and gone in the City of Bridges today, and the 56th edition of the Venice Biennale, All the World’s Futures is now open.  Welcoming 89 different countries to exhibit in the city, with 29 in the Arsenale, 31 in the Central Pavilion, and an additional 29 spread across in the City itself, the exhibition is a monumental affair, with a number of auxiliary events, openings and parties.

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