Chris Ofili, Dangerous Liasions (Installation View), via David Zwirner

Currently on at David Zwirner’s 34 East 69th Street townhouse in uptown New York City, artist Chris Ofili is presenting a series of new works unified under the title Dangerous Liaisons. Referencing René Magritte’s eponymous painting of 1935, which Ofili explores in drawings that employ the compositional organization of the Surrealist’s work as a structure for his own rich and layered exploration of color and line, the exhibition underscores Ofili’s abilities as an expressive and emotive painter whose craft with the brush is complemented by his rich conceptual practice. (more…)

David Hammons, Untitled (2017), via Hauser & Wirth

Marking his first major exhibition on the West Coast in decades, artist David Hammons has touched down at Hauser & Wirth for a major summer blockbuster, an exhibition that underscores the artists’s expansive and challenging practice, and its ongoing discourse with the languages of race, wealth, politics and modern art that have been his hallmark over the course of his life. Remaining razor sharp in its ability to comment on and critique the various socio-cultural spheres his work moves through, Hammons’s show is a masterclass in subtle condemnation. (more…)

Jonas Wood, Still Life with Red Panels (2018), via Gagosian

Jonas Wood’s rapid rise in the past few years to representation at Gagosian seemed to happen almost overnight. But for followers of the Los Angeles-based painter, his ascension comes as no surprise. Wood’s impressive approach both painting and drawing showcases a masterful sense of patterns, perspectives and color, using figurative vantage points to arrive at beguiling images and innovative constructions of the picture plane. On view this month at Gagosian, a range of works from the artist underscores this ability, and delves ever deeper into his creative practice. (more…)

Alissa McKendrick, Untitled (2018), via Team

Painter Alissa McKendrick is presenting a solo exhibition at Team Gallery this month, bringing a selection of paintings to bear on the gallery’s project room series “Gallery B.” The artist, whose works mine a particular language between the surreal, figurative and narrative, makes for a refreshing summer entry in the gallery’s programming. (more…)

Annette Messager, Sleeping Pacific (2017), via Marian Goodman

Artist Annette Messager has brought a series of new works to Marian Goodman Gallery in Paris this month, orchestrating a series of drawings and wall mounted works as well as her first video install, Lost in Limbos (2019).  The show, continuing Messager’s incisive material inventions and impressive orchestration of varied states and conceptual operations, is on view through July 19th.

Annette Messager at Marian Goodman (Installation View), via Marian Goodman

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Oscar Murillo, Manifestation (2018-2019), via David Zwirner

Currently on view at David Zwirner London, artist Oscar Murillo has brought forth a selection of new works exploring both his past visual language and a range of expressive new iterations of his technique, delving into the visual history of his paintings as a shared exchange with both history and modernity.  On view through the end of the month, Murillo brings out a new range of pieces and projects that underscore his continued engagement with the painted canvas. (more…)

Olga Balema, Brain Damage (Installation View), via Bridget Donahue

Upon entering the gallery space at Bridget Donahue this month, one is greeted by a peculiar selection of objects.  Small-scale, think strips of elastic material are laid up against the walls of the space, or twisted out along the floor.  The pieces, with their slight impressions upon the viewer’s perception of space, seems to lend the already raw Chinatown space a look of material temporality, of objects held in momentary sway, as if left behind in between residents.  (more…)

Piero Manzoni, Achrome (1961-62), via Hauser & Wirth

In 1960, at the height of his artistic maturity and of his awareness on the gradual path and progression of his work, artist Piero Manzoni would branch out into a series of material experimentations and evolutions that would mark one of the most prolific stages in his career, and also one of the most conceptually fruitful. The artist, utilizing diverse natural and synthetic materials, such as cotton wool, canvas, polystyrene, phosphorescent paint, and even bread, stones, and straw, would ultimately create a broad range of his Achromes, arrangements of material that both draw on their compositional elements and on their sheer mass to create a new awareness of the object and the space around it, a new manner of seeing branching directly out from the piece itself. Simultaneously, the artist would explore a range of other practices and performative works, focusing in particular on the realization and execution of extensive “lines,” traced across papers, photos, and even across the gallery space. Delving into this important period in the artist’s career, Hauser & Wirth New York has brought together two concurrent exhibitions devoted to the artist’s work, unfolding over two floors and focusing on Manzoni’s most significant bodies of work.

Piero Manzoni, Linea lunga 7200 metri (1960), via Hauser & Wirth

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Roy Lichtenstein, The Conductor (1975), Final Price: £4,977,000 via Phillips

With minimal fanfare and a steady hand, Phillips Auctions rounded out a well-managed evening sale of Contemporary and 20th Century works yesterday evening, closing a 36 lot sale to a final sales total of £35.9 million  with 5 lots going unsold.  The evening marks another strong and reliable outing for the auction house, making itself felt in the blue-chip market with increasingly strong results.  (more…)

Julia Scher, Glückshaube (2006), via Ortuzar Projects

For over three decades, artist Julia Scher has explored the relationship between surveillance, authority, and exhibitionism, orchestrating complex and intimate explorations of the way human and non-human parts of the modern technological apparatus function, both in the creation of and the limitations of personal expression and individual freedom in the modern world. Delving into how technology creates new and divergent relationships to the existing structures of power, Scher investigates just how these relationships bound and inform our place in the world. (more…)

Francis Bacon, Self-Portrait (1975), Final Price: £16,542,650 via Sotheby’s

Following up on a steady, reliable auction last night at Christie’s, Sotheby’s came out swinging this evening, marking a £69,720,050 sale in London that showcased a relatively strong market and ample interest for works at the highest levels of the blue-chip market.  The evening’s sale, which saw 4 of the 43 lots on offer go unsold, marked a strong closing for the first half of the year at Sotheby’s, and brings the season one step closer to conclusion. (more…)

Joan Mitchell, La Seine (1967), via David Zwirner

Currently on view at David Zwirner’s 537 West 20th Street location in New York, the gallery is presenting  a selection of multi-paneled paintings by American master Joan Mitchell, the first exhibition to look specifically at Mitchell’s work in this format, and the possibilities for her work brought forth through the use of expansive amounts of space. (more…)

Jean-Michel Basquiat, Sabado por la Noche (Saturday Night) (1984), via Christie’s

Marking the first of the week’s trio of Contemporary and Post-War Auctions in London this week, Christie’s has capped a 35-lot offering to a final of $45,346,950, a strong figure that saw only three works go unsold with ample interest from buyers to keep the evening moving quickly and relatively smoothly.  The sale marks something of a snap back into form for the auction house following a dire struggle last week during its Impressionist/Modern offering, and seemed to signal emerging blue-chip markets for several younger artists. (more…)

Adam Pendleton, Ishmael in the Garden: A Portrait of Ishmael Houston-Jones (still) (2018), via Max Hetzler

On view at Berlin’s Galerie Max Hetzler, artist Adam Pendleton is presenting a body of new works under the title Who We Are, spread between both locations in the German capital: Bleibtreustraße 45 and Goethestraße 2/3, and marking Pendleton’s first show with the gallery.  The show, drawing on a range of cultural and aesthetic touchstones, presents itself as a sort multi-layered cultural history, intersecting music and film, dance and personal narrative through a series of video and wall-mounted works. (more…)

Yuji Agematsu, zip: 10.01.03 … 10.31.03 (2003), via Miguel Abreu

Currently on view at Miguel Abreu, Japanese-born, Brooklyn-based artist Yuji Agematsu has brought forth a diverse and expressive body of works to the galleries’ 88 Eldridge space, a selection of works delving into notions of urban space and the dense material fusions that it is capable of producing. Connecting the various processes and movements of the New York City streets into a productive engine of its own, the Agematsu’s work chains together disparate spaces and perceptions of reality. (more…)

Robert Therrien (Installation View), via Art Observed

Robert Therrien, an artist whose impressively-scaled sculptures of banal objects and everyday scenes was capable of twisting a viewer’s sense of time and space, has passed away at the age of 71 .  The news was broken by Gagosian, which represents him.   (more…)

Amedeo Modigliani, Jeune homme assis, les mains croisées sur les geno (1918), Final Price: £18,422,000 via Sotheby’s

The first batch of Summer auctions are in the books in London tonight, as Sotheby’s capped off its Impressionist and Modern Evening Sale with results that seemed to emphasize a steadied ship following the announcement of the auction house’s sale to Patrick Drahi earlier this week.  The auction house, capitalizing on a strong offering of works, moved methodically through the evening, selling 23 of the 25 works on offer for a final tally of £98,875,924. (more…)

Tarek Atoui, Organ Within (Installation View), via kurimanzutto

Walking into Kurimanzutto’s cabinet space on New York’s Upper East Side, one is greeted with a slow, droning sonic atmosphere, a series of prickly overtones and delicate aural structures that emanate from a series of plastic tubes, fabric resonators and other materials spread across the floor in a seemingly haphazard fashion. This is artist Tarek Atoui’s ‘Organ Within,’ an installation of the artist’s “open sound laboratory” project. (more…)

Pablo Picasso, Homme et femme nus (1968), final price: £12,464,250, via Christie’s

With several strong auctions behind them in the past months, the last Impressionist/Modern Evening Sale of the first half of 2019 looked to be a victory lap for Christie’s, a last shot at European collectors after a bustling spring season capped off by Basel and the Biennale. But a last burst of buyer interest wasn’t in the cards this evening, as the London auction house struggled royally over the course of a 34 lot sale that saw 10 of the works go unsold, including several major trophies that drove the sale to an anemic final of £36,413,750. (more…)

Fernand Léger, Femme dans un fauteuil (1913), via Christie’s

With the hottest months of the year settling in across the US and Europe, the secondary market will get one last chance to catch some heat of its own. Over the course of the next two weeks, the major auction houses will present a final look at the strength of the secondary market before the summer recess, capping off what has been something of a rebound after a few sluggish years of growth from 2017 to late last year. With two weeks of sales lined up in London this month, interested parties should get a look at just how the auction houses will look to keep that momentum going. (more…)

David Shrigley, FLUFF WAR (2019), via Anton Kern

In his seventh solo exhibition at Anton Kern Gallery, entitled FLUFF WAR, British artist David Shrigley continues his particular style of wry, surrealist humor through a selection of works, including a large-scale kinetic sculpture, two neon sculptures, and 100 new drawings. (more…)

Jackson Pollock, Moon Vibrations (1953-55), all images via Andrea Nguyen for Art Observed

Continuing Abstraction is a fitting title for the exhibition just opened at Rheinsprung 1, another pop-up fair exhibition by the mighty Gagosian Gallery that simultaneously serves as the inauguration for its 17th permanent exhibition space worldwide. Marking both an exploration and elaboration on the language of abstraction, both in the past and through today, the show seems to look back at Gagosian’s impact on contemporary art, intertwined with the languages of abstraction that have changed and evolved over the past century. (more…)

Joyce Pensato, Liza at Berlin (2009), via Petzel

American painter Joyce Pensato, whose recurring cast of American pop icons and slurred, often disturbing renditions of familiar cartoon characters made her a standout of the late 20th Century New York downtown scene, has passed away at the age of 78. (more…)

Bridget Donahue at Liste, via gallery

Liste Art Fair has returned to Warteck, a former brewery on the banks of the Rhine now serving as an exhibition and performance space, for another year of exhibitions showcasing adventurous and exploratory projects from a range of galleries around the globe. Liste continues to build on its position as one of the central hubs for the week of Art Basel, priding itself on a careful curation of young galleries, dynamic, forward-thinking works, and a roster of performances that remains one of the week’s main draws.

Adan Vallecillo, Saturacion Doble (2019), via Livia Benavides

Adan Vallecillo, Saturacion Doble (detail) (2019), via Livia Benavides

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