A Venice court will hear the lawsuit filed by The Icelandic Art Center (IAC) in Reykjavik over the closure of Christoph Büchel’s Icelandic Pavilion “mosque” in the Italian city over a perceived “security threat.” The work was closed in May after remaining open for only two weeks. (more…)
The Financial Times profiles Patricia Barbizet, Christie’s newly minted chief executive, who moved from her early work with Renault through her longtime career working under François Pinault. “My mother was an artist, my brothers and sisters are film and theatrical producers, my father was in cinema. I chose Renault — spot the odd one out,” she jokes. (more…)
The Tate Modern has announced its schedule of exhibitions for 2016, including a major survey of the work of Georgia O’Keefe, as well as the first posthumous retrospective of the work of Robert Rauschenberg in the UK. “There is next to no work by Georgia O’Keeffe anywhere in Europe,” says Achim Borchardt-Hume, the gallery’s director of exhibitions. “Unless you travel to the States and travel quite extensively across the States it is very difficult to form a coherent picture of her work.” (more…)
Repairs to a boiler system at the financially troubled South Carolina State University Museum has led to disputes over what will happen with its art collection, with some arguing that moving the works puts them at risk during the University’s currently dire financial straits. “There’s a certain care that we need to provide to preserve the collections, not only for the university but for the state and the country,” says Museum director Ellen Zisholtz. “We are looking for ways to carry out the mandate without putting the collection at risk.” (more…)
Matthew Eck, former co-director of the SELECT art fairs in Miami and New York, has announced a new fair project to premiere at Art Basel Miami Beach this December, X Contemporary. “Art doesn’t happen in a vacuum, and X Contemporary aims to present this overlap through dynamic events and collaborations, and within a curated context that prominently features some of the most exciting new galleries and artists today,” the fair says in its press release. (more…)
Hedge Fund Manager and Collector Bruce Berkowitz, of Fairholme Capital Management, has reportedly scrapped a proposal for a ten-story office building, which featured public exhibition of works by Richard Serra and James Turrell, in Miami, following fines and a reported lack of attention from City Hall. “There are no ongoing discussions and the only thing I’ve heard from the city is that I’ve been fined $300,000 for the way we cleared and secured the lot.” (more…)
Ingrid Sichy, International Editor of Condé Nast, former editor of Interview Magazine, and longtime contributor to Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, passed away late this week in New York City at the age of 63. Sichy was a foundational chronicler of the New York avant-garde and modern fashion for nearly forty years, and was a fixture at openings and runway shows around the globe. “She could write about anything, but what interested her most were art and fashion, and she traversed those two hothouses like a bemused empress,” says Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter. “She had a crisp mind and an almost uncanny focus when she sat down to write. She was a fun, conspiratorial gossip, but never with malice or envy — the working tools of so many gossips.” (more…)
A theft of 43 engravings by 16th-century artists valued at about $4.4 million from the Richelieu-Louvois branch of the National Library of France has led to the arrest of a library employee. This is the second time engravings have disappeared from the institution this year.
Artist and amateur chef Rikrit Tiravanija has opened his first commercial restaurant in Hancock, NY, titled Unclebrother, and incorporating food from the surrounding area into his menu. “The surprising thing is that, actually, there are a lot of artists around,” Tiravanija says. “Even people who kind of ran away from the city, and are not participating in the art world anymore. Now they’re growing vegetables. These are people who would be interested in something like this.” (more…)
Funding for the proposed Ground Zero Arts Center in New York has reportedly been cut by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation again, bringing the budget for its construction to under $200 million. “We can do a great building for $200 million — it has to be built,” says Maggie Boepple, president of the Performing Arts Center. “It will be smaller; there may be things that you might have liked to see, but that’s how it is.” (more…)
The Observer notes an increasing number of dealers allowing collectors to take a work out of the gallery to view it in their homes before agreeing to buy. “If they are on the fence—for instance, if it is a couple and one [person] likes it more than the other—living with it for a few days helps in the decision,” says dealer Debra Force. (more…)
Adam Szymczyk, director of Documenta 2017 in Athens, is interviewed this week in Deutsche Welle, discussing how the recent financial strife between Germany and Greece bodes for the event. “We don’t want to illustrate the crisis,” he says. “We believe that the real image of the crisis doesn’t exist and it perhaps should not be imposed. We just try to exist in this state of crisis, every single day – in Germany and in Greece.” (more…)
Paris-based art dealer Jean-Gabriel Mitterrand has opened a massive sculpture park in France’s Côte d’Azur, with more than 30 works spread out across the grounds’ lakes and trails. “The works will change whenever they have to be returned or if some are sold. Also the park will be extended when new works are installed,” says the dealer’s son, Edward. (more…)
Mother Jones takes a closer look at Basin and Range, the home of Michael Heizer’s City, and the center of a recently ignited political debate over the allocation of lands under government protection. President Obama signed an executive order protecting Basin and Range earlier this month, earning angry outcries from Republicans. “I don’t think expanding the narrowing use of public lands is appropriate,” Jeb Bush retorted following the bill. (more…)
In a commentary on the ongoing threat of nuclear radiation in Japan, Kenji Kubota, associate professor at the University of Tsukubacurat in Japan, has curated an exhibition inside the exclusionary zone at Fukushima Daiichi Power Plant, a space only accessible to visitors wearing hazmat suits. The exhibition, featuring work by Ai Weiwei, Taryn Simon and others, will remain open until the public is able to see it. (more…)
Bloomberg profiles new tech startup Verisart, a digital venture founded by Robert Norton, the former CEO of both Saatchi Online and Sedition. that utilizes the bitcoin block chain to authenticate and catalog works currently on the market. “We think long-term monetization will come through building a verified database of inventory,” he says. “We think that that will enable transactions through Verisart.” (more…)
The Financial Times profiles Albanian prime minister, Edi Rama, a contemporary artist-turned-politician whose belief in the ability of art to work in conjunction with policy informs his leadership. “Languages are different,” he says slowly. “And to pretend that politics should speak the language of art might be misleading. But, at the same time, I think that art can exercise an influence, without really making it seem like a straightforward influence.” (more…)
The Whitechapel Gallery has announced the London Open 2015, a Triennial open to all artists living and working in the British capital over the age of 26. “The London Open 2015 received the greatest number of applications in the history of the Whitechapel Gallery’s open submission exhibition,” says Daniel F. Herrmann, Eisler Curator and Head of Curatorial Studies. “The entries were of exceptionally high quality – their level of execution, creativity and critical sense are testament to London’s status as the art capital of the world and we are delighted to present some of the most interesting artists working in the city today” (more…)
LACMA is currently showing the video collaboration between Steve McQueen and Kanye West, depicting the musician rapping and running through the Chatham Dockyards in London. The video is currently running at the museum. (more…)
Leigh Morse has been ordered again by a New York judge to continue paying off the $1.6 million in restitution she owes to victims. Morse had drawn criticism for barely paying any of the legally mandated repayment, while refusing to sell her uptown apartment or her Pennsylvania weekend home. “She doesn’t want to change her lifestyle. She won’t even do what people do all over New York — rent!” says prosecutor Kenn Kern.
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As exemplified by the triennial survey of rising Belgian artists and artists working in Belgium, “Un-Scene III”, Brussels is gaining attention as an emerging major art city in Europe. “A city of both commerce and creation”, Brussels provides a mix of local and international artists with a “fertile cultural laboratory” with affordable rents. Russian-born American artist Marin Pinsky jokes, “I don’t want to be too big a booster of Brussels… I don’t’ want the whole world moving here.”
The Hermitage Museum has announced plans to open a contemporary art outpost in Moscow, hinting at an attempt by the Russian city to become a contemporary art powerhouse. “Rather than being perceived as a museum dealing only with the past, the Hermitage is pushing itself forward into the future from its powerful historical position,” says commissioned architect Hani Rashid of Asymptote Architecture said. “Our whole generation of architects looked to the Russian avant-garde of the early 20th century, which made such a powerful break to the past. We’re working within a tradition that we’re extending.” (more…)
A collection of Robert Ryman works from the recently shuttered Swiss exhibition space Hallen für Neue Kunst will travel to Dia Beacon late this year, The New York Times reports. “There’s a very healthy conversation that’s going on right now in New York about painting,” says Dia Director Jessica Morgan said, “but Ryman often doesn’t seem to be a part of those conversations about experimental approaches to painting, where he’s played a big role. And it was very important for me to try to reinsert him into that discussion.” (more…)
The artists exhibiting at the German Pavilion in Venice have erected a Greek flag in protest against their government’s harsh austerity measures taken against the Mediterranean nation, emblazoned with the word “Germoney.” “We show our solidarity with the people in Greece and all other places suffering from austerity,” says artist Hito Steyerl. “As cultural workers and artists we demand an end to austerity for health, culture, and education while public funding for banks and oligarchs seems unlimited.” (more…)
