The Art Market Monitor points to a recent Swiss news article that seems to refute Picasso heir Catherine Hutin-Blay’s claims that Yves Bouvier stole works from her storage facility and resold them.  The article points to paperwork that pokes holes in the claim that Hutin-Blay never knew or did business with the dealer. (more…)

Karma is moving to the Lower East Side this week, and opened its new location on last night Orchard Street  with a show of works by Paul Lee.  “It could be temporary or it could be permanent. I really like the idea of it, and the location is really great,” says owner Brendon Dugan.  “There’s lots of new foot traffic here.” (more…)

One of Francis Bacon’s strongest self-portraits will go on sale at Sotheby’s this coming May, carrying an estimate of $22-$30 million.  “Two Studies for a Self-Portrait goes straight in at number one of all the paintings I’ve handled in my career” says Oliver Barker, Senior International Specialist in Contemporary Art.  “It’s certainly among the greatest self-portraits ever offered at auction.” (more…)

The New Art Dealers Alliance has announced the dates and exhibitor list for the 2016 edition of its New York Fair, taking place during Frieze Week at Basketball City downtown.   (more…)

Karla Black, Ways Appear (2016), via David Zwirner

In her second exhibition at David Zwirner, Scottish artist Karla Black takes over the gallery’s 525 West 19th street location to orchestrate a body of work that smoothly maneuvers through rigid conceptions of medium or genres.  In her previous exhibition in 2014, Black executed a carpet-like installation of bath bombs, nail polish, Sellotape and powder paint, infusing an otherworldly, ephemeral aura into the gallery’s white cube architecture through its lyrical presence.  Here, she presents another floor install, employing familiar everyday objects alongside artistically pertinent materials. The work, Includes Use, utilizes toilet paper collected from different parts of the globe, each manufactured in different shades and hues. Akin to budding flowers, the folds of toilet paper in their assorted hues pierce through earthy, plaster powder and paint, channeling a sort of surreal, utopian topography. (more…)

Hieronymus Bosch, The Last Judgement (c. 1495-1505), via Quincy Childs for Art Observed

Half a millennium ago, Hieronymus Bosch walked across the market square of the small Dutch town of ‘s Hertogenbosch, taking the 100 yard walk to his studio, where he would paint the timeless, demonic, and captivating works that continue to fascinate people today. To commemorate the 500^th anniversary of his birth, the town’s Het Noordbrabants Museum has secured the majority of his works for what is arguably one of the most important exhibitions of our century, Hieronymus Bosch – Visions of Genius. Exploring the timeline of his oeuvre, viewers are able to revive his living genius, and therein the fantasies and chimeras he created with a timeless sense of wonder.

Hieronymus Bosch, The Wayfarer (c. 1500-1510), via Quincy Childs for Art Observed (more…)

Thirteen Italians and Moldavians have been arrested in connection with the art heist last fall from the Museum of Castelvecchio, which saw works by Tintoretto, Pisanello, and Rubens disappear in an overnight theft.  “We hope to succeed in recovering all the paintings in good condition,” says Flavio Tosi, the mayor of Verona. (more…)

Matias Faldbakken, Europe is Balding (2016), via Quincy Childs for Art Observed

Matias Faldbakken sits among a select group of artists working at a certain crux of politically-critical work and a unique sense of material-based composition.  Crossing signifiers from the domestic and lifestyle commodities with the rough elements of building construction (cement, tile, nylon rope), Faldbakken’s work investigates the application and representation of force, often with disturbing contextual undertones. This notion sits at the core of Europe is Balding, his new exhibition of work at Paul Cooper Gallery in Chelsea.

Matias Faldbakken, Tiled Dashboard #3 (2016), via Quincy Childs for Art Observed (more…)

The Russian deputy culture minister, Grigory Pirumov, has been arrested on charges of embezzlement, taking state funds intended for restorations at historical sites.  “This is a real shock for all of us,” says culture minster Vladimir Medinsky. “We are working with the investigators, we will provide all necessary assistance, and the official position of the ministry will be formulated in the nearest future.” (more…)

The New York Times looks at recent trends towards sustainability in museum construction and renovation, including the use of repurposed or receycled material in recent projects like The Whitney and The University of California, Berkeley, Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive.  “At its very fundamental core, this is a project about sustainability,” says Lawrence Rinder, the director of UC Berkley’s museum. “At a philosophical level, it was about the sustainability of our institution — we were in a seismologically unsound building and had to move to preserve our collection and our audience and our programming.” (more…)

Larry Bell, Lil’ Orphan Annie (1960), all photos via Art Observed

Hauser & Wirth is currently presenting work by American sculpture and installation artist, Larry Bell at its Upper East Side location in New York, compiling a series of historically resonant works in conjunction with some of the artist’s recent environmental installs.  The exhibition, titled From the ’60s, sees the acclaimed artist presenting a body of work representative of his career working among the neo-avant-garde that followed in the wake of New York abstraction, and which continued to push the limits of perceptual and conceptual definitions of art.    (more…)

The Art Newspaper reports on Robert Mapplethorpe’s upcoming exhibitions at LACMA and the Getty, and the challenges of presenting works from his X Portfolio, a sexually provocative body of work that was used in the artist’s early 1990’s obscenity trials.  “One must ease the public into it—that’s an art in itself,” Mapplethorpe is quoted in reference to the work. (more…)

Five paintings by Francis Bacon, valued at upwards of €30 million, have been stolen from a home in Madrid, The Guardian reports.  One unnamed expert states that they will be difficult to sell on the market.  “It is not at all easy to sell a Francis Bacon, large or small, without that getting to the ears of those who pore over such a rarified sector,” they said. (more…)

Jeffrey Deitch will be reopening his famed Deitch Projects gallery space at its former 18 Wooster Street location, Art News reports, with current resident Swiss Institute relocating at the conclusion of its lease.  Deitch is the owner of the building that houses the gallery.  “Swiss Institute has been a fixture of the NYC art community since our founding almost 30 years ago, and we will continue to present exhibitions at our location at 18 Wooster Street until our lease ends,” says director Simon Castets. “We will soon be announcing details about our future plans.” (more…)

British Petroleum is withdrawing its controversial sponsorship of the Tate next year, citing an “extremely challenging business environment,” rather than the ongoing protests over its contributions to the museums.  “They are free to express their points of view but our decision wasn’t influenced by that. It was a business decision,” says Peter Mather, head of BP in the UK. (more…)

Pelham Holdings, which represents the legal interests of the Qatari royal family, has filed a new legal complaint in Manhattan federal court, providing a detailed chronology of the sale of the disputed Picasso bust.  The filing states that Maya Widmaier-Picasso’s daughter Diana received a lucrative contract for the work’s $106 million sale to Larry Gagosian, shortly after the original sale to the Qatari family was canceled.  (more…)

The New Yorker has published a selection of photos by Bill Jacobsen, documenting the transitional period between the Whitney’s departure and the Met’s arrival in the Breuer building.  The photos, showing the space’s stripped bare architecture, welcomes both a familiarity with the Whitney’s former home, and an appreciation for the unique architecture its original designer had embraced. (more…)

The New York Times takes a tour of Tom Sach’s studio this week, as the artist prepares for an upcoming installation of a ceremonial tea house at the Isamu Noguchi Museum in Queens.  “It’s a way of creating an armature for ritualized activity, where we overcome our differences,” the artist says. “Within the act of preparing and serving a bowl of tea, we have the opening to investigate human relationships and the human condition.” (more…)

Erwin Wurm, One Minute Sculptures (Installation View), via Art Observed

Erwin Wurm’s One Minute Sculptures are a unique moment in the artist’s catalog, a comical application of the artist’s subversive wit.  Transferring his patently absurdist utilizations of domestic commodities and subjects onto the human form, the works take his nuanced eye for the more unique forms and signifiers mass production and late capitalism, and apply them towards an immediate interaction with the human body.  Through his works in the series, Wurm deconstructs use and value as essentially productive elements of consumption, and then turns the intersection of actor and object into an inherently useless situationism. (more…)

The New York Times interviews artist Maria Hassabi this week, as her piece Plastic gains increasing attention at MoMA this month for its placement of shifting, gradually moving bodies across the floors and stairwells of the institution.  “It was really important for me, while making the work, to keep thinking of the three-dimensionality,” says Ms. Hassabi, “to know there would be people everywhere around us, that people were going to ignore us, and that somewhere in there, somebody would stay and pay attention to us.” (more…)

The FT profiles Andrew Butterfield this week, a dealer known for his impressive work in researching and rediscovering lost Old Masters works.  In the story, Butterfield discusses some of his greatest finds, like a rare Donatello sculpture, and how these works can go overlooked for so long.  “Often what you’re looking at is literally covered in paint from later periods,” he says. “Varnish is a very common mode of second-tier restorers. It’s an easy and a cheap way of solving problems. You’re getting rid of any imperfections. But you’re also getting rid of the perfections.” (more…)

A Francis Bacon painting has been discovered on the back of two paintings by Irish artist Tony O’Malley.  O’Malley seems to have divided the wooden board backing his works, on which Bacon’s piece, Figure, is painted, to create two other paintings, but the pair have recently been reunited, and are being sold at Christie’s in London as a set, estimated at £20,000- £30,000.  “Now these paintings, and the lost Bacon study, will be reunited and viewed together for the first time in almost 60 years,” the auction house said in a statement. (more…)

The Kunsthaus in Zurich is facing criticism over its construction over a 14th Century Jewish cemetary, and its inclusion of works from the collection of Nazi arms dealer Emil Georg Bührle.  “We were playing with open cards about the past when the vote took place in 2012,” said Björn Quellenberg, a spokesman for the Kunsthaus. “That was the time to discuss it.”  (more…)

The Annual sales reports from TEFAF (The European Fine Art Fair) this year have 2015’s total sales figure at $63.8 billion, a 7% decline from 2014.  “The main reason for the negative growth is that the bigger the market gets, the harder it is to keep growing at as fast a pace,” says economist Clare McAndrew, who presented the report. (more…)