Korakrit Arunanondchai (feat. boychild), Letters to Chantri #1: The lady at the door/The gift that keeps on giving(Installation View) at The Mistake Room, Los Angeles, 2014. Photo Credit: Josh White/JW Pictures.

The Mistake Room re-opens for its second show with a newly commissioned project by Thai-artist Korakrit Arunanondchai, open through September 13. The renovations, which followed the inaugural Oscar Murillo exhibition , were led by Alfonso Medina, Director of Studio T38, re-designing the raw warehouse space into a formal gallery space.

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A study commissioned by the New York Times this week indicates that the perception of a growing trend towards flipping work by young artists for huge profits may only be part of broader historical trends in the art market.  Reports by two separate art market consultancies indicate that the current rate of growth in the market is on par with the market boom during the mid-90’s, and that the overall state of the market shows that collectors are, on average, holding on to works longer than in recent years.  “After all I had read about flipping, when looking at the market itself, it’s really business as usual,” says consultant Fabian Bocart, whose Tutela Capital S.A., prepared one of the analyses for The Times. (more…)

A New York businessman has called for the boycott of a Cai Guo-Qiang exhibition in Aspen, due to the artist’s use of tortoises with iPads strapped to their backs.  Andy Sabin, a member of the Turtle Conservancy board, has claimed that the work is deleterious to the tortoises’ health, although museum officials claim that the rescued turtles are under close watch by veterinarians. (more…)

A painting by Baroque artist Guercino has been stolen from the Church of San Vincenzo in the northern town of Modena, Italy this week.  The work, depicting the Madonna with St. John the Evangelist, is valued at over $8 million, and was stolen in the middle of the night when the alarm system failed to function properly.  “This precious painting is part of the cultural heritage of Modena,” says Modena’s mayor Gian Carlo Muzzarelli. (more…)

The German Task Force charged with reviewing the Gurlitt trove of looted artworks has gone on record stating that the work Two Riders on the Beach by Max Liebermann should be returned to American David Toren, whose great uncle had the work stolen from his home by Nazi troops. (more…)

Damien Hirst has purchased one of London’s most impressive examples of Regency architecture, a five story mansion built in 1811 by John Nash and overlooking Regent’s Park.  The home was previously owned by Anne Van Lanschot, a Dutch banking magnate who lived there for over 50 years.  The home was put on the market last year for £34 million, but some speculate that the artist paid more. (more…)

The New York Times has published a profile on painter, performer and gallerist Emily Sundblad, one of the proprietors of the multifaceted Reena Spaulings Gallery space.  “When people asked what it was called, we told them different names,” Sundblad notes. “We didn’t know exactly what the space was yet, but we knew for sure that it wasn’t a traditional New York gallery, and we didn’t want our own names on it.”  (more…)

Barbara Kruger (Installation View), all images courtesy Modern Art Oxford

On view at Modern Art Oxford through August 31st is a major solo exhibition of recent work by American conceptual artist Barbara Kruger. Kruger, who is best known for her paste-up works, black-and-white photographs with declarative phrases in bold letters laid on top, has created a site-specific architectural wrap of the museum’s Upper gallery space in a similar style.

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Sarah Sze, Triple Point (Planetarium) (2013), All Images Via Kelly Lee for Art Observed

Just over a year ago, Sarah Sze brought her eye-catching assemblages to Italy as the U.S. representative to the 2013 Venice Biennale.  Puzzle-like contraptions snaked in and around the building façade, even allowing and supporting a huge boulder to balance on top of the pavilion’s roof.  A myriad of fake rocks, water bottles and other miscellaneous objects were scattered across the space, offering only a small taste of the deceptively hazardous mess that awaited visitors inside. It was widely praised  as a stand out work, and brought Sze to a new level in her artistic recognition. (more…)

Protestors with Signs at the Free Cooper Union rally, via Art Observed

Earlier this afternoon, students, professors, politicians and more gathered to protest Cooper Union‘s decision to institute tuition for the upcoming school year. The alma mater of artists such as George Segal, Alex Katz, and Eva Hesse, Cooper Union has traditionally been a tuition-free school, offering opportunities to study art, architecture, and engineering to those who might not be able to afford other programs of equal quality. When Cooper Union announced in 2013 that it would begin to charge tuition in the fall of 2014, the backlash was immediate as students organized sit-ins, occupations, and, earlier this year, a lawsuit filed against the school’s Board of Trustees by the Committee to Save Cooper Union (CSCU). The Bruce High Quality Foundation, an arts collective founded with members primarily drawn from Cooper Union graduates, has also been active in their support of CSCU.  (more…)

An article in The Wall Street Journal explores the eventful life (and afterlife) of Rudolf Bauer, a little-known early 20th century painter. A contemporary of artists such as Paul Klee and Vasily Kandinsky, the German-born Bauer explored the new movement of abstraction, creating innovative works with the support of patron Solomon R. Guggenheim. Bauer’s work, which had already been exhibited at the MoMA in the 1930s, was meant to feature prominently in the Guggenheim Museum as the core of the collection. In the 1940s, however, Bauer and Guggenheim suffered a falling-out, and Bauer renounced painting while his work went into storage at the museum. The article reports that, after over six decades of near-obscurity, Bauer will feature in upcoming shows by the German Consulate General and at Sotheby’s in addition to a documentary film and an Off-Broadway play.  (more…)

As the final details of Detroit’s bankruptcy plan begin to take shape, bond insurer Syncora (the same group that slapped the Detroit Institute of Arts with a massive subpoena months ago) has filed a formal objection over the management of out-of-court settlements in the city’s exit from bankruptcy.  The complaint, filed this week, stated that chief mediator Gerald Rosen made several statements that he felt it was his duty to get the best possible deal for Detroit’s pensioners, rather than maintain impartial judgements in the settlements. (more…)

Pierre Huyghe at Artist’s Institute, via Kelly Lee for Art Observed

This summer, the Eldridge Street home of The Artist’s Institute played home to an exhibition by French artist Pierre Huyghe, focusing primarily on the artist’s works with living creatures.  Spiders, flies and rats were released in the gallery’s basement space earlier this summer, and their movements, adaptations and occasional escapes (some of the creatures were noted to have left the confines of the exhibition prematurely) to their new locale composed the core of the show.

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Following a Florida court’s $24.6 million decision in favor of several Rauschenberg Trustees for services preserving the artist’s legacy, the Rauschenberg Foundation has filed an appeal, claiming that the sum originally awarded to the three trustees would hamper its charitable work for the arts community.   (more…)

Urs Fischer, TBD (2014), via Sadie Coles HQ, All images © the artist; courtesy Sadie Coles HQ, London

A collection of new paintings by Swiss artist Urs Fischer are currently on view at Sadie Coles HQ in London. Marking a departure from the artist’s more flashy exhibitions of subversive installations and sculptures, this is the first time Fischer has devoted himself strictly to large-scale paintings. (more…)

The Wall Street Journal reports that, after five years and a €52 million renovation, the Picasso Museum in Paris will reopen on October 25th. The museum, which is housed in a 17th century mansion built by a favorite of Louis XIV, was founded by the city in 1985 to house what would become the largest Picasso collection in the world. Closed for renovation in 2009, the museum was meant to reopen in 2011 but pushed back the date twice thanks to delays and controversies such as the museum’s decision to dismiss its director Anne Baldassari. (more…)

Dahn Vo, We the People (Detail) (2011-2013), all images courtesy Farschou Foundation Beijing

On view currently at Farschou Foundation in Beijing is a sculpture-based exhibition from the young Danish artist Danh Vo, featuring the key work “We The People (Detail),” which is a 1:1 copy of the Statue of Liberty, which is currently distributed across globe for exhibitions in New York and China.  The exhibition will remain on view through August 24, 2014.

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An article in the New York Times profiles Dutch art collector Joop van Caldenborgh and his sculpture garden outside the Hague. While the garden might be privately owned, its collection of works by sculptors such as Henry Moore, Sol LeWitt, and Antony Gormley is available to the public through curators and guided tours. The article also reports that the impressive collection is made more attractive by its thoughtful arrangement, which allows the sculptures, no matter the size, room to stand out. (more…)

The New York Times reports that MoMA and the Andy Warhol Museum have partnered in order to digitize Andy Warhol‘s film works. During his career, Warhol used a 16-milliliter film camera to shoot over 600 films such as the famous “Screen Tests” series, the  feature length film “Chelsea Girls”, and “Empire”, an eight-hour long single shot of the Empire State Building. Despite Warhol’s prolificacy, only a small portion of the films have been available to the public through the MoMA and online. This new partnership hopes both to preserve the fragility of the film and to expose the public to a lesser-known facet of the artist’s well-publicized career.  (more…)

After reporting yesterday that Leon Black‘s publishing house Phaidon Press was in talks to purchase online art gallery Artspace, Bloomberg has published an article confirming the deal. Although the price paid by Phaidon for Artspace remains unknown, the article reports that, when Auctionata was in talks to acquire the gallery, Artspace had been valued at just under $5 million. The article also points out that this merger will give Phaidon Press and, by extension, Leon Black access to Artspace’s extensive mailing list of 150,000 active art collectors, increasing “[Phaidon’s] access to global art collectors who are also consumers of its art and design books and multimedia products”.

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Lygia Clark (Installation View), via Art Observed

The Abandonment of Art is an ambitious name for an exhibition at MoMA, even if the work happens to be the medium-pushing sculptures and objects of Brazilian artist Lygia Clark, who over the course of her career constantly sought new modes of encounter, interpretation and perception in the space of art.  Clark’s long-anticipated MoMA retrospective, taking up half of the museum’s top floor, welcomes this expansion, moving through the artist’s career from her early canvases to her later innovations in sculpture and performance. (more…)

Vincent Van Gogh, Installation View, via Art Observed

While the Metropolitan Museum of Art is well-known for its constantly rotating series of special exhibitions, this summer sees a new focus on the museum’s permanent collection. For the first time in over a decade, the Met has united its collection of works by Vincent Van Gogh under one roof, where they will stay for the next six months. Typically scattered across the globe on loans to various museum, the Met’s seventeen paintings by the artist is the largest such collection in North and South America. (more…)

The L.A. Times reports that Demand Media, a content and social media company, has purchased the online art gallery Saatchi Art for $17 million. Another facet of the deal is the naming of Saatchi Art’s CEO Sean Moriarity as the new CEO of Demand Media. An affiliate of the Saatchi Gallery in London, the L.A. based Saatchi Art sells original artwork as well as prints for mid-market prices. The article reports that Demand Media expects the online gallery to add up to $1 million in quarterly revenue. (more…)

The Real Deal reports that collector Peter Brant has recently purchased a large property in Manhattan’s East Village for $27 million. The space was originally a Con Edison substation in the 1920s before being purchased in 1980 and repurposed by artist Walter de Maria as both an art space and private home. Although Brant’s plans remain unclear, the article speculates that the space might serve as the New York City outpost for the Brant Foundation’s Art Study Center, which is based in Greenwich, CT.  (more…)