Mobile Homestead, one of the last works created by American artist Mike Kelley before his suicide last year, will open at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit on May 11th.  The piece, a loyal recreation of Kelley’s childhood home in suburban Detroit, will be used as a community space of sorts, open for the people of Kelley’s home city to hold shows, art events or meetings.  “He kept saying to me, ‘This is never going to happen — it’s a joke,’ because that’s the way he was,” said Marsha Miro, founder and director of the contemporary museum. “But he also said he thought it would be one of the most important things he ever did, partly because it would keep on being a living piece.” (more…)

Darren Almond, Fullmoon@Cape Reinga (2012), via Matthew Marks Gallery

Currently on view at Matthew Marks are a series of sixteen photographs, part of Darren Almond‘s fullmoon series, in which he allows the light of the full moon to illuminate landscapes from all seven continents.

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New York Police raided the gallery of New York art dealer Helly Nahmad, son of billionaire art dealer David Nahmad, at 975 Madison Avenue, in connection with a major government crackdown on illicit online gambling and money laundering.  The raid is connected an alleged gambling ring, which reportedly hosted high-stakes poker events for major celebrities and athletes, itself, reportedly, an offshoot of a broader money-laundering operation.  Prosecutors are expected to comment on the investigation today. (more…)

Art Basel’s “Unlimited Sector,” a fair section dedicated to large-scale art, will get an expansion this year.  An extension project by architects Herzog & De Meuron has added an additional 2,500 square meters of space to the Unlimited Section in Hall 1 of the exhibition space, opening the door for more works.  The Unlimited Sector this year will feature works by Theaster Gates, Ai Weiwei, Antony Gormley, and Adriana Varejao, among many others, raising the number of exhibiting artists up to 79 from last year’s 62. (more…)

Beginning May 1st, The Museum of Modern Art will remain open 7 days a week, following the recent announcement that The Metropolitan Museum of Art would also be opening its doors every day.  MoMA has usually closed on Tuesdays for cleaning and maintenance. (more…)

Artist Egon Schiele’s first diary, written when he was a boy of 16, living in Austria, is slated for publication this month, part of Dr. Christian Bauer’s new book Egon Schiele: The Beginning.  The notebooks feature poetry to his early loves, as well as drawings and sketches from the very beginning of his career.  On one page, Schiele writes: “You rosy, enchanting creature,/ Seeing you makes my heart ache./…In a short line – I love you.” (more…)

James Turrell, Roden Crater (Sunset) (2009), via PACE Gallery

In anticipation of his major, three-museum retrospective beginning next month in New York, Los Angeles and Houston, artist James Turrell is exhibiting a selection of mocels, photographs and designs from his ongoing Roden Crater Project at PACE Gallery’s 57th Street location.  Offering a complex portrait of the artist’s ambitious creative site, the show presents a look at Roden Crater as Turrell moves into the next stage of its construction.

James Turrell, Roden Crater and Autonomous Structures (Installation View), via PACE Gallery

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Creative Time is honoring artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel this year during its annual Spring Gala, and has just released a video of actor Al Pacino, recounting his personal experiences with Schnabel.  “He came to my house once and looked at a couple of my paintings.”  Pacino said.  “I thought: ‘he’s looking at a painting I did.  If he likes, it I know he’s a real phony.  He didn’t like it, and with Julian, he lets you know right away.” (more…)

GQ is currently featuring an interview with painter Kehinde Wiley, profiling the artist on a recent trip to Morocco for his ongoing portraiture series.  Charting the artist’s early life in South Central Los Angeles through his ascension in the art world, the piece offers a studied history of both Wiley’s life and output, including his famous portrait of Michael Jackson.  Initially, “I ignored him, because quite honestly I thought it was a prank,” Wiley says. “Surprisingly, he was really knowledgeable about art and art history.”  (more…)

The New York Times has published a short feature by neuroscientist Eric R. Kandel, showing the links between the biological composition of the brain and the viewer’s understanding of art.  Using the turn of the century works of Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt and Oskar Kokoschka as his example, Dr. Kandel illustrates how these particular works activated certain cells in the brain, causing a powerful emotional reaction.  New studies, such as the bold brain mapping project announced by President Obama this month, would continue to extend studies of the brain and its reactions to creative stimulus. (more…)

Luigi Ghirri, Bastia (1976), via Matthew Marks Gallery

In 1978, photographer Luigi Ghirri first published his manifesto on avant-garde photography, Kodachrome.  Locating the image as both a problem and solution in the increasingly complex interrelations of image, identity and object created through a technologically advancing world, the book sought to use the camera as it was, a machine for generating reproductions, to, in his words “be able finally to distinguish the precise identity of man, things, life, from the image of man, things, and life.” Recognizing the artist’s immense contributions to both photography and conceptual thought, Matthew Marks Gallery is currently hosting a show of 25 of Ghirri’s photographs in New York City, taken from the artist’s landmark book.

Luigi Ghirri, Urbino (1975), via Matthew Marks Gallery

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Helen Frankenthaler, Mountains and Sea (1952), Courtesy Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc., on extended loan to the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. © 2013 Estate of Helen Frankenthaler/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy Gagosian Gallery.

In 1951, at the age of twenty-two, American painter Helen Frankenthaler appeared in her first solo exhibition in New York.  It was a fitting introduction to the artist, who, over the next ten years, developed a uniquely evocative style that would define her as a major talent of mid-twentieth century New York City.  Sixty years later, Gagosian Gallery is exhibiting some of Frankenthaler’s works from this decade, showcasing the creative practice of the artist’s pivotal early years, and offering perspective on her ever-evolving style.

Helen Frankenthaler, Untitled (1951), © 2013 Estate of Helen Frankenthaler/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy Gagosian Gallery. Photography by Robert McKeever”. (more…)

The Frieze New York Art Fair has announced the artists exhibiting in this year’s edition of its annual Sculpture Park section.  The 2013 edition of the Sculpture Park will see works by Paul McCarthy, Martha Friedman, and Nick Van Woert, among others.  “Building upon the success of last year, our aim for this new edition is to increase the ambition of the Sculpture Park program both in scope and scale. Placed in an exceptional location, the program will continue expanding visitors’ experience by displaying large outdoor sculptures in dialogue with ephemeral pieces.”  Says curator Tom Eccles. (more…)

ArtInfo has posted a feature profiling the early professions of a number of high-profile artists, offering a look at how they made a living before becoming art world mainstays.  The list includes Mark Rothko (delivery boy), Yves Klein (judo master), Matthew Barney (model), and James Turrell (cattle rancher), who famously said: ““I don’t know if it’s harder to make a living as an artist or a rancher.” (more…)

Beginning April 25th, the Art Production Fund will unveil a series of murals on the steel shutters of local businesses on The Bowery in New York.  Titled “After Hours 2: Murals on the Bowery,” the project has welcomed a number of artists, including Laura Owens, Adam Pendleton, Dana Schutz and many more to create works only seen when the businesses close for the night.  “They’re all site-specific, and they all relate to the neighborhood,” says APF co-founder Yvonne Force Villareal. (more…)

Annabelle Selldorf, the architect behind David Zwirner Gallery’s newest space on 20th Street in Manhattan, was recently interviewed in Architectural Digest about the unique, cast-in-place concrete façade of the building, the challenges created by such a demanding design, and her experience working with Zwirner to conceptualize the design of the building.  “Truthfully, it was David who wanted the building to be cast-in-place concrete.”  She says. “But like any layperson, he didn’t necessarily know what that entailed. He just knew that he wanted a certain look and feel. And I, knowing more about what it takes to actually do a concrete structure, realized this posed a formidable challenge.” (more…)

Ernesto Neto, for ever (2013), Courtesy Max Hetzler

A series of new drawings and sculptures by Brazilian artist Ernesto Neto (1964) are currently on view at Galerie Max Hetzler in a solo exhibition entitled notes, stones and dots.  The exhibition sees Neto exploring the forms and movements generated from the act of dancing: “If we could feel our body in a state of dance,” he says, “we might gain a better balance.”

Ernesto Neto, animal nature (2013), Courtesy Max Hetzler

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The Louvre was forced to close on Wednesday, after 200 guards and surveillance agents went on strike to protest the growing number of often violent pickpockets at the museum.  “For more than a year, pickpockets have come here every day,” Thierry Choquet, a member of the main union at the Louvre, said. “They threaten guards by telling them that they know where they live.” (more…)

Artist Cyprien Gaillard is featured in the New York Times’ T Magazine, talking about his practice, inspiration, and development as an artist, as well as his viewpoints on the cultural processes that inform his work. “For me, decay is a starting point. I don’t just record it or picture it. What I’m interested in is creating a form of equilibrium within the decay.”  He says. (more…)

The former home of the American Folk Art Museum, constructed just 12 years ago, will be demolished to facilitate an expansion by the Museum of Modern Art.  MoMA had purchased the building several years ago as the Folk Art Museum tried to pay off debts from an expansion, and plans to erect a new building to complete its proposed five-building campus expansion.  “We have a lot of art that we own that we would like to show,” said real estate developer and museum chairman Jerry I. Speyer “When we built what exists today we didn’t get as much exhibition space as we really need.” (more…)

Édouard Manet, Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets (1872), via Royal Academy of Arts

London’s Royal Academy of Arts is currently exhibiting an ambitious retrospective of portraiture by iconoclastic French painter Édouard Manet (1832 – 1883), collected from across Europe, Asia and the United States.  This is the first-ever exhibition of work by Manet that focuses on his broad body of portraiture, tracing the artist’s artistic evolution in the format throughout his life, as well as his contributions to modern portraiture in the contemporary era.  While Manet worked across a range of subjects in figurative painting, portraiture makes up about half of his body of work, offering perhaps the strongest evidence of the artist’s creative motivations throughout the course of his life.

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Los Angeles’s Museum of Contemporary Art has appointed three new members to its board of trustees: former KB Homes CEO Bruce Karatz, investor Stanley Gold and collector Orna Amir Wolens.  The announcement comes after MOCA made the decision to remain an independent institution and forego a merger with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.  “MOCA is a dynamic part of the cultural identity of Los Angeles,” Said Bruce Karatz. “I am delighted to be part of the board that will help ensure MOCA continues its tradition of impressive, groundbreaking exhibitions.” (more…)

In the wake of the Pratt Institute fire that destroyed several floors of the school’s historic Main Building, along with the work and materials of 35 art students, dealer Larry Gagosian has stepped in to arrange a show of work by affected students.  Hosted at the Seagram’s Building, the selections for the show will be made by Brooklyn Museum curator Eugene Tsai, and will be on view from May 9th to the 14th.  “The students wanted a show in Manhattan, and this is like a dream come true,” said Pratt president Thomas F. Schutte. (more…)

Candida Höfer, Teatro Scientifico Bibiena Mantova I (2010), Courtesy Ben Brown Fine Arts

Ben Brown Fine Arts in London presents work by German photographer Candida Höfer, showcasing the artists masterful control, precision, and detail in capturing the grandiosity of Italian Renaissance architecture.  The exhibition, which features images of brightly lit, cavernous interiors of several ornate Italian buildings, depict these majestic spaces as part of the everyday, highlighting the grandeur of the Italian architectural tradition.

Candida Höfer, A Return to Italy (Installation View), via Ben Brown Fine Arts

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