Takashi Murakami has opened his career retrospective at the MCA Chicago, and has designed a series of prints and other pieces on sale at the museum gift shop, Art Newspaper reports, causing a major surge in sales that sees no sign of slowing. “I’ve never had to ask so much from the retail department, as well as everyone else in the building, including the social media team,” Mark Millmore, the MCA’s director of retail says. (more…)

A group of citizens living around Washington Square Park are opposing Ai Weiwei’s proposed fence installation around the park’s iconic arch. “The monumental Arch is a work of art in itself. It does not need to be politicized with the proposed installation,” a letter to the Public Art Fund reads. “The shape is grand and sculptural, as are the statues of George Washington. We feel that the integrity of its design would be compromised by Mr. Weiwei’s art work. This installation sets a dangerous precedent that one of New York City’s most recognized monuments and pieces of art can be decorated and co-opted for 4 months at a time.” (more…)

Artist Cai Guo-Qiang is featured in the Financial Times’s ongoing “Lunch with the FT” series, dining with writer Leslie Hook at his studio. “I can come back and do things for China; that is not a problem, but I also have my own viewpoint, my own principles,” Cai says. (more…)

Ai Weiwei is interviewed in Variety this week, as his documentary Human Flow prepares for its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. “I know what it is like to be viewed as an outcast,” he says of his work. “The current-day displacement of people is the largest since the end of World War II. It’s a global issue and one which tests the resolve of developed nations to uphold human rights. I am eager to understand how those values — which form the foundation of democracy and freedom — are protected and how they have been violated.” (more…)

The 2018 Montreal Biennale has been canceled due to a lack of funding, the Art Newspaper reports. The previous exhibition suffered from major budgetary issues, despite critical praise. “General management was not their forte,”chairman of the board, Cédric Bisson said of the Biennale’s executive and artistic director Sylvie Fortin and her team.

(more…)

Artist Alex Israel will release SPF-18, the feature-length teen surf film he directed, this fall, Art News reports. “It’s an artwork for teenagers, who watch movies at school, on iTunes, and on Netflix,” Israel says. “Distributing it through their channels is key, and I can’t wait for our high school tour. It was great to collaborate with so many incredibly talented people whom I’ve long admired throughout this process.” (more…)

The Art Market Monitor has a studied recap on the current lawsuit between Chinese collectors Lin San and Zhang Chang over the purchase of Gerhard Richter’s Dusenjager.  The work was reportedly bought by Zhang Chang and not paid for, resulting in Phillips auction house claiming of the work, before Lin (who loaned the money for another purchase) stepped in with a lawsuit trying to claim the piece.  (more…)

The Hammer Museum has added Linda Janger, artist Glenn Kaino and Dean Valentine to its board, Art News reports. The group has a long relationship with the museum, having worked in various capacities with the Hammer over the past years. (more…)

Jeff Koons has created a 40-foot high balloon sculpture for Jay-Z’s upcoming tour, continuing the rapper’s ongoing references and interest in the artist’s work.  The work saw its debut at the UK’s V Festival last week. (more…)

Carlos Motta, Towards a Homoerotic Historiography (2015) (detail) Courtesy of the artist

Praz-Delavallade, a main figure in the Paris gallery scene since the ‘90s, opened its first space in the United States in Los Angeles this past January. This summer, the gallery continues its program on the west coast with Over the Rainbow, a group exhibition dedicated socio-political trajectory of the LGTQ movement in the United States, and its ebbs and flows through painting, photography, sculpture, and video. As a French import on the city’s gallery-dense Wilshire Boulevard, the gallery brings together an intergenerational group of artists drawn from a global spectrum of interests and backgrounds, each looking at seminal moments in the gay liberation movement, such as the Stonewall upheaval, the outbreak and aftermath of HIV/AIDS epidemic, and marriage equality granted to same-sex couples through allusive or direct approaches that grasp at a timeless, global sensitivity. (more…)

Alexander Calder, Red Lily Pads (1956), via Art Observed

An embarrassment of riches is spread along the winding pathway of the Guggenheim Museum this spring, tracing the long and storied history of the New York institution through its interconnected relationships with the collectors and avant-garde pioneers that helped to grow the institution into the powerhouse that it has since become.  Visionaries: Creating a Modern Guggenheim offers visitors a firsthand look at the inception of one of the city’s enduring guardians of modern and contemporary art, all through the eyes and hands of the various parties involved in its early years. (more…)

A new report published shows that, despite the diversity of New York City’s neighborhoods, the museum boards for its many museums remain overwhelmingly white, the New York Times reports. “It’s not just who you hire,” Tom Finkelpearl, the commissioner of Cultural Affairs says. “Are people then actually involved in the decision making? Is it tokenism or is it something that’s fundamental? In what categories are people’s careers being nurtured and are people being included?” (more…)

Solange Knowles has announced plans to perform a series of compositions in front of Donald Judd’s 15 Untitled Works in Concrete in Marfa, TX. “Donald Judd’s profound work has had tremendous impact on the way in which I see the world,” the artist said in a statement. “I have visited these works at the Chinati in Marfa various times, at landmark moments in my life and am completely and utterly honored to deliver my performance piece, Scales, alongside these phenomenal installations.”  (more…)

Artist Ai Weiwei and the Public Art Fund have launched an $80,000 Kickstarter project to fund the erection of fences around New York City, expanding the artist’s original proposal for his piece Fences Make Good Neighbors. “Fences can be used to regulate and detain people, to segregate and to train people to accept the given conditions,” the artist says of his work. (more…)

MoMA PS1 has hired SculptureCenter’s Ruba Katrib as curator, Art News reports. “MoMA PS1 is undoubtedly one of the most influential contemporary art museums today,” she said in a statement, “and I look forward to continuing its legacy of working with artists at crucial points in their careers and introducing them to wider audiences.” (more…)

The New York Times profiles the current lawsuit against sculptor Dale Chihuly, who is being accused of taking ideas from an assistant and not properly compensating them for their work. “Yeah, I would say it probably made it easier to attack me,” Chihuly says of the nature of his labor-intensive process and the number of workers on his projects. “I absolutely need my teams.” (more…)

Documenta 14 is at the center of more political conflict this week, after a far-right German politician attacked a pro-refugee sculpture by Nigerian-born, US-based artist Olu Oguibe. Kassel city council member Thomas Materner, a member of Germany’s far-right AfD party, called the work “ideologically polarizing, disfigured art,” over its message. Curator Adam Szymczyk was reportedly “appalled” by the comments. (more…)

Bulgari is aligning itself with Rome’s Maxxi museum to present a new prize for Italian contemporary arts, WWD reports. “The Premio Maxxi sees Italy at the center of the work of the artists involved,” says Jean Christophe Babin, Bulgari’s chief executive officer. “Supporting a prize that valorizes Italy but with significant international scope is in perfect harmony with the identity and values of a company such as Bulgari,” said Babin. “I am sure that this partnership will give new impetus to the prize.” (more…)

London’s National Gallery has bought Bernardo Bellotto’s The Fortress of Königstein from the North (1756-58) for £11,670,000 following the deferment of an export bar on the work, the Art Newspaper reports. The piece “shows Bellotto as one of the greatest view painters of his time,” according to director Gabriele Finaldi. (more…)

The Exhibitor List for NADA Miami Beach 2017 has been announced, with booths from 108 galleries from 16 different countries, including 23 galleries that have never shown at NADA before. “NADA was founded to fill a void in the art world by providing a community where lesser-known international galleries, emerging artists, artist-run spaces, and both young and established galleries can co-exist,” says NADA director, Heather Hubbs. (more…)

Carsten Höller, Double Mushroom Vitrine (Threefold), 2015. All images via Gagosian Gallery.

On view through September 1^st, the Gagosian Gallery in New York presents REASON, an exhibition of recent work by Carsten Höller.  In this show, the artist’s first in New York since 2011, Höller unites scientific exactitude, play, and art through work that transforms the gallery into a laboratory for exploring and disproving the conceptual act and understanding of reason. Revolving doors, rotating mirrors, giant mushrooms, and huge dice create a world of discovery and whimsy, in which viewers are invited to explore the fascinating and beautiful logic behind the natural world.

Divisions Square (Senegal-yellow Surface), 2017

Trained in the natural sciences, Höller’s work has revolved around interrogating the methods through which humans seek to understand the world. Towards this end, he imposes standardized systems of logic on the behaviors and appearances of humans, fungi, insects, and animals, then lets go and observes what happens. As the artist states, “I start with a formula to get a process going, then the formula takes over and continues into infinity on its own. It is not about creative decisions anymore; there is no choice, only reason.” The effect of this process is the sense that Höller’s work seeks to invite viewers into the satisfying and inspiring process of discovery and experimentation. By eliminating subjectivity, the subjects are treated as independent, organic material acting and reacting independently. This places both the viewer and the artist in the position of an objective observer, passively admiring the results of some predetermined formula.  Both formally and conceptually captivating, Höller’s topics work to involve the viewer and inspire reflection and wonder. In this exhibition, the overall scheme for the two galleries is that of binary, diametric opposition and division. Following a pattern of diminishing halves, this takes place through color gradations, light intensity, and the positioning of the work itself.

Installation View.

In Revolving Doors, constructed according to the concept of triadic division, the viewer is engulfed in a sea of changing, shifting, turning reflections. The Divisions series of paintings, as well as two murals that cover the gallery walls, instead follow a binary logic. A biological equivalent to this geometric pattern is explored in Divisions (Rose-grain Aphid and Surface), which shows the parthenogenesis of a female rose aphid against a red background. The Giant Triple Mushroom sculptures are composed of enlarged cross-sections of three different fungal species, while Muscimol 3. Versuch, sees the artist exploring the hallucinogenic effects produced by the fly agaric mushroom when ingested. Another mushroom work, Flying Mushrooms is a giant stabile with moving parts, involving the rotation of seven fly agaric mushroom replicas slowly through the air like a propeller.

Installation View.

As in his other investigations, Höller seeks to eliminate subjectivity in order to apply and allow divisional formulae to determine the composition of each work. Setting objects free in a loose network of objects and interpretations, his pieces push the viewer into an extended space of indeterminacy and playful construction of meaning. The standardized systems of logic applied here produce a captivating and hyperreal resulting piece. The artist’s fascination with the formulaic rationality that rules the natural world comes through in REASON, and invites the viewer into an experience of wonder and play, predicated on the foundation of objective precision. In turn, the exhibition takes on the role of homage to the exquisite symmetry of the natural world.

Revolving Doors, 2014/16

— A. Corrigan

Related Links:
Exhibition Page [Gagosian Gallery]

Maurizio Cattelan’s golden toilet work, titled America, will conclude its popular installation run at the Guggenheim Museum on September, exactly one year after it was installed. “When the sculpture comes off view on September 15, [Donald] Trump will have been in office for 238 days, a term marked by scandal and defined by the deliberate rollback of countless civil liberties, in addition to climate-change denial that puts our planet in peril,” curator Nancy Spector says of the piece. (more…)

Donald and Melania Trump will skip this year’s Kennedy Center Honors, the New York Times reports. “In choosing not to participate in this year’s Honors activities,” Kennedy Center leadership, David M. Rubenstein and Deborah F. Rutter, wrote, “the administration has graciously signaled its respect for the Kennedy Center and ensures the Honors gala remains a deservingly special moment for the honorees.” (more…)

The New York Times takes a tour of artist Cai Guo-Qiang’s Chester, N.J home this week, designed by Frank Gehry.  ‘‘An artist is like a cook,’’ Cai says, ‘‘who needs not only the dining area but also the kitchen.’’ (more…)