In a special feature, The New York Times has invited 15 artists to create imaginative advertisements for themselves as they might run in the newspaper, with submissions from Jenny Holzer, Carol Bove, and Francesco Vezzoli, whose particularly bizarre ad offers a body double of himself as a sexual partner.  ‘‘I immediately felt that it would be hilarious to see a real/fake prostitute ad in the pages of the most respected newspaper in the world,” the artist writes. (more…)

Christie’s auction of works from the Essl Collection launched Frieze week last night in London, with the 44-lot sale attracting £46.9 million in sales, within the estimate for the evening.  The exhibition cover lot, Gerhard Richter’s Netz, failed to sell at auction, but ultimately sold privately after the auction for £5.5 million.  “Through the proceeds of this sale, the long-term future of the Essl Museum is now secured,” Karlheinz Essl said in a statement. (more…)

Joe Bradley, Untitled (2011), via Christie’s

Last evening, Christie’s auction house closed its first auctions of the fall season in London, a successful affair that saw only 5 of the 46 lots on sale go unsold, with a final sales tally of £40,344,500, settling firmly into the auction house’s estimated £32 million to £47 million sales range. (more…)

Gavin Brown is opening a new location on the Lower East Side at 291 Grand Street, a building which has also recently seen the addition of Margaret Lee’s 47 Canal.  The gallery will also maintain the same name has his original space.  “We couldn’t think of what else to call it!” the gallerist says. (more…)

Miami collector Gary Nader has announced plans for his new museum, focusing on Latin American art and featuring about 600 paintings, drawings and sculptures from his personal collection.  “The influence of Latin America in the U.S. is extremely prominent,” he says. “We want to tell the story.” (more…)

Gerhard Richter is interviewed in the Wall Street Journal this week, as the artist opens a new show of works at Marian Goodman in London.  “Abstract pictures do indeed show something, they just show things that don’t exist,” he says. “But they still follow the same requirements as figurative works: they need a setup, structure. You need to be able to look at it and say, ‘It’s almost something.’ But it’s actually representing nothing. It pulls feelings out of you, even as it’s showing you a scene that technically isn’t there.” (more…)

Helen Frankenthaler, Cool Summer (1962), © 2014 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, Photo by Rob McKeever

On view at Gagosian Gallery in New York is an exhibition of work by American abstract expressionist painter Helen Frankenthaler, focusing on a period of her career (1962-1963) in which the artist focused primarily on composing with color and tone rather than formal lines and shapes.  The display will remain on view through October 18th. (more…)

Phillips has opened its new exhibition and auction space at 30 Berkley Square in London, part of its increased efforts to compete at the highest end of the contemporary market.  The space is currently exhibiting a curated show in the space, titled A Very Short History of Contemporary Sculpture, and curated by Francesco Bonami.  “I thought about sculpture, as soon as I saw this space,” Mr. Bonami says. (more…)

Christopher Wool, Untitled (1990), via Phillips

Last night, Phillips wrapped its Contemporary Evening Sale in London, corresponding with the opening days of Frieze London, and setting the stage for the fall season of auctions in both the British capital and New York. Phillips kicked the week off with a moderate sale, featuring a few impressive achievers alongside a number of more subdued sales marks, achieving a final sales total of £14.9 million for the 47 lot sale. (more…)

Outside the Frieze Fair, via Art Observed

As Wednesday winds down, the 2014 edition of Frieze London is well underway, starting another fair off with strong sales and impressive attendance.  As the VIP preview opened, a number of prominent celebrities could be seen browsing the aisles.  Famed German footballer Michael Ballack was seen wandering the aisles, as was writer Salman Rushdie, joining MOCA’s new director Philip Vergne and his DIA successor Jessica Morgan.

Erwin Wurm, via Andrea Nguyen for Art (more…)

Hermann Nitsch,Kreuzwegstation (Station of the Cross) (1961) at Hauser and Wirth, via Art Observed

The Viennese Actionist movement was one of the more visceral post-war collectives that sprung up from the war-torn landscape of mid-20th Century Europe.  The group of Austrian artists (while claiming they were never affiliated officially), among them Otto Mühl, Günter Brus, and Rudolph Schwarzkogler, combined disturbing and often surreal imagery with a ritualistic approach to art making, creating elaborate pieces that often involved flayed animal carcasses, body parts, and bucket upon bucket of blood.

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A Picasso canvas that has never before been exhibited will go on view this week in London.  The 1901 self-portrait is being exhibited at Ordovas Gallery, alongside works by Jeff Koons, Francis Bacon and Damien Hirst. (more…)

Art Basel Miami Beach has announced its selections for the 2014 edition of its special section, Kabinett.  Focusing on special curated shows and group exhibitions, Kabinett this year will feature  a solo exhibition of work by Mickalene Thomas by Kavi Gupta, and an installation by James Turrell at Mexico’s Galería OMR, among others.  The fair will open on December 1st. (more…)

Christie’s has announced that it will be offering a series of three classic Magritte canvases at its New York Impressionist and Modern Art sale next month, including Mesdemoiselles de l’Isle Adam, 1942 (estimated at $5-$7m).  Magritte has been a strong seller in recent years, with a sizable percentage of his top sales occurring in the past five years. (more…)

The New York Times profiles the upcoming exhibition of Leonard Lauder’s Cubist collection (on view October 20th), a series of works collected over the years by the cosmetics tycoon who taught himself a great deal about the world of fine art as a child attending the Met.  “I didn’t discover Cubism then,” he said. “But just by looking, you learn what’s good.” (more…)

The Guardian profiles painter Eric Fischl’s recent series of works documenting the peculiar, occasionally surreal landscapes and politics of the modern art fair circuit.  “The big collectors do this kind of speed-dating thing,” the artist tells The Guardian. “They try to get in and out before anyone buys what they are after and certainly before the hoi polloi gets to look. And then you’ve got people who are just there for the social scene. So you have people texting or not paying any attention at all. But when you stop the moment you can see this weird world that is taking place. They are being regarded and judged by the work itself in some ways.” (more…)

A group of researchers working at Geneva’s Fine Arts Experts Institute have made the claim that about half of all artworks in circulation today are fakes, an estimate “When you buy an apartment, you always get an appraisal first. But in the art world, until recently, you could buy works for 10 million euros without sufficient documentation,” says FAEI chief Yann Walther. (more…)

Collectors Karlheinz and Agnes Essl, heads of the renowned Essl Collection of contemporary art, are selling off a large portion of their works this week in London, a group of works that includes a number of lesser known German and Austrian artists due to Mr. Essl’s unorthodox collecting techniques.  “So many collectors buy only the ‘greatest hits’ of an artist, but I created a collection that reflected the diversity of artists’ careers and went deeper than just the trophies,” he says.  (more…)

The Louvre is reportedly loaning over 300 works to its new museum in Abu Dhabi, The Guardian reports, including works by Monet, Leonardo da Vinci, Van Gogh and Matisse.  “This will be the first time many of these works will travel to Abu Dhabi or even the Middle East, and are a rare opportunity to see important art from French museums,” said Sultan bin Tahnoon al-Nahyan, chairman of the Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority. (more…)

In the run-up to Frieze Art Week, Lisson Gallery has installed a series of posters on the walls of the London Tube station near Regent’s Park, featuring texts designed by artists Ryan Gander and Cory Arcangel.  The work is part of a broader series of projects by Arcangel, Gander and Joyce Pensato at the fair who “are intervening and disrupting the [Frieze] stand through installation, performance and collaboration—manipulating how the public interact with works and staff members, who will be sporting custom-made shoes, suits and other wearable works of art,” according to the gallery press release. (more…)

Carsten Höller, Dice (2014), via Gagosian

After a summer pause, the major art fair circuit will look to get back up and running this fall, as collectors, dealers and artists flock to Regent’s Park in London for the 2014 edition of the Frieze Art Fair. (more…)

Peter Doig, The Heart of Old San Juan (1999), via Christie’s

The fall auction season will get back underway this week, as the bustle of Frieze London will also play home to the first major evening sales since early this summer.  With major lots offered at Phillips, Sotheby’s and Christie’s, buyers in the British capital will compete over a number of classic works alongside their recent purchases at Regent’s Park.

Francis Bacon, Study for a Portrait (1954), via Sotheby’s

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Andy Coolquitt, 2fer (king raashiid) (2011), via Art Observed

In a humorous blend of sculpture, installation and design, Andy Coolquitt complicates the essence of utilitarianism to examine the ritualistic and imposed purposes of objects. Approaching  everyday commodities as physical entities that extend beyond their limited fields of use, the Texas-born artist orchestrates alternate narratives out of materials such as wooden sticks, light bulbs or metal pipes, not just to provoke their aesthetic limitations, but to explore new social dialogues that ultimately encircle these arrangements. (more…)

Frieze co-founder Matthew Slotover has responded to characterizations of his wildly successful event as “Ikea for millionaires,” noting the impact the fair has on broader art institutions and critiquing the often vapid personifications of collectors. “Most don’t see art as purely a display of wealth. For many, there is a genuine engagement and they want to support the culture, and enrich their lives and engage in lifelong learning,” Slotover says. “They could go and buy planes or yachts or cars, which wouldn’t do any of those things. It’s a minority of the wealthy that decide to buy art. If you look through the Sunday Times Rich List, most are not art collectors.” (more…)