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…)

An article on Bloomberg.com reports that collector and billionaire Leon Black is in talks to purchase Artspace through Phaidon Press, the publishing company he bought in 2012. Artspace has been in the news recently for its lower-than-expected sales figures, especially compared to its early success in fundraising. Previous reports indicated that the online auction site Auctionata was a prime contender to acquire Artspace but the Bloomberg article suggests that a deal between Black’s Phaidon Press and Artspace could be signed by the end of the week.  (more…)

Giulio Paolini, Autoritratto (Self-Portrait) (1968), Courtesy of Dominique Lévy Gallery and Courtesy Archivio Giulio Paolini, Turin

Hypothesis for an Exhibition, a survey show paying homage to the work of conceptual artist Giulio Paolini is open at Dominique Lévy on Madison Avenue through August 16. In addition to Paolini himself, the exhibition features the work of Richard Aldrich, Harold Ancart, Sebastian Black, Kerstin Brätsch, Guyton/Walker, KAYA, Charles Mayton, Seth Price, Josh Smith, R.H. Quaytman, Antek Walczak and Viola YeÅŸiltaç. Additionally, Studio Manuel Raeder has designed an accompanying publication, which incidentally coincides with London’s Whitechapel Gallery retrospective Giulio Paolini:To Be or Not to Be. (more…)

The L.A. Times reports that LACMA will honor Barbara Kruger and Quentin Tarantino at its annual Art + Film gala in November. The article points out the similarities between Kruger and Tarantino’s work, highlighting their “artistic appetite for wordplay”. The two will follow in the footsteps of filmmakers such as Martin Scorsese and Stanley Kubrick as well as visual artists such as John Baldessari and David Hockney.  (more…)

As part of new project titled “After Dark”, the Tate Britain will deploy four remote-controlled robots throughout its galleries for five nights beginning September 13th. The public will be able to watch live-stream footage on the Tate’s website as the camera-equipped robots roam the museum’s collection, which includes works by David Hockney, Lucian Freud, and Henry Moore, for five hours each night. Since the robots choose new operators every few minutes, some viewers might get the chance to control the feed and see their favorite artworks in the empty galleries. (more…)

The New York Times reports that Brooklyn Bridge Park will play host to the third annual Photoville, a fair that will present 60 photography exhibitions in repurposed shipping containers. The fair, which goes from September 18th to the 28th, is the brain-child of United Photo Industries, a photography cooperative based in Brooklyn that is known for their installation “The Fence”, which will also be included in the exhibition. In addition to the shows, Photoville will feature talks, panels, and presentations from artists and authors as well as food and drink venues.  (more…)

The New York Times reports that two young German artists have come forward as the perpetrators in the Brooklyn Bridge flag swap. On July 22nd, Mischa Leinkauf and Matthias Wermke scaled the Brooklyn Bridge and replaced the traditional American flags atop its towers with white versions of the flag, a switch that prompted embarrassed city officials to reevaluate security on the bridge. The article reports that, although the swap has garnered publicity as a possible anti-American stunt, the two artists intended the white flags to honor the bridge’s history and especially the birthday of its German-born architect, John Roebling.

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Team Gallery is planning to open a space in Los Angeles on September 14th, 2014. The new space, called Team Bungalow, will be the third iteration of the Team Gallery and the first outside of New York City. The gallery will be based in a small bungalow and garage on Windward Avenue in the Venice neighborhood and will be open on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Team Bungalow’s inaugural show will be called “tl;dr” and feature work by Cory Arcangel.  (more…)

As part of a series called “This much I know”, the Guardian solicited artists Gilbert & George for their life lessons. Among observations on topics that ranged from relationships to religion to politics, the duo, whose latest show at Lehmann Maupin closed on August 8th, made several remarks about art and the art world, including their definition of art as “the friendship that’s formed between the person and the picture – both at the moment of seeing and later on as you remember”.

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An article in the Wall Street Journal profiles Bettina Korek, the founder of For Your Art (FYA), an independent arts organization based in Los Angeles. With FYA, Korek stands at the intersection of the art world and the audience, planning and hosting events featuring artists such as Raymond Pettibon, Barbara Kruger, and John Baldessari that complement L.A.’s current exhibitions. The article reports that, with FYA’s public art events and contacts with institutions such as LACMA and the Hammer Museum, Korek hopes to bring “a new, more democratic patronage” to art. (more…)