Global contemporary art events and news observed from New York City. Suggestion? Email us.

Jenny Sabin Studio Selected as 2017 MoMA YAP winner

February 21st, 2017

A rendering of Lumen by Jenny Sabin, via Archinect
A rendering of Lumen by Jenny Sabin, via Archinect

The Ithaca-based Jenny Sabin Studio has won this year’s edition of the MoMA Young Architect’s Program with her design Lumen, a robotically-knitted canopy made from photoluminescent textiles that both absorb and diffuse light.  The work, which is made from recycled materials and also features a misting system, will hang over the courtyard of MoMA PS1 this summer, as the museum embarks on its annual Warm Up concert series.   Read More »

Paris— Jean-Luc Moulène at The Centre Pompidou Through February 20th, 2017

February 18th, 2017

Jean-Luc Moulène, (Installation View), via Art Observed
Jean-Luc Moulène (Installation View), via Art Observed

To walk through Jean-Luc Moulène’s retrospective at The Centre Pompidou is to traverse through a wasteland of fossils and discarded matter, a history of repurposed and spliced objects placed into an ever-evolving series of dialogues and interactions.  Giving off subtle senses of a dystopian, simulated future, the artist’s sculptures play on a suspended sense of reality, often challenging its role as constructed object or sourced material that plays on a rupture between past, present and future, disrupting easy legibility while staging a site where these divergent sensations are allowed to co-exist. Read More »

New York — Aline Kominsky-Crumb & R. Crumb: “Drawn Together” at David Zwirner Through February 18th, 2017

February 17th, 2017

Aline Kominsky-Crumb and R. Crumb, Drawn Together (Installation View)
Aline Kominsky-Crumb and R. Crumb, Drawn Together (Installation View)

Drawn Together, a decade-spanning look at the collaborative work of the cartoonist husband and wife Aline Kominsky-Crumb and R. Crumb, offers a well-timed opportunity for lovers of the graphic arts at David Zwirner, coinciding with the opening of the New Museum’s Raymond Petitibon retrospective A Pen of All Work.  Although they were individually prominent artists in the graphic arts scene during the course of their careers, Aline and Robert delivered a unique visual and intellectual body of work that both drew on their marriage in the early ‘70s. Later gathered in a series titled Aline and Bob’s Dirty Laundry Comics, which debuted in 1974, the couple’s ongoing collaboration is a statement on marriage, partnership, and dependency, as well as on sexuality and gender roles of the society they lived and worked within. Read More »

RIP – Arte Povera Artist Jannis Kounellis, Aged 80

February 17th, 2017

Jannis Kounellis, via Art Newspaper
Jannis Kounellis, via Art Newspaper

Greek-Italian Arte Povera pioneer Jannis Kounellis has passed away in Rome at the age of 80, according to the Italian Minister of Culture.  “It is a sad day, Kounellis has left us. A master, Italian by adoption, who left a mark on contemporary art,” Minister Dario Franceschini tweeted today. Read More »

New York – Adrian Ghenie: “Recent Paintings” at Pace Gallery Through February 18th, 2017

February 16th, 2017

Adrian Ghenie, Rest During the Flight into Egypt (2016), via Art Observed
Adrian Ghenie, Rest During the Flight into Egypt (2016), via Art Observed

Drawing on a wide range of works from the artist’s recent practice, Pace Gallery is presenting a series of new paintings by Adrian Ghenie, drawing on the artist’s unique approach to both the construction of his canvases, and the position his work takes in its relation to broader timeline of European painting and political history.

Adrian Ghenie, Degenerate Art (2016), via Art Observed
Adrian Ghenie, Degenerate Art (2016), via Art Observed

Read More »

New York — Louise Bourgeois: “Holograms” at Cheim & Read Through February 11th, 2017

February 14th, 2017

Louise Bourgeois UNTITLED (detail) (1998-2014), Suite of 8 Holograms © The Easton Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, NY.
Louise Bourgeois UNTITLED (detail) (1998-2014), Suite of 8 Holograms © The Easton Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, NY.

Throughout the course of her fifty-year career, artist Louise Bourgeois has experimented with a broad span of media, while remaining primarily focused around her foundational sculptural works and works on paper.  That broad range of work is offered a new wrinkle in Holograms, a recently concluded exhibition at Cheim & Read that brings together a body of work never been shown in its entirety in the Chelsea exhibition space’s intimate rear gallery.  Offering a profound elaboration on the artist’s less-known approaches to her work, the show documents Bourgeois’s dialogue with the New York-based fine arts holographic studio C-Projects, resulting in eight holographic photographs blanketed with an alluring red tone, which granted the artist the potential to orchestrate her contemplative, often surreal techniques in this unexpected, yet fertile, medium.

Read More »

New York – “Inventing Downtown” Curated by Melissa Rachleff at NYU’s Grey Gallery Through April 1st, 2017

February 13th, 2017

Boris Lurie, Adieu Amerique, Grey Gallery
Boris Lurie, Adieu Amerique (1959-1960), part of the show’s “Inventing Downtown,” section all images via Shannon Viola for Art Observed

Nestled within the heart of Greenwich Village, New York University’s Grey Gallery is showcasing works from a selection of artist-run galleries in the surrounding neighborhoods over the early post-war years of 1952 to 1965.  The exhibition, which encompasses two floors of gallery space, illuminates the period in the New York art scene in which Pop Art and Minimalism were gradually overtaking the influence and impact of Abstract Expressionism. Pieces from eclipsed artists, such as women and artists of color, come to the forefront in particular here, exploring both the experimental approaches and the outcomes of a cooperatively-run sphere of downtown art, and the often overshadowed artists that were a cornerstone of New York’s cultural ascendancy during the era. Read More »

AO On-Site – Mexico City: Material Art Fair at Expo Reforma, February 9th – 12th, 2017

February 13th, 2017

Koak at AlterSpace, via Art Observed
Koak at AlterSpace, via Art Observed

Taking over the spacious halls of the Expo Reforma once again (the first time in the same location as a previous edition), the Material Art Fair opened its doors this Thursday to strong attendance and interest from collectors and attendees.  Embracing an expanded floor plan for the fair without increasing its gallery count, this year’s edition of Material was distinctly walkable, as larger booths meant more space for ambitious pieces and multi-artist selections, a choice that only strengthened the show’s appeal.

Sangree at Yautepec, via Art Observed
Sangree at Yautepec, via Art Observed

Read More »

New York – Willem de Kooning | Zao Wou-Ki at Lévy Gorvy Gallery Through March 11th, 2017

February 12th, 2017

Willem de Kooning, Door to the River (1960), via Art Observed
Willem de Kooning, Door to the River (1960), via Art Observed

Embarking on their first exhibition under their shared gallery name, Dominique Lévy and Brett Gorvy’s new Gorvy Lévy Gallery has opened 2017 with a bang, bringing together a landmark body of paintings by two masters of the medium, Zao Wou-Ki and Willem de Kooning.  Drawing from each artist’s unique gestural abilities and continually inventive bodies of work over the course of their evolution, the show is a major achievement for the gallery, including several major museum loans that underscores Gorvy’s impact on the gallery’s already strong programming.

Zao Wou-Ki, Untitled (1949), via Art Observed
Zao Wou-Ki, Untitled (1949), via Art Observed

Read More »

AO On-Site – Mexico City: Zona Maco Art Fair, February 8th – 12th, 2017

February 10th, 2017

Zona Maco Wolfgang Tillmans Regen Projects Eleanor Lutz
Wolfgang Tillmans, Eleanor / Lutz, portrait, (2016), Regen Projects. All photos via Art Observed.

As the doors of the Centro Citibanamex opened today in Mexico City, Zona Maco rolled into its 14th edition, bringing a surge in exhibitions, films, and programs to the proceedings of the yearly art fair event in the Mexican capital.  Welcoming galleries from around the globe, the fair’s early-year scheduling offered something of a kick-off to the year’s market events, while offering an indication of current market strength, as well as a spotlight on the Latin American art circuit.

Pedro Reyes at Lisson, via Art Observed
Pedro Reyes at Lisson, via Art Observed

Read More »