Mario Merz, Pyramid (1997-2000), via Pace Gallery

With auctions this week in London centered around the post-war Italian landscape, Pace Gallery has culled together an exhibition of works of artist Mario Merz, featuring a series of sculptural and painted works that illustrate the artist’s broad conceptual scope and his varying interests in the nature of architecture, materiality and space.

Mario Merz (Installation), via Art Observed (more…)

Takashi Murakami, Oval Buddha Silver (2008), all images via Palazzo Reale

After more than a decade, Takashi Murakami has returned to Italy for an exhibition of his Arhat Cycle. The father of the Superflat movement, Murakami’s most recent work blends his signature style, in which he usually combines traditional elements of Japanese culture with consumeristic pop-culture imagery, into a series of paintings and sculptures depicting the artist alongside a dizzying cast of surreal characters.

Takashi Murakami, Arhat Cycle (Installation View) (more…)

Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Roma Capitale, Rome’s contemporary and modern art museum, is planning a new extension of the institution, which will feature works exclusively on loan from its next door neighbor, the Gagosian Gallery.  The museum is also planning an outdoor exhibition space that will feature sculptures by artists like Jeff Koons and Franz West. (more…)

Lucio Fontana, Scultura astratta (1934), all images courtesy Museum d’Art Moderne

On view at Museum D’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris is an retrospective exhibition of Italian painter Lucio Fontana, who was known as one of the the primary founders of Spatialism, and was long known for his association with the Arte Povera movement. The exhibition will continue through August 24th. (more…)

A painting by Baroque artist Guercino has been stolen from the Church of San Vincenzo in the northern town of Modena, Italy this week.  The work, depicting the Madonna with St. John the Evangelist, is valued at over $8 million, and was stolen in the middle of the night when the alarm system failed to function properly.  “This precious painting is part of the cultural heritage of Modena,” says Modena’s mayor Gian Carlo Muzzarelli. (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 Telegraph reports that “Piggyback” (1997), a sculpture by Jake and Dinos Chapman has been removed from the MAXXI contemporary art museum in Rome by Italian officials. The sculpture depicts two nude girls, one straddling the other’s shoulders, and had been flagged by the Italian Observatory on the Rights of a Child as “paedopornographic”. Although MAXXI elected to remove the sculpture from public display, the museum maintained their support of the brothers’ and other artists’ freedom to create controversial art.  (more…)

With the busy summer season in full swing, popular European museums are examining new methods of crowd control in an effort to curb the ever-growing hustle and bustle that could cause damage to both visitors and the art itself. Some museums such as the Louvre and the Prado in Madrid have pursued softer methods like timed tickets and extended hours. Others such as the Vatican Museums and the Uffizi in Florence have taken a harder line. Within the next year the delicate frescoes of the Sistine Chapel will be protected by a crowd-limiting climate control system while the Uffizi has already established a cap of 980 visitors at a time. (more…)

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Rome (Macro) is reportedly facing a financial crisis, after government officials slashed the museum budget from from €350,000 in 2013 to €61,000 this year.  “The exhibitions are programmed, and funded, until spring 2015… We spend very little on the shows as we have several sponsors,” says former president Alberta Campitelli. (more…)

Artist William Kentridge will bring a massive wall installation to the banks of the Tiber River in Rome later this year, part of a commission by the Maxxi Museum.  The work, Triumphs and Laments, will depict scenes from Rome’s 2,000 year history through wall murals, made by removing layers of pollution from the river embankment.  As smog continues to accumulate in the city, the work will slowly disappear. (more…)

Jean-Michel Othoniel, Double Collier Autoporté Or (2014), all images courtesy Galerie Perrotin Hong Kong

On view at Galerie Perrotin, Hong Kong is a solo exhibition of sculptures by French contemporary artist Jean-Michel Othoniel. For the works, great hanging sculptures composed of glass that Othoniel made in collaboration with a Feng Shui Master. Seeking to create forms that originate in human life, the works seek to achieve a symbiosis with the space that they inhabit.

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Giuseppe Penone, Scrigno (2007), all images courtesy Gagosian Gallery

On view at Gagosian London is an exhibition of Giuseppe Penone’s large scale works from 2006-2008 as well as some more recent pieces. Entitled Circling, the exhibition includes 2 major works, Scrigno (Casket), 2007, and Sigillo (Seal), 2008, depicting the structure of trees, specifically: “the tree as a being that memorializes the feats of its existence” The display will remain on view through May 31, 2014.

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Michelangelo Pistoletto, Le orecchie di Jasper Johns (The Ears of Jasper Johns), (1966) via Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed

At the current Michelangelo Pistoletto exhibition The Minus Objects 1965-1966, on view at Luhring Augustine’s Bushwick location, what greets visitors is their own reflection, as a single piece from the artist’s signature Mirror Paintings series, sits at the entrance. But the exhibition looks deeper into Pistoletto’s work throughout his career, focusing on the artist’s sculptural objects created between 1965 and 1966.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, Sfera sotto il letto (Sphere Under the Bed), (1965-1966) via Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed

Bringing together a wide range of industrial materials such as wood, metal, newspaper and plexiglass along with glass mirror, the work carries an individualistic structure and an independent content: Pistoletto, by placing them in an uncommon harmony, orchestrates a coherent body of work composed of, in many ways, unrelated works.  Structures underlining a hybrid combination of contrasting materials create a bridge between different techniques. For example Scultura Lignea (Wood Sculpture) includes a classically styled wooden sculpture, erected inside an orange-colored plexiglass case. Letto (Bed) on the other hand, is an assembly of wide ranging materials including glass mirror, velvet, wood and iron that Pistoletto culls together to render the domestic symbol.

Michelangelo Pistoletto, Scultura lignea (Wood Sculpture), (1965-1966) via Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed

Rudolf Stingel, Untitled (2010), all images courtesy Gagosian Gallery

Painter Rudolf Stingel is currently on view at Gagosian Gallery, presenting an exhibition of the artist’s monumental landscapes. Although several of the works were exhibited in 2010 in Berlin at the Neue Nationalgalerie, this exhibition at Gagosian New York represents their U.S. premier.

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A pair of paintings by Gaugin and Bonnard, stolen from a London collector in 1970, have resurfaced in the home of an Italian autoworker, the Guardian reports.  The pieces were purchased at auction in 1975 for a sum of 45,000 lira (€39 or £32, equal to £300 today), and sat in the kitchen of his home for many years, before the owner’s son noticed a similarity between the works and other Impressionist masterpieces.  “The worker, it seems clear, didn’t know what they were,” says Mariano Mossa, commander of the Italian heritage police. (more…)

The Venice Biennale will reportedly move its opening date up a month, The Art Newspaper reports.  Scheduled to open on May 9th next year, the new dates are forcing art fairs to readjust their scheduling plans for that summer.  “We haven’t finalized the 2015 dates yet, but we’re aware of the potential crunch points in the calendar next year and are looking to make a decision in the forthcoming weeks,” says a spokeswoman for Frieze. (more…)

Giacomo Balla, Mercury Passing Before the Sun (1914), via Art Observed

From the opening lines of the The Futurist Manifesto, on view near the ground floor of the Guggenheim’s current historical survey of the early 20th century Italian avant-garde, one can detect a certain mechanistic determinism, a powerful, single-minded focus on the power of industry, science and machines.  F.T. Marinetti’s famous lines summon the roar of the engine, and the hum of electricity in equal measure, damning an Italy obsessed with its own past, and embracing a new future as a world power.

Umberto Boccioni, Elasticity (Elasticità), (1912), Courtesy Guggenheim Museum (more…)

Björn and Dieter Roth, Selbstturm (1994-2013), via HangarBiocca

HangarBicocca, Milan’s 12,000 square meter former industrial space turned gallery, is the perfect place for Björn and Dieter Roth’s Islands exhibition. The huge interactive installation, curated by HangarBicocca’s Artistic Advisor Vicente Todolí (the former Director of the Tate Modern in London), interacts with the space beautifully, creating a unique environment defined by the artists. Visitors are drawn into the artwork as they walk through the several “islands” created by groupings of work: walls of paintings and prints, sculptures, an installation of repurposed materials, musical instruments, furniture, screens and household items that visitors are encouraged to interact with, including the 131 screens of Dieter Roth’s well-known video diary, the floors from the artists’ studio, and their sculptures: Zuckerturm (Sugar Tower), 1994-2013 and Selbstturm (Self Tower), 1994-2013. (more…)

Francesco Vezzoli’s planned installation of an Italian church in the courtyard of MoMA PS1 in New York has been cancelled after Italian authorities intervened to block the artist’s export of the ruins.  Vezzoli is now under criminal investigation for the deconstruction of the church, despite the prior blessing of the Mayor of Montegiordano, where the church was located.  Vezzoli is searching for a new way to show his work at MoMA, but has yet to fully commit to a new plan.  “It’s like love — if this church turns you down, you can’t fall in love again right away,” he said. “My Juliet is being kept captive.” (more…)

Alberto Giaccometti’s iconic Diego en chemise écossaise will be on sale at Christie’s November 5th auction of modernist and impressionist art in New York. A classic portrait of the artist’s brother, it is anticipated to sell for $30-$50 million.  “With this masterpiece, Alberto Giacometti establishes himself as one of the greatest portrait painters of the 20th Century, paving the way for the likes of Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud.” Andreas Rumbler, Deputy Chair of the Impressionist and Modern Art at Christie’s says. (more…)

Cy Twombly, Sunset (1957), Image Credit: Tom Powel Imaging / Courtesy Dominique Lévy, New York.

Twenty minutes of continuous, monotone sound, followed by twenty minutes of absolute silence; such is the premise for Yves Klein’s 1949 Monotone Symphony, a powerful piece considered to stand at the core of the artist’s pioneering conceptual ouevre and one that bore remarkable influence on fellow artists Cy Twombly and Lucio Fontana, each of which drove their own sense of dichotomous action on canvas and sculpture, defining the continued explorations of abstraction and concept in post-war art.

Yves Klein, Pluie Bleu (S 36) (1961), Image credit Tom Powel Imaging, © Yves Klein, Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York ADAGP, Paris 2013.

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Gilbert0 Zorio, (Installation view), Photo: Peter Malet, courtesy Blain|Southern

A collection of major works selected from the long-running career of Gilberto Zorio is currently on view at Blain|Southern gallery in London Hanover Square. The show includes recent works, new site-specific installations, and important sculptures from the 1960s. Zorio’s first UK exhibition in five years, this show offers a wide range of examples of his work, revealing his evolution as an artist, both marking his profound impression on the Arte Povera movement and showcasing his extension beyond the influential Italian movement.

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Gianfranco Gorgoni, Francesco Clemente and detail of General Animal (1984), Courtesy Thomas Ammann Fine Art AG, Zurich

The work of Italian contemporary artist Francesco Clemente is as diverse in style and influence as the life of its creator.  Transcending traditional borders of culture, artistic movements, intellectual spheres and even medium, Clemente has developed a sense of decentered lexicality; his work standing as a testament to the synthesis of his personal travels and influences – among them, the artists he met and collaborated with in New York City in the 1980s. Portraits of the 1980s, currently on display in the Thomas Ammann Fine Art Gallery in Zurich until September 27, chronicles this engagement with New York’s intellectual and social community through a series of portraits, speaking to the friendships which both redefined Clemente’s own style and thrust him into the limelight of the international art scene. (more…)

A group of art researchers, led by self-styled art history detective Silvano Vinceti, claim that they have taken a major step in identifying the remains of the model for Da Vinci’s most famous painting.  Taking DNA samples from remains in the crypts of Florence’s Santissima Annunziata basilica, the group will perform a number of tests before attempting to reconstruct the face of the woman, conventionally believed to be Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a Renaissance-era silk merchant.   (more…)