The Tate has purchased the instructions to artist Martin Creed’s notorious Work No. 227: The Lights Going On and Off.  Fittingly titled, the 2001 work involves the constant flicking of light in a room from on to off and back again, and won Creed the Turner Prize when it was first unveiled, dispute vocal protests from tabloids and artists.  “It is an important work. It is a sober minimalist piece in a long line of artists using every day materials for potent formal and psychological effect. It’s not easy viewing.”  Says critic Louisa Buck.

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Six artists have been named in the shortlist to produce the latest in the rolling series of sculptures featured on Trafalgar Square’s empty Fourth Plinth – including British artists David Shrigley, Mark Leckey and Marcus Coates. Competing for time slots in 2015 and 2016, two artists from the shortlist will be selected early next year.  Miniature versions of the proposed works will be on display in nearby church St. Martin-in-the-Fields starting September 25. (more…)

The Wall Street Journal recently sat down with sculptor Anthony Caro, who is currently in the middle of a series of shows in Europe, including exhibition at the Venice Biennale and a soon to open show at Gagosian Gallery.  Speaking with the newspaper, Mr. Caro discussed his prolific output, working approach, and his preference to work on sculptures at full-scale. “I’m never comfortable working on something that has to be imagined bigger or different,” he says. (more…)

Gary Hume, Blackbird (1998), all images courtesy Tate Britain

The Tate Britain is currently presenting an exhibition of works by British painter Gary Hume, created throughout his career. On display are 24 recent paintings, rare works never before seen in the UK, as well some of his most well-known pieces, offering a pointed view of his minimalist style and challenging aesthetic practice.

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The restoration of artist William Morris’s home in London has uncovered a full wall, Pre-Raphaelite mural, believed to have been painted by Edward Burne-Jones, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Elizabeth Siddal, Ford Madox Brown and Morris himself.  The work was discovered under layers of paint, completely unbeknownst to those working on redeveloping the house.  “In the morning we had one and a half murky figures, in the evening we had an entire wall covered in a pre-Raphaelite painting of international importance,” property manager James Breslin. (more…)

London’s Frieze Art Fair has announced its program of talks for the 2013 edition of the fair.  Leading the names on the list are appearances by Jérôme Bel, Meredith Monk and Stephen Shore, among many others at the October art fair in Regent’s Park. (more…)

The value of art exports exported from the United Kingdom has reached the highest level since the 2008 financial crash, the BBC reports.  In a report by Sweet and Maxwell, exports were charted at £2 billion in 2012, an impressive number that defied a new law entitling artists and their heirs 4% of the resale price on any work.  “Art experts and dealers were concerned that London’s position in the art world could suffer compared to New York or Hong Kong, which haven’t introduced any such levy on the resale of modern and contemporary art,” said editor Massimo Sterpi of Sweet & Maxwell. (more…)

Artists Sarah Lucas and Tracey Emin are profiled in The Guardianthis week, recounting their early exploits running “The Shop,” a small East London gallery and boutique that served as a launching pad for the pair’s artistic ambitions.  “It was just an idea we had at an Indian restaurant on Brick Lane, but we were excited about it right away. We both had an anti-art slant, and this was always more than just a shop: it was a social thing. I remember we wanted it to be in the Brick Lane area mainly because of its bagel shop! But both of us were marketgoers and had sold stuff there when we needed a few bob.”  Lucas says.

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Anish Kapoor, The Death of Leviathan (2011-2013), via Martin-Gropius-Bau

Covering more than 3,000 square feet in the Martin-Gropius Bau, Kapoor in Berlin is one of the Berliner Festspiele’s tentpole events this summer, examining the pioneering work of Anish Kapoor’s sculptural practice against the backdrop of his German contemporaries and influences.  Composed of almost 70 works, the exhibition serves as an examination of the Turner Prize winner’s work of the past 30 years.

Anish Kapoor, Shooting Into the Corner (2008-2009), via The Guardian (more…)

The final selection of 57 works for the United Kingdom’s ambitious Art Everywhere project have been announced, covering a broad spectrum of British art that includes works by Peter Blake, Edward Burra, Francis Bacon, Peter Doig and John Constable.  The Guardian has published a photo gallery of the works, allowing interested parties a sneak peak at the works before they appear on billboards across the country. (more…)

David Bowie, Original Photography for the Earthling Album Cover (1997), via Victoria and Albert Museum

Perhaps one of the most widely talked about (and best attended) exhibitions this summer, the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) is currently showing a comprehensive exhibition of materials from the David Bowie Archive, marking the first time a museum has had access to this collection.  As holders of the national collection of live performance material in the UK, this opportunity is a chance for the museum to showcase one of the UK’s most important artists.  Compiling costumes, programs, documents, instruments and even a film specially made for the exhibition (including exclusive interviews with  Jeremy Deller, Daphne Guiness, and Thurston Moore), the exhibition is an exhaustive look at the work of one of the UK’s greatest rock stars and artists.

David Bowie Is (Installation View), via Victoria and Albert Museum (more…)

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2013, Designed by Sou Fujimoto, © Sou Fujimoto Architects, Image © 2013 Iwan Baan

Each year, the Serpentine Gallery commissions an outstanding architect who has yet to build on British soil to design a Pavilion in the yards of the gallery in Hyde Park. This year’s pavilion, an impressive cloud of white steel built upon a three-dimensional grid, was conceived by Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto. (more…)

Robert Irwin, Who’s Afraid of Red, Yellow & Blue³ III, all images courtesy Pace London

Currently, Pace London‘s 6 Burlington Gardens location is presenting the gallery’s first exhibition of works by American artist Robert Irwin. The new work springs from the artist’s pioneering practice during the West Coast’s monumental Light and Space movement.  Born in 1928, Irwin has been exploring the concepts of perception and space for over sixty years. Beginning as a painter, he was a foundational member of the Light and Space movement in the 1960s, helping to develop a concept of art as a response to specific life experiences in equal measure with the work’s surrounding environmental conditions.

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Artist Jonathan Yeo’s portrait of Damien Hirst, depicting the artist sitting in one of his own formaldehyde cubes, will go on view this fall at the National Portrait Gallery in London.  The work is part of a show of Yeo’s recent paintings, including portraits of other artists and British political figures.  “Even when we realize it’s a chemical dry suit, which he uses to make his formaldehyde works, it’s not entirely clear if he is making something or whether he is being pickled in one of his own tanks. This power balance is something of which we were both conscious through the creation of the portrait.” Yeo says of the work. (more…)

The Institute for Contemporary Art in London is preparing to release “Art Rules,” an online platform similar to Twitter, which will allow users to engage in short-form dialogues over contemporary art, using the site’s 100-character limit to voice their opinions on artists, theories and the contemporary art world.  The site, which launches August 21st, has already published a number of “rules,” by artists, writers and curators which users will be welcome to respond to, including Jeremy Deller’s encouragement to “throw away the rulebook.”  (more…)

Collector Charles Saatchi has announced that he will offer 50 of the largest sculptures and installations from his collection for auction at Christie’s this fall, in order to support the Gallery’s education program. The October 17th auction, held in London, will be shown in an out of use postal depot before the auction, with the offered works targeted for sale to public institutions. “We think it’s really important to open things up and give museums a chance to have a crack at acquiring these works – they need to be enjoyed and shown.” Says Saatchi Director Philippa Adams.

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Donald Judd, Untitled (1965), via David Zwirner

The tight, straight lines of Donald Judd run directly through the entirety of his career, from his early painted works on through to the increasingly large sculptural works and stacks of the 1980’s and 90’s.  Moving to purify notions of space, light, color and depth, Judd’s career wove a strikingly influential path through the landscape of post-war and contemporary art.  It is this tradition that David Zwirner in London seeks to explore, pulling together a small but tightly organized collection of works by Judd for a show exploring the range and depth of the artist’s career, from his early sculptural explorations with iron and plexiglass, on through to his more refined “stacks,” and wall-mounted installations. (more…)

Alfred Jensen, Twelve Events in a Dual Universe (1978) ©ARS, NY and DACS, London 2013, Photo: Linda Nylind, Courtesy Hayward Gallery

Currently on view at the Hayward Gallery at Southbank Centre in London is a new exhibition of work entitled Alternative Guide to the Universe, a compilation of works by artists who taught themselves their crafts, focusing on work that offers a new perspective on our socially accepted conventions of artistic practice and cultural perception.

Lee Godie. Lee and Cameo on a chair… (early to mid 1970s), © the artist, Courtesy Richard and Ellen Sandor Family Collection

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Artist Katharina Fritsch’s Hahn/Cock has been unveiled on London’s Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square.  The unveiling yesterday caps several months of debate and protest over the deceptively subversive statue, and Mayor Boris Johnson took the opportunity to make several double-entendre driven quips about Prime Minister David Cameron.  “If you were to Google the sculpture in a few years’ time,” Johnson said, “search engines would collapse at the behest of the prime minister. Er, quite properly of course.” (more…)

Subodh Gupta, What does the vessel contain, that the river does not (2012) (Installation View), via Hauser & Wirth

Following its success at the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, New Delhi-based artist Subodh Gupta’s sculpture What does the vessel contain, that the river does not is on view for the first time outside of India at Hauser & Wirth, Savile Row, London through July 27^th.

Subodh Gupta, What does the vessel contain, that the river does not (2012) (Installation View), via Hauser & Wirth (more…)

Thomas Houseago, Roman Masks III, (2013) Courtesy Gagosian Gallery

Currently on display at Gagosian Gallery in London is an exhibition of new sculpture by British contemporary sculptor Thomas Houseago entitled Roman Figures.  Showcasing a continuation of the artist’s signature, rugged forms and unique approach to figuration, the exhibition is a strong continuation of Houseago’s celebrated practice.

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Per Kirkeby, Untitled (2012), via Michael Werner

A tangible sense of degradation runs through the canvases of artist Per Kirkeby, currently on view at Michael Werner in London.  Walking a fine line between impressionist figuration and pure abstraction, his works seem balanced on a pin, teetering between a fully realized environment and complete structural breakdown, a process the artist acknowledges as “an ongoing process of sedimentation.”  The first exhibition of new work since his 2009 retrospective at Tate Modern, Kirkeby’s new exhibition sees him returning to the same interrogations and explorations of the natural environment, as well as his own interpretation of it.

Per Kirkeby, Recent Paintings (Installation View), via Michael Werner (more…)

Gerhard Richter, Abdu (2009),  © Gerhard Richter 2013

Currently on display at Gagosian Gallery’s London space on Davies Street are a series of 4 tapestries, created in 2009 by prominent artist Gerhard Richter, entitled Abdu, Iblan, Musa and Yusuf.  Combining the artist’s signature style with bold new aesthetic forms, the works are based on the artist’s 1990 work, Abstract Painting (724-4).

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London’s Mayfair district, traditionally known for its boutique shops and high-end British art galleries, is seeing a number of American dealers moving in, The New York Times reports.  Gagosian, Pace, David Zwirner and more have opened spaces in the area, seeking to provide an even greater global offering for potential artists and customers in a vibrant market.  “We’re all chasing the same artists,” says Marc Glimcher, president of Pace. “But the intensity of interest in art in London is long-lasting. You can get 10 reviews in 10 different newspapers. And besides the new collectors and galleries, there is a very vibrant museum community.” (more…)