Jean Dupuy, Performances/Bouffe Théâtre d’en face (1979) (detail), via Galerie Louevenbruck

Galerie Louevenbruck Paris is currently exhibiting Jean Dupuy: the collective years (1973-1983),  a first time retrospective of the artist’s “collective” period during the late 20th century. This period of work was developed after Dupuy left Paris for New York in 1967. Having begun his art career as a painter, he infamously threw his old works into the Seine before heading off to America, where a year later his Cone Pyramid (Heart Beats Dust) sculpture became his introduction to the notions of the collective.  Shortly after its creation the piece had already been exhibited at both the Museum of Modern Art and the Brookyln Museum, and its success launched the artist into his 40 year study of “techno-sensual” techniques and collective art practice.

Jean Dupuy, The Collective Years (Installation View), via Galerie Louevenbruck

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Damien Hirst’s spot paintings are once again the subject of analysis and discussion, this time in the New York Times, which looks forward to the publication of his catalogue raisonné for the series this fall.  Released by Other Criteria, the book will catalog the full series of spot paintings, 1,365 in all, and is speculated by some as a way to lend authenticity to the work of an artist whose auction prices have fallen in recent years.  “He needs to regain the trust of the marketplace,” said Jeff B. Rabin, an advisor and co-founder at Artvest Partners. “It seems the catalog is one measure he could perhaps take to start to rectify some of the ill feeling out in the marketplace.” (more…)

Wolfgang Tillmans, young man, Jeddah, b, (2012), via Andrea Rosen

Continuing their ongoing relationship, Andrea Rosen Gallery is currently exhibiting its 11th solo exhibition of work by German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans, on view through June 22nd.  From Neue Welt is the result of a four-year project that Tillmans began in 2008, and completed in 2012, a vigorous photographic cataloguing of the dawn of the 21st century. 25 works have been selected from the hundreds of photographs that were a part of the original work, which culminated at the Kunsthalle Zurich in the fall of 2012.

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Outside View, Art Basel 2013, Photograph Courtesy of Art Basel

The city of Basel, situated at the border between Switzerland, France and Germany, will be transformed into a contemporary arts hub this week for the 44th annual Art Basel. Anticipating record attendence, the fair will look to top its record of over 65,000 visitors at the marathon art event this year.  With over 300 top galleries from all over the world flocking to the city to display over 4,000 artists’ work, the fair is commonly referred to as the “Olympics of the art world.”  and features a similarly brimming schedule of events and claustrophobic crowds of eager spectators. Each day boasts its own full agenda, including film screenings, artist talks, and performances, and joined by the vast number of peripheral art exhibitions and events hosted by cultural institutions of Basel throughout the entire region, held in obscure and romantic venues amidst the Swiss lakes and mountains.

Olafur Eliasson, Untitled (2003), Courtesy of Art Basel

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In the past two years, U.S. authorities have seized over $100 Million in art and antiques from Subhash Kapoor, a 64-year-old American citizen accused as one of the biggest smuggles of ancient antiquities and art in the world.  Kapoor has sold or donated ancient art works to a number of prominent museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and LACMA, and is currently being held in India as a suspect in an international smuggling ring.  The United States is also seeking its own charges for the dealer.  “It’s one of our most significant antiquities and artifacts investigations that we’ve conducted,” Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent in Charge James T. Hayes says. (more…)

Robert Mapplethorpe, Self Portrait (1983), courtesy Skarstedt Gallery

Playing with constructed images of self and cultural phenomena, Robert Mapplethorpe’s challenging self-portraits were an influential and essential part of the 1970’s New York arts scene.  Now, the artist’s work in the medium is documented through eleven photographs at Skarstedt Gallery currently on view through June 15th. The photographs are extremely personal explorations that the artist took of himself periodically throughout his life, meant to explore different aspects of his own identity, as he captures himself in a variety of states and moods.

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Sterling Ruby, SP Paintings (Installation View), courtesy Nahmad Contemporary

This past month, Nahmad Contemporary was home to its inaugural show, a body of new work by American artist Sterling Ruby, entitled “SP Paintings;” a series he has been developing for a number of years, but has never collectively displayed in an exhibition until now.

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Figment NYC, Governors Island

The ferry from lower Manhattan to Governors Island was filled with excited children and adults wearing feathers, sequins and other outlandish pieces of clothing this weekend, setting the tone for the playground of colors, sounds, and movement that marked Figment NYC. Running June 8^th-June 9^th, the festival grounds on Governors Island was transformed into a fantastical wonderland worthy of Seuss and Dali, a colorful and immaginative exhibition of arts, costumes, performances, and other sights, including a petting zoo and free clothing tent, which provided a helpful hand to those who arrived in less motley apparel.

Pop Dogs, Figment NYC, Governors Island

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George Condo, Downtown New York (2012), Copyright George Condo / ARS (Artists Rights Society), New York, 2013 via Sprueth Magers

For the past thirty years, George Condo has created visceral, challenging works that blend art history and theory with an irreverent worldview that make his sculptures and canvases explode with life.  Currently, the artist is exhibiting a selection of  his Drawing Paintings and bronze sculptures, created in 2012, for his third solo show with Sprüth Magers, Berlin. Condo has a long standing relationship with the gallery that started almost 30 years ago, when Monika Sprüth hosted one of Condo’s first solo exhibitions in Cologne in 1984. (more…)

Rodney Graham, (Installation View), via 303 Gallery

303 Gallery is currently presenting its seventh show with artist Rodney Graham, the inaugural exhibition for the gallery’s new home on West 24th Street, New York. In the works on display, Graham continues his allegorical self portraits, creating surreal scenes in hyperreal lightbox photographs. The humorous yet sympathetic works, often ironic re-constructions of esoteric references, give the sense of a private joke, playfully lampooning the absurdity of life.

Rodney Graham, Cactus Fan (2013), via 303 Gallery (more…)

Philip Taaffe, Recent Work (Installation view), courtesy Luhring Augustine Gallery

Recent work by Philip Taaffe is currently on view at Luhring Augustine gallery in Chelsea, New York, marking Taaffe’s first solo show of paintings in New York since 2007. Culling together a diverse set of influences and materials, the works on view unveil Taaffe’s explorations of imagery in art, architecture, and archeology, both in contemporary and historical contexts.

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In the wake of the multiple lawsuits brought against the Knoedler Gallery for sales of counterfeit art since the space closed in 2011, Forbes Magazine has published an article detailing the lack of oversight and due diligence that often plagues collectors when art and antiques are being bought or sold. “Sophisticated businesspeople would never do a business deal without asking questions, but somehow when they are buying art or collectibles, their common sense flies out of their head,” says Patty Gerstenblith, a professor of Art and Cultural Law at DePaul University. (more…)

Ellsworth Kelly, Singular Forms (Installation View), courtesy of Mnuchin Gallery

From Sculpture on the Wall at the Barnes Foundation to the Museum of Modern Art’s Chatham Series, the work of artist Ellsworth Kelly is being celebrated across the East Coast this spring. Until June 1, the Mnuchin Gallery in New York will join in on the event, hosting Kelly’s ongoing Singular Forms series, which has spanned most of hist career, from 1966-2009.  A retrospective of Kelly’s emblematic abstract paintings, the show is curated by the artist himself, presenting his personal take on this broad body of work.

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In an effort to increase public engagement with their collections, a number of museums are now offering free, high-quality images of their works for download and open use. In one such example, Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum has begun allowing visitors to reproduce images of its collection anywhere.“We’re a public institution, and so the art and objects we have are, in a way, everyone’s property.” Says collections director Taco Dibbets. (more…)

Hong Kong Convention Center, site of the Art Basel Hong Kong Art Fair, via Forbes

With the closing of the doors at the Hong Kong Convention Center this past Sunday, the first edition of Art Basel Hong Kong was brought to a conclusion after a flourish of strong sales, critical praise, and notable attention for the art fair giant’s first foray into the Asian continent.

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Stuart Davis, Egg Beater No. 1 (1927), via The Whitney Museum of Art

On view currently at the Whitney Museum is a showcase of some of the museum’s deeper holdings of American artwork from the first half of the twentieth century, exploring the years before the mid-century advent of Abstract Expressionism. This part of the rotating exhibition, which began in December 2012, will continue through May 2013 before moving on to a new selection of works.

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“Francis Bacon in Raincoat,” 1967, photo by John Deakin, (c) The Estate of Francis Bacon, all images courtesy the National Museum of Art Tokyo and The Estate of Francis Bacon

Recently concluded at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo is a solo exhibition of works by Francis Bacon. Marking the first viewing of Bacon’s work in Japan in 30 years the exhibit is a retrospective focusing on the theme of the body, as well as the first exhibition of the artist’s work since his death in 1983.

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Jeff Koons (Installation view), © Jeff Koons. Courtesy Gagosian Gallery. Photography by Robert McKeever

This past week, Jeff Koons opened a show of recent work at Gagosian Gallery in Chelsea, continuing the artist’s exploration of new forms in printed works, sculpture and assemblage.  Facing off against David Zwirner’s show of new Koons pieces several blocks away, the show was seemed to make its show-stopping intentions explicit, showcasing a number of Koons’ stainless steel balloon animals, and a series of hyper-kinetic prints alongside recent inflatable sculptures and takes on classical art works. (more…)

Online mega-retailer Amazon has outlined plans to launch Amazon Fine Art Gallery this summer, a new branch of its site that will allow users to purchase art directly from partnering galleries.  “We have received overwhelming support from the galleries that have already joined the platform and we would love the opportunity to offer your gallery’s selection in the Amazon Art store.” says an email from Amazon to potential new galleries. (more…)

Chuck Close, Self-Portrait/ maquette, 1975  © 2013 Chuck Close courtesy of Pace Gallery

Eykyn Maclean is currently presenting the first exhibition to focus solely on Chuck Close’s photo maquettes, examining their relation to the artist’s large-scale painted portraits. Not only do the works in the Photo Maquettes series offer the viewer a better understanding of the technical aspects of Close’s paintings, but also offer an interesting probe into the delineations between the practices of painting and photography. (more…)

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is about to open its newest commission for its rooftop garden, a spattered-red work by Pakistani artist Imran Qureshi that plays on the images of blood, and leads a series of works currently on view across New York that play with similarly violent imagery.  Responding to bombings in Lahore and Boston, the artist intended the works to provide a moment of reflection, playing against the pristine backdrop of Central Park. (more…)

Artist Mark di Suvero has been awarded a gold medal by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, alongside writer E.L. Doctorow, and honorary inductee Bob Dylan.  The 100-year old award is given to two American citizens each year, rotating every six years between a pair of artistic disciplines.  Past sculpture nominees have included Martin Puryear, Richard Serra and Louise Bourgeois. (more…)

Alexander Gilkes takes the Podium at Phillips to Begin the Auction

Last evening, Philips held its contemporary art sale at its Park Avenue headquarters, offering a total of 37 lots. The sale concludes a very successful run of strong contemporary art auctions in New York during the past week, and the saleroom was high in energy and anticipation as a result, a clear carryover of enthusiasm from the ground-breaking sale held at Christie’s the previous evening. (more…)

Thomas Messer, the legendary former director of the Guggenheim Foundation, passed away on Wednesday at the age of 93.  Messer, who came to the gallery in 1961, just two years after it moved into its signature building on Fifth Avenue, was instrumental in shaping the Guggenheim into the global institution it is today, developing its collection and tirelessly working to expand its mission.  “Here we are, three decades later, with Guggenheims in Bilbao, Berlin, Venice, and soon to be Abu Dhabi. The foundation for all this was laid by Tom Messer. And I can tell you, he laid that foundation under budget.”  said former Guggenheim President Peter Lawson-Johnston. (more…)