Stay Connected
Private sales are one week long.
Editions go fast and prices go up after one week.
Artspace Private Sales
Most Popular Posts
Connect with Facebook
What People are Tweeting About
– THE BIG STORY –
Whither art in the age of high technology? Trailblazing Internet art journal Rhizome.org hosted its annual Seven on Seven conference at the New Museum this week to discuss the intersection of these two enormously powerful cultural drivers, and the art critic Ben Davis writes that an odd inversion seems to be revealing itself: “A few decades ago, he said, it was the computer geeks who were the practical ones, and the artists who were trying to figure out how to screw around to make technology freaky and interesting. These days… the opposite is the case: The technologists are setting the pace in terms of pushing the frontiers of experience. The artists, on the other hand, have been reduced to the role of Jiminy Crickets sitting on their shoulders, pleading with them to think about the implications.” But there’s also the new incursion of a third creative group that warrants some consideration—the mass of neo-folk artists who are flooding the Web and social media with “user-generated” (what a strange term, if you think about it) visual content. In a savvy, fizzy video on PBS Arts’s Idea Channel, Mike Rugnetta draws on the authority of Tolstoy and Aristotle to make a compelling case that memes like LOLCats et al. should be considered works of contemporary art. “User-generated culture is kind of like Andy Warhol‘s Factory in hyperdrive,” he says. “It’s a high-speed collaboration between people combining popular media, advertising, everything into new forms.” And while the vast majority of memes are silly and pretty stupid themselves, that’s exactly what art needs these days in its search for new ideas. After all, if crowdsourcing can help scientists make advances in the enormously daunting field of brain research, and solve other near-impossible puzzles, why can’t it eventually help us make an artistic leap forward on the level of Ghiberti and Alberti‘s innovations in perspective that—combined with a return to classical forms and ideas—supercharged the Renaissance.
– QUOTE OF THE DAY –
“Some people said that a memorial to our living planet was depressing, but I believe that using memories and history to show the abundance of biodiversity the planet once held can spur people to realize their power to connect with work that is under way and take steps in their everyday lives, no matter how small.” – The artist and Vietnam Memorial architect Maya Lin on her new What Is Missing? project, an interactive website memorializing the environmental losses and mass extinctions that the earth has suffered due to mankind’s disruptive presence.
– MUST READ –
For the Love Of God, Srsly? – Damien Hirst is about to open a nearly 100,000-square-foot literal art factory in Dudbridge, Glouchestershire, for creating new work and preserving animals in formaldehyde, which will be powered by “Britain’s second-largest solar-panel roof” and a “large biomass-fuelled boiler” (think about that for a second) and will feature “a ‘glazed gallery’ within the main gallery, which has 65ft-high windows looking out onto a ‘sculpture space’ where Hirst’s work will be displayed among trees next to a stream at the back of the building.” (Daily Mail)
The Clock Strikes a Second Time in NYC – Christian Marclay’s blockbuster 24-hour artwork will be playing for about a month, free, at Lincoln Center‘s David Rubenstein Atrium starting in mid-July, courtesy of collectors Jill and Peter Kraus, who will then give the video to MoMA. (NYT)
Luminaries Remember John Chamberlain — Andrew Russeth has a terrific, wonderfully written report on the late Ab Ex sculptor’s memorial, which included heartfelt reminiscences from Frank Gehry, Whitney chief curator Donna De Salvo, and Dia cofounder Heiner Friedrich, among others. (Gallerist NY)
The Berlin Biennale Will Be Harrowing – The citywide art show, opening April 27, has been curated by Polish artist Artur Żmijewski this year, and it sounds like his themes of mapping the horrors of the Holocaust and the Israel-Palestine standoff will imbue the proceedings: birch trees (“Birke” in German) are already popping up all over Berlin in 26-year-old artist Lukasz Surowiec‘s Beuysian public-art installation memorializing the Birkenau death camp. (Reuters)
Want to Get an Artist Grant? – As part of its new incredibly smart and helpful series of roundups directing artists to support resources (like residencies), Artinfo has gathered together a whole slew of fellowships and grants that can be applied for fairly easily. (Artinfo)
Chinese Art Treasures Stolen at Cambridge – A heist at the British university’s Fitzwilliam Museum has made off with 18 rare and “very valuable” objects, the latest in a short string of similar museum thefts in the UK surely prompted by the skyrocketing market for Chinese imperial artifacts. (Telegraph)
Sweden’s “Racist” Cake Deemed “Briliiant” Art – Max Fisher considers Makode Linde’s golliwog art cake that Sweden’s culture minister gleefully cut into at Moderna Museet earlier this week—setting off a conflagration of outrage in the country and calls for her resignation—and he’s right on point: the artwork was a thorny coup of race-relations satire, and the culture minister was a benighted fool to walk right into the artist’s “mousetrap.” (Atlantic)
– ART MARKET –
ZonaMaco Opens in Mexico City – Latin America’s biggest art fair has kicked off with exhibitors and collectors from throughout the region and beyond flocking in to check out new offerings in art and design. (Christian Science Monitor)
Art Cologne Opens Too – The 46th edition of the granddaddy of all art fairs had its vernissage in the Germany city, expecting as many as 60,000 visitors. (EuroNews)
Scenes From the Dallas Art Fair – The intrepid Linda Yablonsky offers an insider’s glimpse of last week’s art fair in the Texas city, where everything from the size of the collectors’ houses to the ambition of the local art scene is big, big, big. (Artforum)
– IN & OUT –
South African artist Robin Rhode, best known for his riveting stop-motion animations created with nothing but a camera, a piece of chalk, and an empty wall, has joined Lehmann Maupin Gallery. (NYT)
Kehinde Wiley’s debut show at Sean Kelly Gallery, opening May 5, will include the painter’s first portraits of woman, all of whom were attired in original dresses created by Givenchy designer Riccardo Tisci. (Artinfo)
Elisabeth Murdoch, the culturally geared daughter of conservative media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, has given the Tate a gift of about $1.6 million to help underwrite the educational facilities at Tate Modern‘s planned new building. (Bloomberg)
The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis has hired Lisa Melandri, currently deputy director of the Santa Monica Museum of Art, to be its new director. (Artforum)
New MFA Houston director Gary Tinterow has hired Mahrukh Tarapor, a former colleague at the Met (where she was director for international affairs), as his senior advisor for international initiatives. (NYT)
The Getty has hired J. Timothy Child to head up a new fundraising operation to supplement the organization’s enormous $8 billion coffers, with the new money brought in to be used for special projects. (LAT)
Dartmouth College has announced the selection of Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, the team behind the new Barnes Foundation building, to design an expansion of its Hood Museum of Art. (NYT)
