News | Page 44 of 57

Recalling and revisiting history in downtown Brooklyn

This link takes you to Benjamin Sutton's review of TOTAL RECALL, the Public Art Fund exhibition of five commissioned sculptures presented at the MetroTech Commons, downtown Brooklyn. The works in TOTAL RECALL are by Martin Basher, Zipora Fried, Sam Moyer, Matt Sheridan Smith and Kevin Zucker.

Image: Zipora Fried, Armchair (2010). Photograph by James Ewing

A new site for speculative projects

altsprojects is a new project space that aims to “test out interventions and proposals for new exhibition formats”. Richard Frater's project, Alternative, opens today at 11.00am. This link takes you to the altsprojects site.
Image: from the altsprojects site

Wind-powered art picks up sponsorship award

The recipients of this year's NBR Sponsorship Awards include Meridian Energy, with the Wellington Sculpture Trust, for a suite of wind sculptures located along Evan's Bay close to Wellington airport. The sculptures combine public art with a celebration of Wellington's best-known natural characteristic (the wind), bringing together notions of wind power in New Zealand's energy future and the creative use of wind.

The suite of sculptures includes Phil Dadson's Akau Tangi. The title (the Maori name for Evan's Bay) references the lamenting sounds of the wind in the bay, which is reputed to be one of New Zealand's windiest locations.

Images: Phil Dadson, Akau Tangi (2010) installation views, ten poles ranging between 6 to 6.8m, aluminium, stainless steel, black steel, LED lights and paint

Seung Yul Oh project at Artspace

Seung Yul Oh's project POKPO runs at Auckland's Artspace from 4 December 2010 – 19 February 2011.

Surprise gift of $500,000 for the arts

Philanthropist Sir Eion Edgar has announced that his family is donating $500,000 to the Arts Foundation of New Zealand. His surprise announcement was made last night on the occasion of the Arts Foundation's AGM and his retirement as a Trustee.

Sir Eion said: “I believe that the arts are a vital part and integral part of our society. I also believe strongly in the vision of the Arts Foundation, which is to encourage private patronage for the arts and to celebrate and support our hard working artists.”

Turner Prize to leave Britain in 2013

The Tate Britain, the founder and customary host of the Turner Prize, has announced that the 2013 prize exhibition will be held in the Northern Irish city of Derry, a city perhaps most familiar as a symbol of political strife, having been the site of the 1972 “Bloody Sunday” massacre. The decision to move the Turner Prize is an attempt by the Tate Britain to “attract new audiences around the country and bring the prize to a wider and more diverse audience outside the capital.

Image: The town of Derry, Northern Ireland

Living Room 2011: Metropolis Dreaming

Andrew Clifford will curate the next Living Room project, which will take place in Auckland's CBD from 8 – 17 April 2011.

Taking a lead from the Futurists, METROPOLIS DREAMING will explore the imaginative possibilities of the city. Clifford says: “The dynamism of sound and light were important phenomena for the futurists and it is in this audio-visual terrain that METROPOLIS DREAMING will predominantly take place – a perfect genre for temporary and ephemeral projects. This will be a mix of installations, performances, video projects, activities and a poster project. Acknowledging that the city is both a cultural and technological hub, there will also be social projects that bring a new, contemporary angle to these ideas.”

Artists confirmed so far for Living Room 2011 are: Ujino Muneteru (Japan), Young Hae Chang Heavy Industries (Korea/USA) Sam Hamilton (NZ) with John Reynolds (NZ), Gregory Bennett (NZ) with Mike Hodgson (NZ) and Ani O'Neill (NZ/Rarotonga). Contributing to the poster project are Sara Hughes (NZ), Peter Madden (NZ), Ruban Nielson (NZ/USA) and David Shrigley (UK).

Andrew Clifford is the curator at the Gus Fisher Gallery, which is part of Auckland University's National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries.

Image: John Reynolds, Small Magnetic Cloud (2001) , vinyl on aluminium

Review of Jim Speers' Numerology and Territories show

This link takes you to a review of Jim Speers' exhibition Numerology and Territories at Te Tuhi Centre for Contemporary Arts. The exhibition runs to 5 December 2010.

Image: Jim Speers, VeilSide (2010), laser cut steel, 27 x 6 x 9.5cm

Celebrating the launch of Martin Basher's new work in NYC

We are hosting a function tonight (from 6.00pm) to celebrate the launch of Martin Basher's artwork in the Public Art Fund exhibition Total Recall, which features five large-scale sculptural commissions. We will also be screening installation views of the work in situ at the MetroTech Plaza in Brooklyn.

Image: Martin Basher's Minimal Consumption/Reflective Sublime/Aspirational Sunset Art, MetroTech Plaza, NYC

Billy Apple's 48th Birthday

In 1962 the artist who was known then as Barrie Bates changed his name and appearance (with the aid of Lady Clairol Instant Creme Whip) becoming Billy Apple in a self-conscious art action that doubled as a canny exercise in re-branding. Billy Apple celebrates his 48th birthday today shortly after returning from a trip to London to be present at his exhibition Billy Apple: The British and American Works 1960 – 69 at The Mayor Gallery.

Image: Billy Apple bleaching with Lady Clairol Instant Creme Whip November 1962

Former art dealer and seasoned curator to co-curate 2012 Whitney Biennial

Following on from Jeffrey Deitch's appointment as the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles comes the news that the Whitney Museum of American Art Art has appointed Jay Sanders as a co-curator of its 2012 biennial, acknowledging that he has recently worked as a director of the Chelsea gallery Green Naftali. Sanders has been teamed up with seasoned Whitney curator Elisabeth Sussman. This link takes you to the Whitney Museum's Biennial release.

Image: Whitney Museum of American Art

The auction as self-portrait

This month Phillips de Pury & Company launched a new kind of contemporary art auction, one in which a single major player in the art market was invited to create the sale of his dreams. The player was Philippe Segalot, an art consultant and private dealer who persuaded sellers to consign 33 works to the “Carte Blanche” auction, a title The Economist says “is a reminder of the art market's lack of regulation”.

Segalot says: “I have always been interested in the concept of curated sales, where the artworks are selected not for their market value but for their artistic quality, historical importance and coherence within the group. Here I tried to push the idea further by bringing together a small collection of my favourite works by my favourite artists. The result is a true self-portrait, a close representation of my life as an art lover, an art collector and an art advisor.”

The auction was certainly distinctive. The Economist reports that on a number of lots Segalot was seen to be bidding against his assistant and his business partner, all of whom would have been representing collectors. Asked whether acting for buyers as well as sellers on the same lot might constitute a conflict of interest, Segalot insisted it was not a problem.

Financial guarantees were also back in the mix with 7 of the lots in “Carte Blanche” being secured by irrevocable bids from anonymous third party investors. This practice, which was widespread before the global financial crisis, ensures that works sell for a minimum price with the investor taking a larger cut of the price if it exceeds the guarantee.

The so-called ground-breaking “Carte Blanche” series will continue with other sales to be curated by artists, collectors, curators or gallery owners. You can read The Economist article here and another on Segalot's favourite works here.

Image: Thomas Schutte's Grosse Geist No. 16 (2000), one of the lots in the “Carte Blanche” auction

An unusual partnership between Christie's and an affiliate of China's Ministry of Culture

Recently Christie's invited collectors, scholars and art patrons to its New York headquarters in the Rockefeller Centre for what it described as a special exhibition and symposium about the rise of Chinese contemporary art. However, as the NYT reports, the 29 works in the show were not produced by the politically focused Chinese artists who had helped Christie's earn millions of dollars at auction over the past five years. They were mostly by a group of realist painters whose work had been ignored by collectors and curators outside the country, and they were selected by a Chinese government-appointed panel.

The show, Trans-Realism, is part of a partnership between Christie's and an affiliate of China's Ministry of Culture which began just a year after the Chinese Government denounced Christie's for trying to sell two Qing dynasty bronzes that Beijing insisted were looted from the country 150 years ago. As part of the partnership, Christie's is considering financing a series of exhibitions with Chinese institutions like the Ministry of Culture's Centre of International Cultural Exchange.

Christie's art diplomacy is drawing criticism on the grounds that moves to promote artists selected by the Chinese government would alter the the role of the auction house and undermine its credibility with collectors. Others believe that Christie's has bowed to pressure from a government that often tries to silence critics and politically focused artists. But none of this is likely to deter Christie's as it moves to gain entry to China's booming auction market, which the Beijing-based group Artron says has grown to from $1.1 billion in 2004 to about $3.2 billion in 2008.

Image: the two disputed Chinese Qing dynasty bronzes

Upstairs at Starkwhite

Image: Matt Henry, Signal Yellow from the series 16:9 (2011), acrylic on linen, frame, acrylic glazing, 618 x 1001 x 69mm

Review of Martin Basher's exhibition STATES OF PEACE AND CALM W. PERSONAL TOUCH

This link takes you to a review of Martin Basher's current exhibition STATES OF PEACE AND CALM W. PERSONAL TOUCH which runs at Starkwhite until 27 November 2010.

Image: Installations views of Martin Basher's exhibition STATES OF PEACE AND CALM W. PERSONAL TOUCH + EASY ORDERING, Starkwhite, Auckland NZ, 2010

A weekend of art from the studios of this year's Elam graduates

Featuring work by more than 120 graduating students, the annual Elam show runs from Saturday 20 to Sunday 21 November 2010, from 10.00am to 5.00pm. This link takes you to a map of the exhibition venues.

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Rosanna Albertini's hand-made book NEW ZEALAND WITH AN ITALIAN ACCENT – on the wings of artists – will be launched on Saturday 20 November 2010 from 5.00 – 7.00pm in Christopher Wilde's solo exhibition at Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Bergamot Station, Santa Monica. You can order a copy of the limited edition book (made in 100 numbered copies) at rosanna@albertini.ws

Image: cover image and binding conceived by Christopher Wilde

Leigh Davis Flag Poems in Time, Text & Echoes

The images above are of Leigh Davis flag poems presented in the JAR exhibition Time, Text & Echoes, a 300-day project of 30 poem flags presented one at a time in a sequence of ten-day hoists. The exhibition runs to March 2011.

Images: Leigh Davis flag poems presented in the JAR exhibition Time, Text & Echoes (2010 – 2011), New North Road, Kingsland, NZ. From the top: Consider Rosellas, Pacific's Disturbed, Speed Descends, all works dyed polyester knit appliqued onto dyed woven bunting, with canvas head, sisal halyard and brass clips, 1.5 x 3.5m

SCREENS online gallery for art interactives

SCREENS is a new online gallery for art interactives created and curated by Luke Munn and Jeff Nusz. Modeled on the practice of art galleries and taking advantage of digital distribution, SCREENS promotes this emerging art form by “commissioning new work, displaying it in a professional way, engaging a broad audience and fostering critical discussion.”

Seung Yul Oh opens the SCREENS online series with Rain.

Image: SCREENS promotional image for Seung Yul Oh's Rain, 2010

Upstairs at Starkwhite

Image: Layla Rudneva-Mckay, Blue (2009), C-type photograph, 470 x 470mm, starkwhite@starkwhite.co.nz

Layla Rudneva-Mackay floor talk at Artspace

Layla Rudneva-Mackay discusses her work in the exhibition A Rock That Was Taught it Was A Bird at Artspace today at 3.00pm.

Image: Layla Rudneva-Mackay, Taking a moment to lose himself, when found most unexpectedly squashed between a mattress and its base, 2006-2007, C-type print, installation view, Artspace, Auckland, NZ.

Installation views of Martin Basher's sculpture for the Public Art Fund, NYC

Martin Basher's three large-scale mirrored vitrines appear reflective and slightly translucent by day, revealing their contents only at night. Lit from within and stocked with both high- and low-end consumer products, fabricated structures, and hand-made paintings, the cubes begin to mimic retail spaces where strange paintings hypothesize a future satisfied by consumer desires. Blending together ideas of retail display, advertising and Modernism, Basher's work questions the environmental and social implications of consumption in our times. From the Public Art Fund website

Minimal Consumption/Reflective Sublime/Aspirational Sunset Art can be viewed at Brooklyn's MetroTech Plaza in the Public Art Fund exhibition TOTAL RECALL.

Image: installation views of Martin Basher's public art work Minimal Consumption/Reflective Sublime/Aspirational Sunset Art, commissioned by the Public Art Fund, NYC for the exhibition TOTAL RECALL at the MetroTech Plaza, downtown Brooklyn

What's the secret?

RCA secret is an annual contemporary art exhibition and sale of around 2,500 post-card sized artworks made and donated by artists, designers and illustrators, plus up-and-coming-students and alumni from the Royal College of Art. The cards are all sold to the public, with every postcard costing £45, regardless of whether it has been made by a famous name or a young student.

This year's exhibition takes place on 12 & 14-20 November and includes contributions from John Baldessari, Sir Anthony Caro, Jake Chapman, Olafur Eliasson, Tracey Emin, Grayson Perry, Yinka Shonibare and Franz West. You can view the postcards on-line at the RCA Secret website.

What's the secret? Each postcard is exhibited anonymously and is signed on the back so collectors don't know the identity of the artist until they have made their purchase. To date sales of postcards have raised over £1 million, all going to the Royal College of Art Student Award Fund.

Winning entry for the Frieze Writer's Prize 2010

Frieze has announced Erica Cooke as the winner of this year's Frieze Writer's Prize. She receives two thousand pounds and has been commissioned to write her first review for frieze magazine, to be published in the January/February issue. The judges for 2010 were writer and novelist A.M. Homes, philosopher and critic Boris Groys, along with frieze co-editor Jorg Heiser. You can read Cooke's prize-winning review here.

Jae Hoon Lee's Chiang Mai Family at 4A

Jae Hoon Lee's video Chiang Mai Family is screening in Nomad at Sydney's 4A Contemporary Asian Art. Filmed in rural Thailand, his video of a family's daily life creates a sense of spatial distance between their native home ground and the tourists gaze towards an exotic playground.

For further information on this work or others by the artist please contact us at starkwhite@starkwhite.co.nz

Images: stills from Jae Hoon Lee's Chiang Mai Family (2005), single channel video for monitor or projection, edition of 5

Saffronart, Mumbai's fastest-growing online auction house

The VIP online art fair will take place in January (see our VIP blog here), but in the world of art auctions a start-up from India recognised the the web potential a decade ago. Founded in 2000 by Dinesh and Minal Vazirani, Saffronart claims to be the world's largest fine art online auction house. Based in Mumbai, with offices in New York and London, the company has elbowed its way into the Indian art auction scene, alongside established veterans like Christies and Sothebys.

From a modest start of $126,000 in online art sales in 2000, Saffronart is projecting around $30 million in art auction sales this year. The Vaziranis say the market for Indian art is growing exponentially, shooting up from $3 million in 2000 to an estimated $120 million this year, and that many artworks have crossed the million dollar mark, driven in part by the number of wealthy Indians worldwide. (Overseas bidders account for about half of the company's sales.) They had what they describe as their “wow” moment in June 2008 when an Italian collector they hadn't heard of purchased online an untitled 2006 oil painting by Subodh Gupta for $1.42 million.

The Vaziranis say they embraced the internet to reach the biggest number of potential buyers around the world. They publish the prices of artworks on Saffronart's website, an idea considered practically heretical in India ten years ago. “It allowed for a transparency that hadn't existed in the Indian market,” says Minal Vazirani.

Saffronart has come under fire from some quarters for partnering with galleries. They collaborate with prominent galleries, sponsoring exhibitions of emerging artists whose works are available for purchase on the Saffronart website. They are not worried by these concerns saying the company merely acts as a marketing platform and that prices remain the same with the gallery and Saffronart splitting the commission.

Image: Minal Vazirani, CEO of Saffronart, Mumbai

Lorenzo Ruldolf on Singapore as the new Asian outpost of the international art market

Lorenzo Rudolf, the art fair impresario who changed the way art is consumed with Art Basel and Art Basel Miami Beach, will present the first edition of Art Stage Singapore from 12 – 16 January 2011. He is also working with the Singapore Art Museum on an exhibition of works by artists such as Subodh Gupta and Ai Weiwei, drawn from a cache of notable collections in the region, that will be a special feature of the new art fair.

In a recent interview with Mayo Martin he ranges across the state of the international art market, art fair developments in the Asia/Pacific region and why Hong Kong and Singapore will lead the way, art fair “bling-bling”, and the relationship between the holy trinity of the art market – the auction houses, biennales and art fairs.

Image: Lorenzo Rudolf, director of Art Stage Singapore

Jae Hoon Lee's NOMAD exhibition at 4A, Sydney

Jae Hoon Lee's exhibition of large-scale photographs and videos of landscapes is showing at 4A Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney to 11 December 2010. As Lee travelled through India, Nepal and Korea he collected images that were subsequently digitally stitched together to create new, fantastic landscapes, setting up an interplay of real and virtual experiences.

Image: Jae Hoon Lee, In Su Bong (rock climbers), 2010, digitally collaged photograph, 1400 x 1590mm

Martin Basher shows on K Road and in NYC

Martin Basher continues his ongoing explorations into states of beauty, desire, spiritual longing and consumerism with a single body of work exhibited concurrently in Auckland and New York. STATES OF PEACE AND CALM W. PERSONAL TOUCH + EASY ORDERING runs at Starkwhite to 27 November 2010 and his new public sculpture commissioned by the Public Art Fund NYC is on view for ten months in TOTAL RECALL, a five person show at the MetroTech Plaza, downtown Brooklyn.

Image: Martin Basher, Minimal Consumption/Reflective Sublime/Aspirational Sunset Art (2010) in the Starkwhite exhibition STATES OF PEACE AND CALM W. PERSONAL TOUCH + EASY ORDERING

dOCUMENTA (13) announces curatorial team and process

The curatorial team and process for dOCUMENTA (13) has been announced. The exhibition will be held in various locations and will include new works by more than 100 artists from around the world. In some cases these will be presented as parts of projects with other artists, agents, or persons active in cultural fields including science and literature. A number of historical artworks will also be exhibited in these interrelated ideas, conversations and parallel stories.

Artistic director Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev is planning the event with a number of agents, advisors and artists who contribute in various ways, with different levels of engagement, aimed at creating a generative process that is organic and affective, open to change. She says: “In an art world dominated by the curatorial, to act without a pre-defined curatorial plan offers a possibility to both repeat the network of connectivity of the digital age, while also reflecting on its shortcomings and implications from a critical viewpoint.”

This link takes you to the dOCUMENTA (13) announcement.

Image: dOCUMENTA (13) press conference held in Berlin

Arts Foundation of New Zealand Laureates Announced

Ceramicist and set designer John Parker is one of the five Laureates announced last night in Dunedin by the Arts Foundation of New Zealand. Each year the Arts Foundation makes five $50,000 awards across art forms.

The lineup of Laureates from previous years includes: Shane Cotton, Neil Dawson, Phil Dadson, Warwick Freeman, Julia Morison, Ann Noble, Michael Parekowhai, Peter Peryer, John Reynolds, Joe Sheehan and Ronnie van Hout.

Image: Cover of the publication produced by the City Gallery Wellington for the exhibition John Parker: Ceramics, 2002

A sign of the times?

Arts Council England has said it will cut most recipients grants by 15% by 2015 and shrink its own staff to meet government belt-tightening requirements. The Council's operating costs, of which staff account for 56%, will be halved to 12 million pounds in real terms by 2015. Chief Executive Colin Davey says “it will quite a different Arts Council with fewer people doing things in a different way”.

The cuts take in Arts & Business, the 34-year-old nonprofit group that helps cultural organisations get funding from companies, trusts and foundations, and wealthy individuals. Arts & Business will see its 3.8 million pound grant halved in 2011-12, then cut off completely. The move has taken CEO Colin Tweedy by surprise who says, “it's not what you would normally do if you want to encourage the private sector to do more.”

New Zealand's Minister of Arts, Culture & Heritage, Chris Finlayson would agree. He has set up a taskforce to investigate ways to improve philanthropic giving. “The Cultural Philanthropy Taskforce is interested in finding out how to increase charitable giving by private individuals over and above – not instead of – Government funding”, he says. Mind you, the Minister's commitment to maintaining arts funding could be put to the test as the economy continues to stutter along and the Government faces the possibility of an election year recession on its watch.

The Cultural Philanthropy Taskforce is headed up by Peter Biggs (former chair of Creative New Zealand) and the other members are Margaret Belich, Carolyn Henwood, James S Hill, Dame Jenny Gibbs and Dayle Mace.

Installation views of The Story Of A Window

This link takes you to installation views of The Story Of A Window at Neon Parc, Melbourne. Staged in association with Starkwhite and Altman Siegel (San Francisco), the exhibition by Matt Keegan & Dane Mitchell runs to 20 November 2010.

Image: Matt Keegan & Dane Mitchell, The Story Of A Window, installation view, Neon Parc, Melbourne, 2010. Photograph courtesy of the artists and Neon Parc.

Last few days of BEYOND

Our current exhibition BEYOND closes on Wednesday at 6.00pm.

Image: installation view of Tamar Guimaraes' A Man Called Love (2007) in the exhibition BEYOND, Starkwhite, Auckland, 2010

Unnerved: The New Zealand Project at the NGV

Curated by Maud Page, Unnerved: The New Zealand Project closed recently at GoMA, Brisbane and will open at the National Gallery of Victoria on 25 November 2010.

Unnerved includes Gavin Hipkins' The Homely, which has been described as a post-colonial gothic novel. Through a cinematic run of 80 images, which are often slightly blurry and filled with the colours of a dreamscape, Hipkins re-presents monuments and memorials of Australia and New Zealand nationalism with fragmented glimpses of domestic interiors and museum dioramas. He also says: “Although New Zealand has an international reputation for being clean, green and beautiful (a mythology that New Zealanders often call on to represent ourselves) it is the treatment and conquest of nature as an adventure playground that interests me with this project”.

Images: Gavin Hipkins' The Homely (1997-2000), installation view at Brisbane's GoMA in the exhibition Unnerved: The New Zealand Project. Photograph by Natasha Harth

Coming up at Starkwhite

BEYOND closes on Wednesday 3 November and will be followed by a Martin Basher exhibition of works made during his recent residency at the Colin McCahon House in Titirangi. We'll post more details on the show and the opening date next week.

Image: a recent work photographed in Martin Basher's McCahon House studio

Jae Hoon Lee stages an interplay of real and virtual experiences at 4A

Jae Hoon Lee's exhibition NOMAD opens tonight at 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art. The exhibition, which follows his recent Ground Zero show at Starkwhite, has been developed with 4A director and curator Aaron Seeto.

Located on two floors of an historic building in Sydney's Chinatown, 4A began as an initiative of the Asian Artists' Association Inc and evolved into a public artspace dedicated to presenting contemporary Asian art in Australia. Under Seeto's directorship, 4A has become a high-profile hub for cross-cultural discussion and debate.

Image: Jae Hoon Lee, One of these days, 2008, digitally manipulated photograph, 900 x 900mm

Review of BEYOND, artists who engage the paranormal in their practices

This link takes you to a review of our current exhibition BEYOND, featuring works by Tamar Guimaraes (BR), Dane Mitchell (NZ) and Georgina Starr (UK).

Image: Georgina Starr, I am the Medium (2010), sound installation, locked groove vinyl record, turntable, amp and parabolic speaker.

John Reynolds' Tiwatawata: a procession of charred poles across the landscape

Taking its cue from nineteenth century illustrations of local Maori demarcation poles and photos of the eventual fencing of boundaries with the arrival of more recent communities at site of the new Hobsonville Point Park, John Reynolds' recently installed work Tiwatawata dramatises the process of marking off the land.

Consisting of 188 charred and stained wooden poles of various diameters closely staged at irregular distances apart and at differing heights, Reynolds says “Tiwatawata is an artwork IN the landscape rather than ON the landscape, and crucially, a localised drama of edges and site.”
Images: John Reynolds, Tiwatawata (2010), 188 charred and stained poles, installation views, Hobsonville Point Park, Auckland, NZ

BEYOND continues at Starkwhite

Our current exhibition BEYOND runs to Wednesday 3 November 2010.

Image: Dane Mitchell, Apport, 2008 (cinematography by Duncan Cole), 16mm film loop