Art

New York's Best: "Vienna 1900"

by Bobbie Leigh (RSS feed) — Mar 5th 2011 at 8:01AM

Before you climb the museum stairs to see "Vienna 1900: Style and Identity" head for the Neue Museum's Cafe Sabarsky, a dead ringer for an old-world Viennese cafe. With its Josef Hoffmann and Adolf Loos inspired decor, this cafe is a best bet for great coffee and strudels as well as catching the vibe of the exhibition's, turn-of-the-century Vienna. The museum's 1914 building, an Upper East Side landmark, is steps away from Central Park at 1048 Fifth Avenue at 86th Street. (The museum's name means "new gallery.")

Tags: Gustav Klimt, JosefHoffmann, Kolomon Moser, museum event, museum exhibition, neue galerie, new york city art, new york city events, Oscar Kokoschka, Secessionist art, vienna

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The Best of the PULSE Art Fair

by Bobbie Leigh (RSS feed) — Mar 4th 2011 at 9:01PM

The PULSE New York fair has it all --- sculpture, photography, mixed-media, painting. The layout this year with 63 booths is much more manageable territory at the Metropolitan Pavilion than at the other fairs dominating Manhattan this week. In fact, PULSE is the one fair not to miss. It is friendly, not at all imposing, a nice mix of hedge-fund deep pockets and young people, some even changing babies on cardboard arty currogated stools. Most important though is that the works are fresh and new. There's lots to buy at a wide range of prices and people on opening day were not hesitating to add to their collections.

Tags: art fair, art fairs, emerging artists, mixed-media artists, NewPhotography, nyartfairs, young collectors

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The Life & Work of the Late Herb Ritts

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) — Mar 4th 2011 at 3:01PM

Madonna, Julia Roberts, Michele Pfeiffer, Kim Basinger, Richard Gere, Cindy Crawford – all of them owe their fame in some measure to the late Herb Ritts, the renowned photographer whose portraits for the likes of Vanity Fair, Vogue and various fashion houses in the '80s and '90s helped turn many of his subjects into icons. A new book by Charles Churchward, Herb Ritts: The Golden Hour, is a lavish scrapbook / oral history looking at both Ritts' life, legacy and work. Along with some of the well known celebrity and supermodel poses the book's 200 images include intimate portraits, images of extravagant Hollywood parties, travels to exotic locales, and other unforgettable moments from an extraordinary career, many from Ritts' personal archive and previously unpublished. Richard Gere provides an introduction and there are scores of interviews from Ritts' friends including Annie Leibovitz, Elton John, kd lang, Helena Christensen, L'Wren Scott and more.

Tags: books, celebrity, Cindy Crawford, coffee table books, Elton John, fashion, Helena Christensen, Herb Ritts, Hollywood, Julia Roberts, Madonna, photographer, photography, Richard Gere, supermodels, Vanity Fair

Ryan McGinness' Black Light Paintings at The Standard

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Mar 3rd 2011 at 10:01PM

Artist Ryan McGinness is installing his latest work Women: The Blacklight Paintings as well as a set of vinyl installations at The Shop and Le Bain in The Standard, New York presented by Country Club. The work is the follow-up to last December's installation during Art Basel Miami and will be followed by another showing this spring in Los Angeles.

The playful and colorful works take you back to the early 1980s, consisting of fluorescent paint that glows under a black light. The graphic vinyl installations are on view at The Standard, New York Shop and 18th floor club Le Bain during Armory Week through March 6. The overall effect combines a Picasso-esque adoration of the female form with the energy of Keith Haring pieces.

The Standard always combines art with commerce and 300 Limited edition signed and numbered Blacklight posters are for sale for $200 each. One silkscreened print edition of the Blacklight Nudie Cards, printed in fluorescent inks and in an edition of 52 plus five artist's proofs for $5,500 is available through The Standard Shop in New York. The Blacklight Nudie Cards are custom designed classic poker playing cards that will be released in LA in the Spring and available across all Standards. For more information check out an interview with McGinness at The Standard website.

Gallery: Ryan McGinness's Women: The Blacklight Paintings

Tags: armory week, new york art, ryan mcginniss, the standard

Art, Style & Culture: Paris Between the Wars

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) — Mar 3rd 2011 at 4:01PM

Paris Between the Wars: A Cultural Crucible

A brilliant new book, Paris Between the Wars, 1919-1939: Art, Life & Culture by Vincent Bouvet and Gérard Durozoi from The Vendome Press explores the myriad cultural forces which collided in the City of Light during the two decades between World Wars I and II. Over those 20 years artists and intellectuals flocked to Paris from around the world, resulting in a crucible of creativity that wrought great achievements in fashion, graphic design, architecture, literature, fine arts, theater and more. Illustrated with hundreds of paintings, drawings, archival photographs, advertising posters, film stills, and plans, the book travels between the bohemian charms of Montparnasse, which attracted artists such as Picasso, Chagall, and Giacometti, and the vibrant café culture which provided a forum and hunting ground for Dadaists, Surrealists and expatriate writers like Hemingway and Fitzgerald.

Gallery: Paris Between the Wars

Tags: architecture, art, books, coffee table books, culture, fashion, France, Hemingway, literature, Paris, paris+between+the+wars, parisbetweenthewars, photographs, Picasso

A Look Inside The World's Richest Man's New Museum

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Mar 2nd 2011 at 2:01AM

Last fall we saw video renderings of the plans for the new Soumaya museum planned by Mexico's richest man Carlos Slim. The new branch of the museum named for his late wife is the the second one that he has created. The six-story museum was designed by his son-in-law Fernando Romero. The modern and shiny aluminum structure is composed of over 16,000 tiles. The building has five stories of exhibition space totaling 183,000 square feet with six halls. The AP shot some photos as the museum prepared for its inauguration on March 1 by Mexico's President Felipe Calderon.

Tags: auguste rodin, carlos slim, dali, mexico city, mexico city museum, rodin, salvador dali, soumaya museum

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Artsicle, New Art Start-Up Offers Art For Sale, Rent

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Mar 1st 2011 at 11:01PM

The world of online art collecting is expanding rapidly at all price points. The major auction houses and galleries have smart phone and tablet apps for easy access and a bunch of new start-ups have flourished appealing to younger or less wealthy collectors looking for a new way to buy art that feels fresher and less intimidating. The latest is Artsicle which launches this week. Venture Beat reports that the New-York-City-based start-up not only sells art but provides rentals for those in the New York area in a try-before-you-buy arrangement. Price points are low and the artists are ones that haven't hit the mainstream yet. Many pieces are in the $500-to$1,500 range with rentals costing $50 per month.

Other art start-ups which have launched recently include Art.sy; Exhibition A, which uses a fast sale format to sell prints; and the VIP online art fair which had galleries around the world participating in an online mimicry of destination art fairs earlier this winter.

Tags: art buying, art collecting, art start-ups, artiscle

James Franco and Gus Van Sant Partner On Art Exhibit

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 28th 2011 at 3:01PM

If you didn't get enough James Franco during Oscar weekend you can head over to the Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills to take a look at some of his art output. Franco and director Gus Van Sant are the double bill on a shared exhibit titled "Unfinished."

The exhibit includes screenings of the film, "My Own Private River," which is a collaboration between Van Sant and Franco. After casting Franco in the award-winning film "Milk," Van Sant showed him the dailies and other footage that he had shot for "My Own Private Idaho" an early 1990s movie featuring River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves as street hustlers. Franco took the footage and created a new film which is a haunting video portrait of the late River Phoenix in his role as Mike. The film features a soundtrack by REM frontman Michael Stipe.

The exhibit also features artworks in watercolor by Van Sant. His poignant portraits of young men are well-done but have a certain mug-shot sadness as the subject stares at the viewer with an impassive and not-entirely-at-ease gaze. The exhibit runs February 26 through April 9 at the Gagosian Gallery at 56 North Camden Drive, Beverly Hills, California 90210. Daily screenings of the Franco film run Tuesday through Saturday at 10:00am, 12:00pm, 2:00pm and 4:00pm.

Tags: Gagosian Gallery, gus van sant, james franco, river phoenix

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New Exhibit In Philadelphia Explores Chagall's Artistic Legacy

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 27th 2011 at 10:01AM

A new exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in Philadelphia explores the legacy of Marc Chagall and his artist compatriots. "Paris Through the Window: Marc Chagall and His Circle" runs from March 1 to July 10 and focuses on the work of Chagall and others in Paris in the early 1900s.

Chagall arrived in Paris in 1911 and was immersed in the artistic styles flowering in Paris at this time. He worked at La Ruche, a beehive-like building that was home to a variety of artists' studios. French sculptor Alfred Boucher opened the building in 1902 offering inexpensive space and free models for talented artists. It blossomed into a vibrant community for artists to exhibit work and share ideas. When Chagall joined La Ruche it already had many Eastern European artists who had also moved to Paris to discover firsthand the most recent trends in modern art. Other artists there in the 1910s included Archipenko, Kisling, Lipchitz, Soutine, and Zadkine, who were represented in the exhibition by two sculptures in cedar wood that have not been displayed at the Museum since 1963. Shown above is Chagall's "Paris Through The Window" which was painted in 1913. The exhibit seeks to capture the atmosphere of artistic excitement in Paris at this time and also explores a bit of history, looking back to at Chagall's return to Russia during World War I and the rise of the Russian Revolution and his second stay in Paris in the 1920s.

The museum website has a series of podcasts devoted to the exhibit which offer a comprehensive roadmap to all that is going on in a Chagall painting. For example, in the painting shown above, the artist's double-faced self-portrait in the lower right hand corner is a representation of the two sides of his spirit, looking back toward his homeland but also forward toward Paris, Cubism and a world of changing ideas and ideals.

Tags: chagall, marc chagall, museum exhibitions, museum exhibits, philadelphia museum of art

Price For Max Palevsky's House Drops, Items From His Estate Go On Sale

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 26th 2011 at 6:01PM

Last July we chronicled the listing of late Intel founder Max Palevsky's home on Sea Lane in Malibu. Back then that house was listed at $55 million but it now carries a price of $45 million. Last July we mentioned that the home was designed by architect Joe Weiser in 1975 and renovated by Italian designer Ettore Sottsass in 1984. Most of the time when a luxury home goes up for auction we don't always know where the furnishings go but in this case we know where some of the ended up and I got to see some of them hands on recently at Los Angeles Modern Auctions where they will be part of a sale of Modern Art and Design on March 6.

Tags: los angeles modern auctions, max palevsky

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Rembrandt at the Frick: A Case of "True Grit"

by Bobbie Leigh (RSS feed) — Feb 25th 2011 at 3:01PM

Study Rembrandt's self-portrait, a monumental painting in a new show at the Frick Collection in New York City, and you see a man who looks much older than 52. Rembrandt presents himself as a bear of a man, draped in a luxurious fur cape, a golden pleated smock with a red sash wound around his waist. He holds a silver-tipped cane. He looks indomitable, strong, and resolute. The American painter Kenyon Cox's description of the painting in 1910 says it all: "It is the head of an old lion at bay, worn and melancholy, yet conscious of his strength, determined, and a little defiant." Yet in reality, in 1658, the year he painted the portrait, Rembrandt was morose and troubled. He had declared bankruptcy two years earlier. His family was hounded by debtors. He was forced to sell his many collections and even the house and studio he had occupied since 1639. His reputation suffered. Commissions lagged and his once large group of students and followers had all but abandoned him and in some cases, even his "Rembrandtesque" style.

The monumental self portrait has pride of place in the Oval Room in the Frick's new show, "Rembrandt and His School; Masterworks from the Frick and Lugt Collection." It presents work by the master, his pupils, and followers in a blockbuster celebration of Rembrandt's paintings, drawings, and etchings. Henry Clay Frick (1849--1919) and Dutch art historian and collector Frederik Johannes Lugt (1884-1970) were both great admirers of Rembrandt van Rijn. The precocious Lugt at 12 had started to catalog Dutch and Flemish drawings in Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum while Frick once said that the the talents he would most like to have possessed were Rembrandt's. These two admirers were renowned collectors with the eye, the connections, and the deep wallets to buy what pleased them.

Tags: Frederick Johannes Lugt, Frick Collection, Govert Flinck, museum exhibit, museum exhibition, rembrandt, Rembrandts

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Fashion Forward Ikats

by Bobbie Leigh (RSS feed) — Feb 24th 2011 at 11:01AM

Prepare to be dazzled. The 60 ikat robes in Washington D.C.'s The Textile Museum's show, "Colors of the Oasis: Central Asian Ikats," are a riot of sun-splashed color. The rich jewel toned robes, appealingly hung in the round so you can view them from all directions, are from the museum's Megalli Collection. Most are 19th century ceremonial robes from Samarkand, Bukhara, and the silk weaving centers in the Fergama Valley in Central Asia.

Tags: Central Asian textiles, DianeVonFurstenberg, ikat design, museum exhibit, museum exhibition, oscar de la renta, textiles, the textile museum

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Donna Karan On Hand As Nomad Two Worlds Exhibit Opens In Los Angeles

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 24th 2011 at 3:01AM

In our modern, high-speed culture, we lose track sometimes of what came before. How do we bridge the gap between how we live now and the ways that indigenous people have lived on this planet for millennia? A new exhibit in Santa Monica, California showcases art as a form of communication. Nomad: Two Worlds opened last night at Pier 59 Studios West in Santa Monica with a presentation that combined art with strong messages about what we lose when we forget our collective past.

Tags: aboriginal art, donna karan, nomad two worlds, Russell James, urban zen, Urban Zen Foundation

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Artist Sues Kevin Costner To Force Sculpture Sale

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 24th 2011 at 12:00AM

An artist who creates Western-themed bronze sculptures is taking on Kevin Costner over his delayed plans for a Deadwood-area luxury reosrt. South Dakota-based sculptor Peggy Detmers has said she spent more than six years on a monumental sculpture of 14 bison and three American Indian hunters for a commission by Costner. The piece was supposed to be part of a resort that Costner wanted to open in South Dakota's Black Hills. Detmers is suing in order to force Costner to sell the sculpture which she calls "Lakota Bison Jump." Her website features details on the making of the piece which Costner commissioned in the 1990s.

After filming much of his Academy Award-winning movie "Dances with Wolves" in South Dakota, Costner bought land and a casino and announced plans for a resort called The Dunbar on the edge of Deadwood. Those plans never fully came to fruition and for a time the sculpture had no home. According to the Rapid City Journal, Costner eventually spent $6 million to create a display site for the sculpture and build a visitors center: Tatanka: Story of the Bison. Detmers says she wasn't really included in the project.

Tags: Kevin Costner, Peggy Detmers, south dakota

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Classic Works Of Art To Go On Display In Oscars Greenroom

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) — Feb 22nd 2011 at 11:01PM

The Academy Awards take place on Sunday February 27 and once again Architectural Digest is hosting a well-appointed "greenroom" for the celebrity attendees. Fine art dealer Questroyal Fine Art of New York City has announced that six of its painting are part of the Architectural Digest greenroom at the Oscars. Designer Michael S. Smith, who was tapped by the Obamas to create the look for their family quarters at the White House, went for a classic American look inspired by luxe, tailored 1940s Hollywood style. He used furnishings from his personal line with Baker Furniture and handpicked six paintings from the Questroyal collection to decorate the room.

Tags: architectural digest, michael s smith

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