saatchi gallery

Mario Testino Selling Life-Size Kate Moss Pix

Filed under: Art

Famed fashion photographer Mario Testino is selling a series of life-size Kate Moss portraits at an exhibition held at Phillips de Pury & Co' s London branch, including a number of unseen images of the supermodel. "Kate represents the ultimate kind of woman - an icon of our times," Testino tells Vogue UK. The collection, entitled Kate Who, features 18 iconic shots of the Brit beauty, each enlarged to life-size proportions. Although the auction house refused to comment on prices, Phillips previously sold a Testino photo of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger for a record $75,000, and the Moss snaps could easily fetch as much of not more. The images will be on view and sale through 16 at Phillips and thereafter at the Saatchi Gallery in London.

Tags: fashion, Kate Moss, London, Mario Testino, Mick Jagger, Phillips de Pury, photographer, photography, Saatchi Gallery

Charles Saatchi Donates Gallery And Major Works

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art, Big Givers

Art collector Charles Saatchi is famous for his patronage which has made the careers of British artists like Tracy Emin and Damien Hirst, fueling the trend for young British artists in the 1990s. Now the ad man has announced that his lifetime of collecting will be Britain's gain. He has announced plans to donate his London gallery and 200 works as a new public art museum. The impressive gift is worth more than 25 million pounds. The Saatchi Gallery will be renamed the Museum of Contemporary Art, London.

Pieces being donated include Emin's "My Bed" and Richard Wilson's "20:50," a room filled with oil. Saatchi, who is married to celebrity chef Nigella Lawson, is an insatiable collector and even after the donation he will still own many, many works. The donation, no doubt, will allow him to go on collecting while helping insure that contemporary art has a place in Britain's future. The works that Saatchi favors are at time controversial and often challenge the nature of what really makes something "art."According to an article in Art Daily, Rebecca Wilson, associate director of the Saatchi Gallery, said that the gift also includes other works that can be sold to buy new acquisitions to help grow the collection. She referred to is as being a "very agile collection that can respond quickly to developments in contemporary art from all over the world."

The owner of the building that houses the gallery on London's King's Road, Cadogan Estate is hoping that the new museum will stay put in the same place. The staff and management team are also staying the same. What is changing is the name and the knowledge that the gallery, while still the result of one man's obsessive art collecting, is now a gift to the city he lives in.

Tags: art, charles saatchi, donation, london, museum, saatchi gallery