Archive for November, 2009
Saturday, November 28th, 2009
Beast Master :: Walton Ford at Paul Kasmin (NY)
Installation view: The Royal Menagerie at the Tower of London – 3 December 1830, 2009 and An Encounter with Du Chaillu, 2009 (All Images © Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors).
Walton Ford creates watercolors that upon first glance, take on the deceiving appearance of hundred year old Audubon natural history paintings. His scenes capture species in acute biological accuracy, but with closer concentration, reveal deeper allegories of the savagery and greed of mankind. What makes Ford’s images all the more compelling, is that none of them are conjured purely from his imagination. Rather, they are based on painstaking research, often drawing upon primary accounts. Steeped in a dense history of colonialism, his paintings tell the true tales of man’s lust for power, imperialistic conquest, and the subsequent consequences of their violent quests for domination. As Ford said in a January 2009 New Yorker profile, “Before Fay Wray comes to Skull Island, King Kong isn’t doing anything. There’s no story until she shows up….”
Borodino, 2009 (All Images © Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors).
In Borodino, a pack of ferocious wolves feast over a dead soldier, while bodies lay strewn across the snow covered battlefield of the most violent day of Napoleon’s failed conquest of Russia. An Encounter with Du Chaillu shows a curious gorilla holding a rifle’s twisted barrel to his mouth as he stands over the bare feet of one of the famed French-American explorer’s (Du Chaillu’s expeditions into Equatorial Africa confirmed the existence of gorillas and pygmies) unfortunate guides, who lays dead in the jungle brush below. In The Island, Ford’s pile of viciously canabalistic thylacines alludes to the Tasmanian settlers who hunted the wolf-like beasts into extinction in the 20th century.
Chaumière de Dolmancé, 2009 (All Images © Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors).
In a slight thematic departure, the pervertedly humorous Chaumière de Dolmancé shows a visibly aroused monkey bound around the neck by rope, perched on a chair amongst questionable photographs and a banquet of food and wine. The scene is a likely reference to an 1868 chance encounter between French writer, Guy de Maupassant and the English poet Algernono Charles Swinburne, who was notorious for his self proclaimed penchant for pornography, homosexuality and bestiality. As the story goes, after rescuing Swineburn from drowning, Maupassant was invited to lunch at his French retreat (named Chaumière de Dolmance after the homosexual character in Sade novel, Philosophy in the Bedroom), where he was exposed to some of the eccentric Englishman’s peculiar tendencies.
Walton Ford – New Work runs through Dec. 23 at Paul Kasmin (New York). Read on for more of our images from the show and a video tour of Walton Ford’s studio.
Read the rest of this entry »
Saturday, November 28th, 2009
Expect Delays for Koons’ Train
Train – Production Model © Jeff Koons Production / Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Bloomberg reports that due to budget constraints and a drastically shrunken endowment, Jeff Koons’ $25 million commission for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art has been postponed, and may come to a complete halt altogether. Dubbed by The Art Newspaper as most expensive museum commission ever, the proposed sculpture would dangle a full-scale motorized replica of a 70-foot 1943 Baldwin locomotive from a crane in front of the museum’s entrance. Three times a day the train’s wheels would start up, while sounding its whistle and blowing off steam. “We wouldn’t do it unless someone funds it; someone has to write us a check,” said Barbara Pflaumer, LACMA’s associate vice president for communications and marketing.
Friday, November 27th, 2009
Phaidon Releases Anish Kapoor Monograph
Phaidon has just released the most up to date and comprehensive monograph on Anish Kapoor, covering 30 years of the sculptor’s work over 528 pages and 446 color photos. The publisher is also running a 20% discount on all purchases in their webstore, now through December 11. Sign up to their email list to receive a discount code.
Friday, November 27th, 2009
Arkitip Celebrates Black Friday
Attention Kmart shoppers, Arkitip is discounting all issues 50%, for one day only. Don’t miss this opportunity to stock up on back issues of this essential publication, including a meticulously curated selection of artist features and limited editions by the likes of Ryan McGinness, KAWS, Thomas Campbell, Shepard Fairey, Jose Parla, Chris Johanson, and more. Sale runs Black Friday, Nov. 27.
Wednesday, November 25th, 2009
Reach for the Sky :: Tomoo Gokita at Honor Fraser, LA
(All Images © Honor Fraser)
With Heaven, Tomoo Gokita reaches deeper into the metaphysical, further deconstructing the figurative forms that have come to occupy his works less and less. The increasingly abstract canvases in his second solo show with Honor Fraser (Los Angeles) also mark a shift in technique, substituting monochrome black and white gouaches for blue and white acrylics. On view now through Dec. 19. Read on for more images – click for detailed views.
Wednesday, November 25th, 2009
Free Art Basel Miami Passes
We’re giving away one package including free passes to the SCOPE and PULSE fairs, as well as the Wed., Dec.2 Art Basel Vernissage and First Choice events, before the fair opens to the public. The first responder to email us with a photo and brief description of an original work of art from their personal collection wins! Send entries to: info@theartcollectors.com and include mailing address. We will contact the winner via email.
Passes courtesy of our friends at Jonathan LeVine, Richard Heller, and Mizuma Art Galleries.
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
McGee, Powers, James to Reunite
(Image © Jason Schmidt)
We’ve heard that Barry McGee (TWIST), Steve Powers (ESPO) and Todd James (REAS) will soon be reuniting to create a new version of their legendary Street Market installation with Deitch Projects. The 2000 exhibit (along with Indelible Market, its predecessor at the University of Pennsylvania Institute of Contemporary Art) remains not only a defining moment in these artists’ careers, but like the influence Haring and Basquait had before them, a turning point for the recognition of street based art within mainstream contemporary arts.
This is going to be huge.
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
The Art Street Journal’s November Issue
Carmichael Gallery has released the November issue of their monthly newspaper The Art Street Journal containing interviews with Dan Witz, Hush and WK Interact. Free subscriptions are available here.
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
Shag’s Autumn’s Come Undone @ Corey Helford Gallery
Shag, 2009. (All Images © Pirovino/TheArtCollectors)
Culver City’s gem Corey Helford Gallery adroitly puntuated the onset of the Thanksgiving holiday week with the opening of Autumn’s Come Undone, a solo exhibition by Shag, aka Josh Agle. In what is easily the artist’s largest works available to date, Agle is releasing gigantic giclee print canvases in editions of 5, including two immense tryptichs and several expansive dyptichs. The offering of the giclees is balanced by small original paintings. With prices that could be easily described as friendly, this show represents a true opportunity for collectors to acquire superb artwork by a established artist. Increasingly, Shag’s work is heading in a museum trajectory, with his prominence growing well beyond ‘cult’ status. The artist’s masterful sense of color is evidenced in every single composition. Each piece’s color palette is impeccable and astoundingly cohesive. One of Los Angeles’ most potent moments in pop art is presently upon us, open to view until December 9. Read the rest of this entry »
Monday, November 23rd, 2009
Kaws X Kiehls Arrives
(All Images © Jeff Newman/TheArtCollectors)
Check out these new displays featuring KAWS’ designs at Kiehl’s flagship NYC store. As previously reported, the artist and luxury beauty company have teamed up, creating a limited edition moisturizer to benefit Rx Art. While the product is available now in three sizes, you may want to hold off till next week when KAWS gift boxes and shopping bags will be available in store.
100% of net profits will benefit RxArt, a New York based nonprofit which invites well known artists to decorate hospitals and children’s medical centers. No word yet whether KAWS will be creating one of these installations, but his youthful imagery and cartoon references would be perfect fit.
