Skarstedt inaugurates new Paris gallery with an exhibition of recent paintings by Eric Fischl

October 18, 2021

Skarstedt is delighted to announce the inauguration of the new Paris gallery, renovated by Jacques Grange, at 2 Avenue Matignon with My Old Neighbourhood, the exhibition of recent paintings by Eric Fischl, opening on 18th October and remaining on view until 4th December 2021.

In My Old Neighborhood, Fischl stages moments of human interactions set outdoors, on daylit sidewalks and front yards of suburban streets. One of the central themes in the artist’s oeuvre, the vision of American suburban life has fuelled some of his most resonant and provocative works. Here, Fischl’s protagonists are sharing moments of improbable intimacy and proximity in the public space - the realm, distinct from the sense of privacy permeating the artist’s earlier explorations of the other side of the American Dream. Engaged in personal reflections, the characters appear exposed, as if driven to the street by an unknown force. Houses and cars form a grid-like backdrop of angular colour fields yet look unused and detached from the scenes unfolding in the foreground.

Constructing inexplicable emotional tension, Fischl’s poignant compositions portray mundane scenes of a residential neighborhood which border on the sense of emergency.

Karsten Schubert London announces representation of British artist Kirsten Glass

October 15, 2021

Through her work Glass invites us to look at an enchanted world, to step into ritual and reconnect with folklore, animism and magic. For Glass, painting allows for a transmutation of ideas and emotions, finding connections between the material and the imaginary and always hinting at the unknown.

The gallery has been working with Glass since her solo exhibition Swimming Witches in Room 2 in October 2020. The accompanying catalogue essay by Cathy Lomax remarked that the paintings 'draw us in with their alluring surface, their sprinklings of glitter and patches of intense colour, while also confounding us with their resonating layers of meaning'.

This announcement precedes the gallery's forthcoming solo presentation of Kirsten Glass's work at EXPO CHICAGO in April 2022.

Annka Kultys Gallery announces representation of Kate Bickmore

October 11, 2021

Kate Bickmore is an emerging artist (b. Albany, New York, 1993) presently living in London whose practice currently focuses on creating florascape paintings in oils.

Bickmore graduated from the MFA painting program at the Royal College of Art in London in 2019. She received her BA (honours, summa cum laude) in Studio Art from Hamilton College, Clinton, NY in 2015, following a semester studying abroad at the Slade School of Fine Art in London in 2014. Her show In Season at ANNKA KULTYS GALLERY marks Bickmore’s first exhibition at a commercial gallery.

Kate Bickmore takes one of the most classical subjects of painting – flowers – and gives new life to otherworldly creatures in a unique style and scale. They are uncomfortably alien and beautifully human all at once. Flowers are typically considered pretty decorative objects on the receiving end of our gaze, but Kate makes the viewer feel as if they are watching and wanting us. Possibly even making their own plans…
— Jonathan Travis

Axel Vervoordt Gallery now represents Shen Chen

October 8, 2021

Axel Vervoordt Gallery is pleased to announce representation of New York and Shanghai-based artist Shen Chen (b. 1955, Shanghai). Opening on 16 October, the artist’s inaugural exhibition will be held at the Hong Kong space, featuring twelve paintings created between 2009 and 2021. Shen will be the first Chinese artist in the gallery’s roster and his first European solo exhibition with the gallery is planned for 2022 at Kanaal.

Throughout his career, Shen has emphasised the artistic process and materials in his practice. In recent years, he has mainly applied the Western medium of acrylic paint in a way that is reabsorbed through his training and knowledge of the qualities of ink. Painting with the canvas on the floor, he adopts a physical and introspective gesture of layering brushstrokes onto the canvas. Incorporating the flow of his qi (breath movement and energy), Shen paints each brushstroke vertically and by doing so, forms a horizontal marking of where the brushes end and begin again. What emerges from the canvas is a transformative, ever-changing, and endless space. With subtle tonal gradation and nuances, Shen’s works bear stylistic influences of paintings from the Color Field movement of the 1940s and 50s in New York. Yet, his practice is rooted in an innate philosophical mode of thought from his training in traditional Chinese ink painting.

In a disciplined act of repetition, Shen adds depth to the canvas with layers of paint, completing each work only when he feels his qi has left and when he has reached emptiness into the void. His works are temporal, where reciprocating layers of dialogue emerge in each brushstroke between opacity and translucence.

Mariano Ferrante unveils site-specific commission at Centro Cultural Córdoba, Argentina

October 6, 2021

Art Projects International is pleased to announce that a monumental site-specific work “Monocromía en cuatro colores Nro 2” by Mariano Ferrante was recently unveiled to celebrate the re-opening of the Centro Cultural Córdoba, one of the most important cultural institutions in the second largest city in Argentina.

Prominently displayed and installed on the interior walls and ceiling of the expansive Centro Cultural Córdoba complex, this newly commissioned work measures 240 square meters and features Ferrante’s signature layered geometric diamond patterns, created from the juxtaposition of four different colors, similarly found in his “Monocromo” paintings. Currently, Ferrante’s Monocromo paintings are the focus of a solo exhibition entitled “Monocromo” at Art Projects International in Tribeca, New York.

“Monocromía en cuatro colores Nro 2” transforms both the interior and exterior spaces, complementing the sculptural quality and structural design of this architecturally remarkable building. Ferrante’s richly colored work contrasts the raw, exposed concrete ceiling of both the subterranean auditorium and exhibition space, and the work’s repeated patterns of four colors also appear in the environs of the building’s public courtyard entrance, actively engaging visitors, connecting the external space and foreshadowing the inspired interior space.

“Monocromía en cuatro colores Nro 2” is part of the public commission project curated by Santiago Bengolea and presented along with another site-specific work by Leila Tschopp.

Pace inaugurates new London location with exhibitions by Mark Rothko and Torkwase Dyson

October 4, 2021

Opening on Friday 8 October, the gallery’s new home at 5 Hanover Square will present an exhibition of paintings on paper by Mark Rothko and a multi-media installation and series of performances by Torkwase Dyson, commissioned for Pace Live. Designed by Jamie Fobert Architects, the new space has completely transformed the interior architecture of the existing building to incorporate flexible galleries across two floors. The levels will be connected by a feature staircase rendered in black steel, integrating the entire space and allowing for dynamic presentations and installations.

Michael Rosenfeld Gallery pays tribute to George Wein (1925-2021)

October 3, 2021

“Today, on what would have been his 96th birthday, we honor the memory of jazz impresario George Wein (1925–2021), a pioneering jazz producer, musician, patron of the arts, and advocate for equality who changed many lives through his wholehearted belief in art and artistry. A dear friend, mentor, and trusted gallery advisor, George encouraged, challenged, and inspired us.

Michael Rosenfeld Gallery had a long and personal relationship with George and we remember and celebrate his kindness and spirit. In a recent letter to Michael Rosenfeld on the occasion of the gallery’s 30th anniversary, he wrote: “30 plus years ago, by chance I walked into a brownstone building on the Upper East Side. There was a sign outside that said: Michael Rosenfeld Gallery. That was the day I met you. And to say it changed my life, is putting it mildly.”

We are just a few of the many so fortunate to have known this legend and witness his love for the arts. George is best known for conceiving and organizing the Newport Jazz Festival, first staged in 1954. The early success of the festival sparked a career renaissance for George, who spent the following decades organizing jazz festivals across the globe. The Newport Jazz Festival has since become known as a primary site of jazz history, staging important performances by the likes of Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Dizzy Gillespie, and many others. Wein was also a dedicated jazz pianist, briefly studying with Teddy Wilson and performing at his festivals and other venues with small groups usually billed as the Newport All-Stars.

In 2006, his philanthropy enabled The Studio Museum in Harlem to establish the prestigious Joyce Alexander Wein Artist Prize in honor of George’s late wife, a longtime Trustee of the museum and ardent supporter of living artists. The award has since advanced the careers of such contemporary luminaries as Lorna Simpson, Glenn Ligon, Derrick Adams, Gary Simmons, Simone Leigh and, most recently, Cauleen Smith. And like these recipients, George, too, received many awards and honors throughout his life, including induction into the French Legion of Honor in 1991, a DaCapo Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award for Cultural Innovation in 1999, being named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master in 2005 and a Trustees Award for lifetime achievement from the Recording Academy in 2015. He also was honored by Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton at White House jazz concerts in 1978 and 1991. In 2015, he received a Grammy Honorary Trustee Award for his innovations in music production and presentation.

Today, in remembrance of George Wein, we encourage you to read his 2003 autobiography Myself Among Others: A Life In Music and listen to his music.”

The Sunday Painter announces launch of new “Gertrude” initiative

September 23, 2021

Brought to you by The Sunday Painter Gallery founders Harry Beer, Tom Cole and Will Jarvis, Gertrude is an innovative new art platform with the aim of broadening the demographic that can live with art via an art subscription service.

Subscribers can choose art, have it delivered direct to their home to live with for a period, and then return or purchase. In turn this also brings greater sustainability to the lives of contemporary artists living and working today.

Initially launching in London, there are currently 25 international artists listed on the platform including Cynthia Daignault, Hannah Knox, Ansel Krut, Helena Foster, Sara Naim and Nicholas Pope - with plans to grow both the geographical and artistic coverage.

Gertrude is named in reference to Gertrude Stein, one of the most significant art patrons of the twentieth century. Stein was ahead of her time in promoting some of the most important artists of the era, in particular Picasso, Matisse, Cezanne and Braque.

The non-ownership subscription model will plug into the existing infrastructure of the art world, taking works otherwise destined for storage and bring them into the homes of art lovers for a fraction of the cost of buying, and in doing so generate a consistent revenue for artists and galleries and allow customers both transparent information and affordable access to some of the best contemporary art being made today.

For the customer, all artworks are available for £50/month. For the artist, once just one work is subscribed to, we are offering monthly payments ranging from £150/month to £300/month for a 12 month period.

Gertrude officially launches on 27th September and are offering a limited number of free subscriptions to any work for three months - use the promo code tspgert at checkout.

David Gill Gallery now represents Barbara Nanning

September 22, 2021

Barbara Nanning was born in The Hague in 1957 and following her studies at Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam she initially made a name for herself in the international art scene with unusual unique ceramic works. After that, she began working in glass under a commission from the National Glass Museum and the Royal Leerdam Crystal. This inspired a passion for the material and her artistic career took a new direction. From the beginning of her career as a ceramicist, Nanning has always pushed the boundaries of her profession and she was one of the first artists to use paint pigments instead of glaze. For Nanning, nature with its manifold, and widespread world of shapes and colours, is an almost inexhaustible source of inspiration. Her works are filled with contradictions uniting amorphous and rigid structures, liberty and constraint, manual perfection and the use of unexpected materials.

She studies crystals, jellyfish, flowers and micro-organisms with a particular fascination with form, structure and geometry. Her work arises in species and families as is fitting from the natural world which inspires them. In 2009 she began working on the Eternal Spring collection, an installation with objects made of milky white opal glass depicting the awakening nature in spring. The installation includes snow-white branches that protrude from walls, tables and floor objects, from knots of willows or from corals. Some of these objects, including those created with the cast of an ancient pollard willow, are monumental in scale.

Walter Storms Galerie to open third location in Munich

September 18, 2021

On September 24, 2021, Walter Storms Galerie will open a new exhibition space at Amalienstrasse 22 in Munich, thus maintaining three locations in the Bavarian capital in the future. The permanent exhibition in the new gallery is dedicated to the print work of Günter Fruhtrunk (1923- 1982), one of the most important representatives of German constructivist-concrete post-war art. Walter Storms Galerie has owned Fruhtrunk's estate since 2014 and in the same year founded the Günter Fruhtrunk Gesellschaft together with collectors and friends of the artist with the aim of preserving, promoting and protecting the artist's legacy.

The new premises between Theresienstrasse and Oskar-von- Miller-Ring are located in the middle of Munich's Kunstareal, which with its unique combination of art and culture is one of the most important cultural locations in Europe. In the colourfully designed exhibition space, visitors can now learn about the life and work of Günter Fruhtrunk, browse through his favourite books and listen to music from his records. From the gallery, one can see the Munich Art Academy, where Fruhtrunk successfully taught until his death.

Gagosian announces new Paris gallery and three Alexander Calder exhibitions

September 17, 2021

Gagosian is pleased to announce the opening of a new location in Paris this October. Situated at 9 rue de Castiglione, in the 1st arrondissement, the space is part of the historic Hotel Lotti development, built in 1910. The location is steps from Place Vendôme, where Leo Castelli and René Drouin opened the storied Drouin Gallery in 1939, and within walking distance of the Musée du Louvre, Musée de l’Orangerie, and Musée d’Orsay.

The architectural design of the gallery was led by Rémi Tessier and features elevated ceilings and 15.5-meter windows that provide a view of the gallery’s interior from the historic arcades.

To mark the opening of the new gallery, Alexander Calder’s monumental sculpture Flying Dragon (1975) will be installed in Place Vendôme as part of FIAC Hors les Murs, which presents artworks in emblematic public spaces throughout the city.

The inaugural exhibition at rue de Castiglione will underscore the unique visual language of Flying Dragon, presenting diverse archival materials related to the sculpture and its original maquette, alongside additional works from 1975.

Selected works will also be presented at the rue de Ponthieu gallery to further emphasize Calder’s visual vocabulary and the interplay between nature and abstraction, stillness and motion, and monumentality and ephemerality in his practice.

Almine Rech now represents Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe

September 15, 2021

Almine Rech is pleased to announce the representation of contemporary Ghanaian artist Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe in Europe, the UK, and China.

Born in 1988 and raised in Accra, Ghana, Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe now lives and works in Portland, Oregon. Quaicoe presents his subjects in the form of portraiture, where he engages with ideas of empowerment through his bright and luminous depictions of figurative portraits. This is embodied in the postures of his sitters, who appear set against vibrant monochromatic backgrounds.

As a young man, Quaicoe developed a fascination with stylized posters seen at the movie theatre in his hometown, Accra. It was there that, one day, he discovered a group of artists painting large canvases for the posters behind the main stage. This was a catalytic moment for Quaicoe, who then began drawing and painting incessantly from collected magazine clippings and ‘anything he could get his hands on’. After his studies at the Ghanatta College of Art and Design and during his photography studies, Quaicoe became deeply involved in the subject of figuration and portraiture, specifically Black portraiture.

Quaicoe began to paint from his photographs, creating highly personal and intimate yet formal and premeditated portraits. In 2019, during his residency at La Brea Studio in Los Angeles, Quaicoe began to work on the style he is known for today, utilizing pure pigment on canvas with thick, coarse textures. The paintings he produced during this period were then exhibited in his first solo show at Roberts Projects, LA.

Portrait of Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, 2021 / Courtesy of the Artist and Almine Rech - Photo: Dan Kvitka

Sotheby’s announces details of two landmark sales of The Macklowe Collection

September 14, 2021

On 9 September, at a global livestream event, Sotheby’s revealed details of the forthcoming landmark sales of The Macklowe Collection – one of the most important collections of any collecting category ever to appear on the market. Each of the 65 works is a consummate masterpiece; together they constitute an unrivaled ensemble that meticulously traces the most important art historical achievements of the last 80 years. Acquired over the course of half a century, the collection reflects decades of pursuit, honing and refining, driven by immense patience and an innate understanding of quality. Estimated to realize in excess of $600 million – the highest estimate ever placed on any collection to come to auction — The Macklowe Collection will be offered across two dedicated evening single owner sales at Sotheby’s in New York, on November 15 this year and in May 2022.

The first of the two sales will feature 34 works which together encompass an extraordinary breadth of 20th- and 21st-century art, ranging in date from the 1940s to works painted less than a decade ago, and including masterworks by Alberto Giacometti, Mark Rothko, Cy Twombly, and Andy Warhol. The sale will also shine a light on a distinguishing feature of the collection as a whole: its enormous depth. Many artists – among them Jeff Koons, Brice Marden, Agnes Martin, Sigmar Polke, Gerhard Richter, Cy Twombly and Andy Warhol – are represented by multiple works, each one marking a distinct and critical moment in their respective careers, and together forming an insightful portrait of the artists’ evolution over time.

Hans Arp exhibition to launch Hauser & Wirth’s new Zürich gallery at Bahnhofstrasse 1

An exhibition of works by Hans Arp titled ‘Arp: Art is a Fruit’ will launch Hauser & Wirth’s new space at Bahnhofstrasse 1 on 17 September, in Zürich’s historic central cultural district. Helmed by Partner and Executive Director, James Koch, the space will focus on exhibitions by the 35 artists’ estates represented by the gallery and will be a headquarters for Hauser & Wirth’s increasing private sales activity.

Centrally located close to Lake Zurich and adjacent to the landmark Baur au Lac hotel, the conversion of the ground floor at Bahnhofstrasse 1 into a gallery space is being overseen by Swiss architectural practice, Schmidlin Architekten. The floor to ceiling windows of the ground floor gallery space create a strong street presence on the legendary Bahnhofstrasse. The new venue complements the existing galleries in Switzerland in Zurich, St. Moritz and Gstaad and the Hauser & Wirth Publishers’ HQ. In each location, the goal is to create strong, well-proportioned spaces that place the art on view at the forefront of the experience.

‘The creation of this new space, dedicated to our artists’ estates program and private sales, enables us to shine a spotlight on works of the very highest calibre presented in the cultural heart of Zurich.’ — Iwan Wirth

Hauser & Wirth Bahnhofstrasse © Schmidlin Architekten (Images by Nightnurse Images), Stiftung Arp e.V.,Berlin/ Rolandswerth/2021, ProLitteris, Zurich

David Zwirner now represents Steven Shearer

September 2, 2021

David Zwirner is pleased to announce the representation of Steven Shearer in partnership with Galerie Eva Presenhuber. Galerie Eva Presenhuber will present an exhibition of new work by Shearer from September 4 to October 16, 2021, at its Zurich space. David Zwirner will present an exhibition of new work by Shearer in New York in 2023. A comprehensive new monograph of Shearer’s paintings will be released in 2022, published by DCV with support from Galerie Eva Presenhuber and David Zwirner.

Over the span of nearly twenty-five years, Canadian artist Steven Shearer (b. 1968) has developed a painting practice that weds canonical art history to the contemporary moment, specifically its more plebeian or subterranean expressions. His work, which also includes drawing, assemblage, sculpture, and installation, deploys a wide range of references as well as a vast archive of historical and contemporary found images. Rendered in a visceral fauvist palette, his compositions feature figures that recall classical subjects like the artist in his studio or the Rückenfigur, and incorporate his interest in the lo-fi iconography of popular music and the allure and alienation of participatory youth cultures grounded in these musical netherworlds. Shearer’s sources conflate androgynous, long-haired metalheads, 1970s teen heartthrob Leif Garrett, and the cover of Black Sabbath’s 1983 album Born Again with the proto-modernist archetypes of Edvard Munch and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and the ambiguously gendered figures of symbolist Gustave Moreau, as well as Renaissance masters such as Pieter Bruegel and Leonardo da Vinci. The archival impulse that unites these disparate referential systems is rooted in a rigorous, quasi-forensic interest in how images are made, and how the world is constituted by images, in both a symbolic and literal, bodily sense. Shearer’s abiding interest is in making artworks that explore how we remember and idealize each other—in the romance of retrospection. Today’s hypertrophic image culture echoes how people have captured and depicted each other throughout history, and his work poignantly seizes upon these very references, reimagining them in his own distinct visual vocabulary.

The Collector's Visit, 2019 © Steven Shearer

Tolarno Galleries announces representation of Georgia Spain

August 31, 2021

Georgia Spain (b.1993 UK) is a visual artist and musician currently living and working in Sandford, Tasmania on palawa land.

In the same week of June this year, Spain’s paintings won the 2021 Sir John Sulman Prize for Getting down or falling up, and the Women’s Art Prize Tasmania for Six Different Women. In 2020 Spain was the recipient of the prestigious Brett Whiteley Travelling Scholarship.

Spain’s paintings explore the complexities of human behaviour; using narrative and storytelling to examine the cultural, political and personal. Her work frequently looks at ideas around human spectacle, theatricality, ritual and ceremony.

She is interested in the emotional and performative exchanges between people in social and psychological spaces and in her paintings physical connection is explored through bodies in groupings.

For her first work available through Tolarno Galleries, Georgia Spain is auctioning a brand new painting You, me and the weight 2021. All proceeds will go to the For Afghanistan fundraiser, organised by Ben Quilty.

Sally Mann inducted into the International Photography Hall of Fame

Throughout her career, Mann has investigated the visual and metaphorical potential of employing nineteenth-century technologies. She has long used an 8 × 10 bellows camera and has explored platinum, bromoil, and wet-plate collodion processes to make prints that capture the complexities of familial relationships, social realities, and the passage of time.

The International Photography Hall of Fame recognizes those who have advanced the field of photography. The induction ceremony will take place on October 29, 2021, in St. Louis and online.

Photo: Annie Leibovitz

The Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation acquires over 800 prints by Jim Dine

August 24, 2021

Cristea Roberts Gallery is delighted to announce that the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation, USA, has acquired a major archive of prints, dating from 1962 – 2020, by Jim Dine (b. 1935).

The acquisition transforms the Foundation’s holding of Dine’s art, which it has been collecting for over 20 years. Dine has built a career exploring and pushing the boundaries of printmaking, alongside his practice in other mediums. Now aged 86 years, he is one of the most important printmakers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

The largest acquisition, ever, of Dine’s work includes etchings, woodcuts, lithographs, unique variants, studies and trial proofs. The works feature the artist’s iconic imagery of hearts, skulls, Pinocchio, Venus de Milo, tools and bathrobes, the latter two often appearing as autobiographical motifs.

These phenomenal pieces of printmaking, made over six decades, contain a full overview of Dine’s earliest prints, from his Tool Box portfolio made in 1966 to the artist’s most recent works such as Asleep with his Tools, Jim Dreams (Black and Silver), 2018, a black woodcut on paper painted by Dine in silver, measuring over 3.5 x 2 metres.

Jordan D. Schnitzer, director of the foundation, says, “I am honoured and delighted to have acquired such an exceptional body of prints by Jim Dine, which began with my first purchase of his work in 1988. Through the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation exhibition and publication program, I have championed Dine's work ever since. This acquisition of more than 890 prints transforms the holdings of my collections, affording audiences access to the full breadth of Dine's career in printmaking. Having worked with Cristea Roberts Gallery over the past three years to acquire this collection, we look forward to sharing it.”

Hollis Taggart now represents the Dusti Bongé Estate

August 23, 2021

A trailblazing artist, Dusti Bongé (1903-1993) developed a distinctive style that embraced the visual vocabularies of Cubism, Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism. Based in Biloxi, Mississippi—and recognized as one of the south’s first modernist artists—Bongé also developed strong ties to New York’s inner art circles and had a long association with iconic gallerist Betty Parsons, with whom she showed for nearly three decades. Despite Bongé’s many artistic innovations, she has been conspicuously absent from the mainstream art discourse, within the narratives of art history, and contemporary understanding of the artists that shaped modernist art movements.

With its representation of the Bongé estate, Hollis Taggart is committed to furthering scholarship of the artist’s work and bringing well deserved attention to the artist by illuminating the significance of her artistic contributions. This builds on the gallery’s prior successes in deepening scholarship on and expanding visibility for female artists such as Audrey Flack, Grace Hartigan, Kay Sage, Marjorie Strider, Idelle Weber, and Michael (Corinne) West. To launch its new collaboration with Bongé’s estate, Hollis Taggart will present a selection of works by the artist as part of its exhibition of Abstract Expressionist painters at the upcoming edition of The Armory Show, opening in September 2021. The presentation at the fair will mark the first time that Bongé’s works will be on view in New York in approximately 50 years, offering an important opportunity for collectors, scholars, and the public to re-engage with Bongé’s vision and work.

The presentation at the Armory Show will then be followed, in fall 2022, with an exhibition at Hollis Taggart’s flagship location in Chelsea. That exhibition will explore Bongé’s close association with Betty Parsons, illuminating for the first time their long-standing friendship and professional collaborations.