Collecting advice from an expert: Sotheby’s contemporary auction specialist Courtney Kremers

Courtney Kremers
Sotheby’s

AUCTIONS ARE BIG BUSINESS WITH EVER INCREASING INTEREST AND PARTICIPATION FROM ALL CORNERS OF THE WORLD. THANKS TO THE GLOBALIZATION OF THE ART MARKET AND THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF ART BOOSTED BY INSTAGRAM IN PARTICULAR AND SOCIAL MEDIA IN GENERAL, AND BY THE HEADLINE MAKING SUMS THAT ARE BEING REALIZED, EVERYONE FINDS THIS AN INTRIGUING SUBJECT TO FOLLOW WHETHER THEY ARE COLLECTORS OR NOT. THE COMPETITION BETWEEN HOUSES IS FIERCE AND THIS WEEK, IN NEW YORK, PRESENTS MANY OPPORTUNITIES TO PROVE THESE POINTS.

Claude Monet
Meules
Sotheby’s May 2019

ON TUESDAY OF THIS WEEK, SOTHEBY’S TRIUMPHED, OPENING THE NEW YORK AUCTION WEEK, WITH THEIR IMPRESSIONIST AND MODERN SALE. ARTnews DESCRIBES IT AS SUCH:

Powered by a stunning Claude Monet landscape that doubled its estimate and elicited hearty applause in the grand salesroom, Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern evening sale in New York on Tuesday galloped to a market-affirming $349.9 million tally.

Only five of the 55 lots offered failed to sell, yielding a svelte buy-in rate by lot of 9.1 percent.

The buoyant result surged past pre-sale expectations of $252.6 million to $333.2 million. Those estimates do not include the buyer’s premium. (The hammer tally for the evening, before fees, was $300.5 million.)

The total also shot past last May’s $318.3 million result for the 32 lots that sold. The top lot at that sale was Amedeo Modigliani’s Nu couché (sur le côté gauche), 1917, which fetched $157.2 million, making it the most expensive work ever to sell at Sotheby’s.

Tuesday’s auction ranks as the highest-earning Impression-modern evening sale at Sotheby’s since one in May 2015 that took in $368 million.

http://www.artnews.com/2019/05/15/sothebys-imp-mod-monet-meules-record/

Hans Hofmann

BEFORE WORKS CAN REACH THE DAZZLING HEIGHTS OF THE AUCTION WORLD, THEY MUST FIRST BE ACQUIRED BY PRIVATE COLLECTORS AND THAT TAKES CAREFUL DELIBERATION, INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE AS WELL AS THE GOOD FORTUNE OF A GREAT EYE AND/OR A GREAT ADVISOR.

TODAY, THE LRFA BLOG IS DELIGHTED TO HAVE SOTHEBY’S SPECIALIST, SENIOR VP, COURTNEY KREMERS, TO SHARE HER ASTUTE INSIGHTS ON THE ART OF COLLECTING.

COURTNEY, WELCOME BACK! THE LRFA BLOG IS VERY HAPPY TO HAVE YOU HERE.

SOME COLLECTORS, SUCH AS THE MUGRABIS,  FOCUS ON A HANDFUL OF ARTISTS, BUYING NUMEROUS EXAMPLES OF WORK FROM ALL PERIODS OF THE ARTIST’S CAREER, THUS CONTROLLING TO SOME EXTENT THE MARKET FOR THE WORK?

WHAT IN YOUR OPINION ARE THE ADVANTAGES AND THE DISADVANTAGES?

There is a big difference between trying to control an artist’s market, by acquiring a significant number of works, and collecting an artist in depth. The pros/cons of this strategy are no different than having undiversified risk in any other asset class. It is high risk, high reward.

Lucio Fontana

WHEN YOU ARE WORKING WITH A RELATIVELY NEW AND UNSEASONED COLLECTOR, WHAT IS THE BEST ADVICE THAT YOU CAN GIVE THEM?

Collecting involves a careful balance of restraint and gut. At the beginning, the formula should be weighted toward restraint and research, but as you develop a real eye, gut becomes a crucial part of the equation.

HOW DO YOU EDUCATE THE POTENTIAL COLLECTOR IN THE ART OF COLLECTING? WHAT ARE THE PRIMARY CRITERIA AND GUIDELINES DO YOU GIVE THEM?

It isn’t only about buying what you love. For an unseasoned collector, that advice can be a recipe for disaster, or at the very least, for overpaying. The word, “love”, is also confusing to collectors, because what does that mean when it comes to art? Your relationship with an object can grow from something that first would be described as discomfort, because it gets under your skin, stays with you, challenges something you thought you knew. In other words, the reaction to a great object doesn’t always start out as positive experience in a traditional sense, but it can evolve into that. Aside from the gut reaction you feel, which is what makes collecting so emotionally rewarding, you should always ask questions and understand what you are buying, how the work fits into the artist’s overall body of work, what the condition is, which galleries support the artist, which museums have shown the artist, etc. The list of questions is long and you should consider the answers to each one.

Sam Francis

YOU WORKED FOR KIM HIERSTON, WHOM I LIKE AND ADMIRE, IN HER ART ADVISORY FIRM.  WHAT WERE YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES?

Tons of research, among other things. Kim is extremely thorough and disciplined about every artwork she puts forward for a collector’s consideration. It was an information gathering operation first, art advisory second; you can’t advise unless you have all the facts. We spent a lot of time reviewing the artworks on offer through galleries, at art fairs, and in the auctions, and then thinking about how those works might fit into a particular client’s collection, and if so, what the right price was. Once an acquisition was made, we handled all the back end logistics that come with building an art collection – insurance, shipping, framing, conservation. It was a soup to nuts job.

George Condo

WHAT WERE THE MOST IMPORTANT LESSONS YOU LEARNED WHEN WORKING AS AN ADVISOR?  YOU MUST INTERACT WITH A GREAT MANY ADVISORS NOW, AS A SPECIALIST AT SOTHEBY’S. WHAT CHARACTERIZES THE BEST AND THE WORST OF THEM?

There are advisors who do their own research and who spend a considerable amount of time looking at art and understanding the objects, and then there are advisors who just repeat what they hear elsewhere. The parrots are just that, parrots.

NB- THE WORKS ILLUSTRATED IN THIS BLOG (EXCEPT THE MONET) ARE FORTHCOMING LOTS IN THE SOTHEBY’S CONTEMPORARY DAY SALE, ON FRIDAY, MAY 17th.

IN OUR NEXT LRFA BLOG, COURTNEY WILL SPEAK ABOUT LIFE AT SOTHEBY’S IN THIS AGE OF COLLECTING. WE CAN’T WAIT!

Welcome to Lisson New York with gallery director Claus Robenhagen

CLAUS ROBENHAGEN
LISSON GALLERY
photo credit: Max Logsdail

LISSON GALLERY, FOUNDED IN LONDON IN 1967 BY NICHOLAS LOGSDAIL,  IS ONE OF THE MOST  INFLUENTIAL AND RESPECTED INTERNATIONAL GALLERIES SPECIALIZING IN CONTEMPORARY ART. SINCE ITS INCEPTION, LISSON HAS SUPPORTED AND DEVELOPED THE CAREERS OF ARTISTS WHO HAVE TRULY TRANSFORMED OUR AESTHETIC AND INTELLECTUAL UNDERSTANDING OF ART. IN ANTICIPATION OF FRIEZE NEW YORK, AND THE NEW YORK AUCTION SEASON,  LISSON GALLERY NEW YORK IN CHELSEA OPENS TO THE PUBLIC NEXT MONDAY, MAY 2ND, WITH AN EXTRAORDINARY INAUGURAL EXHIBITION OF WORKS BY THE LEGENDARY CARMEN HERRERA, SOON TO BE HONORED WITH A RETROSPECTIVE AT THE WHITNEY MUSEUM.

http://www.lissongallery.com/

Lisson Gallery
New York

 

THE BEAUTIFUL NEW CHELSEA SPACE LOCATED AT 504 WEST 24th STREET , FLOODED WITH NATURAL LIGHT AND DESIGNED BY STUDIO MDA AND STUDIO CHRISTIAN WASSMAN, IS HOUSED IN A NEW BUILDING LOCATED UNDER THE HIGH LINE THAT CONNECTS 24th TO 23rd STREET. ITS ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN HONOR THE FOUNDATIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE HIGH LINE AND THE EXISTING PARK STRUCTURE.

Lisson Gallery
504 East 24th Street
New York, NY

http://www.lissongallery.com/news/lisson-gallery-new-york-to-open-on-3-may-2016

IN ANTICIPATION OF LISSON NEW YORK, THE LRFA BLOG HAS GREAT PLEASURE IN INTRODUCING MY FRIEND AND COLLEAGUE, CLAUS ROBENHAGEN. CLAUS PROVIDES A RICH PERSPECTIVE ON THE LONDON ART MARKET AND A DEPTH OF KNOWLEDGE AND ENTHUSIASM FOR THE VITAL ARTISTS THE GALLERY REPRESENTS.

Carmen Herrera

CLAUS, THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTION TO THE LRFA BLOG. I ALWAYS LOOK FORWARD TO WORKING WITH YOU, YOUR PROFESSIONALISM AND UNFLAGGING KINDNESS AND PERSEVERANCE.

HOW DID YOU FIRST BECOME INTERESTED IN PURSUING A CAREER IN THE ARTS?

While I was growing up parents took me to galleries and museums – I always thought these were important places for education and reflection.

WHAT WERE YOUR ACADEMIC PURSUITS? WHERE THEY IN THE AREA OF ART OR OTHER FIELDS?

I studied art history at the University of Copenhagen.

YOU WORKED FOR OVER A DECADE AT GALLERI NICOLAI WALLNER IN COPENHAGEN. IS THIS WHERE YOU GREW UP AND WENT TO SCHOOL?

My family is from the Northern part of Denmark – Aalborg, while the city is mostly known for industry, it does have a beautiful art museum designed by Finnish architect Alvar Aalto in the 1960s.

Kunsten Museum of Modern Art
Aalborg

WHAT WAS THE SCOPE OF YOUR EXPERIENCE AS A DIRECTOR AT NICOLAI WALLNER AND HOW WOULD YOU CHARACTERIZE THE ROSTER OF ARTISTS THE GALLERY REPRESENTED?

The gallery opened in 1993 and at the core of the program was this wonderful group of Danish artists who true to their time work in a quite activist, engaging manner.

Jakob Kolding
Galleri Nicolai Wallner

This could take the form of art with a societal agenda like in the works of Jakob Kolding or a more personal approach found in the videos of Peter Land. Obviously the program expanded since then and has also come to include older, international artists like Dan Graham, Richard Tuttle.

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
Denmark

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THE DANISH ART SCENE AND CULTURAL ACTIVITIES IN COPENHAGEN?

There are a number of great art institutions in Denmark with Louisiana Museum of Modern Art as the most famous. Copenhagen is small and the art scene reflects that – however I do feel things are changing. There is now a wonderful Nordic art fair CHART happening in August that brings in a number of international visitors. http://chartartfair.com/

CHART ART FAIR
August 26 – August 28, 2016
The Courtyard of Kunshal Charlottenburg during the fair.

CLAUS ROBENHAGEN, OF LISSON GALLERY, IS AN EXTREMELY WELL-INFORMED AND PERCEPTIVE GALLERIST. PLEASE DO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF HIS PRESENCE ON THE LRFA BLOG AND DIRECT ANY QUESTIONS TO US ABOUT THE LONDON GALLERY SCENE AND THE INTERNATIONAL ART MARKET.

THANK YOU ALL FOR FOLLOWING THE LRFA BLOG!

The art of Installation Art at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery

Tomas Saraceno
Installation View

INSTALLATION ART IS SITE-SPECIFIC, A  THREE-DIMENSIONAL WORK SIGNIFICANT IN SCALE THAT TRANSFORMS OUR PERCEPTION OF A SPACE. THE TERM GAINED CURRENCY IN THE 1960s TO DESCRIBE AN ARTIST’S METAMORPHOSIS OF AN INTERIOR, OFTEN FOR A TEMPORARY PERIOD OF TIME, CHARACTERIZED BY THE ARTWORK’S PHYSICAL DOMINATION OF THE ENTIRE SPACE. INSTALLATION ART  INVITES THE SPECTATOR TO LITERALLY ENTER INTO THE  WORK OF ART, OFTEN ENGAGING NOT ONLY THE VIEWER’S SENSE OF SIGHT BUT OFTEN HEARING AND SMELL.

ONE OF THE EARLIEST INSTALLATIONS WAS YVES KLEIN’S THE VOID IN PARIS AT GALERIE IRIS CLERT,  A 1958 PRESENTATION, RADICAL FOR ITS TIME, OF AN EMPTY WHITE INTERIOR IN A COMMERCIAL GALLERY. ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CONCEPTUAL SPECTRUM, A YEAR LATER THE SAME GALLERY WAS TRANSFORMED BY ARMAN’S FULLNESS, WHEN THE ARTIST CRAMMED THE SPACE WITH RUBBISH SO THAT THE WORK COULD ONLY BE VIEWED THROUGH THE STOREFRONT WINDOW. 

 

IN NEW YORK, EARLY INSTALLATIONS INCLUDE JIM DINE’S THE HOUSE AND OLDENBURG’S THE STREET. IN APRIL, 1966, AT LEO CASTELLI GALLERY, ANDY WARHOL CREATED TWO SEPARATE INSTALLATIONS: A ROOM FILLED WITH SILVER HELIUM PILLOWS, SILVER CLOUDS, ANOTHER COVERED WITH HIS COW WALLPAPER, BOTH CHALLENGING OUR PRECONCEPTIONS OF THE NATURE OF ART AND APPROPRIATE MATERIALS.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65obeVlgD9E

 

SINCE ITS INCEPTION, TANYA BONAKDAR GALLERY HAS DEMONSTRATED AN IMPRESSIVE COMMITMENT TO THE CHALLENGES OF CONTEMPORARY ART AND THE GALLERY ARTISTS IT REPRESENTS WITH ITS DEDICATION TO EXHIBITING AND PLACING SITE-SPECIFIC INSTALLATION WORKS IN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS AND MUSEUMS. THE GALLERY, LOCATED IN THE HEART OF CHELSEA AT 521 WEST 21st STREET,  PROVIDES ARTISTS WITH THE TRUE MEANING OF ARTISTIC LICENSE BY SUPPORTING THEIR NON-COMMERCIAL PROJECTS THAT EXPAND THE POSSIBILITIES OF SCALE AND SCOPE. http://www.tanyabonakdargallery.com/

IN TODAY’S LRFA BLOG,  RENEE COPPOLA, GALLERY DIRECTOR, WILL DOCUMENT SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS IN THE TWENTY YEAR HISTORY OF THE GALLERY EXHIBITIONS.

Charles Long
Untitled
2010
aqua-resin fiberglass and latex paint over steel with found objects
51 x 51 x 32 inches; 129.5 x 129.5 x 81.3 cm
DETAIL

TANYA BONAKDAR OPENED THE GALLERY IN 1994 ON PRINCE STREET IN SOHO. WHO WERE THE ARTISTS THAT MADE UP THE OPENING ROSTER OF THE GALLERY? HOW DID TANYA BECOME INTERESTED AND INVOLVED IN THEIR WORK AND WHAT PROMPTED HER TO OPEN A GALLERY?

Many of the artists who were showing at the gallery in the early years have enjoyed a long, productive relationship with Tanya and the gallery. Uta Barth, Charles Long, Olafur Eliasson, Mat Collishaw, and Ernesto Neto are just some of the artists who were shown in Soho during the 1990s and still exhibit with us today. Tanya is very interested in showing international artists, as they provide a great range of perspectives and different ways of seeing the world.  She has been consistent in this respect, and the gallery’s roster of artists represents a very diverse group.

Olafur ELIASSON
Your now is my surroundings
2000
Skylight, mirror, concrete tiles, drain pipe, drywall, insulation
Installation, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, 2000

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS OF PAST EXHIBITIONS THAT HAVE DRAWN THE GREATEST CRITICAL, MUSEUM AND COLLECTOR RECOGNITION?

So many exhibitions have been well-received by the public and press.  Sarah Sze’s first show at the gallery in 2010 was incredibly popular and led directly to her Venice Bienniale nomination and ultimate commission.  Olafur Eliasson’s show at the gallery in 2000 won the Art Critics of America Award for Best Gallery Show of the Year.  More recently, Ernesto Neto’s exhibition of interactive, crocheted sculptures in 2012 generated great interest from curators, and from there Neto was invited to present a major solo exhibition at the Guggenheim Bilbao.  So it is true that the gallery shows have historically been a catalyst for many major exhibitions.

ERNESTO NETO
SLOW IIS GOOOD
Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York
14 APRIL – 25 MAY 2012

THE GALLERY ROSTER IS EXTREMELY DIVERSE REPRESENTING MORE THAN THIRTY ARTISTS AND COMMITTED TO SHOWING WORK IN A LARGE DIVERSITY OF MEDIA. I HAVE ALWAYS BEEN IMPRESSED BY THE SUPPORT THE GALLERY SHOWS TO ITS ARTISTS IN EXHIBITING WORKS THAT ARE DEMANDING IN TERMS OF INSTALLATION AND PLACEMENT. WHO ARE SOME OF THE ARTISTS THAT FOCUS ON INSTALLATION? WHAT IS THE MARKET FOR THESE WORKS?

Our last exhibition (January 8 – February 14, 2015) is work by Susan Philipsz, an artist best known for often very large-scale indoor and outdoor audio installations.  For our show, Susan will present an immersive, 24-channel sound installation, inspired by 1930s émigré artists, Hollywood film scores, and McCarthy-era censorship.  (This piece was originally shown in the large Hamburger Bahnhof space in Berlin.)  Although on the surface the work seems immense – requiring the space of an entire room and somewhat specialized audio equipment, there is actually great versatility to her pieces that I believe make them quite easy and adaptable and suited for many different types of spaces.  However, it is true that there are many works of art that are large-scale and require much more space than your average painting or domestically-scaled sculpture.  These installations are certainly well-suited for museums and institutions, yet there are also some very passionate and committed collectors who don’t mind devoting a room in their home or office to a major work!

THE GALLERY MOVED TO ITS CURRENT LOCATION AT 521 WEST 21^ST IN 1998. IT WAS AMONG THE FIRST TO EXODUS SOHO AND DEFINE CHELSEA AS THE DOMINANT GALLERY AREA IN NEW YORK. WHAT DID THE NEW SPACE ALLOW THAT THE ORIGINAL SOHO SPACE COULD NOT?

Our move coincided with a period of tremendous growth for the gallery, and Chelsea offered the gallery a possibility to continue with this trajectory of expansion.

OLAFUR ELIASSON
Your engagement sequence
Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York
28 APRIL – 27 MAY 2006

IN 2006, THE GALLERY EXPANDED EVEN FURTHER, ACQUIRING 5000 SQUARE FEET OF STREET LEVEL SPACE. THIS DOUBLED THE SIZE AND CERTAINLY ENHANCED THE GALLERY EXHIBITION CAPABILITIES AND ITS PROGRAMMING. SPECIFICALLY, WHAT ARE SOME OF THE EXHIBITIONS THAT THIS NEW EXPANDED SPACE MADE POSSIBLE?

The first exhibition in the new downstairs space was Olafur Eliasson’s Your Engagement Sequence and really represented how the renovation allowed for new opportunities in regard to the program.  For example, that artwork used light within a totally darkened room, which the artist viewed as an opportunity to explore what he calls the “fifth dimension” of an individualized perspective of the dimensions in space. The enhanced size of the gallery helped make the work even more successful.

IN OUR NEXT LRFA BLOG, RENEE WILL DISCUSS FUTURE EXHIBITIONS WE CAN ANTICIPATE AS WELL AS  A RECENT ADDITION TO THE GALLERY PROGRAMMING -E/I DISCUSSIONS- AN EDUCATIONAL AND INFORMATIVE YEAR LONG SERIES OF SATURDAY TALKS.

I APPRECIATE YOUR COMMENTS AND QUESTIONS AND, MOST OF ALL, YOUR READERSHIP!

 

Tis the season! very special gifts culled from Ursus Books by Doug Flamm

ARTISTS’ BOOKS ARE MADE AND CONCEIVED BY ARTISTS AND COME IN MANY DIFFERENT SHAPES AND SIZES. DOUG FLAMM, OF URSUS BOOKS, A NEW YORK BASED BOOKSTORE SPECIALIZING IN ART BOOKS AND ILLUSTRATED BOOKS, HAS A DEEP KNOWLEDGE OF AND PASSION FOR THIS UNIQUE AREA OF PUBLISHING. PRIOR TO JOINING URSUS,  DOUG WAS AN INDEPENDENT BOOKSELLER, DEALING IN THESE EXTRAORDINARY BOOKS THAT RESONATE WITH ART AND BOOK CONNOISSEURS ALIKE.

URSUS BOOKS PROVIDES AN INTERNATIONAL CLIENTELE WITH A COMPREHENSIVE SELECTION OF ARTISTS’ BOOKS, REFERENCE BOOKS, EXCEPTIONAL COPIES OF RARE BOOKS IN ALL FIELDS AND FINE ANTIQUE DECORATIVE PRINTS.  LOCATED ON THE THIRD FLOOR OF 699 MADISON AVENUE AT 63rd STREET, URSUS IS AN INVITING AND WELL-STOCKED NICHE WITH A WELCOMING AND INFORMED STAFF. http://www.ursusbooks.com/

IN HIS ORIGINAL CONTRIBUTION TO THE LRFA BLOG, DOUG EXPLAINED THE REVOLUTIONARY INFLUENCE THAT ARTIST ED RUSCHA HAD ON ARTISTS’ BOOKS (FORMERLY IN THE FORMAT OF LIMITED EDITIONS BY 20th CENTURY MASTERS SUCH AS PICASSO AND MATISSE, OFTEN CONTAINING AN ORIGINAL ETCHING OR LITHOGRAPHY BY THE ARTIST.)

Ed Ruscha turned this category on its head. He changed the definition of what an artist’s book is. He conceived of ideas and projects using the commonplace technology of off-set printing. He selected very banal subjects (as he does in his paintings and works on paper) – parking lots, gas stations, swimming pools, and produced these images in a rudimentary way that parallels his artistic genre. In so doing, he created extraordinary objects that don’t fall within the traditions of livres d’artiste but have a value and vitality very much their own and liberated this form of artistic invention.

 

Douglas Flamm
URSUS BOOKS

 

 

I WAS DELIGHTED WHEN DOUG AGREED TO GATHER TOGETHER A WONDERFUL SELECTION OF ARTISTS’ BOOKS CURRENTLY AVAILABLE AT URSUS – A MEMORABLE GIFT FOR THE HOLIDAY SEASON OR A GREAT ADDITION TO ONE’S OWN LIBRARY YEAR ROUND.

 

Olafur Eliasson

ELIASSON, Olafur. Your House.

908 pp. Illustrated by Olafur Eliasson using computer-aided laser die-cuts. Oblong folio, 285 x 440 mm, bound in original cloth. New York: Library Council of the Museum of Modern Art, 2006. (#157176) $18,500.00

Conceived by Olafur Eliasson as part of the Contemporary Editions series at The Museum of Modern Art, this book is one of the more exciting new achievements in book making in the 21st Century. The subject of the book is Eliasson’s house in Denmark that is rendered in a vertical cross-section through an elaborate laser die-cut process of each page. The format of the book allows Eliasson the space to fully realize his idea on a scale of 85:1, so that each leaf corresponds to 2.2 centimeters of the actual house.

Eliasson summarizes the experience of viewing this book, “Reading a book is both a physical and a mental activity. It is like walking through a house, following the layout of the rooms with your body and mind: the movement from one room to another, or from one part of the book to another, constitutes an experiential narrative that is physical and conscious at the same time.”

Signed by Eliasson on the colophon. One of an edition of 225 copies. Condition is as new.

Born in 1967, Olafur Eliasson is a Danish-Icelandic artist whose sculptural and installation works are deeply informed by culture, ecology, and the nature of human perception. His works are inspired by his investigation of the relationship between subjective perception and natural phenomena. Perception, according to Eliasson, is as much an immediate sensory experience as it is rooted within the cultural framework of our memory.

Among the recurring themes in Eliasson’s works are light, ephemerality, and the environment. Such projects like The Weather Project (2003) in which an ecological model is placed into an institutional model frame of the Tate Modern, are fundamental rejections of object-based art. In creating environments and situations that engage our most basic sensory responses, Eliasson’s works democratize the experience of art. Participation and the act of viewing brings Eliasson’s works to life as he once explained, “I like to think that my work can return criticality to the viewer as a tool for negotiating and reevaluating the environment—and that this can pave the way for a more causal relationship with our surroundings.”

LEWITT, Sol. Complex Forms.

Comprised of four (4) large double-folded colour screenprints, 355 x 1420 mm (14 x 56 inches). Square folio, 360 x 360 mm, bound in thick paper over board, lettered spine and both covers with original colour screenprints by Lewitt. Preserved in black cloth folding box. Zurich: Annemarie Verna & New York: Brooke Alexander, 1990. (#156784) $30,000.00

Sol LeWitt

Edition limited to 15 copies signed and numbered by Lewitt. These four original coloured screenprints printed by Watanabe Studio in New York capture on paper the amazing Lewitt series of wall paintings that the artist conceived in 1987-88. Complex Forms represents Lewitt’s experiments with fracturing the cube into component parts. The application of four colours juxtaposed in variations of hue and saturation further expands the visual experimentation.

 

A key factor to emphasize is that Lewitt’s wall paintings were executed directly on the wall for a limited duration, usually a month or two. When a given exhibition was over, many of his creations were not sold and carried away like a painting or sculpture. They were simply painted over and permanently lost except for the original drawings and/or colour gouaches.

Sol Lewitt

“The essence of Lewitt’s work is the original idea as formulated in the artist’s mind. Because it emphasizes conceiving rather than implementing, this kind of art has often been referred to as conceptual art” (Andrea Miller-Keller, Sol Lewitt: Twenty-Five Years of Wall Paintings 1968-1993 in the exhibition catalogue of Addison Gallery, University of Washington Press, 1993, p.37). Condition is “as new.”

Sol LeWitt, whose deceptively simple geometric sculptures and drawings and ecstatically colored and jazzy wall paintings established him as a lodestar of modern American art. Sol LeWitt was born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1928. As a child, he attended art classes at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford. LeWitt completed a BFA at Syracuse University in 1949 and then served in the United States Army in Korea and Japan during the Korean War. In 1953 he moved to New York, where he took classes at the Cartoonists and Illustrators School and did production work for Seventeen magazine. LeWitt subsequently worked in graphic design in the office of architect I. M. Pei from 1955 to 1956. During the first half of the 1960s, LeWitt supported himself by working as a night receptionist at the Museum of Modern Art, where he met future critic Lucy Lippard and fellow artists Dan Flavin, Robert Mangold, and Robert Ryman.\

LeWitt is regarded as a founder of both Minimal and Conceptual art. Inspired by Eadweard Muybridge’s sequential photographs of animals and people in motion, LeWitt incorporated seriality in his work to imply the passage of time or narrative. Two important essays by LeWitt, in particular, defined the new movement: “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art” (1967) and “Sentences on Conceptual Art” (1969). The earlier text proclaimed: “The idea becomes a machine that makes the art.” He began making wall drawings in 1968. The earliest consisted of pencil lines—in systematized arrangements of verticals, horizontals, and diagonals on a 45-degree angle—drawn directly on the walls. Later wall drawings included circles and arcs and colored pencil. LeWitt would eventually use teams of assistants to create such works.

In the early 1960s, LeWitt made paintings and reliefs before concentrating on three-dimensional works based on the cube in the mid-1960s. For these, he used precise, measured formats such as grids and modules, and systematically developed variations. His methods were mathematically based, defined by language, or created through random processes. He took up similar approaches in works on paper.

RUSCHA, EDWARD. Every Building on the Sunset Strip.

Every Building on the Sunset Strip
Edward Ruscha

Accordian fold artist’s book illustrated in b&w. 8vo, wraps preserved in a new cloth box. 1966. (#105867) $7,500.00
First Edition, first printing. Photomontage showing contiguously every building on both sides of the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles.

Sunset Strip
Ed Ruscha

Approximately 22 feet long when folded out to its full length. Ruscha identifies street numbers and the names of cross streets. The folded accordion paper of Ruscha’s “Sunset Strip” has an extra 2″ flap of paper folded over behind the last page, therefore making this a true first edition. The final Jaguar building is pictured alone on this last half page. All other editions are cut evenly on the final page, including later printings that say “first edition” in front. Apparently the printer made an error in estimating the proper folding length of the printed paper the first time, but this was corrected in subsequent editions. Chip to silver mylar of slipcase and slight crease to spine of book, else a very good copy.

Sunset Strip
Ed Ruscha

Ed Ruscha’s photography, drawing, painting, and artist books record the shifting emblems of American life in the last half century. His deadpan representations of Hollywood logos, stylized gas stations, and archetypal landscapes distill the imagery of popular culture into a language of cinematic and typographical codes.  The ironic choice of words and phrases that are a dominant feature in his work draw upon the moments of incidental ambiguity implicit in the interplay between the word and image. Although his images are undeniably rooted in the language of a piercing observation of  American life, his elegantly conceived art addresses complex and widespread issues regarding the appearance and function of the world  at large and our transient place within it.

Ruscha’s artist books have proved to be deeply influential. They have widely influential other artists who have adopted their disaffected look. Their influence also extends to architects: Denise Scott Brown, Robert Venturi and Frank Gehry, who has known Ruscha since the 1960s. Inspired by the unassuming books that he found on street stalls during a trip to Europe, in 1962 Ruscha published his first artist book, Twentysix Gasoline Stations under his own imprint, National Excelsior Press. 

MORE SPECIAL ADDITIONS TO YOUR HOLIDAY GIFT LIST IN OUR NEXT LRFA BLOG.

 

 

Things I Can’t Live Without: Curator Jason Ysenburg on the future of the Vanmoerkerke collection

The Vanmoerkerke Collection
Ostend, Belgium

 

THE VANMOERKERKE COLLECTION OF CONTEMPORARY ART IS EMBLEMATIC OF THE DYNAMIC ART SCENE THAT HAS DEVELOPED IN BELGIUM AT A TIME WHEN THE COUNTRY IS GARNERING ATTENTION AS AN INTERNATIONAL SOCIOPOLITICAL AND CULTURAL PRESENCE. AS A PIVOTAL DECISION-MAKING CENTER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, BRUSSELS ENJOYS AN INFLUX OF DIPLOMATS, PUBLIC OFFICIALS AND OTHER PROFESSIONALS THAT HAS REVITALIZED THE CITY’S CULTURAL LIFE AND INSPIRED A SIGNIFICANT SURGE OF COLLECTING OF CONTEMPORARY ART. BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES AND FAVORABLE TAX LAWS ON CAPITAL GAINS AND INHERITANCE  HAVE FURTHER SUPPORTED THE CONTEMPORARY ART SCENE.

MUCH OF THE VANMOERKERKE COLLECTION IS HOUSED IN A RENOVATED INDUSTRIAL BUILDING NEAR THE OLD AIRPORT IN OSTEND, A RESORT TOWN ON THE BELGIAN COAST, AND IN AN ANNEX BUILT IN 2010 FOR MORE SIZABLE ARTWORKS. MARK VANMOERKERKE IS CONSTANTLY CULLING AND EDITING HIS COLLECTION. IN 2008, HE SOLD 500 WORKS AT PHILLIPS, LONDON TO SHARPEN ITS FOCUS ON POST-CONCEPTUAL EUROPEAN AND AMERICAN ART. IN AN INTERVIEW WITH ART AND AUCTION, POSTED ON SEPTEMBER 1, 2012, MARK VANMOERKERKE EXPLAINS, “IF YOU’RE A CRAZY COLLECTOR, YOU RUN OUT OF SPACE.” http://www.artcollection.be/

VANMOERKERKE AND MANY KINDRED PRIVATE BELGIAN COLLECTORS ARE OPENING THEIR PRIVATE EXHIBITION SPACES TO THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY OF COLLECTORS, GALLERISTS, DEALERS AND MUSEUM CURATORS WHO TRAVEL THE WORLD TO ATTEND ART FAIRS AND VIEW CONTEMPORARY ART.

CURATOR/DEALER, JASON YSENBURG, RECENTLY APPOINTED DIRECTOR AT GAGOSIAN GALLERY FOLLOWING A LONG TENURE AS CO-DIRECTOR OF THE REVERED SONNABEND GALLERY, WAS A NATURAL CHOICE FOR MARK VANMOERKERKE’S BIANNUAL INVITATION TO CURATE AN EXHIBITION FROM HIS HOLDINGS.  JASON’S ANALYSIS OF THE WORK, AS IT SPANS A SENSIBILITY THAT RANGES FROM THE MINIMAL TO THE COMPLEX, IS ACCOMPANIED BY A MARVELOUS ESSAY “THINGS I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT” THAT PROVIDES A CLARIFICATION AND PERSPECTIVE ON THE TWO AESTHETIC INSTINCTS THAT CHARACTERIZE THIS COLLECTOR’S PASSION.

IN CLOSING, JASON WRITES:

Irony and the minimalist impulse

Ed Ruscha
“Step on No Pets”

Much of Ed Ruscha’s work could easily have been included in Building 1. His emphasis on formal serialization aligns with that of the Bechers. His insistent repetition of structures, whether gas stations, vacant lots, pools, or parking lots, serves to erase the temporality of the imagine in much the same way that we come to understand in the Becher’s typologies. However, there is a conflicting minimalist impulse in his work, which like Stingel, is self-consciously ironic.

Using a minimal number of ideas within each individual piece, Ruscha, can ironically engage the viewer. For instance, “The Teepees” and “Step On No Pets” critique two different types of Romanticism. “The Teepees” takes on the romantic vision of the American West in the manner of Edward Curtis’s photography. Curtis and others like him manipulated photographic representation to create a picture of a way of life in the American West that never really existed. “The Teepees”, by contrast, captures an historic sense of impending doom: Western settlers on the verge of destroying Native Americans and their culture. And yet, does it? Does the image totally escape the genre in which it stands in critical relation? Is it actually just another Romantic citation of an iconic Native American image?

Ed Ruscha
“The Teepees”

“Step On No Pets” sets out to tame a cornerstone of Romantic philosophy: the Kantian sublime. The towering mountain peaks, a quintessential example of how the sublime overwhelms the individual viewing subject, in Ruscha’s painting is overwritten with a silly anagram that diminishes the viewer’s feeling of powerless. Or does it? Are we still drawn primarily to the large image of the mountain, almost failing to see the words or notice their anagramic form? Neither image entirely escapes the generic moorings of Romanticism. Wedded to the trope of irony as we are, we are never quite sure whether or not we should take these images seriously.

 

Louise Lawler
“Not Cindy”

The viewer’s memory should also pull Lawler back into Building Two, alongside the Ruschas. Her work, “Not Cindy” frames Ruscha’s “Humans” in the context of a woman sitting in a chair with her back to the viewer. Ruscha’s painting plays on the word “Humans” against a very non-human backdrop of silk taffeta. With its open-ended title, Lawler’s image takes Ruscha’s word play at its word. Is the person depicted in the photograph NOT Cindy Sherman, despite the resemblance? Or is the NOT Cindy a reference to the fact the painting depicted in the photograph is NOT by any Cindy but rather is a work by Ed Ruscha? The memory trace of Lawler’s image, re-contextualized in Building Two, could be re-title as “Not Ruscha”. Lawler makes it possible to frame an ironic image ironically.

Singularity and the force of form

Banks Violette needs only one object to overwhelm the room and the viewer: “Pentastar”. The work of art looms over us, practically forcing out anyone from the room. Its massive form is inescapable; we almost can’t look away. The subtitle of the work, “in the style of Demons”, evokes the menacing nature of minimalism and allows Violette to emphasize that the minimalist is not also the minimally impactful. Strangely enough, we could call the work perhaps even sublime. The singular emphasis on the force of size, evocative of Richard Serra’s sculptures, creates new spaces that force us to rethink our relationship not only to the art object but also to space itself.

Banks Violette
Pentastar, 2008
back view

The Future of Collection…

These are the things the collection can’t live without today. However, the continual play of the desire for Maximalism alongside the desire for Minimalism will assure that there is some tomorrow when the collection will be different, a yet to be determined collection of things I can’t live without tomorrow.

CHRISTMAS IS AROUND THE CORNER! HARD TO BELIEVE SINCE THANKSGIVING FEELS JUST A TURKEY LEG AWAY. START MAKING YOUR LIST (AND CHECKING IT TWICE)….

FOR THOSE YOU HOLD NEAR AND DEAR, CONSIDER A VERY SPECIAL GIFT OF A UNIQUE ARTIST’S BOOK. UNLIKE AN ART BOOK, A CATALOGUE OR MONOGRAPH THAT DOCUMENTS WORKS MADE IN ANOTHER MEDIUM (PAINTING, SCULPTURE, PHOTOGRAPHY), ARTISTS’ BOOKS ARE CONCEIVED BY THE ARTIST AS ARTWORKS IN THEIR OWN RIGHT.

IN THE NEXT LRFA BLOG, I WELCOME THE EXPERTISE OF BOOK DEALER, DOUG FLAMM, WHO WILL INFORM US OF SOME OF THE VERY SPECIAL PUBLICATIONS THAT ARE CURRENTLY AVAILABLE AT URSUS BOOKS AND WOULD GRACE ANY CHRISTMAS STOCKING!

UNTIL THEN…

 

Seeing the Mind Behind The Art: the psychology of perception

Arts and Mind Lab
Boston, Massachusetts

ELLEN WINNER, DEPARTMENT HEAD AND CHAIR OF PSYCHOLOGY AT BOSTON UNIVERSITY, FOUNDED THE ARTS AND MIND LAB TO EXPLORE PSYCHOLOGY AS IT RELATES TO THE ARTS- NOT ONLY VISUAL BUT ALSO THEATER, LITERATURE AND MUSIC – AND TO BRING THE STUDY OF CREATIVE ENDEAVORS INTO THE MAINSTREAM OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH.  Seeing The Mind Behind the Art PROVIDES CONCRETE DOCUMENTATION THAT PEOPLE OF VARYING DEGREES OF AESTHETIC SOPHISTICATION ARE ABLE TO DISTINGUISH UNLABELED PAINTINGS BY ABSTRACT ARTISTS FROM SUPERFICIALLY SIMILAR PAINTINGS BY CHILDREN, CHIMPS AND ELEPHANTS. EVEN INDIVIDUALS WITH NO ARTS TRAINING RECOGNIZE THE GREATER TALENT AND CREATIVE INTELLIGENCE EVIDENT IN THE ARTISTS’ COMPOSITIONS.

Ellen Winner and the Arts and Mind Lab, Boston

IN THREE FOLLOW UP STUDIES, NOW UNDER REVIEW, RESEARCH CONFIRMS AND EXTENDS THIS FINDING. EVEN YOUNG CHILDREN ARE ABLE TO MAKE THIS DISTINCTION. AS ELLEN STATES: “LABELS DO NOT OVERRIDE OUR PERCEPTION OF THE QUALITY OF THE WORK.”

 http://www.ellenwinner.com/artsmind-lab.html

TO CONTINUE:

…And what kinds of reasons do people give for choosing the works by the artists?

They say something very interesting. They talk about the greater mental work that went into the compositions by artists compared to the works by children and animals. They say that the artist works show more thinking, more planning, more intentionality. They infer a greater mind behind the artists’ works. That is why we called our paper “Seeing the Mind Behind the Art.”

In three follow-up studies, now under review, we confirm and extend this finding, including when the images are presented one by one rather than in pairs, and when people are just asked to decide for each image whether it was by a famous artist or a child or animal.

We have even found that young children can make this discrimination, and we have found that people look longer at the works by artists, and show greater pupil dilation when looking at the artist images.

So we conclude:

You, standing in the museum making disparaging comments, may think that a child could have created a work indistinguishable from the abstract expressionist painting you are looking at. But you are wrong. You actually see more than you know that you see in abstract art. You can tell if a painting is by a famous artist vs. by a child or animal. AND you will like the works by the artists better and you will judge these works to be better art.

And so, in reality, your kid could NOT have done that!

OTHER RESEARCH PROJECTS UNDER INVESTIGATION  BY THE ARTS AND MIND LAB INCLUDE:

How beliefs about the artist shape our evaluation of the art work.
We are examining how beliefs about the artist’s moral character, originality, and mental state shape (perhaps unconsciously) how children and adults respond to works of art. Thus far we are examining this question with respect to painting and film.

How hard is it to detect forgery in paintings?
We are examining how skilled lay adults are at detecting forgeries. Despite the prevalence of undetected forgery in the art world, we are finding that people are better than chance at telling which painting is the forgery and which is the original when the two are paired.

Attitudes about art.
Must great works of art be beautiful? Or are other criteria more important? We are exploring lay attitudes about what makes art great and exploring possible connections between attitudes about art and personality characteristics and political and social values.

I LOOK FORWARD TO SHARING THESE STUDIES WITH YOU. ELLEN, THANKS SO MUCH FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTION.

IN THE NEXT LRFA BLOG, I HAVE THE PLEASURE OF INTRODUCING JASON YSENBURG, SENIOR DIRECTOR AT GAGOSIAN GALLERY. JASON HAS BEEN A RESPECTED PRESENCE IN THE ART WORLD FOR SOME TIME, A CO-DIRECTOR OF SONNABEND GALLERY FOUNDED BY  THE LEGENDARY ILEANA SONNABEND, WITH HER SON, ANTONIO HOMEM. WHEN SONNABEND CLOSED THIS YEAR, JASON JOINED GAGOSIAN  GALLERY WHERE HE IS BASED PRIMARILY AT THE 24th STREET SPACE IN NEW YORK BUT ALSO WILL ACT IN A CURATORIAL CAPACITY AT GAGOSIAN’S MANY LOCATIONS.

LAST YEAR, JASON WAS INVITED TO CURATE AN EXHIBITION FROM THE WORKS IN THE ILLUSTRIOUS VANMOERKERKE COLLECTION, LOCATED IN OOSTENDE, BELGIUM, ONE OF THE FINEST PRIVATE COLLECTIONS OF CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS WORKING IN PAINTING, SCULPTURE, PHOTOGRAPHY AND VIDEO TODAY.

PLEASE JOIN US IN READING AND COMMENTING ON JASON YSENBURG’S EXHIBITION: THINGS I CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT. 

UNTIL THEN!

 

“my child could do that” – art psychologist Ellen Winner refutes that premise!

Arts and Mind Lab

 

 

THE ARTS AND MIND LAB, BASED IN BOSTON, STUDIES THE PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPONENTS OF INVOLVEMENT IN THE ARTS AS WELL AS OTHER ASPECTS OF CONCEPTUAL DEVELOPMENT. IN ESTABLISHING THIS UNIQUE RESEARCH CENTER, DIRECTOR DR. ELLEN WINNER, PROFESSOR AND CHAIR OF PSYCHOLOGY AT BOSTON COLLEGE, HAS COMBINED HER EARLY PASSION TO BECOME AN ARTIST AND STUDY AT THE PRESTIGIOUS SCHOOL OF THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS IN BOSTON WITH HER ACCOMPLISHMENTS IN THE FIELD OF DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY. ONE OF ELLEN’S PRIMARY AREAS OF CONCENTRATION FOCUSES ON THE CREATIVE PROCESS IN THE VISUAL ARTS THAT INCLUDES INVESTIGATION OF WHAT BROAD THINKING DISPOSITIONS ARE ACQUIRED BY STUDYING THE ARTS, HOW STUDENTS MAKE SENSE OF THE ARTS AND THE ROLE OF THE ARTS IN THEIR LIVES. https://www2.bc.edu/~winner/lab.html

I AM FASCINATED BY RECENT DEVELOPMENTS AND ADVANCES IN NEUROSCIENCE AND COGNITIVE SCIENCE. WE NOW HAVE SUCH A RICH IN-DEPTH LANDSCAPE OF HOW OUR BRAINS AND OUR EMOTIONAL LIVES FUNCTION AND INTERACT. MANY SCHOLARS IN AESTHETICS AGREE THAT THE “COGNITIVE REVOLUTION” HAS GREAT CONSEQUENCES FOR OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE CREATION, INTERPRETATION AND APPRECIATION OF ARTWORKS. NEW STUDIES ENLIGHTEN US ON THE WORKINGS OF THE MIND, PERCEPTION, AND THE EMOTIONAL IMPACT THAT THE INVESTIGATION OF ART AND AESTHETICS PROVIDES. THUS, IT IS A UNIQUE PRIVILEGE TO POST ELLEN’S COMPELLING ARTICLE ON OUR RESPONSE TO ART PRODUCED BY EITHER MASTERS OF PAINTINGS OR BY CHILDREN OR ANIMALS.

TO CONTINUE…

Here is the striking finding:

If people could not tell the difference, they should choose the artist images about 50% of the time (since there are only two choices for each item).

However, this is not what happened. Both art students and non-art students chose the artist images significantly more than chance in response to both questions.

So you don’t have to have any specialized arts knowledge to prefer the images by the artists and to recognize these are the better works in the pairs. And the fact that people value the artist works more tells us that they can tell the difference between the works by the artists and those by the outsider artists (children and animals).

But I haven’t told you the whole story. We actually made the task a bit more difficult. The first ten pairs people saw were presented unlabelled. Of course we never said that one of the images was by a famous artist and one by a child or animal. We just showed the images and asked our questions.

Then we tricked people. The next 20 pairs were labelled as “artist” and either “animal” or “child.” But in half the cases, we reversed the labels! The first pair below is what people saw in the correct label condition; the second pair below is what they saw in the reversed label condition. (No one saw the same painting in more than one labeling condition, but everyone saw the same 30 pairs of images.

 

Child Artist

 

Artist Child

 

What about judging how good the works were? For the art students, knowing whether it was by an artist or a child or animal made absolutely no difference. They judged the works by artists better and equally so in all three conditions, as you can see in by looking at the right hand side of this graph. All three bars are of equal height.

Charting the influence of a label

The story for non-art students was a little different. They were indeed influenced by the correct label. So they chose the Hans Hoffman more when it was labelled artist than when it was labelled child.

But they were not influenced by the wrong label! Look at the left side of the graph. Note that the gray bar for the non-art students is just as high as the white bar (the unlabelled condition). This means that when the Hoffman was labelled “child,” it had no influence on them. They still judged it better. The label could not override the perceived quality of the work.

IN OUR NEXT POSTING, ELLEN WILL DOCUMENT ADDITIONAL ASPECTS OF HER RESEARCH STUDY –  THE REASONS PEOPLE GIVE FOR WHAT THEY CHOSE. EVERYONE INVOLVED IN THE ART WORLD, WHETHER A COLLECTOR, DEALER OR CURATOR, IS ALWAYS CONTEMPLATING THE HOW AND WHY PEOPLE THINK AND RESPOND TO VARIOUS WORKS OF ART – THANK YOU, ELLEN,FOR YOUR INVALUABLE INSIGHT INTO THIS PROCESS.

AND THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR READING AND FOR YOUR COMMENTS AND QUESTIONS!

 

Luhring Augustine’s Lauren Wittels on the gallery’s future plans and the future of the art market

Charles Atlas, 2014
Digital Print
37 x 60 inches

 

LUHRING AUGUSTINE GALLERY HAS AN EXTRAORDINARY CURATORIAL HISTORY. IT HAS PROVIDED THE PUBLIC WITH MUSEUM QUALITY OVERVIEWS OF ARTISTS WHO HAVE GREATLY CONTRIBUTED TO OUR UNDERSTANDING OF 20th AND 21st CENTURY ART AND WHO HAVE PROVIDED AN ENORMOUS INSPIRATIONAL SPRINGBOARD FOR THOSE WORKING TODAY. SOLO EXHIBITIONS ACCOMPANIED BY SCHOLARLY CATALOGUES INCLUDE MARCEL DUCHAMP, GERHARD RICHTER, MARTIN KIPPENBERGER, AND MOST RECENTLY MICHELANGELO PISTOLETTO.  THESE EXHIBITIONS SET A HIGH STANDARD FOR THE CURRENT GALLERY PROGRAM THAT IS REFLECTED IN THE UNIQUE VISION AND CREATIVE INTENSITY OF THE ARTISTS THE GALLERY REPRESENTS TODAY.

http://www.luhringaugustine.com/

THIS MONTH’S GALLERY NEWSLETTER SERVES TO CONVEY THE SCALE AND SCOPE OF CURRENT INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITIONS OF LUHRING AUGUSTINE ARTISTS. TO NAME A FEW, GUIDO VAN DER WERVE’S “CULTURAL CARTOGRAPHIES: MAPPING” OPENS IN DECEMBER AT THE UTAH MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART, JANET CARDIFF AND GEORGE BURES MILLER AT ARoS AARHUS KUNSTMUSEUM IN DENMARK, AND THE ICELANDIC ARTIST RAGNAR KJARTANNSSON’S “S.S. HANGOVER”, SHOWN AT THE 55th VENICE BIENNALE,  WILL ‘NAVIGATE THE WATERS’ OF THE HIRSHHORN MUSEUM AND SCULPTURE GARDEN LATER THIS MONTH.

http://www.luhringaugustine.com/news/

Ragnar Kjartansson: The Visitors
February – March 2013

 

ONE OF THE MOST DEDICATED AND IMPASSIONED GALLERISTS WITH WHOM I HAVE THE PLEASURE OF WORKING IS LAUREN WITTELS, SENIOR DIRECTOR AT LUHRING AUGUSTINE. TODAY LAUREN WILL INFORM US OF THE GALLERY’S CURRENT AND FUTURE PLANS.

LAUREN, WELCOME BACK! WHO ARE SOME OF THE ARTISTS THAT ARE RELATIVELY NEW TO THE GALLERY? WHAT IS IT THAT EXCITES YOU ABOUT THEIR WORK? DO YOU SEE A CONTINUUM OF AESTHETIC SENSIBILITY BETWEEN SOME OF THE MORE ESTABLISHED ARTISTS THAT THE GALLERY REPRESENTS AND THE YOUNGER ONES AND, IF SO, IN WHAT WAYS?

THE ART WORLD, THE WHOLE WORLD, HAS BEEN GLOBALIZED. IN WHAT WAYS HAS IT AFFECTED THE BUSINESS OF THE GALLERY? DO YOU EXHIBIT IN MORE INTERNATIONAL FAIRS, IN ASIA FOR EXAMPLE, OR THE MIDDLE EAST?

Since I started in the art world in 1989, the expansion is head-spinning –in terms of scope, geography, and sheer numbers. This is a much bigger question than can be addressed here, but yes, the globalization is astounding and exists in a number of different forms: our clients are far more global; the art fair proliferation carries inventory to all corners of the world; the international Biennial phenomenon – the countless biennials in practically every country and continent. It’s unbelievable how big the art world’s footprint is today.

It also has to be acknowledged that the technology developments since I started working here in 1989 have made this all possible. When I first started, you would shoot the show after the opening; slides and transparencies would come in a week’s time; then you would mail out offers. People would call you and say they were interested in a piece and they would be in New York in three weeks, and you would reserve that work for them. These days, works are digitally shot and instantly emailed all over the world; clients now often make decisions about purchases from digital images alone. Sales happen in a tiny fraction of the time it used to take.

Richard Mucha: Hidden Tracks
November 2013 – January 2014

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE HONORS AND EXHIBITION EVENTS THAT THE GALLERY ANTICIPATES FOR ITS ROSTER OF ARTISTS IN THE SEASON AHEAD? WHAT EXHIBITIONS CAN WE LOOK FORWARD TO AT THE GALLERY ITSELF?

In September we gave Roger Hiorns his first solo exhibition in New York; he has shown all over Europe and in Los Angeles before, but we are honored to be able to introduce him to a New York audience. That will be followed by a solo show by Zarina Hashmi, her first exhibition since her touring retrospective, Paper Like Skin.

THE GALLERY HAS ACQUIRED AN EXHIBITION SPACE IN BUSHWICK, BROOKLYN. WHAT ARE SOME OF THE LARGE-SCALED INSTALLATIONS AND PROJECTS SCHEDULED THERE?

Bushwick is unbelievably exciting. We opened in February 2012 with a show of new work by Charles Atlas, the perfect person to show in a neighborhood full of artists – he has a cult following for sure. Most recently, we just closed a show of Michelangelo Pistoletto’s Minus Objects from the mid-1960s, an exhibition that was unanimously hailed as being museum-quality in every way (the catalogue will be out in 2015). September will see a large-scale video projection by Ragnar Kjartansson, and then Philip Taaffe will show monumentally-sized paintings in January 2015.

HOW DO YOU PROJECT THE FUTURE OF THE GALLERY AS THE WORLD HAS OPENED ITSELF TO THE ENORMITY OF INFLUENCES FROM OTHER CULTURES AND REGIONS? WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE INCLUDED AT LUHRING AUGUSTINE IN THE YEARS AHEAD?

Luhring Augustine has always been involved with an international roster of artists, and I am sure this will continue in the future. As for what I’d like to see included in the years ahead, I would love to see the gallery foster another generation of younger, less established artists. That mix of the new with their predecessors, and the connections that cross between them, always makes for a rich and developed program.

IN THE NEXT LRFA BLOG, I HAVE THE PRIVILEGE TO INTRODUCE ELLEN WINNER, PROFESSOR AND CHAIR OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY AT BOSTON COLLEGE AND DIRECTOR OF THE ARTS AND MIND LAB DEDICATED TO BRINGING THE STUDY OF THE ARTS INTO THE MAINSTREAM OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH. ELLEN IS ALSO AN ON-GOING SENIOR RESEARCH ASSOCIATE ON PROJECT ZERO AT THE HARVARD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION.

I HAD THE PLEASURE OF SITTING NEXT TO ELLEN AT THE ANNUAL BENEFACTOR’S LUNCH AT THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART LAST SPRING AND THE TIME FLEW! HER STUDY AND INSIGHT INTO OUR PRECONCEIVED NOTIONS ABOUT ART AND OUR PERCEPTION OF AESTHETIC ENDEAVORS FASCINATED ME AND I AM DELIGHTED THAT SHE HAS AGREED TO POST AN EXAMPLE OF HER RESEARCH ON THE LRFA BLOG, A PAPER ON DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN WORKS BY ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISTS AND “SUPERFICIALLY SIMILAR” ONES BY PRESCHOOLERS, CHIMPS AND ELEPHANTS” PROVIDING INSIGHT INTO “SEEING THE MIND BEHIND THE ART”.

UNTIL THEN, THANKS FOR READING!

 

The art world: here, there and anywhere- thanks to exhibit-e

 

 

With galleries attending over half a dozen art fairs a year, on-the-go access to inventory is essential. Use galleryManager wherever you go—on a computer or any mobile device to present a curated selection of inventory and so much more.

exhibit-E BELIEVES IN GREAT DESIGN THAT HAS LASTING VALUE AND HAS ESTABLISHED, IN ITS 25 YEAR HISTORY, A UNIQUE EXPERTISE AND AESTHETICS WHICH SERVE THE ART WORLD WELL. THEIR ABILITY TO ADAPT EACH CLIENT’S SPECIFIC NEEDS INTO AN INTELLIGENT DESIGN REFLECTS exhibit-E’S PRIMARY GOAL: TO INTEGRATE TWO GREAT IMPULSES; THE IMPULSE TO MAKE THINGS WORK AND THE IMPULSE TO MAKE THEM BEAUTIFUL. http://www.exhibit-e.com/

exhibit-E BELIEVES A GALLERY’S WEBSITE SHOULD PROVIDE A HOST OF CAPABILITIES AND CONTENT DESIGNED TO STRENGTHEN THE BOND BETWEEN THE ART-LOVING PUBLIC AND THE GALLERY, ADVISORY SERVICE, COLLECTOR OR ART INSTITUTION UTILIZING SOCIAL MEDIA ACTIVITIES TO CREATE BIGGER NETWORKS AND CHANNEL ITS INFLUENCE TO A BROADER AUDIENCE.

GAGOSIAN GALLERY, WITH TWELVE INTERNATIONAL VENUES BOTH COAST TO COAST AND ACROSS THE WORLD: HONG KONG, LONDON, PARIS, GENEVA, ATHENS AND ROME, IS UNIQUE AMONG ITS PEERS IN TERMS OF SCALE, HISTORY AND COMPLEXITY. TRANSLATING THIS ONLINE AND PRESENTING THE TRUE DEPTHS OF ITS CONTENT AND ARCHIVES WITH DIRECTNESS, SIMPLICITY, AND STREAM-LINED NAVIGATION IS AN ART FORM IN ITSELF – ONE THAT exhibit-E CAPABLY AND BRILLIANTLY DEMONSTRATES.

BROWSING GAGOSIAN.COM http://www.gagosian.com/ PROVIDES AN UP-CLOSE LOOK AT HOW GALLERY WEBSITES CAN BE DESIGNED WITH AN EYE TOWARDS THE FUTURE. IN OUR LAST CONVERSATION IN THIS SERIES WITH exhibit-E’S DAN MILLER AND BILLY MAKER, THE LRFA BLOG PROVIDES AN EXCERPT FROM THE GAGOSIAN CASE STUDY AND AN INSIGHT INTO BRANDING AND MARKETING AN ENORMOUS ART WORLD GLOBAL PRESENCE.

GAGOSIAN CASE STUDY

Upon first approaching gagosian.com, the site wastes little time getting to the most relevant information. Right there on the front page are the current exhibitions taking place at the different Gagosian locations, with an image from the exhibition, the gallery location, the artist’s name, exhibition dates, and a link to “View Exhibition.” One is immediately taken with the uniformity and restraint of the site. There are no visible bells and whistles.

For the user, browsing the Gagosian Gallery site is an engrossing experience; an art lover can easily spend hours digging through the amount of content contained within. And getting to the content is not a formidable challenge: it’s built to let the user navigate, and there are multiple “connections”  throughout the site, i.e., there are no dead-ends where the user is left with nowhere else to go. It’s quick and easy to jump from artist to exhibitions to related multimedia.

There are still plenty of opportunities for what galleries can do with their most valuable resource—their content, namely the art and the artists who make it—and the design of gagosian.com is positioned to evolve as the art world further embraces the Internet as a means of doing business.

GAGOSIAN.COM DOCUMENTS exhibit-E’S ABILITY TO RESPOND TO EVERY WEB DEMAND AND THE NEW galleryManager APP IS THE LATEST EXAMPLE OF THEIR CONTINUED COMMITMENT TO REDUCE THE HEADACHES AND FRUSTRATIONS THAT MANY CLIENTS EXPERIENCED WITH THE  GALLERY MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE EXISTING AT THAT TIME. galleryManager ENABLES EASY TRACKING OF EVERYTHING FROM CONTACTS AND TRANSACTIONS TO ARTWORK, INVOICES AND PURCHASE ORDERS; CHECKING THE PROVENANCE OF AN ARTWORK AND INSTANTLY UPDATING APPRAISALS AND CATALOGUING – FROM ANYWHERE ONLINE, AND NOW AS AN APP.

http://player.vimeo.com/video/89316768?title=0&byline=0&portrait=0

NEW FEATURES OF THE galleryManager INCLUDE:

Email Artworks, Document Section for Artists, Search by Acquisition, Search by Condition, Acquisiton Notes Field, Add tags when entering Artworks and Custom Invoice Numbers, Additional Fees Section, Searching by Acquisition Status and Static Set Keyword Filters.  The new iPad app gives you the ability to sync your Static Sets and selections of artworks with details to your iPad and chose what additional images display on the iPad app.

AND HERE’S HOW…

DOWNLOAD THE iPAD APP

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/gallerymanager/id829292401?mt=8

AND TAKE A LOOK AT HOW EASY IT IS TO NAVIGATE!

http://www.gallerymanager.com/support/43

THANK YOU, ONCE AGAIN, exhibit-E!

LUHRING AUGUSTINE GALLERY, LOCATED IN CHELSEA PRIMARILY WITH A DAZZLING DUPLEX EXHIBITION SPACE IN BROOKLYN’S BUSHWICK SECTION WAS FOUNDED IN 1985. ITS PRINCIPAL FOCUS IS THE REPRESENTATION OF AN INTERNATIONAL GROUP OF CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS WHOSE DIVERSE PRACTICES INCLUDE PAINTING, SCULPTURE, DRAWING, VIDEO, PHOTOGRAPHY, AND PERFORMANCE– ALL OF THE HIGHEST INTEREST AND QUALITY. IN OUR NEXT LRFA BLOG, I HAVE THE PLEASURE TO INTRODUCE THEIR DIRECTOR, LAUREN WITTELS, FRIEND AND COLLEAGUE, TO SHARE HER OWN PROFESSIONAL HISTORY AS WELL AS THAT OF THIS OUTSTANDING CONTEMPORARY GALLERY.

PLEASE JOIN US.

Anthony Allen of Paula Cooper Gallery on his initial art world experiences

Anthony Allen
Paula Cooper Gallery

PAULA COOPER IS  A LEGENDARY PIONEER IN THE CONTEMPORARY ART WORLD WHO LAUNCHED THE FIRST GALLERY IN SOHO IN 1968. THE OPENING EXHIBITION WAS A BENEFIT FOR THE STUDENT MOBILIZATION COMMITTEE TO END THE WAR IN VIETNAM. IT INCLUDED WORKS BY CARL ANDRE, DAN FLAVIN, DONALD JUDD, ROBERT RYMAN AND ROBERT MANGOLD—ALL NOW ESTABLISHED AND GREATLY SOUGHT AFTER ARTISTS BUT EXTREMELY CEREBRAL AND INNOVATIVE CHOICES AT THE TIME.  THAT WAS JUST THE BEGINNING! THE GALLERY’S DEDICATION TO CONCEPTUAL AND MINIMAL ART AND ITS THOUGHTFUL EXPANSION, OVER FORTY YEARS, TO EXHIBIT AND SUPPORT CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS SUCH AS SOPHIE CALLE AND KELLEY WALKER, DIVERSE IN AESTHETIC AND CHOICE OF MEDIUM, IS GREATLY ADMIRED.

THE HISTORY OF PAULA COOPER GALLERY TRACES THE HISTORY OF THE CONTEMPORARY NEW YORK ART WORLD. AS WELL AS FEATURING SOLO AND GROUP EXHIBITIONS THROUGHOUT THE YEAR, THE GALLERY HOSTS CONCERTS, MUSIC SYMPOSIA, BOOK RECEPTIONS AND, FOR EXAMPLE, STAYED OPEN 24-HOURS A DAY TO SHOW CHRISTIAN MARCLAY’S EXTRAORDINARY FILM, THE CLOCK.

I AM VERY PLEASED TO INTRODUCE ONE OF THE GALLERY’S DIRECTORS, ANTHONY ALLEN, AND APPRECIATE THAT HE HAS TAKEN THE TIME TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE LRFA BLOG.

ANTHONY, WELCOME! PLEASE TELL US ABOUT YOUR OWN PROFESSIONAL HISTORY BEFORE WE EXPLORE THAT OF THE GALLERY’S. WHAT IS YOUR BACKGROUND IN THE ARTS AND WHAT LED YOU TO JOIN THE ART GALLERY WORLD?

My background is in literature and not in the visual arts. I studied French and English literature in Geneva, where I grew up, continued my studies in Paris, then moved to the US and got a doctorate in French Literature. My specialty was the medieval period. But I was also very interested in contemporary art, so when I started teaching French literature, I also started taking art history classes.  One class, in particular, was a kind of epiphany (it was a class on Bataille and the “formless”), and it made me want to switch careers. Eventually I moved to New York and looked for a job in the art world.

WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST PROFESSIONAL JOB IN THE ART WORLD AND HOW DID YOU DECIDE TO PURSUE THIS CAREER?  WHEN DID YOU JOIN PAULA COOPER GALLERY AND WHAT PROMPTED YOUR DECISION?

I happened to start at Paula Cooper Gallery as a summer intern, while I was still in teaching.  It was a great way to learn more about the gallery world.  Just as I was finishing my internship, a position at the gallery became available. I left my teaching job and started as a full-time employee in October 2000.

HOW WOULD YOU ADVISE SOMEONE INTERESTED IN THE BUSINESS ASPECT OF ART TO GET A PROFESSIONAL FOOTING IN THE GALLERY WORLD?

I think internships are a great way to start if you can afford an unpaid position for a while.  As an intern you interact with the entire staff at the gallery and get a better understanding of everyone’s roles and responsibilities.  You meet the artists and have a first-hand experience of their work.  You participate in the gallery’s life. You get to learn a lot if you pay attention.

IN THE NEXT LRFA BLOG, WE HAVE THE PLEASURE OF LEARNING ABOUT AN EXTREMELY INNOVATIVE AND TRANSFORMATIVE TIME IN THE WORLD IN GENERAL AND THE ART WORLD IN PARTICULAR. AS ANTHONY SHARES THE HISTORY OF A GALLERY OF GREAT RESPECT AND INTEGRETY, WE TRACE AS WELL THE CLIMATE OF THE TIMES IN WHICH SOHO WAS AN OUTPOST FOR A SMALL, DEDICATED GROUP OF GALLERISTS AND COLLECTORS.

ANTHONY IS A GENEROUS AND KNOWLEDGEABLE EXPERT AND I AM SURE WOULD ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS WITH GREAT THOUGHTFULNESS AND INFORMATION. DO ASK!