| | The First Art Newspaper on the Net |   | Established in 1996 | Saturday, February 1, 2020 |
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| | Sarcophagus dedicated to sky god among latest ancient Egypt trove | |
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An Egyptian archeologist inspects a mummy in a limestone sarcophagus discovered along many finds in 3000-year-old communal tombs dedicated to high priests, in Al-Ghoreifa in Tuna al-Jabal in the Minya governorate, on January 30, 2020. The archaeological mission in Al-Ghoreifa in Minya, about 300 kilometres south of Egypt's capital Cairo, found 16 tombs filled with 20 sarchophagi, including a wooden sarcophagus of the sky God Horus, the Antiquities Ministry announced. The communal tombs dating back to around 2600 BC were dedicated to high priests of the god Djehuty and senior officials in Upper Egypt. Mohamed el-Shahed / AFP.
MINYA.- Egypt's antiquities ministry on Thursday unveiled the tombs of ancient high priests and a sarcophagus dedicated to the sky god Horus at an archaeological site in Minya governorate. The mission found 16 tombs containing 20 sarcophagi, some engraved with hieroglyphics, at the Al-Ghoreifa site, about 300 kilometres (186 miles) south of Cairo. The shared tombs were dedicated to high priests of the god Djehuty and senior officials, from the Late Period around 3,000 years ago, the ministry said. They were from the 15th nome, an ancient Egyptian territorial division ruled over by a provincial governor. One of the stone sarcophagi was dedicated to the god Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, and features a depiction of the goddess Nut spreading her wings. The ministry also unveiled 10,000 blue and green ushabti ... More |
The Best Photos of the Day Installation view, ÂJack Whitten. Transitional Space. A Drawing Survey. Hauser & Wirth New York, 69th Street, 2020. © Jack Whitten Estate. Courtesy the Jack Whitten Estate and Hauser & Wirth. Photo: Genevieve Hanson.
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 | | Exceptional acquisition for the Van Gogh Museum collection: Woman Bathing by Edgar Degas | | She painted with the Hairy Who. Now she's going big, at 79. | | Brains turned to glass? Suffocated in boathouses? Vesuvius victims get another look | 
Edgar Degas (18341917), Woman Bathing, c. 1886, pastel on wove paper mounted on cardboard, 72.5 x 57.2 cm, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam.
AMSTERDAM.- The Van Gogh Museum has acquired an important pastel by the French Impressionist Edgar Degas (18341917): Woman Bathing, c. 1886. The work presents an intimate view of a nude woman washing herself with a sponge. Degas made masterful use of pastels to render the light on her body subtly and softly, but the treatment of the background is also very striking. Woman Bathing is one of around ten ambitious pastels from a period in which Degas focused all his effort on depicting female nudes. Vincent van Gogh (18531890) was a great admirer of these drawings and his own work was influenced by them. The acquisition of this fully worked-out pastel is the first top-ranking piece by Degas to enter the Dutch national collection. Woman Bathing belongs to a group of over ten pastels on which Degas worked in the years 188487. He focused all his efforts at the time on the depiction of frame-filling female nudes. Having previous ... More | | 
The artist Gladys Nilsson, at home in Wilmette, Ill., Jan. 9, 2020. Alexa Viscius/The New York Times.
by Jonathan Griffin
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE ).- In 1966, Gladys Nilsson and five other young artists organized an exhibition of their work at Chicagos Hyde Park Art Center and became the talk of the town overnight. The group called themselves the Hairy Who. Their art could be caustic, outré, vulgar and loud; psychedelic patterns and clashing colors abounded. It was bad taste and brilliant fun. Tattoos, graffiti, comic books, fanzines, games and toys, newspaper and magazine advertisements were all influences, as was the encyclopedic, global collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. Rooted in the surrealist traditions of Chicagos art scene, it was unlike anything else in America at that time. Nilssons work stood somewhat apart from that of her peers, especially her watercolors of animalistic creatures, which are rendered with extraordinary delicacy and subtlety. She also adopted a graphic technique borrowed from her husband, fellow ... More | | 
Remains of people who were buried in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in the forcini, or boathouses, at the ancient beach of Herculaneum, Italy, Aug. 2, 2012. Gianni Cipriano/The New York Times.
by Jennifer Pinkowski
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE ).- The infants and children huddled in the stone boathouses. The women pressed in next to them. The men crowded in last. Theyd all fled Herculaneum on Aug. 24, 79 A.D., as Mount Vesuvius rained destruction on the city, as it did Pompeii and other Roman settlements near the Bay of Naples. While Pompeii was consumed by ash, Herculaneum was done in by a pyroclastic flow a fast-moving, dense, extremely hot surge of ash, gas and rock. At the citys seaside, hundreds of people died that day. The remains of 340 of them have been unearthed since 1980 some in the boathouses, known as fornici, and some on the beach. How they died has long been debated. A prevailing hypothesis is that their blood and brains were vaporized by the extreme heat of the pyroclastic flow. At another site ... More |
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| | First major survey of Jack Whitten's works on paper on view at Hauser & Wirth | | Wes Wilson, psychedelic poster pioneer, dies at 82 | | Royal Ballet suspends choreographer over sexual misconduct claims | 
Geometric Collusion #1, 1981. Acrylic, pastel, and compressed charcoal on Rives paper, 66 x 48.3 cm / 26 x 19 in. © Jack Whitten Estate. Courtesy the Jack Whitten Estate and Hauser & Wirth. Photo: Genevieve Hanson.
NEW YORK, NY.- Hauser & Wirth is presenting the first major survey of Jack Whittens works on paper, spanning the artists six decade career. Jack Whitten (1939 2018) made it his mission to disrupt the discipline of art history through experiments with material, process, and technique. He effectively constructed a bridge between gestural abstraction and process art, constantly working toward a nuanced language of painting that employs deeply personal expression. Whitten was also a prolific and powerful draughtsman. The unique body of works on view at Hauser & Wirth testifies to the immensity of his commitment to drawing as a means to make manifest his ideas and advance his methods. Jack Whitten. Transitional Space. A Drawing Survey. spotlights the artists playfulness and improvisational skill in searching for his own special visual language. Paper was more than an effective medium for Whitten; ... More | | 
A Wes Wilson poster for the New Years Eve 1966 show at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco. If the lettering on Mr. Wilsons posters was often hard to decipher, that was by design. Image: Wes Wilson.
by Neil Genzlinger
NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE ).- Wes Wilson, who helped create the trippy look associated with the second half of the 1960s through the vivid, swirling posters he made for rock shows by the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and others, died Jan. 24 at his home in Leanne, Missouri. He was 82. His son Jason confirmed his death. No cause was given. Beginning in 1966, Wilson made posters for Bill Graham, who produced rock shows at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco, as well as for Chet Helms of Family Dog Productions, who started at the Fillmore but soon moved to the Avalon Ballroom, not far away. Posters had been used to advertise stage shows for decades, but most were utilitarian conveyors of date, time and place. Wilson, along with several other poster artists, took the form to a different level, one full of loud colors, attention-getting imagery and vibrant typography. ... More | | 
Liam Scarlett, the Royal Ballet's artist in residence, works with New York City Ballet dancers on a piece, in New York, Jan. 8, 2014. Andrea Mohin/ The New York Times.
by Alex Marshall
LONDON (NYT NEWS SERVICE ).- The Royal Ballet has suspended Liam Scarlett, its artist-in-residence, after accusations of sexual misconduct involving students at the Royal Ballet School. The company was made aware of the accusations against Scarlett in August, it said in an emailed statement Thursday. Scarlett was suspended immediately, and an investigation is ongoing, the statement added. Scarlett, who was heralded as a choreographic wonder boy of British ballet, has created work for the New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theater and Miami City Ballet, among others. The impact of the accusations is already spreading beyond Britain. On Tuesday, the Queensland Ballet in Australia suspended Scarlett, an artistic associate of the company, and canceled its planned productions of his new ballet Dangerous Liaisons, The Australian newspaper reported. ... More |
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| | Strauss & Co's biggest contemporary art sale yet offers the cream of Pan-African talent | | Kunsthaus Pasquart opens an exhibition of works by Kapwani Kiwanga | | Swann delivers historic auction of African-American fine art | 
Omar Victor Diop, Trayvon Martin, 2012, from Liberty, 2016. Signed, titled and numbered 2/5 on the reverse, inkjet print on Hahnamühle, 109,5 by 80 cm.
CAPE TOWN.- A new wave of internationally celebrated South African artists, among them Nicholas Hlobo, Athi-Patra Ruga and Simphiwe Ndzube, lead Strauss & Cos much-anticipated Contemporary Art auction, due to be held in Cape Town on 15 February. Many of the artists have already established international profiles with top awards and critically acclaimed exhibitions. Now in its third year, this benchmark annual Strauss & Co sale coincides with the Investec Cape Town Art Fair and will feature 102 carefully vetted lots, amongst which is a single owner consignment of pan-African works from a leading South African collector. For savvy art lovers sick of the northern winter all roads lead to Cape Town in February, for it is Art Week as the grape harvest comes in and the Cape is one huge party. The city is hard to beat as a destination - exciting, vibrant and warm - with the best African Contemporary art for sale at Strauss & Co. In February ... More | | 
Kapwani Kiwanga, pink-blue, 2017. Exhibition view The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, Toronto (CA), 2017; Courtesy the artist, Galerie Poggi, Paris, Galerie Tanja Wagner, Berlin, Goodman gallery, Johannesburg / Cape Town; Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid, © Adagp, Paris, 2019.
BIEL/BIENNE.- Kapwani Kiwangas (b. 1978, CA / FR) artistic process is research-oriented, initiated by marginalised or forgotten histories and political events, which she articulates in her sculptures, installations, photographs and videos. The artist contrasts her research with the expressive materiality of her work, with which she refers to socio-political phenomena, syncretism or the global effects of power structures. The solo show examines Kiwangas career via a selection of significant, representative and new works. The exhibition layout can be understood as a narrative that places emphasis on two key aspects: the examination of the impact of disciplinary architecture and spatial elements on the human body and the research into post-colonial stories and narratives ... More | | 
Carrie Mae Weems, Untitled, detail, seven panels of framed chromogenic prints & sandblasted text on glass, 1996-97. Sold for $305,000, a record for the artist.
NEW YORK, NY.- The Thursday, January 30 sale of African-American Art from the Johnson Publishing Company at Swann Galleries was an all-around success. The packed auction room saw all 87 lots find buyers, bringing $2.9 millionover twice the high-estimate for the auction29 new auction records were established, and 22 artists made their market debuts. Nigel Freeman, director of Swann Galleriess African-American Fine Art department, remarked on the offering from the Ebony and Jet publishers: It was an honor and a thrill to close this chapter of the Johnson Publishing Companys illustrious history with a perfect sale of their works. The sale of the collection was the perfect storm of an auctiona prestigious name anchored with significant works by important artist, but with a wonderful new group of artists fresh to the secondary market, providing ... More |
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| | Exhibition dedicated to the phenomenon of the pop-cultural mainstream opens at Haus der Kunst | | First exhibition of Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez Archive opens at the Harry Ransom Center | | First large-scale solo exhibition in Belgium of the artist Wolfgang Tillmans opens at WIELS | 
Assume Vivid Astro Focus, Walking on Thin Ice, 2003. 1-Kanal-Videoinstallation (Farbe, Ton) © the artist. Courtesy Sammlung Goetz, München.
MUNICH.- Brainwashed is dedicated to the phenomenon of the pop-cultural mainstream, which reached its peak in the early 2000s. Characteristic of this mainstream were media formats such as reality TV, Hollywood film productions with the claim of being global events, an advertising industry dominated by self-optimisation and an international star cult pushed by a plethora of music videos. The exhibition explores the question as to which manipulative strategies in pluralistic societies have been able to create a medial consonance, a dominant taste within culture, up to and including the propagation of political convictions or even hegemonic views of history. The artists brought together here critically reveal commercial visual languages, their contradictory promises and clichés. Their artistic methods of deconstruction include new editing and collage techniques, as well as diverse practices of self-staging, such as media-driven branding. The ... More | | 
Brefoot and concentrating, Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez works in his studio in Barcelona, Spain. At the time, he was writing The Autumn of the Patriarch. Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez Papers, Harry Ransom Center.
AUSTIN, TX.- Selections from the archive of internationally renowned and Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez (19272014) will be on view for the first time during an exhibition opening Feb. 1 at the Harry Ransom Center at The University of Texas at Austin. The exhibition then will open in the fall at the Museo de Arte Moderno in Mexico City. The bilingual exhibition, Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez: The Making of a Global Writer, examines how the Colombian author who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1982 became an international success soon after the publication of his 1967 novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude (Cien años de soledad). Now translated into more than 45 languages, the book has worldwide sales approaching 50 million copies. GarcÃa Márquez is a global writer because his stories continue to enter the lives of millions of readers worldwide every year, curator ... More | | 
Wolfgang Tillmans, 6407-35, 2007, © the artist, courtesy Galerie Buchholz, Berlin/Cologne, Maureen Paley, London, David Zwirner, New York, Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris.
BRUSSELS.- WIELS inaugurates 2020 with the first large-scale solo exhibition in Belgium of the artist Wolfgang Tillmans. Exhibited over two floors, Today Is The First Day presents work by the artist from the past three decades, while opening up onto the latest developments in his practice that will include new photography, sound and video works in a spatial constellation, conceived especially by Tillmans for WIELS. Tillmans, one of the most influential artists of his generation, is known for pushing the limits of photography and image-making. In the late 1980s the artist began producing works by using the first generation of laser photocopiers that could create half-tone images. His first pictures were made by enlarging images, either found or shot by the artist. In the early 1990s Tillmans gained attention for his seemingly everyday images of his contemporaries and the emerging European electronic music ... More |
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Behind the Scenes: The Working Side of the Museum, 1928 | From the Vaults
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| | More News |
 Brexit will curtail orchestra touring warns Sir Simon RattlePARIS (AFP).- Sir Simon Rattle still can't believe that what he calls the "terrible mistake" of Brexit is actually happening. Britain's biggest classical music star returned from the Berlin Philharmonic to lead the London Symphony Orchestra, his country's greatest and arguably most European orchestra. The irony is not lost on the great conductor, who has made no secret of the fact that he would not have returned had he known Brexit might turn his homeland into a "self-built cultural jail". The LSO "was always a European orchestra right from the start 100 years ago," Rattle told AFP, with its founding fathers mostly European and its first conductor, Hans Richter, a German. Now with Brexit happening Friday, Rattle sees no way around having to curtail European tours. "The practical difficulties will be immense ... More Kiluanji Kia Henda's first major solo exhibition in a European museum opens in NuoroNUORO.- The MAN Museo dArte Provincia di Nuoro is presenting the first major solo exhibition in a European museum dedicated to Kiluanji Kia Henda (Luanda, Angola, 1979), one of the most important artists and activists of African origin on the contemporary art scene. The exhibition runs from Friday 31 January to Sunday 1 March 2020. Something Happened on the Way to Heaven is an exhibition curated by Luigi Fassi, director of the MAN. It has been organized specifically for the museum in Nuoro, which, in collaboration with Fondazione Sardegna Film Commission and Luma Foundation in Arles, invited the artist to stay on the island and show us Sardinia through his eyes. This project has adopted the same invitation/residency formula used last year with the French-Ivorian artist François-Xavier Gbré and continues the MANs exploration of the contemporary African art ... More Malmo Konsthall opens exhibition of works by Ragna Bley and Inger EkdahlMALMO.- Ragna Bley (b. 1986) is a painter who experiments with form and material, text and language, time and space. Her large-scale paintings are characterised by organic, mutable formsa collapsing geometry of fluid, elementary shapes that fray at the edges and ooze out. The paint appears to follow its own path, flowing in all directions. Her painting oscilliates between the depictive and the intangible. Bley´s oeuvre is distinctly experimental, and also includes sculpture and performance in which language and text serve as major components. This exhibition comprises several series of works, three of which were executed specifically for Malmö Konsthall. The paintings are arranged into a procession that makes its way through the exhibition space in both directions, imposing a new, different set of conditions for viewing and experiencing. Here two new series ... More House of Illustration opens the first ever retrospective of the prolific graphic designer George HimLONDON.- House of Illustration opened the first ever retrospective of seminal mid-century graphic designer George Him, the Polish-Jewish émigré who brought continental avant-garde aesthetics to the UK. Spanning Hims long and versatile career as both an independent designer and as one half of the prolific Lewitt-Him partnership (1933-1954), the exhibition includes iconic wartime propaganda posters for the Ministries of Food and Information, corporate branding for El Al airlines and adverts for clients including Schweppes, Technicolor, the Post Office and The Times. Describing himself as roughly as old as graphic design in the modern sense, George Hims life and work runs parallel with the history of the profession. Though a Royal Designer for Industry and a favourite of iconic British brands such as Penguin Books and Transport for London, ... More Yayoi Kusama & Modern Japanese Art and Ceramics on view at the Ackland Art MuseumCHAPEL HILL, NC.- The Ackland Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill presents two new exhibitions of 20th and 21st century Japanese art. The exhibitions "Yayoi Kusama: Open the Shape Called Love," and Toriawase: A Special Installation of Modern Japanese Art and Ceramics are on view from Friday, Jan. 31 through Sunday, April 12, 2020. Visitors to Open the Shape Called Love will experience a smaller-scale, more contemplative, handmade side of Yayoi Kusama, a revered contemporary artist known primarily for her large-scale blockbuster installations. Included in the Acklands exhibition are early works on paper, intimate dot and net paintings, provocative sculpture and multimedia work, and a tabletop mirror box, all of which provide insight into Kusamas later artistic output. While Kusamas famous Infinity ... More Two items relating to Abraham Lincoln bring a combined $250,000 in an online auctionWESTPORT, CONN.- Eager bidders gave a tip of the top hat to Abraham Lincoln in University Archives online auction held January 16th. Several historically significant lots pertaining to Honest Abe were offered in the sale, with two of them combining for $250,000. In all, 281 lots came up for bid in an auction that grossed nearly $900,000, including the buyers premium. The sales top earner was a copy of the book The Miscellaneous Works of Oliver Goldsmith, by American author Washington Irving, with an ownership signature by Lincoln ($175,000). The book, which was formative to Lincolns views on slavery, had been given to him by his brother-in-law, Ninian W. Edwards. Lincoln later presented it to his law partner, with an inscription. The runner-up lot was also Lincoln related: a carte de visite photograph of the president, signed by him (as A. ... More Mima Museum opens new exhibition, ZOOBRUSSELS.- The artistic selection of the exhibition fulfils a specific intention: to choose artists from different backgrounds, making everyday use of anthropomorphic characters and figures. Anthropomorphism is a concept aimed at associating with man behaviours or physical characteristics peculiar to animals and vice versa. The anthropomorphic image in the media expresses a collective reality often shared subconsciously. From there it draws part of its evocative power and explains why it reflects its era with such frankness. In the same vein, Raphaël Cruyt and Alice van den Abeele, the curators of the exhibition, invited artists who turn spontaneously to anthropomorphism in their work. The second selection criterion is the complementary nature of the respective artistic paths followed in order to offer up an overview of contemporary anthropomorphism. ... More Confidence in both modern and contemporary art evident at London Art Fair 2020 LONDON.- London Art Fair concluded its 32nd edition on Sunday 26 January, reporting robust sales and an overall attendance of 23,000 visitors. The Fair opened with a Preview Evening on Tuesday 21 January, where collectors, institutions and art enthusiasts enjoyed a first look at presentations by 129 galleries from 14 different countries at the Business Design Centre in Islington. Sarah Monk, Director of London Art Fair, said: As we enter a new decade, London Art Fair endeavours to continue reflecting the art market in all its breadth, from established and more traditional mediums to new areas of growth, such as the surge in interest in textile art. We celebrate our heritage through initiatives such as our annual Museum Partnership, whilst also embracing change and disruption through our curated sections which feed our visitors and collectors appetite ... More Curtain stays down at Paris ballet as pension strike goes onPARIS (AFP).- The Paris Opera on Friday cancelled a performance of the classic ballet "Giselle", disappointing fans who had hoped to see an end to pensions strike action that has put the troupe out of action since early December Dancers are fighting a plan that would forge a single national pension system, ending their own centuries-old regime that lets them retire at 42. Beyond that age, they say, it is impossible to meet the exacting standards for works staged by a world-class dance company, after a career that often begins when performers are still in their teens. The city's two operas houses, at the Palais Garnier and the Bastille, have been forced to cancel around 75 performances since going on strike on December 5, causing losses of more than 15 million euros ($16.6 million). But unions had largely called off the strikes in recent weeks ahead of new ... More Tiffany, Pairpoint light up Fontaine's January auctionPITTSFIELD, MASS.- Provenance and designer names carry gravitas when it comes to auctions and both always seem to be in generous supply at Fontaines Auction Gallery. Its January 18 was no exception with fine lamps by Tiffany taking the lead. Rare Pairpoint models came in a close second, taking six out of the top 10 places in the sale. We had a very nice selection of Tiffany lamps that buyers really responded to and the Pairpoint lamp collection from noted collectors Ed and Sheila Malakoff, also sparked buyers interest, said John Fontaine, owner of Fontaines Auction Gallery. Many lots did better than expected, most selling over their estimates, which is more indicative of the overall strength and quality of the sale. Leading the parade of Tiffany lamps across the block was the sales top lot, a Tiffany Studios Peony Border floor lamp that retained ... More A young composer takes on opera's oldest mythLOS ANGELES (NYT NEWS SERVICE ).- It wouldnt be a new opera without a little drama. In the days leading up to the premiere of Eurydice, Matthew Aucoins operatic adaptation of Sarah Ruhls play, the lead soprano couldnt sing. (Doctors orders.) The baritone playing her father was getting over a cough. Even Orpheus called in sick. As if there werent enough pressure on this production already. Opening at Los Angeles Opera on Saturday, Eurydice is a big work, with a big cast and chorus, and the baggage of big expectations: It will head to the Metropolitan Opera next year. Given the circumstances, Aucoin the operas 29-year-old composer and conductor was surprisingly cool. Adjusting his best-laid plans with each opening-week surprise, he seemed more at ease than ever before in his young yet prodigious career. You got ... More |
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Flashback On a day like today, Japanese painter and sculptor Takashi Murakami was born February 01, 1962. Takashi Murakami (born February 1, 1962) is a Japanese contemporary artist. He works in fine arts media (such as painting and sculpture) as well as commercial media (such as fashion, merchandise, and animation) and is known for blurring the line between high and low arts. In this image: Installation view, Takashi Murakami: The Octopus Eats its Own Leg, MCA Chicago, June 6 - September 24, 2017. Photo: Nathan Keay, © MCA
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