The First Art Newspaper on the Net    Established in 1996 Sunday, January 1, 2023

 
Major exhibition features hieroglyphs, 200 years after the language was deciphered

Installation of an amulet infront of The Book of the Dead in Hieroglyphs unlocking ancient Egypt © The Trustees of the British Museum.

LONDON.- This major exhibition at the British Museum marks one of the most important moments in our understanding of ancient history: the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs. Hieroglyphs: unlocking ancient Egypt explores the inscriptions and objects that helped scholars unlock one of the world’s oldest civilisations, exactly 200 years since this pivotal moment. At the exhibition’s heart isthe Rosetta Stone, amongst the world’s most famous ancient objects. Before hieroglyphs could be deciphered, life in ancient Egypt had been a mystery for centuries with only tantalising glimpses into this forgotten world. The discovery of the Rosetta Stone in 1799, with its decree written in hieroglyphs, demotic and the known language of ancient Greek, provided the key to decoding hieroglyphs in 1822; a breakthrough expanding the modern world’s knowledge of Egypt’s history by some 3,000 years. This immersive exhibition brings t ... More



The Best Photos of the Day
Best Photos of the Day
Installation view of mixed up with others before we even begin. November 26, 2022 to April 10, 2023 at mumok.





Exhibition at the Louvre takes visitors on a fascinating journey to the crossroads of civilisations   Exhibition traces the transformation of Kimono fashion from the late 18th through the early 20th century   Machine Dazzle: How many ways can you say fabulous?


Buddha meditating between two monks. Fayaz Tepe. State Museum of History of Uzbekistan © Art and Culture Development Foundation, Republic of Uzbekistan / photo: Andrey Arakelyan.

PARIS.- This exhibition takes visitors on a fascinating journey to the crossroads of civilisations, in the heart of central Asia, in Uzbekistan, where Samarkand and Bokhara are household names. But many other trading posts in the region brought to light works of art that are now listed as objects of world heritage. Genghis Khan, Tamburlaine, Marco Polo – these legendary names live on in our imaginations. Yet Uzbekistan, an intellectual, cultural and artistic centre at the crossroads of India, China and Iran, remains almost unknown. With over 170 works, including Uzbeki national treasures never before exhibited in the West, and loans from great European and American museums, this unprecedented exploration promises its visitors a few culture shocks as well as moments of sheer wonderment. Thanks to remarkable loans from Uzbekistan, and from major European and American museums, the exhibition encompasses nearly 180 works and invites visitors to a journey ... More
 

Ko-omote (literally "small face") Noh masks are used for main or secondary roles, of either a young girl or a supernatural being. Inspired by Heian-period (794–1185) aristocratic style, the face is painted white, with shaved and painted eyebrows, neatly combed hair, and black-dyed teeth. The mask conveys the idea of innocent beauty.

NEW YORK, NY.- Kimono Style: The John C. Weber Collection explores the artistic exchanges between the kimono and Western fashion through more than 60 examples of the T-shaped Japanese garment, as well as Western couture, Japanese paintings, prints, and decorative arts On view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Kimono Style: The John C. Weber Collection traces the transformation of the kimono from the late 18th through the early 20th century, as the T-shaped garment was adapted to suit the lifestyle of modern Japanese women. The exhibition features a remarkable selection of works, including a promised gift of numerous modern kimonos from the renowned John C. Weber Collection of Japanese art, as well as highlights from The Costume Institute’s collection. More than 60 kimonos, including men’s and children’s wear ... More
 

Machine Dazzle at his studio in the Museum of Arts and Design at Columbus Circle in Manhattan, Dec. 22, 2022. (Justin J Wee/The New York Times)

by Jennifer Schuessler


NEW YORK, NY.- It was movie night at the Museum of Arts & Design in Manhattan, New York, and the costume designer Machine Dazzle was ready for his entrance. The selection was the 1980 roller-disco fantasy “Xanadu,” and he had draped his 6-foot-5 frame in a shiny take on Olivia Newton-John’s purple Grecian goddess look, accessorized with pastel-rainbow pumps, sequined legwarmers and a Venetian-style ONJ mask on a stick. The movie, of course, was a mess — but the kind of wildly colorful, overstuffed, yes-to-everything mess that could have roller-skated right into his own work. “How many different ideas can find their way into a costume?” Dazzle asked the audience, plenty of whom came in their own homemade light-up headdresses, sparkly jackets and legwarmers. “A lot. If you don’t believe me, go upstairs.” “Upstairs” meant the museum’s fourth and fifth floors, where “Queer Maximalism x Machine Dazzle,” on view throu ... More


Tony Vaccaro, 100, dies; Photographed war from a soldier's perspective   Barbara Walters, a first among TV newswomen, is dead at 93   Exhibition explores the different forms of appearance of the diorama-feeling and its receptive mechanism


After the war, Tony Vaccaro replaced the searing images of horror embedded in his memories of war, by focusing on the splendor of life and capturing the beauty of fashion and those who gave of themselves: artists, writers, movie stars, and cultural figures.

NEW YORK, NY.- As a high school student in the New York City suburbs, Tony Vaccaro became intrigued by photography. Two months after graduation, when he was inducted into the Army during World War II, he showed a captain the photos he had taken for his yearbook and requested an assignment as a combat photographer with the Signal Corps. “The pictures are great,” the officer told him. But since he had no experience in combat and was too young to be a seasoned photographer, he was rejected. At 21, though, he was old enough to be an infantryman. Vaccaro spent 272 days in combat with the 83rd Infantry Division, which fought its way from Normandy to Germany. Along with the M1 rifle he carried across Europe, he kept a small 35 mm Argus C3 camera that he had bough ... More
 

The journalist Barbara Walters at her office in New York on Oct. 30, 1973. (Tyrone Dukes/The New York Times)

by Alessandra Stanley


NEW YORK, NY.- Barbara Walters, who broke barriers for women as the first female co-host of the “Today” show and the first female anchor of a network evening news program, and who as an interviewer of celebrities became one herself, helping to blur the line between news and entertainment, died on Friday. She was 93. Her death was reported by ABC News, where she was a longtime anchor and a creator of the talk show “The View.” Her publicist, Cindi Berger, said in an interview that Walters died at her home in Manhattan surrounded by loved ones. She did not give a cause. Walters spent more than 50 years in front of the camera and, until she was 84, continued to appear on “The View.” In one-on-one interviews, she was best known for delving, with genteel insistence, into the private lives and emotional states of movie stars, heads of state ... More
 

Tracey Snelling, Watching me Watching you, 2021.

BUDAPEST.- Bazaar spectacle, a tool for scientific illustration, children’s toy, or therapeutic method? As the love child of art and the entertainment industry, since the beginning of the 20th century the diorama has been a beloved, though nowadays often critically viewed presentational medium of natural science museums. This presentational format that combines painting methods, stage design and optical illusion, aims to present natural scientific or anthropological results and theories to laypersons as an immersive installation, conveying the illusion of reality within the limited space of a box. However, the origins of the diorama are rooted much more in visual arts than in the natural sciences. Louis Daguerre, the French painter heralded as the pioneer of photography, presented the prototype of diorama in Paris in the 19th century. He placed layers of grandiose painted canvases on top of each other, which he brought to life with projected light effects ... More



Reuven Rubin artworks to lead Clark Auction Gallery on January 22, 2023   New research position for The Met's Michael C. Rockefeller Wing   Exhibition at Museum Ludwig Cologne examines the depiction of plants in the visual arts


A self portrait in ink wash on paper ($2/3,000), is signed and dedicated to Hope and Faith.” Dated 1940, the drawing measures 17 by 12 inches.

LARACHMONT, NY.- The pioneering landscapes of Romanian-Israeli painter Reuven Rubin, especially those painted in the 1920s during a time when the international art world was rapidly changing, are highly sought after. Considered Israel’s most famous artist, Rubin (1893-1974) was Israel’s first ambassador to Romania and visited New York City often.
From an old New York family that befriended the artist in his early days as part of New York City’s art scene in the late 1920s comes four artworks by the artist, starring at Clarke Auction Gallery’s Wednesday, January 22 auction, at 10 am. While the auction has nearly 400 lots, running the gamut from jewelry and silver to Asian arts and traditional antiques, the highlight will be Rubin’s artwork. The story of how Rubin met Hope Weil in 1928 and became a constant in her family’s life for decades is one that, like many other stories, begins a bit serendipitously. Rubin was ... More
 

“Gilt: Trophies 2&3,” 2022, by Hew Locke, displayed on the facade of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, on Sept. 14, 2022. (Lila Barth/The New York Times)

NEW YORK, NY.- The Metropolitan Museum of Art has named a new Research Associate in the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing who will be instrumental in creating new digital and in-gallery content—a collaborative project with World Monuments Fund (WMF)—that will reframe the Museum’s African art galleries. Sosena Solomon, an award-winning social documentary film and multimedia visual artist from Ethiopia, will join the department for one year to research and design content relating to major cultural landmarks and heritage sites across Africa. Solomon’s work with the The Met’s curatorial team will draw upon archives at World Monuments Fund’s headquarters in New York City and include filming with caretakers at historic sites in situ. “In the Museum’s new Africa galleries, this initiative will afford a critical bridge with the extraordinary yet relatively unfamiliar architectural ... More
 

Franz Wilhelm Seiwert, Hinterhof, 1922. Museum Ludwig, Köln. Reproduktion: Rheinisches Bildarchiv Köln.

COLOGNE.- What do plants mean to human beings? The exhibition Green Modernism: The New View of Plants takes us back to the early twentieth century and examines the depiction of plants in the visual arts and how they were viewed in botany and society in general. After all, as plain as potted plants in pictures may appear at first glance, and as matter-of-fact as botanical reports read, they always also attest to the contradictions, fears, longings, and ideologies of the modern age. The exhibition focuses on this topic with around 130 exhibits in four chapters. The Comedian Harmonists sang about a plant that was extraordinarily popular at the beginning of the twentieth century. Cactuses were “hunted” in the Americas in order to be grown and sold on the German market. Like a big game hunter, the plant collector Curt Backeberg had a portrait of himself taken in white clothing with a lasso in his arm next to a meter-high cactus ... More


Soundwalk Collective and Patti Smith conceive a new site-specific and multidisciplinary exhibition   Exhibition showcases 35 of the most accomplished prints by Albert Dumouchel   First ever book about architect Elissa Aalto published


Patti Smith © Stephan Crasneanscki.

PARIS.- Between 2019 and 2021, Stephan Crasneanscki and Patti Smith collaborated on the creation of Perfect Vision: a triptych of albums which take their inspiration from the writings of three emblematic French poets: Antonin Artaud, Arthur Rimbaud and René Daumal. Central to the work was the poets’ necessity to travel to different lands to acquire a new vision and perspective on themselves and their art. Recorded in the Sierra Tarahumara of Mexico, the Abyssinian valley of Ethiopia, and the Himalayan Summit of India respectively, the core idea is that each landscape holds sleeping memories that are the witness of human passage. Produced with Russell Elevado, Leonardo Heiblum, Nicolas Becker and Soundwalk Collective’s Simone Merli, each album retraces the poets’ ... More
 

Albert Dumouchel (1916-1971), The Fall of Icarus, 1963, etching, 7/15. MMFA, gift of François Beauchamp. Photo MMFA, Jean-François Brière.

MONTREAL.- Considered to be the father of Quebec printmaking, Albert Dumouchel (1916-1971) explored this art for three decades, all the while pushing the limits of techniques and materials. A little more than fifty years after his death, the exhibition Revelations: Prints by Albert Dumouchel in the Collection of the MMFA offers an opportunity to admire the astonishing diversity of the output of this artist and teacher, who inspired an entire generation of printmakers in Quebec, an important part of his legacy. Composed of works from the MMFA’s collection, this exhibition showcases 35 of the most accomplished prints by Dumouchel, 10 of which were recently donated to the Museum. These works trace the trajectory ... More
 

Alvar and Elissa Aalto in Maison Carré, France 1959. Photo Alvar Aalto Foundation.

HELSINKI.- The Elissa Aalto centenary programme culminated in the release of a new book about her life and work, a touring exhibition of Aalto towns, and celebrations commemorating the 100th anniversary of the architect’s birth on 22 November 2022. Elissa Aalto’s (1922–1994) intriguing life journey took her from her childhood home of Kemi to the world’s metropolitan hubs, first as an employee at Alvar Aalto’s Helsinki-based office and later as the famed architect’s second wife. Architect Elissa Aalto is a new book shedding light on her lesser-known personal history and creative accomplishments. Published by the Aalto Alvar Foundation and edited by Chief Curator Mia Hipeli, the book features articles by Mia Hipeli, Timo Riekko, Jonas Malmberg ... More




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Exhibition presents new work for the first time in a major exhibition from Vancouver artist Jin-me Yoon
VANCOUVER.- For a limited time from October 15, 2022 to March 5, 2023, the Vancouver Art Gallery presents Jin-me Yoon: About Time, featuring Vancouver artist Jin-me Yoon’s significant artwork of the last decade. Frequently combining photography, video and installation, Yoon’s recent work is distinguished by a poetic, cinematic aesthetic. Earlier this year, Yoon was the recipient of the prestigious Scotiabank Photography Award, celebrating excellence in Canadian contemporary photography. Yoon emerged in the city’s contemporary art scene in the 1990s, and her lens–based works have often been linked with the formal aesthetic of the Vancouver School of Photoconceptualist artists and theorized within the identity politics of race and gender of the period. About Time is a significant solo exhibition that provides fresh perspectives on Yoon’s artistic practice ... More

Galerie Leu presents Martin Wickstr&oumlm in retrospective painting installation
MUNICH.- Galerie Leu since December 8th is presenting the first exhibition of acclaimed Swedish artist Martin Wickström in Germany, which will end on January 30th, 2023. True art, according to Hermann Hesse in his educational novel Narziß und Goldmund (1930), arises when ideas and practice meet. The artist is thinker and craftsman in one person, Hesse recalled. Something similar is embodied by the Swedish artist Martin Wickström, who has become known, among other things, for his detailed, colorful photorealistic paintings and whimsical installations with ready-mades, in which things are taken out of context and transformed into existential question marks. Wickstrom draws inspiration from most things that catches his eye. World News and History. Old newspaper clippings, scientific findings, great masters and pop kitsch ... More

'The Lost Rhino: An Art Installation' with Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg at the Natural History Museum
LONDON.- The first in a series of art installations in the Jerwood Gallery at the Natural History Museum, The Lost Rhino invites us to explore extinction, conservation and technology. At its centre sits The Substitute, a digitally recreated, life-sized northern white rhino. With the subspecies on the edge of extinction, Ginsberg's hyper-realistic recreation forces us to reflect on whether this new lifeform, created using technology, can ever be a substitute for the real thing. At its centre sits The Substitute, a video installation by artist Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg that brings visitors face-to-face with a digitally recreated, life-sized northern white rhino. With the subspecies nearly extinct, this piece explores the paradox of our preoccupation with creating new life forms, while neglecting existing ones. Displayed alongside Ginsberg's ... More

William Turner Gallery presents 'Alex Couwenberg: SuperGlide'
SANTA MONICA, CALIF.- In this new series of visually exquisite works, in the exhibition at William Turner Gallery that began on December 10th, Alex Couwenberg utilizes a jazz-like ensemble of color, line and texture to create lyrically engaging, deftly complex compositions. These multi-layered canvases captivate the viewer with the precision of their virtuosic execution, but they are at heart wonderful improvisations - reductive and additive processes drawing upon his intuitive and spontaneous reactions in the moment. Couwenberg simultaneously builds upon and excavates the surfaces of his paintings, constructing an abstract archaeology of his own deeply personal, semiotic patois. Born and raised in Southern California, Couwenberg’s work expresses the seemingly contradictory sensibilities of the region - the love of nature, and its variegated, open-spaced color and light ... More

Benefit Shop Foundation kicks off new year at January 18th auction with vintage and more
MOUNT KISCO, NY.- What better way to start the new year off than with a bit of vintage? Long a source for notable estates in the area as well as from the Hamptons to Palm Beach, the Benefit Shop Foundation, Inc., continues to suss out fine goods, most with storied provenance. Its Red Carpet auction on Wednesday, January 18, at 10 am is no exception. On offer will be all manner of interesting items and collectibles to appeal to buyers of all tastes from traditionalists to vintage and modern aficionados. Glass lovers will admire the collection of Fostoria while bibliophiles will pore over signed limited editions. Designer fashion and luxury goods are overflowing in this sale. Among several fine estates feeding this auction is former US ambassador to Poland Georgette Mosbacher’s uptown New York City apartment ... More

Paintings by Imants Lancmanis, beginning from 1958, presented in the Great Hall of LNMA
RIGA.- An ambitious exhibition The Art of Imants Lancmanis is on view in the Great Hall of the main building of the Latvian National Museum of Art in Riga. Although Imants Lancmanis’ oeuvre can be included in the current of contemporary postmodern painting, the artist himself has chosen to describe it as conceptual romanticism. The imagery in his works has been influenced equally by an understanding of the legacy of the Old Masters, nature studies and a lively imagination. Paintings by Imants Lancmanis, beginning from 1958, are thematically grouped in the Great Hall of the Latvian National Museum of Art (LNMA). Imants Lancmanis graduated from the Painting Department of the Art Academy of Latvia in 1966. Since then artist has developed his individual style embodying in it own world view in all classical genres of painting. Viewers will be able to see several series of paintings – ... More

Bridgette Wimberly, playwright and librettist, dies at 68
NEW YORK, NY.- Bridgette A. Wimberly, a playwright whose first staged work, a drama about abortion, was an off-Broadway hit in 2001 with Ruby Dee in the lead role, and who later made a mark in opera, writing the libretto for the widely produced “Charlie Parker’s Yardbird,” died on Dec. 1 at a care center in the Bronx. She was 68. Her family said the cause was complications of strokes. Wimberly took up playwriting relatively late. In an interview with The Plain Dealer of Cleveland in 2003, when one of her plays was being staged by the Cleveland Play House, she confessed that had someone told her a decade earlier that she would be a playwright, “I would have said that someday I’d be going to Mars, too.” Yet her first produced play, “Saint Lucy’s Eyes,” staged at the Women’s Project Theater in Manhattan in April 2001, was so well received — ... More

A charity tied to the Supreme Court offers donors access to the justices
NEW YORK, NY.- In some years, Chief Justice John Roberts does the honors. In others, it might be Justice Sonia Sotomayor or Justice Clarence Thomas presenting the squared-off hunks of marble affixed with the Supreme Court’s gilded seal. Hewed from slabs left over from the 1930s construction of the nation’s high court and handed out in its magnificent Great Hall, they are a unique status symbol in a town that craves them. And while the ideological bents of the justices bestowing them might vary, there is one constant: All the recipients have given at least $5,000 to a charity favored by the justices, and, more often than not, the donors have a significant stake in the way the court decides cases. The charity, the Supreme Court Historical Society, is ostensibly independent of the judicial branch of government, but in reality the two are inextricably intertwined ... More

The complex history behind a Vienna Philharmonic tradition
NEW YORK, NY.- If the Vienna Philharmonic’s annual New Year’s Concert is a global success, its legacy and reach rest on five pillars: a marvelous orchestra; internationally renowned conductors; a timeless repertoire, by the Strauss family and other composers of the 19th century; a splendid location, the gilded Musikverein; and TV broadcasts watched most recently by some 1.2 million people in 92 countries on five continents. The event, which returns this weekend with Franz Welser-Möst leading the Philharmonic, is by now a familiar one, and a multiday affair with three concerts. Between the preview performance, the New Year’s Eve Concert and the New Year’s Concert, conductors and the orchestra are faced with the extreme demands of an emotionally and physically challenging marathon. Just days after the series of concerts, CDs and DVDs of the Jan ... More

Pinakothek der Moderne │ Sammlung Moderne Kunst presents 'Mix & Match. Rediscovering the Collection'
MUNICH.- On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Pinakothek der Moderne a new presentation of some 350 works by more than 150 artists in the Sammlung Moderne Kunst are being displayed in an exhibition space extending over 3600 square metres. For the first time the exhibition programmatically titled MIX & MATCH brings together painting, sculpture, prints, photography and video art from different periods and in different media, displayed in thematically defined spaces. Unconventionally juxtaposed works of art spanning 120 years open up lively perspectives on pivotal contemporary questions. Since the opening of the Pinakothek der Moderne in 2002, not only the holdings of the collection have grown and expanded. Against a background of social upheaval and crises, the museum as an institution frequently reassesses its core tasks and exhibition practices ... More

'Korakrit Arunanondchai: From dying to living' on view at Moderna Museet
STOCKHOLM.- What brings us together and what divides us? Gatherings, both ritualistic and political, are at the core of Korakrit Arunanondchai’s work. In this exhibition the celebrated artist explores the threshold between life and death, as a space where new possibilities can be imagined, involving the individual and the collective. On show are a number of new works in immersive settings, by an artist who can rightly call himself a storyteller. Korakrit Arunanondchai was born in Bangkok in 1986, but after studying in the USA, he now divides his time between the city of his birth and New York. His distinctive combination of various mediums and techniques as well as his collaborative practice have attracted international attention during recent years. Dualities – life and death, past and present, dream and reality, fiction and documentary ... More


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New Images in the Age of Augustus

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Kongkee: Warring States Cyberpunk

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Flashback
On a day like today, Chinese painter Qi Baishi was born
January 01, 1864. Qi Baishi (1 January 1864 - 16 September 1957) was a Chinese painter, noted for the whimsical, often playful style of his watercolor works. Born to a peasant family from Xiangtan, Hunan, Qi became a carpenter at 14, and learned to paint by himself. After he turned 40, he traveled, visiting various scenic spots in China. After 1917 he settled in Beijing. In this image: Qi Baishi, Crabs, circa 1930. Album leaf, ink on paper. University of Michigan Museum of Art. Gift of Sotokichi Katsuizumi, 1949/1.199.

  
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