Art in America - Most Recent News and Opinion

Venice Biennale First-Timers: The Bahamas

Fri, 24 May 2013 13:30:00 +0100

This summer, the Bahamas will celebrate its 40th year as an independent commonwealth while also presenting its first pavilion in the Venice Biennale. Tavares Strachan, who was born in Nassau, Bahamas, and lives in New York, will represent his homeland by way of the North Pole with an exhibition titled "Polar Eclipse" in the Arsenale.

Singaporean Artist Scores at Art Basel in Hong Kong

Fri, 24 May 2013 10:30:00 +0100

While larger galleries boasted of seven-figure sales early on at the inaugural Art Basel in Hong Kong fair (May 23-26), a young Singapore gallery celebrated a quieter victory. Chan Hampe Galleries sold the contents of its booth, a project by Singaporean artist Dawn Ng, before Tuesday evening's vernissage.

Life of Objects: An Interview with Mary Mattingly

Thu, 23 May 2013 14:45:00 +0100

Ecology, nomadic living and community participation are central to Mary Mattingly's collaborative projects. Triple Island, her next collaborative work, will open July 20 on Pier 42 in Lower Manhattan.

The Lookout: A Weekly Guide to Shows You Won't Want to Miss

Thu, 23 May 2013 12:00:00 +0100

This week we check out Travess Smalley's complex abstract photo-collages at Higher Pictures, Arthur Ou's shimmering, tactile paintings at Brennan & Griffin, and Wolfgang Tillmans's expansive show featuring photographs from the past five years at Andrea Rosen.

Superflat Screen: Takashi Murakami's Jellyfish Eyes

Thu, 23 May 2013 11:00:00 +0100

Murakami's debut feature film, Jellyfish Eyes, makes breaking down the divide between art and commerce look like child's play.

Westerners and Easterners Alike Flock to Art Basel In Hong Kong

Wed, 22 May 2013 15:45:00 +0100

Art Basel in Hong Kong, formerly known as Art HK, is the place to go for East-meets-West-style work like Wu Di's Plaything (2013). The painting shows a monkey-headed human figure in Western Renaissance garb on the end of a leash held by a human-headed monkey, all against a background of old master-style gold leaf. Overall, Tuesday's preview of the inaugural Art Basel Hong Kong (May 23-26) saw steady sales and increased numbers of visitors from outside the region.

Carol Bove Colonizes the High Line

Wed, 22 May 2013 13:00:00 +0100

Carol Bove recently installed seven new sculptures along the High Line's Rail Yards segment. Cecilia Alemani, curator of High Line Art, spoke with A.i.A. last week, soon after Friends of the High Line began giving tours of the final portion of the track.

Long Island Art Dealer Glafira Rosales Arrested

Tue, 21 May 2013 18:30:00 +0100

Glafira Rosales, a little-known art dealer affiliated with the formerly venerable gallery Knoedler & Co., was arrested at her Long Island home this morning, according to the New York Times.

Asia Society Appoints Josette Sheeran

Tue, 21 May 2013 17:00:00 +0100

The Asia Society, a global nonprofit that fosters connections between Asia and the U.S., has appointed Josette Sheeran as its new president.

The NeoLucida: Artists Revive an Old Master Tool

Tue, 21 May 2013 11:45:00 +0100

When artists Pablo Garcia and Golan Levin launched their latest Kickstarter project on May 7, aiming to raise money to produce an updated camera lucida, the $30 NeoLucida, their big hope was to attract 500 backers before June. By midmorning on the next day they were fully funded.

More than Words: An Interview with Karla Black

Mon, 20 May 2013 15:15:00 +0100

Scottish artist Karla Black makes large, multisensory sculptural installations that commingle traditional art supplies—plaster, chalk, paint, paper—with materials more familiar from the medicine cabinet, such as Vaseline, face powder and Alka-Seltzer.

Concrete Continuity

Mon, 20 May 2013 10:45:00 +0100

How do new generations of artists absorb the art of the past? "Concrete Remains: Postwar and Contemporary Art from Brazil," a compact show on view at Chelsea's Tierney Gardarin Gallery (formerly Cristin Tierney), through June 22, is, in one sense, an exploration of this question. It also encapsulates an important area of Latin American art, shedding new light on the ongoing preoccupation of 21st-century Brazilian artists with their nation's major contribution to 20th-century art: Concrete and Neo-Concrete art.

Miami Museum Looks South to Go Global

Fri, 17 May 2013 17:00:00 +0100

With a new Herzog and de Meuron-designed building and a new name, the Miami Art Museum hopes to make that tropical city a center of the art world. Formerly known as the Miami Art Museum, the institution will be re-named in Pérez's honor when it reopens in December as the Pérez Art Museum Miami.

Warhol Enlivens Phillips Evening Sale

Fri, 17 May 2013 15:00:00 +0100

Last night's contemporary art sale at New York auctioneer Phillips totaled $78.6 million, falling short of the evening's high estimate of $110 million. The undisputed star of the evening, Andy Warhol, accounted for three of the evening's top 10 sales, with his silkscreen painting Four Marilyns (1962) ringing in at $38.2 million. The house found buyers for 31 of the 38 lots offered.

The Frieze Speakeasy Experience

Fri, 17 May 2013 11:30:00 +0100

"Don't you know how to read? Show me your number!" barked the unseen doorman. I showed it to him. "I'm not even talking to you," he jeered. The man ahead of me was afforded entry, while the door shut in my face. It was a Monday afternoon on Randall's Island but I felt as self-conscious as if it were Friday night in front of a club in SoHo.

Hammer Museum Hires Curators Butler, Moshayedi

Thu, 16 May 2013 17:00:00 +0100

Cornelia Butler, named in April as co-curator with Michael Ned Holte of the upcoming Hammer biennial "Made in LA 2014," will assume the position of chief curator. She replaces Douglas Fogle, who left the Hammer in 2011 to be an independent curator. Aram Moshayedi, currently of REDCAT, will also join the Hammer, in the newly created position of curator.

At the Altar of Saint Genet

Thu, 16 May 2013 15:00:00 +0100

Gold leaf, honey, tar, blood, wax, flowers, leeches, pheasants, arrows: such are the materials used by Seattle-based experimental theater company Saint Genet, whose new work Paradisiacal Rites opens at Seattle performance space On The Boards this week.

Cooper Occupation Exceeds One-Week Mark

Thu, 16 May 2013 13:00:00 +0100

In the latest development in an ongoing conflict, students at New York's Cooper Union have occupied the office of school president Jamshed Bharucha for a full week. They have vowed to continue their protest until Bharucha steps down. "It's very evident that he does not believe in the mission of the school," second-year art student Angus Buchanan-Smith told A.i.A. during a visit this week to the East Village college.

The Lookout: A Weekly Guide to Shows You Won't Want to Miss

Thu, 16 May 2013 12:00:00 +0100

This week we check out Michele Abeles's photos at 47 Canal, geometric abstractions and sculptural tableaux by Elizabeth Neel at Sikkema Jenkins and Gedi Sibony's bare-bones assemblages at Greene Naftali.

Christie's Sells Nearly Half a Billion Dollars of Contemporary Art

Thu, 16 May 2013 09:00:00 +0100

Christie's contemporary art sale last night achieved the highest total in auction history at $495 million. Records were set for Pollock, Lichtenstein, Basquiat, Manzoni, Tuymans, Cornell, Hofmann, Guston, Noland, Mehretu, Serra and Ruth Asawa in a two-hour sale in a buzzing, packed room in which 94 percent of artworks offered found buyers among an exceptionally active field of telephone and in-room bidders.