contemporary art
Zhang Enli/Alex Van Gelder, Hauser & WirthTuesday, 14 January 2014
In 1920, Man Ray, now better known for his solarized photographs, produced a sculpture made from found objects. L'Enigme d'Isidore Ducasse, named after the 19th-century French poet who used the pseudonym Comte de Lautréamont, is a sewing machine... Read more... |
theartsdesk in Dunkirk: The spirit of FRACWednesday, 27 November 2013
Those French and their grand projects! Not the least of them is the division of the country into 23 areas who acquire their own collections of international contemporary art, supplemented by a national loan collection, all under the rubric of FRAC,... Read more... |
Sonica, GlasgowSaturday, 23 November 2013
At first it looked like a joke. But, as each muscle spasm, set off by an electric shock, did appear to produce a pained expression in the performer and a subsequent note, one slowly had to accept that these four string quartet players were indeed... Read more... |
Adrián Villar Rojas, Sackler Serpentine GalleryFriday, 27 September 2013
A queue of artists, press and glitterati snaked its way through Kensington Gardens waiting to be let into the private view for the opening of the Serpentine’s new Sackler Gallery this week, housed in The Magazine, a former 1805 gunpowder store,... Read more... |
theartsdesk in the Hamptons: The $26 Million BarnWednesday, 28 August 2013
There’s never a good day for traffic in the Hamptons, and a Friday in August takes the biscuit. The Montauk Highway, also known as Route 27, was bumper to bumper on the way to the Parrish Art Museum, recently relocated from nearby Southampton... Read more... |
Art: theartsdesk at Manchester International Festival 2013Sunday, 07 July 2013
I’m watching someone with a mic pacing the linking bridge on the second floor of the Arndale Shopping Centre. He’s repeating the same phrase over and over again, which he’ll do for the next 20 or so minutes. “We’re souls refreshed,” I think it is.... Read more... |
Cornelia Parker, Frith Street GallerySunday, 09 June 2013
Cornelia Parker came to prominence with various acts of destruction/resurrection. Some of the most famous examples include a blown-up garden shed in Cold Dark Matter: An Exploded View, 1991, the charred remains of churches in Mass (Colder Darker... Read more... |
Helen Chadwick, Richard SaltounTuesday, 21 May 2013
It's 17 years since Helen Chadwick died without warning of heart failure at the tragically early age of 42 and nine years since the Barbican staged a retrospective of her work. Time, then, for a reappraisal and this small but beautifully presented... Read more... |
Gallery: Art Projects and The Catlin Guide at the London Art FairMonday, 14 January 2013
The London Art Fair may not have the international heft or VIP glamour of Frieze, but for 25 years it’s been the place to see and buy the best of British modern art. While the main fair features 100 established galleries – including Browse and Derby... Read more... |
Artes Mundi Prize, National Museum Wales, CardiffFriday, 30 November 2012
An award for artists whose work engages with "social reality, lived experience and the human condition" has been won by a Mexican forensic technician whose works deals intimately with her country’s brutal drug wars. Britain’s most valuable art award... Read more... |
Turner Prize 2012, Tate BritainTuesday, 02 October 2012
There are two films in the Turner Prize exhibition and taken together and watched end-to-end they last just under three hours. That sounds gruelling for an art exhibition, but they’re from the strongest two candidates on this year’s shortlist. And... Read more... |
Thomas Schütte: Faces and Figures, Serpentine GalleryFriday, 28 September 2012
On the evidence of this Serpentine exhibition of huge sculptures, small sculptures, photographs, drawings, watercolours and prints, the German artist Thomas Schütte is obsessed, but obsessed, with faces. It is billed as the first show to focus... Read more... |
