I can’t say I wasn’t charmed by Marble Sculpture from 350 B.C. to Last Week’s title, though it’s a tad overblown. And I was pleasantly surprised by the almost gauche clutter I encountered on the gallery’s routinely Spartan first floor, with thirty-one midsize-to-extra-large artworks from wildly different historical periods crowded together like refugees from an intergalactic conflict.
Now you don’t even have to be a part of the 1% to make art enthusiasts with strong opinions wild with fury this holiday season — just buy them the scale model of Jeff Koon’s flashy car.
Since we’ve been running down the most powerless and most f***able art world figures, now we’re seeing which ones are in dire need a makeover. Anyone in the public sphere knows the way they dress reflects greatly on their work, and art people, fortunately or not, are no exception.
Imagine strolling through clean, bright halls, surrounded by immaculate display cases filled with baubles and trinkets, the steam-polished precious metals and gems coruscating in the glare of spotlights. Hear your feet clacking on the white floors, stopping to look closer at the jewelry on display, but not close enough to stir the ire of the security guard peering over your shoulder. Imagine wanting everything you see, from diamond diadems to neon-tubed necklaces. No, you’re not in Tiffany’s or Cartier, you’re in the Museum of Arts and Design, gazing at their new show, Picasso to Koons: The Artist as Jeweler.
This week’s Required Reading includes Tracey Emin’s gift to 10 Downing St, you too can levitate in photos, Koons as roadkill, Nike’s swoosh is 40, internet art bubble, evolution of the hipster, autobot aethetics, street art in East Timor & more.
Jeff Koons’s art collection, thoughts on LA MOCA’s questionable art history, Invader in Paris, a tour of the Calatrava building in Milwaukee, something fishy about Warhol, iPhone photography and corporate culture and the US government … all on this week’s Required Reading.
The recent Cariou v Prince District Court decision has brought to the fore, once and for all, the elephant in the art world and courtroom, Fair Use, which had, until now, managed to avoid close scrutiny in the popular press.
Jamie Alexander and Derek Song were surprised in late December of last year when they received a letter from the New York law firm of Jones Day, which represents Jeff Koons, LLC. Their San Francisco retail store and gallery, Park Life, had never attracted the attention of the art world’s big hitters before, but now, one Peter D. Vogl had sent them a cease-and-desist letter calling for the immediate cessation of their sale of balloon dog bookends. Apparently the 10.2” matte plastic pooches were threatening the Koons art empire and potentially confusing customers who are more accustomed to spending a lot more money on ten foot high hi-gloss steel versions of the same species.
Felix Salmon just posted an incandescent piece on the State of the Art World seen through the lens of Davos. At a meeting of plutocrats and artists, Salmon sees collectors buying art not for its aesthetic quality but for its aura: the respect and awe that comes with owning something really expensive.
Davos, Switzerland — ModernARTization: Art and Philanthropy Changing Societies. Yes, it’s a mouthful, and I also don’t know what it means, and the presentation didn’t help. Organizer and philanthropist, Victor Pinchuk, hosted a gathering at the Morosani Schweizerhof Hotel in Davos, Switzerland to discuss how philanthropy can change and educate societies through art. I walked away with the impression that the rich were patting themselves on the back.
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Can Art Create World Change? 3 Artists at Davos
Earliest Known Paintings Discovered in Spain
Artists Kickstarting Their Own Careers
Alone Among The Living and the Dead
Mike Kelley Dead at 58, Apparent Suicide
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