In BOOM: Mad Money, Mega Dealers, and the Rise of Contemporary Art, Michael Shnayerson paints a vivid portrait of the dizzying ascent of the contemporary art market and the powerful succession of dealers responsible for its rise.
Author Archives: John Seed
John Seed is a professor of art and art history at Mt. San Jacinto College in Southern California. Seed has written about art and artists for Arts of Asia, Art Ltd., Catamaran, Harvard Magazine, International Artist, The HuffingtonPost and Poets and Artists. An archive of his writings can be found at www.johnseed.com
Posted inArt
Delving Into the Story of a Black Woman Waiting for a Bus in Postwar Los Angeles
Like the canvas itself, which has been hidden away for years in a private collection, the painted woman in Elsie Palmer Payne’s “Bus Stop” is ready to be studied and re-evaluated.
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A Critical Piece of Advice Robert De Niro, Sr. Gave Me About Art
Robert De Niro senior’s sage advice, which he gave me in the late 1970s, has stayed with me, although I remember finding it intensely challenging when first offered.
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The Bo Bartlett Center Opens with a Vision for Community Service Through the Arts
The artist Bo Bartlett recently got together with family and friends to celebrate the opening of an eponymous arts center that intends to serve the Columbus community through a rich program of exhibitions, concerts, lectures, and film.
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Manuel Neri’s Chromatic Chaos
Apparent in Manuel Neri’s works with plaster figures is a kind of dualism: they reference classical forms while also radiating contemporary anxiety and subjectivity.
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Remembering Greg Escalante, a Gallerist and Friend to Artists
One reason that Greg Escalante’s battle with depression remained largely hidden was that he drew attention to himself in order to serve others, especially artists.
Posted inBooks
A Comprehensive and Contemporary Guide to Figurative Drawing
Figurative artists know the importance of learning “the rules” before they break them, which is precisely the opportunity this book intends to offer its most ambitious readers.
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Clusters of Loose Geometries in Conceptual “Thought Drawings”
Roberta Allen’s gentleness and sweet humor keep this exhibition free of the high seriousness that can make some conceptual art so dry and off-putting.
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The Early Life of Bruce Conner and His Rat Bastard Bohemia
To say that Conner was an outsider who also wanted to belong is to barely scratch the surface of his paradoxical persona.
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Some Doritos with Your Goya? Old Master Still Lifes Get an Update
With a bit too much time on my hands and a subscription to Adobe Photoshop I have been playing with an idea: what will happen to traditional still life paintings when elements from contemporary life are grafted into them?
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The Artist Statements of the Old Masters
“If the great European artists of the past were alive today, what kinds of statements would they need to write to explain and justify their work?”
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China’s Young Postmodern, Post-Mao Artists
LOS ANGELES — Jin Shan was 12 when the student-led Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 rocked China, eliciting a brutal and unprecedented military response.