Posted inArt

Aqua Returns to Miami Beach

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

After a stint in what felt like rather cramped quarters in Wynwood last year, the Aqua art fair returned to Miami Beach in a more relaxed setting — that even had a water feature — but the whole affair did feel a little underwhelming. I’m not a big fan of looking at art in hotel rooms since their low ceilings make everything feel cramped but that’s not to say there wasn’t a lot of good things to see on both levels of the complex.

While Aqua is normally known to be heavy with West Coast names, there were galleries from all over in the mix, including — from what I could tell — quite a few from Canada. Here is a selection of what I saw.

Posted inArt

By Self-Censoring, Smithsonian Betrays Art’s Integrity

by Kyle Chayka

When I saw that the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery chose to remove David Wojnarowicz’ “A Fire in My Belly” from its Hide/Seek exhibition following Republican political pressure, I was embarrassed and a little confused for the museum. Isn’t it the job of the art world to stand up to those who essentialize art as “offensive” or “degenerate,” and represent the minority who find little voice in the mainstream outside of art? By choosing to self-censor rather than bear out a media storm that has now turned against the museum, the Smithsonian sets a precedent by which art exhibitions can be compromised piece by piece simply because their imagery may be disagreeable to some.

Posted inArt

Rawson Projects Takes Root on Bedford Avenue

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

On November 11, a small gallery opened its doors on Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg and caused a ripple of excitement in local art circles. Not only was this one of the first galleries to open on Bedford for ages but many people are taking it as hopeful sign that some energy was returning to a neighborhood that used to be a central part of New York’s art world dialogue.

Named Rawson Projects, the small gallery consists of Christopher Rawson, Julian Calero, and James Morrill. Their first exhibition, Fingers in the Sun, features the work of local painter Sam Martineau and it is a smart show filled with works that are nuanced and almost impossible to capture in photographs.

Posted inArt

Art Basel Miami in Pictures

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

There’s no point in giving you a “review” of the mothership of art fairs in Miami, Art Basel Miami Beach, so I thought a photo essay with some observations were more appropriate.

I admit that I got a little bored after three hours of wandering around. I found myself seeing the same thing and getting the same numbness I get during marathon holiday shopping trips or walks through ancient souks … there’s only so much merchandise you can see in one stop.

It was still refreshing to see some galleries display the prices of their wares freely, and examples of excellent abstraction by names mostly absent from the art history survey books, but I was most shocked to discover what must be the most awful Basquiat I have even seen in my life.

Posted inOpinion

Kill Famous Artists at #Rank

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

We already warned you, so it should be no surprise that Paul Steen’s art world-ized open source video game based on Assault Cube, but injected with 150 of the “most important living artists” according to Artfacts.net, is awesome.

In his virtual world you can roam PS1 or the Istanbul Biennial or at a Jeff Wall show at the Kunstwerk in Berlin gunning down famous artist to win the game. This isn’t a kumbaya game, people. You need to kill to win.

But I have to admit that there’s nothing more fulfilling than reading “Damien Hirst fragged Jasper John.” Download the “Art Assault” modification here: paulsteen.se/aa.html And enjoy!

Posted inBooks

Reading Jerry Saltz’ Seeing Out Louder

by Kyle Chayka

Though the art world seems to have recovered from crisis mode with the enthusiastic approach to (and beginning) of Art Basel Miami Beach 2010, the remnants of our previous recession-driven apocalypse are still close at hand. Auction successes are blazing beacons of money, but seem shaky and could prove to be singular. Museum administrations have become dangerously insular, commercially driven and intermixed with business and political influences. In comes Jerry Saltz’ Cassandra paean Seeing Out Louder, a collection of the critic’s writing from 2003 to 2009.

Posted inNews

Smithsonian Caves to GOP Pressure, Removes Ant-Covered Jesus Video

by Kyle Chayka

The National Portrait Gallery has caved under Republican political pressure and removed a potentially “offensive” video work by David Wojnarowicz, a multi-media artist who was felled by AIDS in 1992, from its Hide/Seek exhibition. The exhibition, deemed brave and important by critics, uncovers previously-veiled LGBT influences in the history of art. Yet threats and demands that the exhibition be canceled from Reps. John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Eric Cantor (R-Va.) have caused the NPG to remove Wojnarowicz’ “A Fire In My Belly,” a video that features a brief clip of ants crawling over a crucifixion Jesus figure.

Posted inArt

Marc Horowitz Crowdsources Life/Art From Strangers

by AX Mina

On November 1, one of People Magazine‘s Top 50 Hottest Bachelors, conceptual artist and Internet start Marc Horowitz, took a line from Subservient Chicken and let the Internet tell him what to do. He agreed to bound by these decisions, no matter how absurd, and to broadcast the results online for the wider world to see.

For the entire month, with the backing of the New York-based public art organization Creative Time, Marc has been crowdsourcing his life. Everything from what he should wear to how he should celebrate Thanksgiving becomes open to the masses. The piece continues in the tradition of Marc’s extensive body of enormously popular Internet-based works, from “Talkshow 247,” where he broadcast his life continuously for three months, and the “Google Maps Roadtrip,” a journey across the country using only Google Streetview.

Posted inArt

Miami’s Seven Art Fair Goes Indie

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

The buzz before Miami was that Seven Art Fair was going to be one to watch and that is certainly the case.

This indie fair of seven galleries with solid programs — and some art stars among them — have created a wonderful little side fair that has a well-organized area for video works (which is both inviting and well spaced), a space for the #Rank event (which we’ve mentioned before), rooms for work by various artists to talk to one another (some better than others), but most importantly an attempt to collide gallery stables to see what they could come up with together (most notably on one wall covered salon style with pieces from the whole constellation of “Seven” artists).

Did all the artists fit perfectly together? No, but this is an art fair and not a curated exhibition. It was good to see some galleries try something that felt interesting and less commercial than the run-of-the-mill art fairs.

Posted inArt

12 Holiday Picks From MoMA’s Design Store

by Kyle Chayka

If you weren’t paranoid about the holidays before Thanksgiving, now they’re really coming up. Hanukkah and Christmas and everything else are JUST around the corner in December, and then New Years! OMG! So what are you picking up your loved ones this year? Being artsy as you all are, you probably want to support our city’s fine artists and institutions.

To discover some cool art-related presents, I visited the Museum of Modern Art’s gift shop and design store in search of desirable objects. Here’s what I came up with.

Posted inOpinion

One Last Look

Avatar photo by Hrag Vartanian

Man Bartlett’s “Kin” during the last day of #TheSocialGraph exhibition. We will have a photo essay tomorrow and there are a few more podcasts on the way, but last Saturday we threw a closing party for the show, which featured livestreaming of Man Bartlett’s “#24hKith” performance for the first hour of the event (the final hour of his performance) and a listening party for the Sound of Art album. Also, in a few weeks we will be announcing the publication of the #TheSocialGraph catalogue, which will include essays, photos, explanations and other texts to reveal a few more facets of the world of social media art.