by Michael Anthony Farley on March 24, 2016
If you ask someone how the art market is doing in Hong Kong, get ready for an earful. We’re unfortunately not in town for Art Basel, so we can’t speak to that topic first-hand. But as a person with internet access, I’ve been bombarded with more contradictory facts and opinions (let’s be honest, mostly opinions) about the state of the unstable Chinese economy, the tastes of the Asian art market, and the manic-depressive cycles of art fair outlooks than I ever thought I’d need to know.
Below, we’ve aggregated some of the uneven reporting on Art Basel Hong Kong, including some quotes from director Adeline Ooi and other industry experts, to get a better idea of just what China’s market troubles mean for the art world:
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by Paddy Johnson on March 9, 2016
Lorna Mills’s Midnight Moment at Times Square
Canadian artist Lorna Mills gets a write up in CBC for her Times Square billboard installation. Love this excerpt: “I’m a Canadian artist and I’ve just put a mountain in Times Square? That kind of made me laugh,” Mills tells CBC Arts, erupting with infectious laughter, appropriately enough. “We just never go wrong when we export charismatic landscapes.” True, true. Can we all talk some more about the Group of Seven, please? [CBC Arts]
The art world is a hot bed of incestuous relationships and intrigue. Some commercial galleries are complaining that museums expect them to sponsor shows that include work by artists they represent. But museums say their expenses are sky high and can’t afford to launch the shows without this support. These financial realities may explain why nearly a third of the major solo exhibitions at museums in the United States between 2007 and 2013 featured artists represented by just five galleries. As you might have guessed those galleries were the big ones: Gagosian, Pace, Marian Goodman, David Zwirner and Hauser & Wirth. [New York Times]
Love this: The Rauschenberg Foundation will ease copyright restrictions on work by Robert Rauschenberg. Among other things this means royalty-free use of his images to museums and educational institutions who use Rauschenberg’s art in promotional materials. [Culture: High & Low]
Martha Tedschi, currently the deputy director of the Art Institute of Chicago will leave to take on the role of director at Harvard Art Museums. [Boston Globe]
Here’s an ostrich chasing some cyclists. Weird. [Youtube via: metafilter]
NYC is getting new buses that have been outfitted with wifi and charging ports. [Curbed]
Mayor Bill de Blasio promised an unprecedented era of transparency—he would be the first mayor not only to disclose meetings he had with lobbyists, but that all city officials in executive agencies publicly disclose their meetings with registered lobbyists. This would take place on a monthly basis. Well, we’re two years in and we haven’t seen any disclosures. So much for that promise. [Capital New York]
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