To hear the phrase “the first woman to” do or become something is unfortunately quite common nowadays, and while the road to equality is still long, we salute those who help pave it.

We are also nevertheless very happy for Laurence des Cars, the first woman to lead The Louvre in Paris in its 228-year-long history. She was appointed on May 26, 2021 by the French President Emmanuel Macron, and will assume her position at the realm of world’s most visited museum on September 1.

While the name of Laurence des Cars only just became familiar to many, this experienced art historian has been around for a while. Born in 1966 to journalist and writer Jean des Cars, she studied art history at the Sorbonne and École du Louvre. Her first position as curator was at the Musée d’Orsay, of which she has also been President since 2014, along with the much smaller Musée de l’Orangerie since 2017. From 2007 to 2014, she was in charge of Agence France-Muséums, the French government body behind the Louvre Abu Dhabi.

Des Cars is a specialist in 19th- and early-20th-century painting. As a teacher at École du Louvre, she organized many exhibitions for various museums, including the traveling show on Edward Burne-Jones (1998-99), Gustave Courbet (2007-08), and Jean-Léon Gérôme (2010-11).

During her time as head of Musée d’Orsay, Laurence des Cars oversaw the acclaimed 2019 exhibition “Black models: from Géricault to Matisse,” which looked at the representation of Black figures in visual arts, from the abolition of slavery in France (1794) to the modern day. The museum is also the first French venue of its kind to voluntarily return a Nazi-looted painting to its rightful owners.

“My heart beat much faster,” des Cars said to France Inter, after learning about her new role from the culture minister, Roselyne Bachelot, on May 23. She will be replacing the museum’s leader of the past eight years, Jean-Luc Martinez, who will now serve as a special ambassador for international co-operation on cultural heritage. According to a statement from the French culture ministry, Des Cars pledged to extend The Louvre’s opening hours in order to attract younger visitors, and to foster “a dialogue between ancient art and the contemporary world,” which will be particularly interesting to see, given that The Louvre has been a “classical” art museum under Martinez’s leadership.

In an interview with The New York Times, des Cars expressed her excitement to be the first female president-director of The Louvre. “Things are really changing for women in the museum world. Of the 70 curators in the Louvre, more than half of them are women. More women are heading museums, especially in Europe. And younger women are much more confident these days,” she said.

Although he grew the museum’s attendance to over 10 million a year, the previous Director Jean-Luc Martinez was criticized for a few decisions, including the Louvre’s partnership with the Uniqlo brand for a merchandize line, or the one with Airbnb, which allowed a couple to spend a night in the museum.

The Louvre Museum is a state-owned venue with the annual budget of about $291 million and more than 2,000 employees. Despite the fact that the attendance plunged by 72 percent to 2.7 million in 2020 during the pandemic, it is still the most visited – and the largest – art museum in the world.

As reported by The Guardian and the French Culture Ministry, about 67 percent of the country’s national museums are headed by women. Laurence des Cars will be joining the company of Catherine Chevillot, Director of the Musée Rodin, Tatyana Franck at the Élysée museum, and Sophie Makariou, President of the Musée Guimet.

https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/laurence-des-cars-named-louvre-director
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/26/arts/design/louvre-laurence-des-cars.html
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/26/louvre-appoints-laurence-des-cars-as-first-female-president

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With the difficulties posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, virtually every in-person event on Earth was cancelled, art fairs among them. Directors had to get creative, inspired to find a way to keep art, hope, and inspiration alive by bringing the show to the public somehow.

A little background: Cube Art Fair is actually a Brussels-based enterprise, happening in the Belgian capital every year for four years now. It mainly focuses on American artists through a high standard of curation, presentation, and organization of a major gallery fair. Through Cube Art Fair, European collectors have a unique change to get familiar with the contemporary art scene in the United States, be it emerging or established.

So how does a Brussels fair end up in New York? The reason would be Gregoire Vogelsang, the man behind Cube, who moved to the Big Apple after managing an art gallery in Belgium for two years.

Now onto the NYC event! To visit Cube Art Fair 2021, you better get your legs ready: the artwork can be viewed on over 100 of the city’s many billboards and kiosks, from the heart of Times Square to the Lower East Side, Chelsea, Hell’s Kitchen, the Upper East Side and beyond. The whole of Manhattan is Cube Art Fair’s exhibition space! The billboard initiative seems to be part of Cube’s #staycreative campaign, which had already taken place in Brussels and Miami.

What not to miss? The Cube Art Fair definitely recommends seeing “Soft Stories,” one of the artworks appearing on a 12,000-square-feet billboard in Times Square. Created by Canadian photographer Laura Jane Petelko, the open series takes the symbolic inhabitation of animals as the point of departure and goes on to tackle the topics of intimacy, isolation, our relationship with nature.

On the other hand, the sculptural work of the American artist Sam Tufnell tries to reorient our understanding of beauty. His pieces present in the Cube Art Fair exhibition call out the macabre: there is a sculpture of a skull made of noodle soup, for instance.

Among other participating artists are Denmark’s portrait photographer Kenneth Willardt, the French-Mexican photographer Patricia de Solages, and Belgian wildlife photographer Griet Van Malderen.

Make sure you scan the QR code of each artwork, to find our more about it, or even to purchase it, in physical or NFT format.

Cube Art Fair is on view in New York City through May 9, 2021.

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To wind up at the Metropolitan Museum of Art must have been an interesting journey. Could you please tell us a little about yourself and the journey that brought you there.

I’m a chemist. I studied chemistry in Italy and then crystallography which is the discipline that studies crystalline materials particularly minerals; I obtained my PhD in Italy. Then I came to the US for a postdoctoral period at the University of Michigan continuing along that line with regular chemistry. That’s where I started looking for an alternative career in the industry.

Simultaneously, I discovered American art museums and found that they are very interesting and different than European museums, especially the Italian ones.

There is a degree of integration among different professions and also a broader array of professions within the museum. I discovered that there were scientists working in museums. Here in the US I found they have science labs that we are supporting the restorers, conservators and the art curators in their investigation which was a big discovery for me. Very few people were hiring scientists in museums and it was just a few university laboratories doing this and there were no scientists in museums, and even now there are no scientists in museums in Italy.

So I always had the thought to do this but I always left it as a thought thinking it would be nice but I can’t.

I discovered this field, then I just picked up the phone and started calling all the labs in museums. I spoke with their scientists and asked about an opening. I had a list of 12 it names to call. I still remember in fact my wife Jennifer, who at the time I was dating, said who told me that since I had a list of contacts to just pick up the phone and call.

And I wondered how to do that because I wouldn’t do that in Italy. She reminded me that this is not Italy and this is how you do things in America. So I just called them.

Everybody was very nice. There weren’t many opportunities. But the last person I called was the scientist at Los Angeles County Museum of Art. He said yes and he informed me that they had a fellowship I should apply for and so I applied. I actually went there on my own. I took a Southwest flight that probably stopped in 16 places before getting to LA to go for the interview.

They offered me a job that paid very little. I could manage and so, after a lot of trouble to get the Visa permit, I started in LA. I still remember when I went there for my interview because it was March and there was still snow on the ground in Ann Arbor, Michigan where I was living at the time. I got to LAX (which is not the best place in LA) but when I saw the palm trees I said, I’m going to get this job. So I started it and that September I moved to LA. I spent two years there as a fellow which is basically a very Junior position but it was an extraordinary experience because I really had a fantastic mentor, great colleagues, and it was really so integrated. There I got to work on everything from paintings to ancient Egyptian silver and bronze sculptures, Modern art. So really that was how I learned. After two years, I had the opportunity to get a research position at the Freer Gallery in Washington DC, which is the collection of Asian art of the Smithsonian. There I started working on a special project on Japanese art.

Then, after two years LA County Museum of Art called me and told me that the person I worked with there had retired and asked if I was interested in the job of senior scientist there. After some time there the Met museum called. Even though I loved Los Angeles, I could not say no to New York. New York is where things happen and and my task at the MET was really to create the first scientific research department in the all history of the MET. The MET had a few scientists, but they were working on different conservation areas, in different environments. So they asked me to come in, bring them together and create a bigger structure. Therefore, I gave up surfing in the morning before I went to work and I moved to NYC.

I’m still here, 16 years later.

You are a very successful scientist, what is your role/job description at the Met museum?

Now every day the first thing I do is to arrange the calendar for the following week because out of 16 people on my team I can only bring in six people every day because of Covid-19 occupancy restrictions, so I’m just like the guy who takes down bookings for the tennis courts or something like that. It’s not very exciting and you can imagine everybody wants to be here. A lot of my work is administrative. I created a team, I assembled a work structure; as a non profit we have to do a lot of fundraising that is looking for grants to secure positions to take care of the maintenance of equipment and to purchase new equipment. My biggest priority right now is really helping museums and the Arts to achieve more representation and more diversity.

We’re lucky that in the sciences we have an amazing pool of talented scientists of color, so we can take advantage of programs that existed in the past. We increased the minority representation in the sciences and our task now is reaching out to these candidates letting them know that this is a great career and they can join the museum and contribute and help us become more representative of America. To do that I just need to do a lot of knocking on doors to get money.

Because today is a very quiet day I could come in to do the interview with you and also work in the laboratory. I’m thinking it’s a luxury for me. I can shut off the paperwork and go to the laboratory where I’m putting together a new instrument that will allow us to do more work in identifying materials in works of art. Tomorrow I have a new Junior scientist who’s a PhD candidate here at City College and who works with me.

I also work on Japanese art. That’s my skill, my passion. I’ve done a lot of work to study artworks such as the famous Great Wave by Hokusai. If you Google me you’ll see that I talk a lot about that. Our job is to discover how those prints were made, and also to really look through materials, through the technology, through the identification of artists pigments and processes, and understand more about the society that produced these works.

Our aim would be not to just stop at the surface or under the surface, but scrape down and tell a story that really says something new about Hokusai and understand art through the lens of the components and physical nature of the object.

How do you apply your scientific expertise to the artworks that the museum deals with? Can you give an example?

For example, in Hokusai’s Great Wave (you can look up in our collection website) you see there’s a beautiful and dynamic live representational force of nature in the Great Wave where tiny little men are about to be washed out by the wave. One of the things that was very interesting to me was the use of blue. Now the woodblock printing in Japan in the 1800s was the most advanced color reproduction technique in the world. So even though it was a pre-industrial society, there was no steam power, no machine, etc., they could achieve amazing results in several fields.

They were able to achieve amazing color quality, amazing quality control over print that were sold at a very low cost. It was commercial illustration, it was not art. You start seeing prints like the Great Wave, my own hypothesis is that we have the beginning of artistic prints in that they go beyond even what was already highly achievable at that time in the sense that the depth of color and the color range is amazing. Our brain processes variations in light (expressed in drawings with light and dark shading) as variation in depth in space. Hokusai and the master craftsmen who printed this work knew this intuitively, and they took extra care with lighter and darker shades of blue to create depth and movement. The observation is that these works are truly exceptional, and trying to deconstruct them to see what makes them amazing in the use of color and then going into analysis to prove this theory is part of the work. Therefore, we use a variety of tools, and the most important ones are the eye and the microscope, as you really want to get close to it and observe it. I’m not that good but my colleagues that work in conservation really have highly trained eyes and they can very often tell me what I’m going to find. They are always right. And then we go on with non-invasive analytical techniques. These are instruments that allow us to identify the materials without removing particles from the work, eventually it may be necessary to do what we call micro sampling, that is removing microscopic fragments.

We have a fiber optic instrument that shines just like regular white light and we capture the reflection of the color, and we can see through a spectrometer broken down in each wavelength rather than the eye which has only three receptors, the eye sees blue, green, and red.

Blue, green, and red are amazing colors because we have color vision essentially by seeing these three colors. This instrument instead has hundreds of receptors so we can really get a very complex picture that gives us the fingerprint of a certain color. We can tell whether it’s Indigo or Prussian Blue.

So what we discovered was how those two pigments were mixed which makes the printing more complex, time consuming, and ultimately more expensive, if you see that the publisher chose to go through this route and created something that clearly has more added value, more artistic quality. Then, this is not a normal print, and I think that that is an important statement to make because it says something about the time that was done and what people wanted and it gets a bit more complex. You can imagine that landscapes are important to those who love to travel. And that’s normal for us. We don’t even think about it. You have a landscape in front of you and say, oh I would like to visit the place or I visited that place. I think about older times like special feudal society when they were not allowed to travel and could not just pick up and go with money; but also needing to be authorized by their local sovereign lord. You could not just go somewhere else and not work for him.

So what we see in Japan in Tokyo is that people had a little bit more money and

people started traveling. So maybe it’s a pilgrimage. Maybe it’s going to a famous sanctuary or famous art place. So if you’re a person of means you travel and you commission a painting that shows a famous place.

If your personal means are less you may buy a print and maybe still travel so the print could be a souvenir. If you’re somebody who cannot travel at least you can afford the print because now you see the landscapes around you. There is always a correlation of what you see in paintings and what you need to make that painting.

Before the 1820’s (The Great Wave is from 1830s) you cannot find landscape prints in Japan.

Quite simply because they didn’t have a blue color that you can use for print that would give you the bright blue of the sky and the deep blue of the ocean. All they had was indigo, which is the color of blue jeans, a bit of a dull color. It doesn’t really work. If you make it really concentrated it comes out a dull grey-blue.

If you want to you can make it a little like the blue sky but it won’t be the real blue sky and so at some point Prussian blue from Europe arrived in Japan. And that’s about 1820 the moment it arrives you have landscape prints. This is not a coincidence.

We traced the use of colors which is the very basic step into looking at a piece of art with the curators or art historians. We then join in and so it’s a little bit of a forensic conversation, a little bit of art historical background. We go in through a step-by-step approach using not the eyes but microscopes, for non-invasive analysis as well as x-ray laser based infrared tools.

Have you ever come across a forgery?

We generally don’t comment on forgeries and similar issues. There are other issues which are not outright forgeries, but it’s where a piece has been restored and and so a part is not original and some of them could be historical and some could be very new. So it’s more about deciding which one stays and which one goes. I know it’s a very fascinating topic, but I am sure there are actually less forgeries than you think. We haven’t seen many those. We also have the opposite which is when we have an object that may be classified as a reproduction or a copy and with true analysis we can tell that it’s actually the real thing. That’s far more exciting because instead of condemning something you can actually bring it back from obscurity.

What do you think of the art world right now during Covid-19? What has the impact been as far as you see?

I can tell you only what I know about-that it is certainly a crisis.

This is hitting all of us really hard.

I say it’s a catastrophe because right now the MET is losing an enormous amount of money. We’re trying to stay open and we really wanted to stay open, not so much to find revenue. As you know, we have a particular admission policy where New Yorkers and New York State residents “pay as they wish”.

The fixed price ticket is only for people outside of the State of New York. But with Covid the only people who come to the museum are New Yorkers and New York State residents. Our revenue is very small right now and really I would say the decision was to open because we think we represent something for the city for our members, for our public, and we wanted to be there.

The reopening was not about the money. As you look at museums closing around the country it’s very sad and I hope that museums can stay open and will decide to stay open if they can.

It is a great time now to visit and experience the museum because there are only very small crowds. Everybody is wearing a mask. Everybody is distancing. You can relax in the galleries.

What has been the most challenging part of your job?

We are a frontier profession but the field is still making advances that are considerable. Also we are at the border between different disciplines so it’s really a matter of communication. It’s really learning the language of other professions while communicating our work in a way that is responsible and relevant to others, and fighting every day for our own relevance. Really the ones at the table are the ones being part of the messaging in every sense.

What has been the most enjoyable part of your job?

I like to talk all over the world about my profession. I’ve been honored to be with scientists who achieve far more than me and we talked to school children and we see them get excited when we bring them here in the labs. We want to do more and more of that. That is absolutely enjoyable.

Then, the other part that is amazingly enjoyable is being in the lab and developing something new, creating a new instrument, making a new discovery. That is something that by itself is worth all the work that you put in.

You most likely do not work alone. What kinds of things do the team members do to assist you with your work?

The staff is highly specialized: chemists or geologists. Most of them are with PhDs where 80% are women, 20% men. Every year we have two to three postdoctoral fellows. We have had over 200 since I came here: interns from High School to graduate, undergraduate to graduate, and post graduate fellows to high level scientists coming.

That’s a very broad crew. We have people specializing in different areas. So I have a person who specializes in analysis of paintings, a person specializing in organic material now. This is sort of the oil, the tempera order. We have a person specializing in organic analysis for the rest of the collection. We established it recently, three people who are in charge of the environment. They study air quality, temperature, humidity, and light conditions.

It’s a luxury to have so many. We’re probably the largest in the US in a museum.

These types of diversity of scientific training and discipline is very important when you think of an art museum like the MET. We collect anything and everything from ancient Asia art

to the contemporary world. There isn’t another museum in the world that has a collection so broad and I don’t mean this to brag. For example, the British museum has the widest archaeological collection but does not have the diversity of art that the Met museum has.

It doesn’t matter how big you are, but it’s about the diversity.

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Photography captures moments in real-time and preserve them through it. A form of art that acts as a window to the past and a way to look back to periods of times and events that created history. A photograph allows the viewer to travel to that specific moment and experience what the photographer tried to capture and convey. It could be a simple memory, a statement, a communication or just a way to tell a story and bring to life a vision of that time.

A photograph is highly influence by the person behind the lens, how the photographer sees the moment, the composition and mostly what is trying to show through the selection of locations, subjects, colors, and methods. For most artists the intention is to produce a photograph that will deliver their intent or will allow the viewer to create their own experience and conclusions.

In Garry Winogrand’s Color exhibition at The Brooklyn Museum, viewers and visitors will find a different side of the artist photography, the less known side, his color photographs. Winogrand was a celebrated photographer. Known for his black and white images, Winogrand was a pioneer of the of “snapshot aesthetics” trend in contemporary art, a trend form around the 1960s in fine art photography consisting on presenting what the photographer saw, casual looks and ordinary living. Winogrand was a figure of his time and a pivotal artist of his generation. According to the press release of Garry Winogrand: Color exhibition, Winogrand used to carry two cameras one with black-and-white film and another with Kodachrome color film, despite not having the resources to produce his color images he still shot them, leaving an unknown and undeveloped work, that now is the center of this exhibition.

As the first exhibition dedicated to Winogrand’s color photography, it presents more than 450 never seen or rarely seen color photographs through seventeen projections in vertical and horizontal points. “Presented in eight thematic sections that highlights Winogrand’s diverse subjects and approaches to color photography” as it was described in the press release. The contrast between the colorful and constant changing slides and the darkness of the gallery room makes it a unique experience to the visitor, a sense of intimacy that allows the viewers to travel through the snaps, the colors and the compositions, to look back to that specific time to recognize and remember their own experiences or to discover a new one. Stories and history not as familiar as the present-day but can still carry an experience, a comparison and distinction to it.

Scenes that seem as everyday life, simple subjects, elements and people who represent that moment in time, leaving a visually compelling experience to the guest making the exhibition a special immersion into Winogrand’s work. The constant changing and movement of the slides give the display a rhythm, engaging the guest and the art in an ingenuous way. Accompanied by a small selection of the artist popular black-and-white photographs the exhibit creates a generous window into the artist photography.

Garry Winogrand (1928-1984) was a renown photographer that defined a generation with his work, creativity, methods and style, originally from a working-class family from the Bronx, New York City, he traveled through New York and the United States capturing with his lens the lives and places of normal America and moments that are now part of his legacy to the world. Winogrand was committed to his unique selection of subjects, large crowds and chaotic places that created a contrast with calmer and less packed scenery, an aesthetic that made him a representation and now a reference in the world of photography.

“Continuing the Museum’s commitment to canon-expanding exhibitions, Garry Winogrand: Color is an exciting opportunity to rethink not only the work of an influential artist but also the history of color photography and its modes of presentation before the 1970” expressed curator Drew Sawyer in the Brooklyn Museum press release.  Garry Winogrand: Color is on view through December 8, 2019, at The Brooklyn Museum.

Written by Monica Herrera

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New York City is a cosmopolitan city, where art museums are one of its biggest attractions for visitors who want to learn about art. The variety of options New York has to offer for those seeking to get in touch with the artistic world is an advantage and privilege for locals and visitors. Now the City has an additional option for people who admire, love and appreciate dogs.

The AKC Museum of the Dog, founded in 1982 in New York City, was later moved to St. Louis County, Missouri. After more than 32 years the museum is back in the City. A museum dedicated to celebrate dogs, their history, influence in society, and to praise the emotional bond between canines and humanity.

A unique place where sightseers will find fine-art paintings from various artists and media. Figurines and artifacts that showcase the history and diversity of dogs and their elements, as well as a substantial library with about 42,000 books and all sort of dog related information that a visitor might want to explore. Including a children section.

The Museum of the Dog according to their website, offers “rotating exhibits featuring objects from its 1700 pieces.” Visitors will discover paintings of famous dogs through history, including painting U.S. Presidents George H. Bush’s dog Millie and George W Bush’s dogs Barney and Miss Beazley. It was reported that former first lady Barbara Bush praised the museum in a letter in 1990. Among other famous dogs, visitants will see Edwar VII’s wire fox terrier Caesar.

As part of the American Kennel Club, an organization considered a leader force in all dogs related matters and advocacy, the museum has growth under their financial support and contribution. “The AKC Museum of the Dog houses one of the largest collections of dog art in the world and is an important part of AKC’s history and future,” expressed Ronald H. Menaker, Chairman of the Board for the American Kennel Club in their press information.

For some art critics, art dedicated to dogs has not being taken serious at times due to the sentimentality attachment, for visitors is a new way to learn and appreciate dogs. The Museum of the Dog has added technology and screens where a digital dog will appear to interact with guests enhancing the visitors experience.

The Museum of the dog located in 101 Park Avenue, entrance on East 40th street, open Tuesday through Sunday.

Written by Monica Herrera

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The internationally recognized museum is hosting an exhibition titled “Habitat.” The title was borrowed from the magazine “Habitat” which was founded and edited by Lina and her husband Pietro Bardi. The magazine is a publication that innovated in graphic design and critical writing on art and architecture in Brazil. It is a crucial part of the exhibition because it includes texts by and about Lina.

The exhibition will be curated by Julieta Gonzalez, artistic director, Museo Jumex, Cidade do Mexico: Jose Esparza Chong Cuy, former Pamela Alper Associate Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago and Tomas Toledo, chief curator MASP.

The exhibition is meant to address the life, work and legacy of its designer Lina Bo Bardi; an Italian-Brazilian architect, curator, set-designer, editor and influential thinker. Lina arrived in Brazil and immersed in the country’s diverse culture and was able to turn her South African Habitat into the setting for the creation of a unique and radical idiom.

The exhibition also interprets the production of Lina as a process of “unlearning” Western knowledge and perspectives which began with her arrival in Brazil and deepened following her travels throughout the North East of Brazil and during the period that she lived in Salvador in the 1950s and 1960s.

It seeks to position Lina as a versatile and multi-disciplinary intellectual and a true-thinker of her culture. It also re-examines her contributions to the fields of architecture, design, criticism, museology and curatorial practice.

Lina is the author of two iconic buildings, the MASP and the Sesc Pompeia which is basically a cultural and leisure center. Both buildings speak of the striking features of Lina’s architectural skills and thoughts. Apart from being the author of the MASP, Lina also conceived exhibitions at the former headquarters of the Museum on 7de Abril Street from the time of its foundation in 1947. She also organized some exhibitions at the MASP such as “A mao do povo brasileiro” (The Hand of the Brazilian People) in 1969 and the Africa negra (Black Africa) in 1988. A special section of the “Habitat” exhibition is therefore dedicated to the MASP.

The exhibition and the publication are organized into three sections: Lina Bo Bardi’s Habitat, From Glass House to Hut and Rethinking the Museum.

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The artists that are exhibiting are: Ursula Damm, Birgit Bruggemeier, Stephan Isermann, Jan Georg Glockner, Theresa Schubert, Rico Graupner, Sebastian Kaye, Freya Probst and Mindaugas Gapsevicius. These artists are presenting scientific experiments as works of art and then analyzing them in a cultural context. They are trying to change the link between art practice and technology and its place in today’s world.

The exhibition which is titled “Shared Habitats” offers stopovers for the participants to be able to connect in the realm of other creatures. “Shared Habitats” refers to the idea of Jakob Von Uexkull, who laid the foundation for the understanding of a constructed internal “world” of a being, where the identification of external stimuli creates internal memory and action between the individual and its environment. This idea is able to explore the inter-relations between humans and their habitat, humans and non-human species and humans with machines.

This exhibition takes up Uexkull’s respect for the completeness of the individual world and develops an aesthetic of exchange. It shows that humans are able to develop visions and new spheres of possible futures.

At the same time, it communicates the ideas of Lazlo Moholy-Nagy who described the so-called primitive man as a hunter, craftsman, builder and physician all in one person. According to Lazlo, these skills were lost in the modern age and he thought it was important for him to re-position human in everyday life with the help of art.

This exhibition normally uses modern technologies: virtual reality, social networks, video games and research with the aim of presenting Bauhaus University as a place where science, innovation in art and technology all take place. Visitors are not only presented with works of art but are also given an opportunity to experiment together in the laboratory.

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Since it opened its doors, Istanbul museum has welcomed visitors from every segment of the public with the support and cooperation of the local government, the public and private sector. It has gained worldwide recognition having received more than 7 million visitors and organized free art programs for more than 750,000 children and young people.

The museum initially held its operations, since its establishment, in a former warehouse called Antrepo that was redesigned by Tabanlioglu architects to serve as a museum. After 14 years of operation, Istanbul moved its operations to the historical Union Francaise building in Beyoglu in March 2018 while its new building is been constructed.

Istanbul Modern’s new building, which will be at its current location in the center of the ongoing “Galataport” development project, will be designed by a renowned architect with years of expertise in designing museum buildings.

Istanbul Modern’s founding sponsor, the Eczacıbaşı Group, and the Galataport consortium, Doğuş Group and Bilgili Holding, are contributing to the cost of the new building, which is scheduled to be completed in two years.

The current exhibitions of Istanbul museum are: the event of a thread global narratives in textiles (22^nd February- 7^th July 2019) which brought together 25 international contemporary artists who use textile to create aesthetic and cultural narratives through objects, installations and video works. Artists who will be showing their prowess in this exhibition include: Noa Eshkol, Andreas Exner and Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu among many others.

The other exhibition is the Two archives one selection; Tracing Ara Gulers footsteps in Istanbul (22^nd May- 17^th November 2019). This exhibition draws on the collections and archives of both institutions to show the role of Ara Guler’s photographs in shaping the public’s collective memory of Istanbul and the changes that have taken place in the city from the mid 20^th century.

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Max Hollein took office as director of the Metropolitan Museum of art in the summer of 2018. His innovative and inspiring skills earned him the position in the world’s largest museum. He has proven record of building collections and organizing outstanding exhibition. His knowledge and passion of art has always been expansive and the confidence he portrays in his work will continue to help develop a shared vision and a strong collaboration with extra ordinary with curators and conservators.

It has been roughly nine months since he took over and he is up to the task in leaving his mark in the museum.

Max’s commitment to fulfilling his promise of new annual commissions for two public spaces and integrating Modern and contemporary art at the Met’s Fifth Avenue building is evident in the upcoming exhibition programme.

Among artists whose work will feature in the exhibition are: the Cree Canadian artist Kent Monkman whose practice is “a new idea of modern history painting.” Kent will make monumental paintings for the Great Hall (19 December-12 February 2020).

Wangechi Mutu, Kenyan born artist who is one of the most creative artists of her generation will also be showing her prowess. Chosen for the first ever project for the empty sculptural niches on the Fifth Avenue Façade, Wangechi who makes pieces with “fantastic otherworldly narratives,” is creating sculptures already being cast based on works in the Met’s collection (9 September- 12 January 2020).

While Mutu’s sculptures are the first site-specific pieces, Max mentioned that one of the niches had been “used” before by the beloved children’s television character Big Bird, who posed playfully in them for a 1983 Sesame Street special titled “Don’t Eat the pictures.”

The line-up also includes solo artists presented by Hollein and the Met’s deputy director for exhibitions, Quincy Houghton such as this month’s premiere of the Icelandic artist Ragnar Kjartansson’s seven screen video installation Death is Elsewhere (30May- 2 September), a retrospective of the late Indian sculptor Mrinalini Mukherjee (4 June-29 September) at the Met Breuer and a survey of the Swiss French Modern artist Felix Vallotton (29 October- 26 January 2020) which will pair his portrait of Getrude Stein along with Picasso’s, one of the centerpieces of the Met’s Modern collection.

The omnipresent Leonardo will be represented in a single-work display of Saint Jerome in the wilderness (around 1840), which might have belonged to 18^th century Swisss painter Angelika Kauffmann, on loan from the Vatican Museums (15July- 6 October)

Aside from the contemporary art takeovers, the Met’s president and chief executive Daniel Weiss presented a balanced budget for the first time in three years. Weiss said, “The Met’s controversial change to scrap its-pay-what-you-wish admissions policy for non-New Yorkers helped us with our finances but didn’t affect access or “feeling of welcome” to the museum. There was no “negative effect” on attendance among any measured group.” The museum ended the 2016 fiscal year with a deficit of $8m down from a potential $40m. Its current annual operating budget is $350m.

Weiss also addressed multiple building and renovation projects including the $150m European paintings Skylights project which was launched last summer and is due for completion in 2022. He said the project is not really glorious but is important.

He also generally discussed the need for an overhaul of the Lila Acheson Wallace wing for modern and contemporary art- which looks a little bit like prison from Central Park, he did not give an updated timeline for the planned Chipperfield designed modern and contemporary addition which is expected to cost $500m and was put on hold in 2017.

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Airbnb is a privately held global company headquartered in San Francisco that operates an online market place and hospitality service which is accessible via its website and mobile apps. It started off in 2008 and has since date hosted guests and helped to make sharing a space easy, enjoyable and safe.

The Louvre Museum is the world’s largest art museum and a historic monument in Paris, France. It is home to hundreds of thousands of pieces of art. The Louvre pyramid is one of the most iconic landmarks in Paris which also serves as the main entrance to the Louvre Museum. It is a large glass and metal pyramid that was designed by Chinese American architect I.M Pei and is surrounded by three smaller pyramids in the main courtyard of the Louvre palace in Paris.

Airbnb and Louvre Museum have come together to offer an amazing once-in-a-lifetime experience to two lucky winners. The special offer is part of the Louvre’s celebrations of the 30^th birthday of the pyramid entrance of the Louvre Museum. Contrary to the norm where we get to spend only a few hours in a museum during the day, this time round you might get to experience the world’s largest museum at night. The special night will include an exquisite dinner and drinks alongside the company of the “Mona Lisa Painting” and “Venus De Milo” on the night of April 30^th without any other visitors pushing past to get a better photo with the painting.

After wining and dining, the two will get to relax in Napoleon ILL’s rococo salon before the guests retire to their sleeping quarters in a frosted glass miniature pyramid. They will however not have the freedom to move around in the museum but they will get a personal tour by an art historian.

The museum has continued to attract a wider audience especially in the last year where it broke its record of attendance by welcoming 10 million visitors. The record number was helped by some blockbuster shows including the music video “Apes**t” by Beyoncé and Jay Z that was filmed in the museum.

For a chance to spend a night with Mona Lisa, all you need to do is fill out Airbnb’s form which asks why you think you are Mona Lisa’s perfect guest and  whether you are able to travel between April 28^th and May 2^nd. The deadline to apply for the exclusive night in the Louvre museum ends on April 12 at 6pm Eastern Standard Time.

This is an amazing chance to experience the world’s largest museum when the doors shut and the lights go out under the skies of Paris.

The post THE LOUVRE MUSEUM GIVES YOU A CHANCE TO SPEND A NIGHT WITH “MONA LISA” IN THE MUSEUM appeared first on Artiholics.

Death is a scary word, one of the words that none of us want to hear. We have all lost people we love and nothing is as horrifying and saddening as the fact that we will never see them again and we have to lay them to rest. Depending on the culture and belief, different people follow different procedures while laying their loved ones to rest.  For instance, the Hindus cremate their loved ones ideally within 24 hours while others bury in a tomb and others in a graveyard which is basically a piece of land specifically set aside for burying the dead.

A tomb is generally and structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber of varying sizes. When we date back to the old days, tombs were most commonly used to bury the dead. For instance according to the Bible, Jesus was buried in a tomb.  King Tutankhamen of Egypt was also buried in a tomb. He was an Egyptian Pharaoh of the 18^th dynasty and ruled between 1323-1332BC.  His tomb was discovered in 1922 by British archaeologist Horwad Carter and it attracted worldwide press coverage and has ever since attracted visitors.

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  Photo Courtesy of Kenneth Garrett National Geographic

Houses and other buildings can be conserved in different ways; walls can be re-painted and maybe bring in some new furniture but it is almost very rare to think of giving a new or better look to a tomb. However, King Tutankhamen’s tomb will now be able to stand up for a few more years after the Getty Conservation Institute recently announced completion of a decade of work on the 3,300 year old tomb. The purpose of conserving the tomb was to leave it in a condition in which it will be able to serve future visitors.

The joint conservation between the Getty institute and the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities began in 2009 with the main concern being the brown spots, scratches and abrasions on the wall paintings in areas where visitors have access. Dust tracked in on the visitor’s shoes and clothing had settled on the walls, dulling the appearance of the wall paintings.

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  Photo Courtesy of National Geographic

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The conservation process began by studying the condition of the 3,300 year old tomb which was a very intense project. The study of the tomb’s condition involved a team which included an Egyptologist to conduct background research, environmental engineers to test the tomb’s microclimatic conditions, microbiologists to study the brown spots, architects and designers to upgrade the infrastructure, scientists to study the composition of the wall paintings and conservators to treat the walls. The biggest role during the conservation period was installing infrastructure like a ventilation and filtration system to limit humidity and dust. The conservators treated the areas of minor flaking on the paintings with adhesives to attach the particles.

Afterwards, they gently cleaned the wall paintings to eliminate the dust, some of which was embedded in the surface. Egyptian conservators had used biocide treatments with an adhesive over the years to kill any microorganisms on the paintings, resulting in shiny areas; the Getty team reduced the adhesive so the shininess disappeared.

The old viewing platform at the entrance to the burial chamber was replaced with a narrower one so that visitors could no longer touch the wall paintings. New signs on the tomb’s modern history remind visitors of the impact that their presence has on their surroundings. The conservators also recommended a limit of 20 visitors at a time who can stay for not more than 10 minutes.

The conservators did not re-paint or restore anything, everything that is visible in the tomb today is just but the original.

The post DECADE-LONG EFFORT BY GETTY TO CONSERVE KING TUTANKHAMEN’S TOMB BEARS FRUITS appeared first on Artiholics.

Italy has stood ground on its firm decision of declining to lend the artworks one of its greatest natives, to France. What is termed as this year’s “greatest cultural event” at the Louvre Museum in Paris, is expected to mark the 500^th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci. However, an agreement between Italy and France, to have Leonardo’s works lent on loan to the Museum has been scrapped off by Italy’s government. According to Italy’s undersecretary in the ministry of culture Lucia Borgonzoni, two years ago the former minister of culture Dario Franceschini signed an agreement, to lend several paintings as well as drawings to France for the Louvre Museum exhibition in honour of Leonardo.

Borgonzoni asserts that the signed deal of having the works at the exhibition puts Italy on the margins of a great cultural event, terming that the artist is by far remembered as one of their own, “Leonardo is Italian; he only died in France”. The artistic master worldly known for his painting “The Monalisa” was born in Anchiano, Italy in 1452 and passed away in France in the year 1519. Borgonzoni is now requesting to have the whole deal revised on the basis of having the nation’s interest put on notice as a major concern, “Where museums’ autonomy is concerned, the nation’s interest cannot come second, the French cannot have everything.”

The director of the Uffizi Galleries in Florence Eike Schmidt, said that the three paintings in their possession: The Annunciation, The Adoration of the Magi, and The Baptism of Christ would not be lent to the Louvre Museum as they as too fragile to be moved. However at the moment questions on why the condition of the paintings was not discussed ahead of this year (when the exhibition is set to take place) are being raised.

With another concern emerging, who would have thought it would turn out to be a tit for tat fair game? Schmidt was quoted citing the Museum’s policy to never lend “The Mona Lisa”, “I am sure my French colleagues at Louvre will support me when I apply the same rules to our Leonardo paintings that they apply to the Mona Lisa,”

Both Italy and France are preparing exhibitions this year marking the 500th anniversary of the death of Leonardo, with Italy still seeking ways to access the Mona Lisa. The Louvre has repeatedly brushed requests to allow the Mona Lisa to be shown in Italy, with claims that is owned by the France since the French Royal Family acquired it right after the artist’s death.  

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California is USA’s most popular state with almost 40,000,000 residents. Among many other cool and fun facts, California is also home to the world’s largest and tallest tree. The beautiful city supports art and is home to many museums among them the California museum, Asian Art museum, Palm Springs air museum and the J Paul Getty museum among others.

However, California is not new to wildfires and firefighters are among the busiest career persons, trying to beat the blazes and save lives and properties from damage. The city has been prone to wildfires for years now and the 2018 one has been recorded as the most destructive one ever, with a total of 7,579 fires burning an area of 1.667,855 acres, this recording as the largest amount of burned acres recorded in a fire season. In mid-July to August 2018, a series of large wildfires erupted across California, mostly in its northern parts, including the destructive Carr Fire and the Mendocino complex fire. On 4^th August 2018, a national disaster was declared in Northern California due to extensive wildfires burning there.

Despite the threats the fire poses to the region, the J Paul Getty Museum (located in California) is “safe” from the wildfires that have destroyed lots of property and also led to loss of lives.

Commonly referred to as the Getty, the museum which was constructed in from 1984 to 1997 was made to be fire resistant. Efforts were put in by the constructors so as to protect the valuable collection of works, to ensure that the works will be viewed by upcoming generations and most importantly to protect it from the wildfires that often strike the city.

Wildfires destroy and kill and are uncontrollable, how then does the Getty play safe? Well, it was built with fire resistant materials, a fire-suppression system and an immaculate landscape that may well keep the museums content ranging from collection of artworks and photography safe from the flames. The exterior of the museum is also made of 1.2 million square feet 0f travertine stone while the interior walls are made of concrete. Its roof is also composed of fire-resistant stone and this makes it fire proof; the wildfires have nothing on it, at least not for now.

For the interiors, the museum is equipped with automatic fire doors that are capable of trapping flames, a carbon-filtered air-conditioning system that can push out smoke, it also has internal sprinklers which are pipes that are always dry until when they will be needed to avoid damaging the works stored in the museum. Efforts to ensure that the Getty remains inflammable actually never stop; trees and grass are well-watered to lessen their flammability and one million gallon water tank sits under the parking garage just in case the wildfires reach the property.

The Getty was constructed with wildfires in mind and it is indeed “safe” and ready to face the flames. Hopefully there will be a lasting solution for all other regions in California.

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Attention Floridians: Be on the lookout for suspicious individuals with a giant Gnome-Shaped protrusion in their waistband. Sometime between 9pm Thursday night and 5am Friday morning the Cornell Art Museum in Delray Beach, Florida was robbed. To be more specific, it had been Gnomenapped.

With the use of a ladder and some tools the 35″ tall 45 lb. blue pigmented resin sculpture ‘Power Gnome: Electric Blueberry’ (Seen above, third Gnome from the left) was unbolted from this custom steel pedestal and whisked off into the warm summer night. Electric Blueberry is one of thirteen Power Gnomes exhibited in this show by New York-based sculptor Sam Tufnell. This is a one-of-a-kind piece as it is the only Power Gnome ever cast in that beautiful arctic blue color.

The Gnomes are part of the Museum’s current exhibit “Lit” curated by Melanie Johanson featuring 85 pieces of art by 16 artists who incorporate light into their artwork.

“Please bring the Gnome home. He is missed dearly by his family.” – Sam Tufnell

The Museum has put up a $500 reward for the safe return of ‘Electric Blueberry.’

Various incarnations of the Tufnell’s “Power Gnomes” line-up have been a staples at Castle Fitzjohns Gallery in New York’s Lower East Side, standing sentinel in the window off and on since the gallery opened in 2013.

The Gold Gnome nicknamed “The One Percent Gnome” is part of their current show “Misappropriation” up until June 15th.

“Ghost Gnome” a clear version of the Power Gnome is currently on display at Vertu Fine Art in Boca Raton, Florida.

The remaining three Gnomes have been removed from the outside pedestal for the time being, but the other nine Power Gnomes featured in “Lit” are currently on display indoors at the Cornell Art Museum, all pieces are available to purchase.

Exhibit dates are April 28-August 28, 2016. Open Tuesday-Sunday, 10 am-4:30 pm; Sunday hours are 12-4:30 pm from May through September; admission is a suggested $5 donation.

If you have any details that may lead to the whereabouts of ‘Power Gnome: Electric Blueberry’, please contact the Cornell Art Museum at 561-243-7922, ext 305 or email Stephanie at swatson@oldschool.org

Follow the Cornell Art Museum on Twitter: @CornellMuseum and Instagram: @CornellArtMuseum.

SAM TUFNELL (b. 1978)
Sam Tufnell is a contemporary artist born in Los Angeles, California. He received his Bachelors of Fine Arts in 2002 from the School of Visual Arts in New York. Tufnell creates sculptural pieces using casts and molds and sometimes using items found at the supermarket that are easily identifiable. His works have been exhibited in Miami, Palm Beach, New York City, and other cities around the U.S. In 2013 he received the Solo Award Winner Art Expo NYC award. He donated works to be sold in a silent auction for the 2014 and 2015 Art Walk NY, coalition for the homeless charity. He currently lives and works in Upstate New York, and has a studio in Chelsea which he is converting into a showroom. www.SamTufnell.com

The post “Gnome Heist” Public Sculpture Stolen From Florida Art Museum Late Thursday Night: Museum Offers $500 Reward For Safe Return appeared first on Artiholics.

New York City is the capital of the art world, but if you aren’t an artist or an art collector, the idea of leaving your comfort zone and going out to see some art might seem a bit overwhelming. If you are a resident, or are planning a trip to the big apple, you might have a hard time navigating the couple hundred museums and over 1500 art galleries all within a few subway stops of your hotel (or apartment). We’ll make life a little easier for you. In alphabetical order, here are The Top 40 World Class New York Art Museums.

American Folk Museum

Asia Society and Museum

Bronx Museum of the Arts

Brooklyn Museum

Children’s Museum of the Arts (CMA)

The Cloisters, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution

El Museo del Barrio

Frick Collection

Godwin-Ternbach Museum at Queens College

Hispanic Society of America

Japan Society

The Jewish Museum

Kosciuszko Foundation

Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met)

MoMA PS1

Morgan Library & Museum

Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology

Museum for African Art

Museum of American Illustration: Society of Illustrators

Museum of Arts and Design (MAD)

Museum of Biblical Art (MOBIA)

Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA)

Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)

Museum of the Moving Image

National Academy Museum and School

National Museum of the American Indian

New Museum

Nicholas Roerich Museum

Noguchi Museum

Queens Museum

Rubin Museum of Art

Scandinavia House

Sculpture Center

Socrates Sculpture Park

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (The Guggenheim)

Staten Island Museum

Studio Museum in Harlem

Ukrainian Museum

Whitney Museum of American Art (The Whitney)

Don’t want to break the bank? The Smithsonian’s once a year “Free Museum Day” is Saturday, September 27th  (that’s just two days after my show opens in the Lower East Side) Select partner museums around the country are free that day with the admit two coupon you can download and print from the web. You now have zero excuse to not go out and absorb some culture!

Written and Researched by Cojo ‘Art Juggernaut”

The post Artiholics Tourist Guide: New York City’s Top 40 Art Museums appeared first on Artiholics.

Last month when it was announced that Björk’s Album of apps Biophilia was being purchased by MoMA for its collection I noticed they hadn’t mentioned Max Weisel.

What I thought was the most profound thing at the time the album was designed was that a large portion of the apps on the album were designed and programmed by a teenager.

I met Max at the 2012 Volta NY pre-party  at Villain in Williamsburg few months before this article in Vice was written.  He told me about how he and developed apps for Björk’s Biophilia album, and that they constructed a playable iPad rig on stage, so he could control a lot of the music and was now touring with Bjork.

I was a huge fan, and had a huge crush on Björk in my teenage years (who didn’t?), and he introduced me to a few of her Icelandic choral background singers who were also at the party; Ester Auðunsdóttir invited me to come to their show at Roseland ballroom the next night as their guest .

Needless to say, the show was an INSANE mix of music, singing, performance art, and technology.

I caught up with Max in June 2014.  We chatted online, me from my studio in NYC, he rather appropriately on a tablet in an airplane flying to California. We talked about the inclusion of the app in MoMA’s permanent collection, his involvement in the project at such a young age (he designed the app at 18) and how it all came together.  Enjoy the Artiholics Exclusive interview with artist / programmer Max Weisel.

Artiholics:  So how did Björk find you in the first place?

Max Weisel: At the beginning, Björk had the idea to do an app album. Normally, when someone goes to do a music video or something like that, the label has people they can reach out to. They know production companies and directors. Björk herself knows a lot of people too of course. However, when they started this project (early 2010) no one was making apps for albums.

She was talking with her manager who she’s been with for 30 years and he suggested they reach out to the developers of her favorite apps. I had made some small apps at the time. Nothing too crazy in the music / creative space. I woke up one day to a comment on my wordpress blog asking for my info on behalf of Björk. I actually laughed it off and assumed someone was just messing with me. However, curiosity got the best of me. I started looking into the name attached to the comment and found a record label and a phone number. I called them up.

“Hey, this might be odd, but someone wrote a comment on my blog asking for my info for Björk”

Artiholics:  Where were you living at the time?

Max Weisel:  Arizona with my parents, I was 18 and had just graduated high school (barely :P).  The person on the other end of the line was like “Yeah! Thanks for reaching out. We’re still figuring this out, but let me get your info and I’ll shoot you an email.”

A week or so later, I got an email from Björk and her assistant with some of their ideas and the themes she was thinking about for each of the songs on the album. We kept emailing back and forth for awhile and I started putting rough concepts together.

Header photo by Joris Bulckens

Interview by Cojo “Art Juggernaut”

The post Artiholics Exclusive Interview: The Teenage Programmer Behind Björk’s Biophilia App… The One MoMA Recently Acquired appeared first on Artiholics.

Islamabad, Pakistan – Friday, June 6, 2014

As I mentioned in our article last week about the Pakistani Art School tour (click to read), the contemporary art scene in the city of Lahore is growing. After the trysts with faction groups, the nation is empowered and feel a sense of patriotism and pride. They desire peace and want to be viewed as respected as a nation who seeks to protect the citizens in their care. To be recognized as on par with other nations is to be part of the developing movement that is hitting Pakistan today. To be part of change that is tangible is both exciting and real, never has a sense of pride been so prevalent and people feel the change in the air.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoNvJHu3QJ4?rel=0]

My second visit was at the Lahore Museum. Interestingly, Rudyard Kiplings’s father, John Lockwood Kipling, was one of the earliest and most famous curators of the museum. He recognized the need to celebrate and protect the heritage of the region and the museum, the largest in the country, houses some of the finest specimens of Muslim, Sikh and Hindu artifacts.

The museum seeks to protect and pageant Pakistan’s historical and cultural past. The impressive entrance to the museum exhibits remarkable examples of both Mughal and Sikh door-ways and the intricately carved wood-work exhibited remains a craft unique to the region today. There is a huge collection of paintings dating back to the Mughal, Sikh and British periods as well as various other treasures such as a collection of musical instruments, ancient jewelery, textiles, pottery, and armory.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=857d8KdjDWw?rel=0]

My third visit was to the Pakistan National Council of Arts (PNCA) in the modern city of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad. Located four hours from Lahore and built at the northern edge of the Pothohar plateau, en-route we marveled at the breath taking scenery of lush hills and mountains.

As we neared the modern PNCA building, the impressive four-story Art Gallery that comprises of 1800 square yards and houses 14 galleries, would rival any western gallery. Borne from the growing awareness to promote the arts in the capital, the institution seeks to close the gap between the artist and the intellectual, ideally seeking to promote home-grown artistes and essentially providing a platform for them to springboard their work to the international market. Bringing “all forms of Art under one roof” is the vision of PNCA and this is done through the numerous galleries that bring together the renowned artist along with the emerging one.

I had the pleasure of viewing a collection by the famous Pakistani artist Sadequain Naqqash (1930-1987) a world renowned Pakistani artist best known for his skills as a calligrapher and painter. Sadequain was the most prolific painter of post-partition Pakistan and was well known for his large scale murals. He was interested in the natural forces that affected the equality of mankind and the threats faced by his fellow men. He was intrigued by the human spirit and potential to stay steadfast in their resolve in a selfless struggle for the greater cause. Sadequain was a true ‘man of the people’ who painted for the people and repeatedly stated that he was not interested in decorating the drawing rooms of the rich and powerful. He worked predominantly on large murals specifically for public buildings in order to symbolize the collective labor of humanity.

Although of Pakistani origin, I tend to think of myself as an international artist who has had the good fortune to exhibit in many different countries internationally. This visit home left me quite nostalgic but also highlighted my senses to the art scene many years back and the developments that I have had the pleasure of seeing today. I may not be a ‘homegrown’ artiste but I feel the need to promote the talent that is so prevalent in the region.

Last year an art auction was held in Dubai, supported by the United Nation World Food Programme (WFP) for Pakistan. The “Pakistani Contemporary Art Now” exhibition auctioned off 56 paintings moderated by the prestigious Christie’s auction house. Paintings were donated by Pakistani masters and emerging artists and over 1.5 million dollars was raised and donated to the WFP.

I was humbled to have my work included alongside renowned artistes such as Gulgee, Sadequain, Ahmad Pervez and Bashir Mirza, whose pieces won the highest bids of the evening. This event not only raised the profile of the artists of the region but also provided collectors the opportunity to invest in promising artists.

According to the local artists, the art market began thriving almost a decade ago with the value of Pakistani art tripling between 2005 and 2009. Pakistani expatriates, wealthy locals and serious art collectors are recognizing the creativity and talents that were emerging from Pakistan. This interest enabled the art scene to flourish and be recognized both as a viable entity as well as a lucrative investment.

A recent online poll noted that twenty percent of expatriates invested in art, second only to property. As the art scene seeks to further develop through seeking to distance itself from the media negativity, the resolve is witnessing in all forms of contemporary mediums. New galleries are opening up and the art dialogue is spreading through online magazines and blogs. In the modern internet age, the word is spreading fast and all these mediums of expression seek to bring a nation to the forefront of its true potential and to ultimately become better than they think they can be.

The current scene sees artists intermingling across previously blurred borders to produce unique creations that incite an air of freshness. Thoughts and views are being constantly questioned and it is this challenge that will give rise to the meaningful conversations that effect change within a countries understanding and attitudes.

We are not an angered nation who is devoid of morals or who place no value on the frailty of human life, in fact we are a nation that understands that a visual stimulus creates dialogue, which in turn promotes ideas and a collective community spirit.

Art breaks down the barriers and invites people to a platform of intelligent participation, irrespective of socioeconomic status, age, race, gender, caste or hierarchy. It is this force that promotes cohesion, greater pride and patriotism and brings together an otherwise divided country.

Written and photographed by Qinza Najm

The post The Pakistani Art Museum Insider: Lahore Museum & Pakistan National Council of Arts (PNCA) appeared first on Artiholics.

Legendary surrealist painter who’s Oscar winning special effects defined the look of Ridley Scott’s Alien, H.R. Giger, died today at the age of 74 in a Zurich hospital in Switzerland, resulting from injuries he sustained in a fall.  If you’ve never had a chance to delve into his amazingly dark techno-organic work outside of the Alien / Poltergeist / Species film franchises or Dark Seed video games, he is one of our 10 Surrealists every art lover should know – and I highly encourage you to do a little googling.

I remember in the 90s the New York club The Limelight, which was a nightclub built inside what was once an old church, commissioned Giger to create a VIP H.R. Giger Room.  I had been to the Limelight a few times during it’s heyday and unfortunately never got access to the room.  The Limelight is now a mall.  According to io9 there are still a few Giger bars in existence.

His sculptures, drawings, and paintings are all insane marvels of technological futuristic wizardry, combined with living matter, muscles, tendons, vaginas, cocks, bones, exoskeletons.  If you aren’t into aliens fucking but you do want to add H.R. Giger to your art book library you may prefer his hyper-future architectural vision of New York he created in a book chock full of insanely intricate cityscapes, 1982’s  H.R. Giger N.Y. City (long out of print, good luck finding it).  For anyone else who isn’t intimidated by a little hi-tech eroticism, here is a full list of his books of his collected works.

Enjoy this small gallery sampling some of his insane future landscapes, brooding creatures, and erotic inter-species sexual depredation (some images are not safe for work):

Giger’s Alien, 1979  via vikisecrets

HR Giger at Work, 1978  – Photo credit: Mia Bonzanigo via vikisecrets

“Erotomechanics VIII” 1979 via Whatculture

Lilith, 1977 via vikisecrets

via gabinetelynch

Birth Machine Babies

via system 75

via Steve Gray

via dark planneur

via wackymania

Written by Cojo “Art Juggernaut”

[source: swissinfo.ch]

The post H.R. Giger, Legendary Surrealist Artist Behind the Character Design in Alien, is Dead [NSFW] appeared first on Artiholics.

New York – Saturday, March 8, 2014

This year the first of the Armory Arts Week press previews was for  Spring / Break Art Show in an old school house (called The Old School) in Little Italy. It’s a cool step away from the traditional art fair because it not only focuses on the curator as key, but also has a hard-on for “new media” art, which means you will be seeing either video or projection art in almost every room, and if no video there is usually some auditory component.

Sometimes it is fun to be surprised by art, going into a show without knowing any of the players is like going to a movie not just without any spoilers, but also having no knowledge of the plot or cast. That was my experience last year when I first attended Spring / Break 2013. I was a blank slate. Having never been to the fair previously I was green to the rundown elementary school layout. It seemed disjointed and reminded me of a cross between PS1 and the random dilapidated school buildings turned solo artist exhibitions you see at the Governors Island Art Fair.

This time I settled right in. I knew some of the artists and curators personally ahead of time and was able to more easily identify the work.  It was fun to see how each curator played with this year’s theme for the fair PUBLICPRIVATE.

Entering the building and checking in I wandered into the first room which had an eaten away pillar which reminded me of the box from Frieze except made out of garbage.

Passing through that room I encountered a hallway full of blood illuminations by Jordan Eagles I have been to several Jordan Eagles blood shows when he worked in solid form, but these 13 projectors really filled out the space with a hemo-glow. Curated by Tracy Causey-Jeffery.

Jordan walking through the corridor.

Jordan’s silhouette in blood.

Ducking out I spun around when I heard my name called. It was art writer / curator Benjamin Sutton. I had seen some of his install pics on Facebook and instantly recognized the room he curated by the unmistakable ceiling cats by artist Caroline Wells Chandler.

Benjamin getting interviewed by Samantha Katz from Whitewall Magazine.

Samantha Katz.

The piece that was his starting point for building the show was this grotesque sculpture “Selfie as a Chocolate Chip Cookie,” also by Caroline.

I climbed up on the radiator to get this shot.

“Rule 34; Charm” by Sigrid Sarda. Made with real maggots dipped in gold, wax, real human bones & hair.

This room was curated by Jessica Hodin, The director of the Bleeker Street Arts Club.

Jessica jumped behind this transparent piece.

Jessica Hodin.

Assistant Director of Bleeker Street Arts Club, Anita King.

They have a new show titled FEELING HUMAN, with an opening reception this Sunday, Mar 9, 2014 from 1-4pm featuring some artists from this exhibit. 305 Bleecker St., NY NY 10014

Artist Lucas Zallmann poses with his fridges.

You open them up to find metal dildos and books.

Curated by Wills Baker and Sarah Sulistio.  Sarah is seen here talking with Spring/Break Co-Founder Andrew Gori.

A few photos by Carl Gunhouse.

A piece by Jacob Rhodes from Field Projects.

Curated by Chris Bors seen here with an original piece of his own.

Lia Chavez performing Luminous Objects

Which is curated by Tali Wertheimer, seen here, who is opening a new gallery called TWO RAMS on March 16th.

Artist and curator Max Razdow standing in front of one of his drawings.  I met Max last year when he had his own booth at Volta NY.

Curator Kari Adelaide.

Artist Jesse Bransford and his drawing experiment based on rolling a RPG die titled “Dice Drawings Set Five.”

Singing Bruce Springsteen with a mask on, mask off, show is over.  Crystal Curtis

Group Show curated by David Alexander Flinn

Room with projectors by Rin Johnson audio by Michael Valinsky.

Iphone cases by Collin Munn

I asked three staircase docents if they knew who made these streamers and none of them had a clue.  One said the girl with the yellow purse who was just here.  One said the girl with the green purse who was just here.

It wasn’t until I found a map.  Coralina Meyer.

Founders of the Spring/Break Art Fair, Ambre
 Kelly and 
Andrew 
Gori.

Andrew Gori.

Art by Alex McQulkin which was a collaborative piece she did with her mom.  She commissioned her mom knit a pussy riot mask for her.  She then wore the mask, took pictures of it, and then drew the mask.  This drawing is the end result.

Art by Alex McQulkin & Michael St. John.

This is a piece made by hand cutting out individual diamonds from Sotheby’s catalogs and pasting them together.

Curator Marina T. Schindler

Pin-up style art by Walter Robinson, curated by Ambre Kelly & Andrew Gori

Wall of small pieces depicting Jerry Saltz doing things, by Ambre Kelly, curated by Andrew Gori.

The next room I photographed parts of Liminal Reclamations curated by Tracy Causey-Jeffery and Amy Kisch.
We Are Made To Endure, Portraits of the Donner Party by Robert Saywitz

A room playing all of Woody Allen’s Oscar Nominated films while a toy train goes in a circle referencing recent allegations.

As well as A Universe in My Throat, 2012 by Kevin Bourgeois

Golden Coin by Patrick Meagher

Nightfall by Devin Powers.

Photo and video pieces by Rachel Garrard

Private Drive-In.

By artists Fall On Your Sword and Sarah Bereza (pictured above).

Inside the bug.

I blew out the shot with a flash so you could see the paint work on the car by Sarah.

Sit in the bug and enjoy a superfast loop of scenes from movies that take place in the front seat of cars, including this scene from Grease, as well as that famous 1955 Back To The Future scene with Marty McFly and his teenage mom.

Spring / Break Art Show is located at Old School, 233 Mott Street, NYC and costs $5
All work from the show can be purchased online at SpringBreakArtFair.com

Thursday, March 6 –  Sunday, March 9
Noon – 8pm Daily

Written and Photographed by Cojo “Art Juggernaut”

The post SPRING/BREAK Art Show Is Your Elementary School On Psilocybin appeared first on Artiholics.

New York – Friday, March 7, 2014

After checking out the opening reception for the first ever Clio Art Fair Jamie Martinez from Artefuse and I grabbed a train up to 55th street for the opening night party for The (UN)FAIR. Being press and a media sponsor of the event we buzzed the massive line and shot upstairs.

The first thing you couldn’t help but notice was that the place was packed.

I walked into the masse following a siren’s song and found a woman singing while standing right next to a beautiful Norman Rockwell painting, not the first (or ten thousandth ) thing I expected to see at THE (UN)FAIR but a pleasant surprise. Into the next room where for a few bucks they print your face on a t-shirt onto a baby’s body.

I quickly passed to the next room which had an intricate floor to ceiling vision obscuring sculptural installation.

On the wall beyond hung a few of those meta art world comic strips that Hyperallergic publishes. Into the large room where on the right is an interactive musical installation where you can play a series of instruments by pressing old school arcade buttons.

& Jerry.

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream served to you by THE ACTUAL Ben & Jerry. After meeting Jerry, and initially guessing wrong about which ice cream hippy I was talking to I got some cookie dough ice cream (and you just had a taste memory of that flavor). It hit the spot and I ended up coming back a few more times over the course of the night. (Just FYI, THE (UN)FAIR has free unlimited Ben & Jerry’s for the run of the fair).

I ran into fellow Artiholics Jen Wallace, the curationista of THE (UN)FAIR and got a picture with her.

Her partner James Wallace who was acting as greeter to the elevator crowds.

While talking to him one of the poet performers walked into the hallway and started reciting poems for us from memory, and they were great (anyone know who this guy is?)

Last year, the first year of THE (UN)FAIR, the show only occupied half of the entire floor space on the third floor. This year the space was twice as big with two additional new large rooms making way for some large paintings.

As well as an area for performance.

Vivian & Artist Gigi Chen.

And a massive projection piece, nearby which there are a few large patches of comfy AstroTurf where you can lounge out eating popcorn and ice cream while drinking wine in a small stackable mason jar like the most bizarre Willy Wonka factory picnic.

Max Noy, and Jamie both from Artefuse.

Artist Mark Parsons and one of his CartoGraphiPOP sculptures.

Jen and Mark Parsons.

Artiholics writer Betty T. Kao is doing a performance piece called “Belly Full of Artifacts” at The (Un)fair. Photos by Lauretta Prevost.

She will be performing again there on Saturday from 8 – 10 pm.

Artiholics is a media sponsor The (UN)Fair.

THE (UN)FAIR is located only a few blocks away from The Armory Show.  500 W 52nd St. New York, NY 10019

March 5th – 9th, 2014
11am – 8pm free

Opening Party: 3/5, 8-10pm free
Benefit Party: 3/6, 8-10pm $20 click here
Closing Party: 3/9, 8-10pm free

Written and Photographed by Cojo “Art Juggernaut”
(*editor’s note: I will finish crediting these photos and hyperlinking to artists websites next week when I am done seeing all these fairs and have time)

The post THE (UN)FAIR is Back, Bigger, & More Popular Than Ever – Opening (Photos) appeared first on Artiholics.