BIANCA BRIGITTE BONOMI ON THE ART FESTIVAL AT HAY, HAY-ON-WYE
|
|
Last weekend saw the second annual Crunch: The Art Festival at Hay. This year's combative line-up included art commentator, Anthony Haden-Guest, sculptor Richard Wentworth (below), critic Godfrey Barker, who exposed the "conspiracy" at the heart of the art world, and curator Julian Spalding who branded Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin and Joseph Beuys "worse than junk."
|
|
|
|
PUT DOWNS AND SUCK UPS: MATTHEW COLLINGS' WEEKLY VENTINGS ABOUT THE ART WORLD No 39: BEAUTY AND RULES
|
|
Here's a compressed Saatchi Online article version of a film I recently finished work on, about beauty in art. The film was an hour long and was shown on BBC2 on 14 November 2009. (In the UK it can be accessed on BBC I-player.) For me there are certain laws by which beauty in art - this almost meaningless notion - can actually be defined. People are curious about it. They have their stock questions. Is it in the eye of the beholder? Does it change over time?
|
|
|
|
PUT DOWNS AND SUCK UPS: MATTHEW COLLINGS' WEEKLY VENTINGS ABOUT THE ARTWORLD: No 38: CONCEPTUAL ART TOILET BREAK
|
|
A few months ago I received a request to take part in a debate at the Oxford Union. The motion was: "This house believes that conceptual art just isn't art." Adrian Searle and Miroslaw Balka were on the panel too, and on the other side were the Stuckist leader Charles Thomson and Mark Leckey (below), the artist who won the Turner Prize last year for a conceptual art installation. Towards the end of his speech about being anti-conceptual art Leckey pointed at me, said "Gaahhh!" and cried out: "I can't stand being in the same room as this man."
|
|
|
|
MINIMAL MEANS AT INITIAL ACCESS, WOLVERHAMPTON
|
|
The Frank Cohen Collection is currently showing 'Minimal Means', a group show that explores how a significant group of contemporary artists have responded to Modernism. The exhibition includes works by Rudolf Stingel, Richard Prince, John M Armleder (below), Anselm Reyle, as well as works from Frank Cohen's contemporary furniture and design collection, such as Pylon Chair by Tom Dixon and 'Slice' Chaise Lounge by Mathias Bengtsson. 
|
|
|
|
CAROLEE SCHNEEMANN AT TATE LIVERPOOL
|
|
As part of the Abandon Normal Devices Festival, Carolee Schneemann will be presenting a new piece at Tate Liverpool from 23-27 September and present a new performative lecture on the 24th.
|
|
|
|
CLARE STEPHENSON AT SPIKE ISLAND
|
|
'She-who-Presents', Stephenson's new show at Spike Island, is a continuation of her most recent body of work which draws on both the art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and French literature, in particular the exuberant language of Jean Genet's transvestites from Notre-Dame des Fleurs (Our Lady of the Flowers, 1944).
|
|
|
|
BETHAN HUWS AT STOUR VALLEY ARTS
|
|
This autumn sees two new works by acclaimed artist Bethan Huws in East Kent jointly commissioned by Turner Contemporary and Stour Valley Arts. A film, shot during a wedding reception at Margate's Winter Gardens, will be screened under a canopy of trees in King's Wood, while a temporary text work is installed at an outdoor location on Margate's seafront.
|
|
|
|
EVA HESSE AT THE FRUITMARKET GALLERY, EDINBURGH
|
|
The Fruitmarket Gallery's 2009 Edinburgh Art Festival exhibition is a solo presentation of the work of German-born American artist Eva Hesse, a major figure in post-war art. Throughout her career, Hesse produced a large number of small, experimental works, so-called test pieces. This exhibition proposes that rather than simply technical explorations, these small objects - made in a wide range of materials, including latex, wire-mesh, sculp-metal, wax and cheesecloth - radically put into question conventional notions of what sculpture is.
|
|
|
|
BANKSY AT BRISTOL ART MUSEUM, UK
|
|
Banksy takes his work off the streets for his first museum show in his hometown of Bristol. This unique collaboration between the city's foremost cultural institution and one of the region's most infamous artists is already attracting thousands of visitors with waiting times of up to an hour to enter the exhibition. In a BBC interview, Banksy said: "This is the first show I've ever done where taxpayers' money is being used to hang my pictures up rather than scrape them off."
|
|
|
|
WILLIE DOHERTY AT THE FRUITMARKET GALLERY, LONDON
|
|
This major exhibition of work by Willie Doherty, one of the most significant artists of our times, brings together a selection of new and existing films and photographs, and includes a new film, Buried, made specially for the exhibition.
|
|
|
|
HARLAND MILLER AT THE BALTIC, GATESHEAD
|
|
Artist and writer Harland Miller presents a collection of paintings and montages which have been made, or adapted, specifically for BALTIC from a series of works Miller has referred to as the Bad Weather paintings. Based on the dust jackets of old Penguin books they are painterly reproductions of these iconic classics but with fictitious titles that are specific to the North East where Miller himself grew up.
|
|
|
|
A DUCK FOR MR. DARWIN AT BALTIC, GATESHEAD
|
|
'A Duck for Mr. Darwin' is a group exhibition of nine contemporary artists exploring evolutionary thinking and the theory of natural selection. The show features sculpture, drawing, painting, film and installation which focuses on the legacy of Charles Darwin's ideas and the spirit of experimentation which was so distinctive to the time in which he lived. 
|
|
|
|
STEPHANIE COTELA TANNER ON SHONA ILLINGWORTH AT JOHN HANSARD GALLERY, SOUTHAMPTON
|
|
The remote, unforgiving landscape that Balnakiel and nearby local village Durness occupy were home to artist Shona Illingworth from age two to seventeen and her recollections of enduring the weather, social tensions and military presence serve as inspiration for her recent exhibition, 'Balnakiel'. The artist adamantly asserts that this work is not about her personal experiences; it is an investigation of cultural, social, and collective memory. 
|
|
|
|
GLENN BROWN AT KARSTEN SCHUBERT, LONDON AND TATE LIVERPOOL
|
|
A major retrospective of the work of Glenn Brown is at Tate Liverpool until 10 May, while at Karsten Schubert in London you can see a series of new etchings in which the artist layers single or multiple portraits by Urs Graf, Rembrandt and Lucian Freud to create new portraits which are at once recognizable and completely unfamiliar (below). 
|
|
|
|
JAMIE HOLMAN: TOO COOL FOR SCHOOL?
|
|
British art colleges have turned out a stellar role call of musical individualists, from John Lennon to Brian Eno, Jarvis Cocker to Alison Goldfrapp. Meanwhile, music schools have bequeathed us the likes of Katie Melua and Leona Lewis. Cheers BRIT School! With the help of a grizzled '70s pop guru and, er, the Devil, erstwhile tompaulin singer and art school alumnus Jamie Holman asks why "You can't teach talent". 
|
|
|
|
ANGUS FAIRHURST AT ARNOLFINI, BRISTOL
|
|
Angus Fairhurst (1966-2008) was one of the most influential members of the group of artists associated with London's Goldsmiths College in the late 1980s. He participated in the seminal exhibition, Freeze, which introduced the world to a generation who became known as the Young British Artists, setting the tone for contemporary art in the UK over the next two decades.
The fertile mind and anarchic spirit of Angus Fairhurst found many forms, in a body of work which defied categorisation through its sheer breadth of media and invention: painting, performance, animation, photography, video, sculpture, music, print, wallpaper, drawing, collage.
|
|
|
|
DAVID LYNCH EXHIBITS AT FORMAT09 PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL
|
|
The international photography festival FORMAT09 will take place between 6 March and 5 April 2009 across Derby with QUAD, the city's new £11.2 million arts centre, as its hub. PHOTOCINEMA is the theme for this year's festival and Oscar-nominated director David Lynch will take part, together with some of the world's foremost photographers and cinematographers including FORMAT09 patrons Martin Parr. 
|
|
|
|
KATY MORAN AT MIMA, MIDDLESBROUGH
|
|
Based in London, Katy Moran was born in Manchester in 1975 and received her Masters in Painting from the Royal College of Art in 2005. She is celebrated for extraordinarily efflorescent canvases that release painting from the often frozen, idealised space of representational art. Moran's first major solo exhibition, at MIMA, brings together the most significant paintings of her career.
|
|
|
|
MAX MCGUINESS ON JANET CARDIFF AND GEORGE BURES AT MODERN ART OXFORD
|
|
It took me a few minutes to find the eponymous subject of 'The Dark Pool', Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller's 1995 installation. At first glance, the murky room seems to house little more than a parody of bohemian squalor - discarded teabags, cups, typewriters, and pulp fiction. But then appears a battered old leather suitcase with its lid slightly ajar. Inside is an eerie, sculpted miniature waterscape with a clutch of retro cars and figurines drawn up beside an inky puddle of stagnant water, cut off by the edge of the case. Alienation has never been this enjoyable. 
|
|
|
|
ART FESTIVAL AT HAY, UK
|
|
This weekend a new art event launches in Hay to coincide with the Hay Festival's winter weekend of literary events. The Art Festival at Hay and the Institute of Art and Ideas will be presenting a series of talks and debates, focusing on the impact of the credit crunch on the art world. Speakers include Saatchi Online contributor Anthony Haden-Guest (below), artists Alison Jackson and Gavin Turk, and the critic and arts tv presenter Ben Lewis. To find out more and to book tickets click here. 
|
|
|
|
FUTURE50 AT PROJECT SPACE LEEDS, UK
|
|
Future50 features 50 UK artists from the Axis website, which profiles contemporary artists nominated by influential artists, curators and writers. All the works in the exhibition are for sale with prices starting at £120. Works can also be bought online until the end of January 2009. 
|
|
|
|
ALISON NORDSTROM ON GIACOMO BRUNELLI AT THE NEW ART GALLERY, WALSALL
|
|
Saatchi Online artist Giacomo Brunelli creates extraordinary photographs of animals, both living and dead. Using a Miranda Sensomat camera from 1968 that once belonged to his father, his photographs are taken during daily morning walks when the light is best, and his subjects are those he sees along the way. The black and white images are then hand-printed in a makeshift darkroom. A book of his photographs is published this autumn and his first solo show in the UK is on until the end of this month.
|
|
|
|
ERIC BAINBRIDGE AT WORKPLACE, GATESHEAD
|
|
New Modernism meets melamine and sausages in a new work by Eric Bainbridge for his first solo
exhibition at Workplace Gallery. Postwurstendung conflates Bainbridge's ongoing reappraisal of
Modernist sculptural principles with arguably the ultimate reductive minimal object - The Frankfurter.
|
|
|
|
MARTIN CREED AT IKON, BIRMINGHAM
|
|
Ikon hosts a survey of new and recent works by acclaimed British artist Martin Creed, including pieces commissioned by the gallery, plus associated events. It is one of Creed's most comprehensive and ambitious exhibitions to date.
|
|
|
|
BLOOMBERG NEW CONTEMPORARIES 08, LIVERPOOL
|
|
Unique in the firmament of International Biennials, a survey of the brightest stars in the new cosmology, exceptional new works by artists who might burn bright or twinkle for a day - Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2008, selected by Richard Billingham, Ceal Floyer and Ken Lum, is on view in Liverpool until 22 November and travels to London on 6 December. This year is the largest show ever with the work of 57 artists, chosen from over 1400 submissions. 
|
|
|
|
DAVID SHRIGLEY AT THE BALTIC, GATESHEAD
|
|
David Shrigley is perhaps best known for his intuitive drawings that are typically dead-pan in their humour. His cartoon-like sketches are deliberately dysfunctional and deal with everyday doubts and fears of the human condition. In this exhibition the Scottish-based artist David Shrigley will be showing previously unseen animations and sculptures.
|
|
|
|
JANE FRERE: RETURN OF THE SOUL, PATRIOTHALL GALLERY, EDINBURGH
|
|
Featuring thousands of wax figures held in limbo, 'Return of the Soul: the Nakbah Project' is the outcome of Scottish artist Jane Frere's eight-month residency in East Jerusalem. These figures were created by Palestinians following a series of workshops in refugee camps in the West Bank, Jordan and Lebanon, on drawing, anatomy, period costume, physical theatre and oral history. Accompanied by first-hand testimonies, these figures, all representing individual Palestinians with names and origins, express the Palestinians' sense of loss, heritage and identity 60 years on from the momentous events of 1948. To watch a film about the exhibition and an interview with artist Jane Frere, click here. 
|
|
|
|
FAR WEST AT THE ARNOLFINI, BRISTOL
|
|
For its summer show, the Arnolfini has been transformed from an arts venue into a 'concept store', capitalising on the consumer and cultural relationships produced by the shifting of the economic centre of the world towards the East. The store includes an ambitious programme of participation projects, off-site presentations, discussion forums, live art and film. A selection of specially branded and exclusive products designed by artists such as Liu Ding and Surasi Kusolwong are available for purchase. 
|
|
|
|
PIPILOTTI RIST AT FACT, LIVERPOOL
|
|
With her trademark heady mix of bright light, lush colours and zany feminine energy, Pipilotti Rist challenges viewers to look at art differently: whether lying on the floor, peering into a small dark crack in the floor or perched on oversized furniture, she creates in her work an "Alice in Wonderland" sense of wonder.
|
|
|
|
PIETER HUGO AT OPEN EYE GALLERY, LIVERPOOL
|
|
Open Eye Gallery and Autograph ABP are presenting the first substantial UK exhibition by South African artist Pieter Hugo. The exhibition focuses on three bodies of work, all of which use portraiture to call into question our understanding of how we look at others. Hugo will be in the UK to do two events - one in Liverpool, the other in London. 
|
|
|
|
FOLKESTONE TRIENNIAL, UK
|
|
Internationally acclaimed contemporary artists including Christian Boltanski, Tracey Emin, Mark Dion, Jeremy Deller, Tacita Dean, Langlands and Bell (below) and Mark Wallinger have been commissioned to create new works for the first Folkestone Triennial, 'Tales of Time and Space', which will open on 14 June and run until 14 September 2008. One of the most ambitious public art projects to be presented in the UK, the Triennial will present works specially created for public spaces throughout Folkestone. 
|
|
|
|
CATHY WILKES AT MILTON KEYNES GALLERY, UK
|
|
Cathy Wilkes's work is characterised by the creation of a slowly emerging, distinctively personal vocabulary of sculptures and paintings which she makes and re-makes in evolving assemblages and environments. This exhibition presents the most comprehensive display of her work in the UK to date, bringing together the work she's made since the mid-1990s and more recent, new works. |
|
|
|
FREYA SMAILL ON STUART WHIPPS AT THE NEW ART GALLERY WALSALL, UK
|
|
Stuart Whipps, one of the West Midlands' leading young photographers, takes the production space of the MG Rover as his subject for his current show, 'Ming Jue', at The New Art Gallery Walsall. When Whipps first began this project in 2004 the site of production was the Longbridge Rover Plant in Birmingham. In 2005, however, the 6000+ staff were informed that production would halt for a week. In the end, the staff never returned to the plant and the production of the MG Rover transferred to Nanging, China.
|
|
|
|
MATT PRICE ON WHERE TO SEE ART IN THE WEST MIDLANDS, UK
|
|
If you're interested in visual art, there's no better time to be living in or visiting the West Midlands region. What was once, in the dim and distant past, considered by some as a bit of a cultural desert, is now a hive of local, national and international activity with an energetic and growing community of artists at its heart. That's if you can catch them - many of them are out and about, working on exhibitions and projects in cities all around the world, whether shows at commercial galleries in New York, London, Milan and Geneva or in major public art biennales such as Venice or Shanghai. And if you're quick off the mark, you can usually get to see their work in the West Midlands before they achieve national and international success - the trick is knowing where to look. 
|
|
|
|
THE ART OF IDEAS, BIRMINGHAM, UK
|
|
A new initiative funded by the Arts Council England, Birmingham City Council and Business Link West Midlands launches tonight to support and promote creative talent in Birmingham. Entitled the "The Art of Ideas", the project, consisting of talks, guided tours, an artists' project, a cultural art map of Birmingham, and essays about the arts in Birmingham which we will publish on Saatchi Online's Magazine, aims to explore the place of art and creativity in shaping the West Midlands. All the events are free. 
|
|
|
|
GLASGOW INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF CONTEMPORARY VISUAL ART
|
|
Glasgow international Festival of Contemporary Visual Art opens on 11 April showcasing the best of contemporary visual arts, from established Scottish and international artists, and from emerging talent. Among the highlights are the largest exhibition in Scotland to date by Jim Lambie, Tramway's major new commission by Jonathan Monk, Adel Abdessemed's show at Douglas Gordon's Glasgow House, a private house turned "not for profit" gallery, and a rare appearance by the Vancouver-based artist Rodney Graham and his band. 
|
|
|
|
PRINT THE LEGEND: THE MYTH OF THE WEST AT THE FRUITMARKET GALLERY, EDINBURGH
|
|
The Fruitmarket Gallery's major spring exhibition takes its title from the final scene of the film 'The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance': 'Sir, this is the West. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend'. This group show presents a selection of northern European sculpture, photography, installation and film in the context of the western and its role in the creation of the myth of the American West. The show includes Douglas Gordon's 'Five Year Drive-By (The Searchers)', and a newly commissioned work by Mike Nelson inspired by the climax of Clint Eastwood's 'High Plains Drifter'. 
|
|
|
|
OUT OF BODY AT OPEN EYE, LIVERPOOL
|
|
'Out of Body' is an exhibition of photographs and moving image works that explore, manipulate and reflect upon the human body. Many of the works express the resistance of our bodies to being coded or pinned down as images, such as the photographs of emerging Spanish artist Naia del Castillo (below). 
|
|
|
|
GEORGIE HOPTON AT THE NEW ART CENTRE, ROCHE COURT, WILTSHIRE
|
|
Following her nomination for the 2007 Maxmara Art Prize for Women Georgie Hopton is having a solo exhibition at the Artists' House at Roche Court. Known for her paintings and sculpture influenced by Morandi and Picasso, her inspiration for this new series of works, comes mainly from flowers, which she has grown herself and then photographs, paints and sculpts.
|
|
|
|
PIO ABAD AT CHAPTER, CARDIFF
|
|
From pompadour wigs to totalitarian floor patterns, Pio Abad's intricate black, white and red ink drawings of interwoven patterns explore the grotesque as a creative strategy in examining the function of excess and its degenerative possibilities as a visual quality. 
|
|
|
|
BILL OWENS AT THE ARNOLFINI, BRISTOL
|
|
Bill Owens black and white photographs entitled 'Suburbia' offer a now iconic chronicle of the birth of newly-built suburban neighbourhoods in California during the early 70s. On view in this exhibition alongside this series is Owens' more recent work, 'New Suburbia', which documents his return to some of the same locations as his original series. 
|
|
|
|
MARK TITCHNER AT THE BALTIC, GATESHEAD PLUS LIMITED EDITION
|
|
The 2006 Turner Prize nominee Mark Titchner's major exhibition at the Baltic, entitled 'Run, Black River, Run', comprises eight new billboard-sized banners and a video installation in which this mantra to psychotic self-improvement is endlessly repeated: 'If you don't like your life you can change it... After all what good is life without conquest?... If you can dream it you can do it.' Titchner has also created a limited edition print (below) which is available - and signed - for just £210.
|
|
|
|
CAMILLA LOW AT DCA, DUNDEE
|
|
Camilla Low's upcoming solo exhibition at the DCA will showcase the young Norwegian artist's colourful minimalism, writes Lupe Nunez-Fernandez.
|
|
|
|
PREVIEW: MARCEL BROODTRHAERS AT MILTON KEYNES GALLERY, UK
|
|
In January the Milton Keynes Gallery will open the most comprehensive exhibition in the UK by the renowned Belgian artist Marcel Broodthaers who died in 1976). Broodthaers was a poet, photographer, filmmaker and artist, and throughout his career he questioned the role of the artwork, the artist and the art institution. The MKG exhibition will explore the diversity of Broodthaers' practice, including in books, editions, objects, projections and paintings, and will feature several works never seen in the UK. 
|
|
|
|
|
