Author: conte

LONDON.- Spring 2010 sees the return of the longest running print fair in the world, the London Original Print Fair, 29 April – 3 May 2010. The 25th Fair will take place in the main galleries at the Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, Piccadilly. It will be the largest ever, with some 60 exhibitors including new participants from America and a specialist in Japanese prints. Dealers, Print Workshops and Publishers come from France, Germany, Ireland and America as well as Britain. In 2009 attendance rose from 6,000 to 10,000 and strong sales were reported in all areas, old master, modern and contemporary. This year the Fair will include first-time

NEW YORK, NY.- An installation of 14 bold and colorful paintings created by contemporary Aboriginal Australian artists will go on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on December 15. Drawn from a U. S. private collection, “Contemporary Aboriginal Painting from Australia” will provide an introduction to Aboriginal painting, which has become Australia’s most celebrated contemporary art movement and has attained prominence within the international art world. The installation will present works created primarily over the past decade by artists from the central

NEW YORK, NY.- The Museum of Modern Art presents Performance 7: Mirage by Joan Jonas, a gallery installation by the artist Joan Jonas (American, b. 1936), from December 18, 2009, through May 31, 2010, in The Yoshiko and Akio Morita Gallery. The installation, which recently entered MoMA’s collection, re-imagines Mirage, a groundbreaking performance originally created in 1976 for the screening room of New York’s Anthology Film Archives. For the original performance version of Mirage, Jonas carried out a series

VALENCIA.- In Miradas Reveladoras one can observe a graphic sequence that was intended to be an illustrated report and has ended up being a work of art because of the sharpness of the details in the composition as well as the sensitiveness in reflecting the social discourse that provided each photograph with veracity. This exhibition is a compilation of images of the most significant sociocultural changes that took place in Cuba 50 years ago and shows the cracks of Cuban society in decisive moments of confrontation with its fate. Some critics talk about the thematic exhibition as a testimony which shows with amazing clarity the atmosphere and circumstances that surrounded individuals, masses, leaders, and those who were captured by the lens.

LONDON.- An album of 40 ‘suppressed’ cartoons by leading British caricaturist James Gillray (1756-1815) has recently come to light in the Criminal Law Policy Unit of the Ministry of Justice. It features material judged socially unacceptable in the 19th century – including explicitly sexual, scatological and politically outrageous subject matter. The album was probably seized by police more than a century ago as ‘pornographic material’ and handed to Government officials. This slim volume of ‘Curiosa’ has now been transferred to the print collections of the V&A. In the 1840s Gillray’s plates were acquired by an

DETROIT (AP).- Houses with dreary urban facades covered in polka dots. A traveling dollhouse made from the remnants of abandoned homes. A dilapidated residence covered in ice. Artists across the Detroit area are using the city’s blight as their canvas, transforming abandoned homes into high-concept projects to draw attention to the homelessness, poverty and urban decay plaguing Detroit. They hope the ongoing experiment will shed some creatively inspired light on what Detroit was, is and could

LONDON.- The Michael Hoppen gallery announced an exhibition of work by one of America’s foremost fashion photographers Fernand Fonssagrives. Once the highest paid photographers in the world, he was ambivalent about the acclaim he received in his chosen field, preferring to remain anonymous. Little was written about him, even at the peak of his success. He was linked to the early ‘Design Laboratory’ classes of Alexey Brodovitch, and was a key member of the close knit group of photographers now celebrated as ‘The New York School. His most memorable work traces the unique partnership he had with his first wife, legendary model Lisa Fonssagrives,

ATLANTA, GA.- The Savannah College of Art and Design presents “NO LAB on Tour” by renowned multimedia artist Cao Fei and Map Office co-founders Laurent Gutierrez and Valerie Portefaix. The exhibition will be on display at the ACA Gallery of SCAD, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St., Dec. 14-Feb. 7. In “NO LAB,” Chinese artist Cao Fei teams up with Hong-Kong-based Map Office to create a virtual experience of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina in the online virtual world community, Second Life. Fei depicts the storm surge and the devastating aftermath through a stark, politically charged multimedia presentation. In the ACA Gallery, visitors can experience “NO LAB on Tour” and participate in the ongoing discussion of urban space, society and the trauma/drama of change via a variety of visual materials including line drawings, photographs, light boxes, a video and computer stations where they can ac

DALLAS, TX.- Today the Dallas Museum of Art announced the 2010 season of Arts & Letters Live, the Museum’s literary and performing arts series that this year is celebrating its 19th season. With approximately 30 scheduled events featuring 50 authors, 20 actors, 7 musicians, and 2 dancers, some of this season’s highlights will include appearances by Mrs. Laura W. Bush, David Sedaris and Ira Glass. Widely acknowledged as a major contribution to Dallas’s cultural life, Arts & Letters Live has sold out most of its events since its inception in 1992. Audiences estimated at over 172,000 have attended more than 330 series programs, offered locally or on tour. To date, Arts & Letters Live has showcased more than 350 regional, national and international writers, often in combination with performing or visual arts. “We’re thrilled about the diversity and caliber of this year’s lineup, which showcas