(UK) They say the best way to know a city’s nooks and krannies is through its locals, I couldn’t agree more, Dangerously Naive’s favorite Londoner graced us with his favorite visionaries last week (http://naiveboy.com/2009/11/21/ten-visionaries-of-jaiden-jeremy-james-by-navo/), and today he’s giving us an exclusive personal first class tour of his favorite spots to be seen or be incognito in London Town.

1. CLAIRE DE ROUEN’S BOOK STORE on charing x road for all the latest books and specialist magazines.

125 Charing Cross Road, WC2H 0EA London
+442072871813

Mon-Fri, 10:00–18:30; Sat, 10:00–18:00

www.clairederouenbooks.com

2. SOUTHBANK for my cultural fix it is definitely my favorite location in London with its mix of Bohemians for all kind of places from artists, to designers, to film makers. I love the BFI especially when it’s the London Film Festival and always check films out and the latest exhibitions they have, Tate Modern for my cultural fix of contemporary art. Haywood Gallery also puts on some amazing shows in recent months Warhol, Longo and Ruscha.

3. THE ROYAL COURT THEATRE, an amazing place for theatre the celebrates old talent whilst nurturing and embracing new. Each production is beautifully done and seems to question and challenge modern-day culture.

50-51 Sloane Square, London, SW1W 8AX, United Kingdom
+44 20 7565 5000

www.royalcourttheatre.com

4. PONYSTEP, a place where every and anything is welcome. Like boombox and those before it, Ponystep offers a unique clubbing experience.

www.ponystep.com/

5. JOINERS ARM’S, sleazy, cheap, testosterone overloaded and a place I would be lost without.

116-118 Hackney Rd, London E2 7QL, United Kingdom
020 7739 9397‎

6. FASHION RETAIL ACADEMY where I was trained by Philip Green the man behind TOPSHOP, I owe a lot to this them.

15 Gresse Street, London, Greater London W1T 1QL
020 7307 2345 /020 7307 2361

www.fashionretailacademy.ac.uk

7. SOMERSET HOUSE, I am at awe of its architectural beauty every time I see it, the new home of London Fashion Week and currently hosting the amazing Showstudio Exhibition.

Strand, London, WC2R 0RN, United Kingdom
+44 20 7845 4646
www.somersethouse.org.uk

8. INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART, always plays the best new arts films and has great shows on as well as a cute little bookshop.

Nash House
12 Carlton House Ter, London, SW1Y 5AH, United Kingdom
+44 20 7930 3647

www.ica.org.uk

9. SHOREDITCH, truly amazing location, home to the coolest people, hot spots and companies from the likes of Gilbert & George to Tracy Emin, as well as the home of Fashion East, Dazed & Confused Magazine and I-D Magazine. Boombox, Ponystep, George & the Dragon, Joiners, the list goes on definitely a place to visit and an even cooler place to live.

10. MY HOUSE, home is where the heart is.

http://jaidenjames.blogspot.com/

Related Entry: http://naiveboy.com/2009/11/25/didios-brasil-by-navo/

Introducing Her Excellency Sandra Esquilant, art world darling (#80 on ArtReview magazine’s 100 Most Important People in Contemporary Art list) and charming owner/hostess at The Golden Heart, London’s best-known East End power art bar.

Sandra Esquillant behind the bar at London's The Golden Heart pub

For a limited time Beck’s labels will be taking on a whole new look thanks to collaborations with the world of music.

Electro Pop Sensation Ladyhawke and indie faves Hard-Fi have created their own bespoke labels for the iconic green bottle for ‘Music Inspired Art’. The acts will be the first music artists to take control of the labels following previous collaborations with Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin and Gilbert & George.

To mark these unique musical labels, we’re giving away a crate of Ladyhawe and Hard-Fi bottles, a Hard-Fi signed iPod and set of drumsticks.

To be in with a chance of winning this great prize simply answer the following question:

Which two artists are designing this year’s Beck’s labels?

Just email your answer and phone number to: laura@whos-jack.co.uk

Plus check out www.becks.co.uk to find out further information

Please drink Beck’s responsibly 
www.drinkaware.co.uk

© 2009, InBev UK Limited, all rights reserved

The Frieze Art Fair is on in the UK. This is one of the major art events int he UK. Worth a look to see what is happening overseas…

A visitor strolls past a large-scale Gilbert and George. The fair features over 150 contemporary art galleries from 30 countries, presenting the work of over a thousand artists

Photograph: Oli Scarff/Getty Images

p.s. Click the image to see more images by my favourite: the guardian.co.uk

Beauty. What do contemporary artists, choreographers, actors and directors think of it? Is it important to them or not? I told you about my little project on beauty yesterday. Today I’m proud to announce that I will be kicking off The Utopia Parkway Files with… Gilbert & George. I got to talk to the English artists when they were in Brussels for their Jack Freak Pictures-exhibition at Baronian Francey. (It’s still on, more info here.) Want to know about beauty as a means to hypnotize a viewer, or about the spunky blossoms they adore, then read on.

‘The concept of beauty is extremely important to us. When we started as baby artists, the galleries that we could exhibit in, were limited. They were the modern galleries that where there. And in all these galleries, beauty was taboo. So was colour, so was meaning, so was thought, so was love and sex. Everything was taboo. Except for a circle, or a square, grey, black or white. So we had to fight that.’

‘Beauty was our art. We wanted to make our artwork beautiful to carry the meaning. We used it as a means to hypnotize our audience in some way, to look at our work. Difficult subjects can be transmitted to the viewer through beauty. Beauty is the messenger.’

‘Yes, we are aware of the fact that beauty is considered to be an ugly word, in some educated circles. Mainly in the media. Not in the vast general public. In our case there’s always been a gulf between the vast general public and the media. A separation, in some way.’

‘It’s wonderful that beauty is a matter of opinion. It is elastic. What is beautiful for one person, the other person doesn’t see as beautiful. We love the sunset, we like the rain falling down. It’s all beauty. We are feeling happy in the world, when the sun goes down. You feel at one with everybody. Other people fall in love with a dog or a cat.’

‘We like beautiful people. All people can be beautiful. Beauty is what is in your brain. It’s not about the visuals, or what you see on the outside. Internal beauty is quite extraordinary sometimes. Sometimes you see beautiful people, but when they start to speak… that’s it. You never want to see them again. Their beauty vanishes immediately.’

‘We have become, in the last four of five years, great believers in the compliment. If you see somebody on the street with a beautiful coat, and you give them a compliment on their coat, they will remember that compliment for years and never throw that coat away. It’s extraordinary. People only want to be beautiful. They only want compliments. We did a print, Certify, based on compliments. Everybody loves that print. Everybody wants to be loved. It’s extraordinarily simple.’

‘Does it bother us if people call our work ugly? We don’t think they would call it ugly. They would call it wicked, but not ugly.’

‘We always say that our art should be capable of bringing out the bigot from inside the liberal. A person that is normally very fair and general thinking, who sees opera and ballet and exhibitions, should face up to his bigotry as well. We will be there to help him do that. And vice versa. A person who hates culture and modern art, well, somewhere there is also the capability to appreciate beauty and meaning.’

‘Is there any art that we consider to be beautiful? We don’t really look in that way. And we’ve stopped going to shows long ago. But we like Van Gogh. And this English artist nobody knows: Samuel Palmer. His trees are very sexual. They are all shouting sexuality. Yes: they are full of spunky blossoms.’

(Gilbert & George, interviewed by Hans-Maarten Post for Utopia Parkway, 9-9-09, gallery Baronian Francey, Brussels)

(photo credit: Gilbert & George, Jack Freak Pictures, ‘Flagwood’ (2008), courtesy Baronian Francey)

Iconic figures? You bet. It was rather strange to see thát many people turn up for an interview with Gilbert & George, yesterday evening, at Bozar (Brussels). Young and old, anxiously trying to get hold of those last tickets, as if some famous rock star was going to appear. A completely packed theatre listened to the often funny stories of the British artists, who even sang a little tune at the end.  ‘Do you think our early work was rather dark and melancholic? Well, that was because we were drinking a lot in those days, and we probably overdid it a little bit.’ Read on, for more quotes and highlights.

From Thursday onwards, Brussels’ gallery Baronian Francey is showing some of Gilbert & George’s recent Jack Freak Pictures (until October 31), so that’s why the two gentlemen are in town. At Bozar they were interviewed by writer Michael Bracewell. It turned out to be an enjoyable evening, both informative and funny, with two artists not taking themselves too seriously.

On their early days: ‘Starting to work together was not a conscious decision. Something just came over us. And like a cloud we drifted away from those other students at art school. We wanted to make art with content. That was taboo. We wanted to make figurative art. That was taboo. We wanted to make art about life, death and love. That was taboo too. We were alone. We didn’t fit in. The art world considered normal people to be inferior and unintelligent. We wanted to make art for everyone. That was not thought very well of.’ 

Their biggest invention: ‘We were poor and didn’t have a studio. So we decided to become art ourselves. That was our biggest invention. We borrowed a list with addresses from an art gallery, and we started writing all those people letters to tell them we were still alive. There was an important show for which we were sure we were going to be selected, but we didn’t. So we turned up as a living sculpture at the opening. It was a big success. We got invited to Düsseldorf by one of the most important galleries.’

On those first, dark pictures: ‘We got paid a lot for our first works of art. We discovered drinking and that didn’t go very well. We started to drink a lot and we probably overdid it a little bit on those feelings of being outsiders and being desperate.’

Can art be prophetic? ‘Art has to incorporate past, present and future. We like to think that our pictures are like our tomorrows.’

On holidays and little boys: ‘We are working all the time. There is nothing else we can do. We have tried to go on holiday, but after two days in Malaga or Lisbon we wanted to go home. Creating new pictures is a great privilege. Nobody can interfere. And the next privilege is to show them in all these cities around the world where people turn up to come and see them. And all of a sudden we are at openings, surrounded by teenagers licking us all over.’

On discovering red: ‘People often ask us why we started using red early on in our career, after having worked in black and white. Well, it was simple: we discovered colour. Every artist starts out with a box of crayons. We didn’t have that. So it took us four years to find red.’

On inspiration: ‘We go deadheaded to our studio. Without any ideas. We just have what is inside us: love, fear, hope… and we try to trust that. We don’t want to have ideas. But we are collecting images all the time.’

On the Jack Freak Pictures: ‘We were amazed that we came up with more than 150 new pictures. Usually an artist doesn’t know what to do next after a career retrospective. We had a positive trauma. It’s rather amazing if you take into account that we only have 1 (!) assistant. And he’s only allowed to scan. We do all the rest. That’s something we are really proud of.’

On religion: ‘Was Jesus heterosexual? was one of the subtitles of one of our paintings. A lot of religious people were really angry, whereas the only thing they had to do was say yes. That many people are dying because of the condom-policy of the church. Religion is a subject we have to explore. It would be silly not to.’

On arguing: ‘We don’t argue. And even if we did, we wouldn’t tell you. Doing this together is an enormous strength. It removes all self-doubt. They can never defeat us. That’s why the world is divided in two’s.’

On wearing the same clothes: ‘We don’t dress the same. We dress similarly. That’s a big difference.’

On walking and routine: ‘Yes, we are always eating at the same restaurant, at 8 o’clock sharp. We never read the menu. Why should we? We don’t want to waste our brain reading menus. And why should we cook ourselves? We prefere to use our brain in more interesting ways. Before we eat, we go for a walk. George walks for one hour and a half. I just do 45 minutes, because I have flat feet. It’s important to go out and see the world, the trees, the cars and the birds.’

On changing the world: ‘Can art change the world? Yes, we believe it can. There’s so many galleries these days and newspapers are writing about art all the time. Art makes you see the world in an other way. Only culture changes people. Vicars won’t.’

PS: Bozar will be showing the complete Jack Freak Pictures-series (153 pictures) next year (October 2010-January 2011).

 (photo credit: Gilbert & George ‘Rosarium’ (2008), courtesy Baronian Francey)

Palais des Beaux-Arts

Rencontre avec Gilbert & George
Débat animé par le critique et écrivain anglais Michael Bracewell
Mardi 08.09.2009 20:15

Le retentissant duo d’artistes anglais est de passage à Bruxelles pour un débat animé par le critique Michael Bracewell. Un avant-goût de la grande exposition que BOZAR EXPO leur consacrera à l’automne 2010.

Gilbert & George

Cancan, 2008 (c) Gilbert & George

Gilbert et George se sont rencontrés en 1967, en étudiant la sculpture à la St Martins School of Art de Londres. Reconnus dès les années ’70 pour l’ivresse de leurs performances, ils défraient la chronique en costume d’hommes d’affaires, leur uniforme excentrique. Le couple est surtout célèbre pour ses photomontages monumentaux, tramés de noir, saturés de couleurs vives et assemblés à la manière de vitraux. Après les Musées d’Art contemporain de Chicago, Paris, Pékin et le Guggenheim de New York, la Tate Modern de Londres leur a consacré une importante rétrospective en 2007

À l’automne 2010, Gilbert & Georges présenteront au Palais des Beaux-Arts l’ensemble de leur série Jack Freak Pictures. Après leur participation à la Biennale de Venise en 2005 et leur grande rétrospective à la Tate Modern en 2007, ils se sont une année durant installés dans un studio pour réaliser une nouvelle série de 153 œuvres d’art, les Jack Freak Pictures. Quelques-unes de ces œuvres voyageront de juin 2009 à février 2010 dans sept galeries d’art européennes (Arndt & Partner Berlin, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac Paris, White Cube London, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac Salzburg, Bernier/Eliades Athens, Alfonso Artiaco Naples et Baronian_Francey de Bruxelles), chaque galerie exposont une sélection différente.

Exposition à Bruxelles
GILBERT & GEORGE: JACK FREAK PICTURES
du 11 septembre au 31 octobre 2009 à Galerie Baronian_Francey

Images © Gilbert & George

Links

• Palais des Beaux-Arts, Bruxelles
• Info & tickets
• Galerie Baronian_Francey

Stampfli & Turci – Art Dealers

Disclaimer & Copyright

Super Contemporay @ Design Museum: Hugely inspiring look at iconic deisgn in, around or created in London. Especially loved the maps created for individual’s own London life. On my recommended list.

Coco Before Chanel: 30 minutes too long, too much time spent stringing out the beginning in slummy old Paris, not enough empathy with Coco. I so badly wanted to love it too…

Futurism @ Tate Modern: A little wishy washy but some good pieces to see. Not the sculpture. Do not like the sculpture.

Per Kirkeby @ Tate Modern: A bit angry for my liking.

Moon: Super intelligent film. Love Sam Rockwell. Love Kevin Spacey’s creepy-yet-etheral voiced GERTY. Brilliant artwork too.

Gilbert & George JACK FREAK PICTURES @ White Cube, Hoxton: Bold, brash and brassy, as I’ve come to expect from the Shoreditch-based twosome. Worth a scoot around if you’re in the area.

GALERÍA ALTAIR.
Palma de Mallorca

ANTHONY CARO. THE KENWOOD SERIES

Anthony Caro (New Malden, Surrey, 1924), es un escultor británico abstracto cuya obra se  crea a través del ensamblaje de objetos industriales metálicos de desecho. Tras sus estudios de escultura en la Royal Academy Schools en Londres, trabajó como asistente de Henry Moore. Tras conocer al escultor americano David Smith a principios de los 60, abandonó su inicial obra figurativa y comenzó a construir esculturas soldando y atornillando diversos objetos de metal prefabricado, como vigas, pletinas, mallas…   En 1963 atrajo la atención pública por la exposición en la Whitechapel Gallery en 1963, donde exhibió grandes esculturas abstractas situadas directamente sobre el suelo, eliminando la barrera entre obra y espectador e invitándole a aproximarse e interactuar. Esta manera de contemplar la escultura fue un punto de partida radical y sirvió como base para sus futuros desarrollos en el arte tridimensional. A menudo se le considera  como el primer escultor que elimina el pedestal a la escultura, aunque Smith y Brancusi habían ya realizado algunos pasos en esa dirección.

Como profesor en St Martin’s School of Art de Londres durante el perido de 1953 a 1981 Anthony Caro fue muy influyente en la jóven generación de escultores abstractos británicos como Bruce McLean, Barry Flanagan, Richard Long y Gilbert & George.

Sus inquisitivas aproximaciones abrió nuevas posibilidades, tanto formalmente  como respecto a la temática. 

En 1980, la obra de Caro cambió de dirección, introduciendo elementos más literales con una serie de dibujos que remiten a figuras griegas clásicas. Posteriormente trabajó con instalaciones de gran escala, como “Sea Music” que se encuentra en el muelle de Poole (Dorset), o “Chapel of Light” en la Iglesia de Saint Jean-Baptiste de Bourbourg (Francia).

A menudo trabaja con acero, pero también utiliza un diverso rango de materiales, como el bronce, plata,  plomo, gres, madera y papel. Entre sus exposiciones más importantes destacan sus retrospectivas en el Museum of Modern Art, Nueva York (1975), Trajan Markets, Roma (1992), Tate Britain, Londres (2005). Su obra ha sido galardonada en numerosas ocasiones, incluyendo el Praemium Imperiale for Sculputure en Tokio en 1992.

Listening to: “Fluorescent Half Dome” – Dirty Projectors

And now, a word from Gilbert & George, everyone’s favorite weird British art guys:

We are only human sculptors in that we get up every day, walking sometimes, reading rarely, eating often, thinking always, smoking moderately, enjoying enjoyment, looking, relaxing to see, loving nightly, finding amusement, encouraging life, fighting boredom, being natural, daydreaming, travelling along, drawing occasionally, talking lightly, tea drinking, feeling tired, dancing sometimes, philosophising a lot, criticising never, whistling tunefully, dying very slowly, laughing nervously, greeting politely and waiting till day breaks.

…….

SCARY UNFINISHED PROJECT NEWS: I think somebody else may have finished my story before I did. It doesn’t sound exactly like “World’s End,” but it’s uncomfortably similar. End of days, British slackers, drinking the apocalypse away. Will probably have to give it a quick perusal the next time I’m at the Booksmith.

Exhibition dates: 16th June – 18th September, 2009

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My favourite pair of ‘agent provocateurs’ are at it again!!

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Artist duo George (left) and Gilbert (right) pose in front of their work “The Church of England” in Berlin, Germany

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Gilbert & George
‘DATING’
2008

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Gilbert and George
‘BRITISHISM’
2008

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“As the international tour of the last Gilbert & George retrospective (2007–2009) did not include Berlin, Arndt & Partner are now presenting a solo exhibition of the celebrity artist duo in its gallery rooms behind the Hamburger Bahnhof. It is the first Gilbert & George solo show in Berlin for 14 years. The exhibition features a selection of 20 large-scale pieces from the Jack Freak Pictures, the largest Gilbert & George group of pictures to date. The thrust of the content is given by the colors and shapes of the Union Jack flag that dominate the bulk of the pictures as well as the recurring motive of medals, emblems and trees. In the Jack Freak Pictures the artist duo explores aspects of nationhood and of the sentient individual in the nets of society. In his essay published in the catalogue accompanying the exhibition the British writer Michael Bracewell describes these pictures as “the most iconic, philosophically astute and visually violent works that Gilbert & George have ever created …”

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Gilbert & George installation photograph of their exhibition ‘Jack Freak Pictures’ at Arndt & Partner, Berlin

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“Gilbert & George, who met as students of sculpture at St. Martin’s School of Art in London 42 years ago, embarked on a joint artistic career that was to encompass a wide range of media from drawing to video and their trademark pictures. Further, the pair revolutionized the concept of sculpture by presenting themselves as “living sculptures” dressed in the quintessentially British tailored suit, shirt and tie. But it was their monumental trademark pictures composed of a gridlike array of smaller images which they began to create in the early 70s that first brought them international fame. Figures, cityscapes, symbols, plants, bodily fluids, excrements and text interlock in pictorial messages as visually powerful as their content is provocative. The pictures, which started out in black and white and later assumed increasingly luminous, bold colors, generally also depict portraits of the artists themselves and seize on taboo subjects like sexuality, race, religion and national identity with a brash and fearless candor.

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Gilbert & George
‘JESUS SUITS’
2008

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Gilbert & George
‘CHURCH OF ENGLAND’
2008

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“The Jack Freak Pictures again feature the bodies and/or faces of the artists. In these compositions, their bodies function as stylized representatives of the individual in society, whose relationship to social norms and categories, to national, religious and sexual identification processes is relentlessly explored and commented upon. Departing from their earlier oeuvre, some of their new pictures split the raw images into much smaller fragments before merging them into new forms. The result is a fascinating kaleidoscopic mix of the monstrously grotesque with an intricate ornamental structure reminiscent of sacred art. In ever new variations, Gilbert & George order the signs and fragments of social life they find in their neighborhood – the multicultural East End of London –, where solidarity and friendship are as visible as intolerance and marginalization.

Press release from the Arndt & Partner website

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Gilbert & George
‘POSTER DANCE’
2008

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Gilbert & George
‘REALM’
2008

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Gilbert & George
‘SPIDER’
2008

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Gilbert & George
‘UNION WALL DANCE’
2008

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Arndt & Partner
near the Hamburger Bahnhof
Invalidenstraße 50-51
D-10557 Berlin

Opening Hours
Tue-Sat: 11am-6pm

Arndt & Partner website

Ang Tsherin Sherpa

Cosmic Mandala, 17″ x 17″ Ground Pigment and Gold on Cotton, 2006

• Sacred Images: Thangka Painting at the Alta Galleria
• 3 June  – 16 July, 2009
• 2980 College Ave. Suite #4, Berkeley, CA -  510-414-4485

Marietta Ganapin

Untitled (Blue Mountain by Vasily Kandinsky), 11″ x 11″,  cut paper, 2009

• 3 new collages in DAUGHTERS OF THE REVOLUTION: Women & Collage
• at Pavel Zoubok Gallery
• 533 West 23rd Street   New York, NY 10011  -  212.675.7490
• 2 July — 14 August, 2009

Gilbert & George

Star Wheels. 2008 – as seen on the Daily Beast

• Gilbert & George: JACK FREAK PICTURES
• opens in London at White Cube Hoxton Square and Mason’s Yard
• 10 July —22 August,  2009

The Magalog selects the best looks from the S/S 2010 Issey Miyake collection.

Source: men.style.com

Die Kunstjournalisten in England sind homophob, tarnen es allerdings als Kritik. Die „Sunday Times“ hat uns „Schwule in Anzügen“ genannt. Das würde man niemals über einen heterosexuellen Maler schreiben. Unsere Bilder bringen die Bigotterie der Liberalen zum Vorschein und das Liberale der Bigotten. Ein Cockney-Taxifahrer, der moderne Kunst für Schrott hält, mag unsere Kunst.

Gilbert von Gilbert & George im morgigen Tagesspiegel

20 neue Arbeiten von Gilbert & George zeigt die Galerie Arndt & Partner in ihren Räumen am Hamburger Bahnhof. Eine wahrlich museale Ausstellung. Unser Videoclip ca 8 min: Gilbert & George

Organizers Looking To Make Annual HK Festival Asia’s Answer To Art Basel, Frieze As Local Collector Base Grows

The Hong Kong International Art Fair is rapidly becoming a major annual destination for art lovers, collectors, galleries, and museums

Hong Kong’s large-scale HK 09 International Art Fair, which we profiled last week, is off to a successful start. As James Pomfret writes, the “burgeoning international art fair…aimed at tapping Asia’s growing pool of contemporary art collectors has shown positive signs of shrugging off the global economic downturn.”

New collectors from the mainland, as well as Western and other East Asian collectors, are taking to the festival’s auctions, held by Western and Asian auction houses, to snatch up works during one of the best buyers’ markets in recent history. As Pomfret goes on to indicate, the organizers of HK 09 are looking to establish the festival as Asia’s answer to the Western art fairs like Art Basel in Switzerland and Frieze in London:

Hong Kong has been trying to position itself as Asia’s cultural capital, and is now the world’s third most important auction hub for Asian artwork, behind New York and London.

Spread throughout a cavernous hall in Hong Kong’s convention center overlooking the city’s sweeping harbor, a slew of big-hitting art dealers have been lured out this year including New York’s Gagosian Gallery and London’s White Cube.

Sprinkled among the 110 galleries from 24 countries are an array of works including “walking” minimalist LED nude sculptures by Julian Opie; raw, whorled, wood carvings by David Nash; lurid Chinese contemporary oil paintings by the likes of Yang Shaobin, haunting plastic dolls by Korea’s Jin Young Yu, and a silver sculpture by Damien Hirst with a price-tag of 1.5 million pounds.

Despite recent signs of weakness in the global art market amid the financial downturn, there were a number of notable sales at ART HK 09 including a large Gilbert & George “Gingko” picture bought by an Asian collector for 325,000 pounds.

“We wanted to bring top quality examples by our artists to introduce them in the best possible way to a new market,” said Graham Steele, with the White Cube gallery which sold the Gingko piece, along with several works by Damien Hirst.

Steele said he was pleased so far with the gallery’s first foray out to Hong Kong, but said the market for Western contemporary art in Asia and China still needed time to mature.

…This year’s fair is slightly larger than last year’s inaugural event which drew some 20 thousand visitors.

Magnus Renfrew, the fair’s organizer, said the number of visitors had exceeded his expectations so far, and included “high rollers, big spenders, culture vultures, VIP’s” and other leading figures in the international art world.

For those with more modest budgets, the fair offers works starting from $1,000. ART HK 09 runs in Hong Kong until Sunday.

Other upcoming Asian art fairs include ShContemporary in Shanghai to be held in September, and ArtSingapore in October.

With buyers from Hong Kong, Mainland China, Korea, and Japan rapidly growing in numbers, it looks like Hong Kong is really coming into its own as a contemporary art destination city and Asian art collectors are becoming some of the most influential and motivated buyers in the world. As Art Daily writes:

Hong Kong’s elite and key Asian collectors from across the region joined the thousands who visited the [HK 09] Fair on its first day. The mood was heightened as those gallerists seeking new territory in the evolving international art market reported robust sales.

The day saw a delighted Lisson Gallery (who are featuring a solo show by Julian Opie), selling seven works; several Gibert and George pieces and two by Damien Hirst being snapped up at White Cube, and SCAI The Bathhouse selling their key piece by artist Kohei Nawa to an Asian collector with a museum.

Other successes at the fair include sales by local Hong Kong hero Fang Shao Hua of Kwai Fung Hin Gallery, Gana Art of Seoul Korea who sold work by five of their artists with many more on reserve and Ben Brown Fine Art who sold work by Ron Arad and have reserves on other pieces. Ben Brown Fine Art’s eponymous gallery owner says of the Fair, “Great buzz, incredible attendance including many who bought from us last year. Long live Hong Kong.”

The HK 09 International Art Fair continues through May 17.

Op het moment dat ik aan het eind van de middag Deventer nader barst er een flink noodweer los. Door een gordijn van opwaaiend stof van over de IJssel en de eerste neerkletterende regeldruppels vanaf de andere kant van de IJssel spoed ik mij voor het eerst van mijn leven richting Het Havenkwartier. Tijdens de voorbereidingen van het avond diner heb ik een gesprek met Robert Witt. Robert Witt is in 2005 afgestudeerd aan de kunst academie Constantijn Huygens in Kampen, alwaar hij experimenteerde met installaties en geluid. Na zijn afstuderen heeft hij o.a. aan het project van Anne Reijse meegewerkt: “Mevrouw de Vries”. Hieruit is “Grannittin” ontstaan; een live performance en CD uitgave, verschenen via het Esc.Rec label. Tijdens dit project werkte Witt met behulp van contact microfoons aan het bewerken van het geluid van de breinaalden. De zelfde basistechniek zal Witt vanavond toepassen tijdens het 3 gangen diner in Het Havenkwartier.

Tijdens het diner heb ik het genoegen naast Anne La Berge plaats te kunnen nemen. Zij maakt deel uit van de gelegenheidsformatie Apricot My Lady. Na de maaltijd verzorgt Apricot My Lady de CD presentatie van “Newly Refurbished and Tussock Moth”. Vanaf de kop van de tafel manipuleert “vader” Witt ondertussen de geluiden, die wij tijdens de maaltijd produceren. We worden zo omringd door vervreemdende geluiden, die de gulzige gasten een aangename spijsvertering bezorgen. Geen enkel moment overheersen de surroundklanken. Wel is er incidenteel verbazing bij het terughoren van bewerkt maaltijdgeroezemoes. De versgebakken CD “Midazolam” (Esc.Rec23) van Robert Witt laat bij thuiskomst horen hoe Witt’s geluidsbewerkingen klinken.

Na het uitbuiken betreedt Apricot My Lady het podium van Het Havenkwartier. Adam Bohman neemt plaats achter zijn tafel met objecten, zijn broer Jonathan “master of ceremony” houdt zich ditmaal bezig met tekstvoordrachten, Lukas Simonis bewerkt zijn gitaar en Anne La Berge filtert en samplet haar fluitspel. De CD “Newly Refurbished and Tussock Moth” is een voornamelijk instrumentale luisterervaring. De performance van vanavond is een voorstelling, waarbij de alledaagse teksten van Jonathan Bohman een typisch Engels accent geven aan het geheel. Beide Bohman brothers, droge humor en platte muziek roepen herinneringen op aan de grensverleggende kunstwerkjes van Gilbert & George. Is dit de objectivistische vorm van outtisme? Een nieuw Fluxus werk? Het is in ieder geval een gebeuren dat je “live” moet ervaren. Het stuk “Love, Hate and never Heard” laat eerst precies één minuut muziek horen waar Apricot My Lady gek op is, daarna volgt een minuut gehate muziek en tot slot wordt een minuut muziek gespeeld, die nog nooit door iemand is gehoord. Ook bij een stuk als “Concerto for Several Things” wordt je op het verkeerde been gezet, als Jonathan Bohman zichzelf nog maar eens een goede scheerbeurt geeft. Het zijn juist die alledaagse elementen en objecten, die concerten als deze totaal (on)grijpbaar en avontuurlijk maken. Dan is ieder “event” een kunstwerk op zich en ontstijgt het menige voorgebakken “impro-battle”, zoals we die tegen komen in het free-jazz circuit.

Hong Kong Becoming The Meeting Place For Art And Luxury

Louis Vuitton x Stephen Sprouse

In the ongoing economic downturn, major luxury companies are getting more creative in their branding and marketing approaches, even in luxury-happy East Asia. With luxury sales projected to see their first recession in recent memory this year, with some figures expecting a decline of 7% in 2009, luxury companies are looking to emerging markets like China and India, which have vast consumer bases and plenty of newly-monied potential buyers who, unlike many of their counterparts in the developed world, are new to the luxury market and still willing and eager to part with cash. As Guo Zuli, director of the World Luxury Research Center, said in a recent interview, Chinese buyers are still very new to luxury products — therefore, they are not expected to display the same level of “luxury fatigue” of western or Japanese buyers in 2009. Luxury marketers see that potential already, and if they’re smart they will turn their attention to growing this revenue stream as western demand falters — since western demand will stay relatively weak in the near and possibly the long term.

The Chinese market shows remarkable resilience in the financial crisis because it has an increasing number of people able and willing to buy luxury goods, says Guo.

“Unlike the mature traditional markets, demand in China is far from saturated either materially or psychologically.“

The high-end market, which was once believed to be immune from economic downturn, has seen weakening sales growth or even declines in the traditional markets of the United States, Europe and Japan, analysts say.

Although positive signs from buyers in the mainland should hearten luxury goods makers amid the worst luxury environment in years, it’s not enough to simply sell to the newly rich in the BRIC countries. These companies are global, and they need to sell to global consumers. In other major luxury markets, we have already seen Louis Vuitton team up with artists like Takashi Murakami to create signature collections as a way to appeal to a younger market as well as more seasoned art buffs and luxury buyers. The Murakami designs for Louis Vuitton proved some of the most successful handbag lines in the company’s history, and were, in 2007, included in a retrospective of Murakami’s work at Los Angeles MOCA.

I bring up Louis Vuitton’s previous involvement with art figures as a new avenue for cross-marketing in more mature markets because this weekend brought the announcement of a partnership between Louis Vuitton and the Hong Kong Museum of Art, with the help of the French Consulate, to jointly develop a large-scale exhibition — “Louis Vuitton: A Passion for Creation” — which will be held at Hong Kong MoA between May 22 and August 9. According to the event’s press release,

This exhibition will bring the story of Louis Vuitton to life, illustrating the creative process through installations combining works of art and archive documents.

It will feature a selection of works from the Fondation Louis Vuitton pour la Creation, including a number of significant large-scale works, sculptures, photographs and installations by internationally known artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Cao Fei, Paul Chan, Gilbert & George, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Andreas Gursky, Pierre Huyghe, Jeff Koons, Bertrand Lavier, Christian Marclay, Richard Prince and Yang Fudong. Works by established and newly discovered international artists working in the medium of video will also be shown. With a contemporary presentation, these works reflect the artists’ talent and demonstrate the diverse creativity in art.

The Foundation has also invited seven Hong Kong artists to take part in this exhibition, showing its close ties with Hong Kong and enhancing cultural exchanges. They are Nadim Abbas, Lee Kit, Leung Chi Wo, Pak Sheung Chuen, Tsang Kin Wah, Adrian Wong and Doris Wong Wai Yin.

Louis Vuitton has been building relationships with artists, notably through exemplary collaborations with Stephen Sprouse, Takashi Murakami and Richard Prince. A selection of works from these collaborations will also be featured in the exhibition.

Richard Prince for Louis Vuitton

I will be interested to see if these art-luxury-fashion hybrid marketing techniques will pick up steam in the mainland market. While demand from a certain level of consumer — namely, the plenty-of-cash-to-burn segment — should show steady growth, simple steady growth won’t be enough to counteract the plummeting demand from Europe and North America that luxury companies are seeing. To reach a whole new audience, which would be young urban elites, marketing in the mainland will likely pull in more big-name contemporary Chinese artists, since they are rapidly gaining notoriety from younger audiences and, unlike foreign artists, will be able to reach domestic audiences more easily.

I foresee luxury companies who want to grow market share in the mainland turning to big-name Chinese artists and designers to create China-only collections for Louis Vuitton in coming years, much like the previous successful campaigns by Takashi Murakami and others. Marketing in the mainland requires pitching products that may have a foreign face, but have an unmistakably Chinese soul (to paraphrase Little Red Book). Enlisting the Chinese artistic elite to give luxury the Chinese soul it needs to reach a rapidly-growing demographic could just be the magic bullet for global luxury companies.

Stephen Fiehn and Tyler B. Myers. Photo by Jennifer Korff.

Performance duo Cupola Bobber are getting set to hit up Link’s Hall for two weekends next month with their latest work, Way Out West, the Sea Whispered Me. Name-checking both Gilbert & George and Laurel and Hardy in their announcement, WOW, TSWM promises not to flinch at all the world’s oceans are capable of, both positive (waves at sunset picturesquely lapping at a beach’s lonely sands) and, well, negative.

Watch these fellas do their thing April 17/18/19 and 24/25/26 at the lovely, legendary Link’s–get your tickets here.  Not only that, but on April 23 they’re throwing a satellite event at the equally lovely and legendary Hideout: It’s free, it’s at 6:00pm, and will launch a “reading companion” to WOW, TSWM (I’m thinking it’s either a book or a little gnome with permanently-moist fingertips and a headlamp) along with some presentations in formats varied and unnamed. Mysterious!