The global art fair Art16 returns to Olympia London from 20 – 22 May 2016, showcasing work from more than 100 galleries worldwide and exhibit contemporary art from around 30 countries.
It will be the fourth show since the original ART HK, founded by Tim Etchells and Sandy Angus. As with previous years, the fair strongly promotes work from emerging talent and galleries with two programmes Emerge and London First, curated by Jonathan Watkins
From Retna, Space Invader, Cleon Peterson to Damien Hirst, Pearl Lam and Katrin Fridriks, discover the highlights from this year’s fair.
ART16 until 22 May 2016 Olympia, Hammersmith Road London W14 8UX
Damien Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery just opened ‘Now’, a solo exhibition of work by American artist Jeff Koons (b.1955). While the Parisian institution Centre Pompidou dedicated a major retrospective to the the artist in 2015 in Paris (covered), ‘Now’ is the first major UK exhibition to be devoted to Koons since the Serpentine Gallery’s 2009 show, ‘Jeff Koons: Popeye Series’.
Spanning thirty-five years of the artist’s career, the exhibition features thirty-six paintings, works on paper and sculptures dating from 1979 to 2014. Drawn from Damien Hirst’s collection, a number of these works have never before been shown in the UK.
The Gallery 1 features early works from Jeff Koons like the Inflatable Flowers (1979) , the NEW (1980 -1986) with vacuum cleaners sculptures.
The Gallery 2 features a shiny giant Balloon Monkey (2006-2013) in a mirror polished stainless steel with transparent blue colour coating. ‘ It constantly reminds viewers of their existence, it’s all about you. When you leave the room, it’s gone.’ The monumental sculpture evoques of sensuality with its seductive polished finish and phallic tail.
The next gallery hosts some of the erotic works from “Made in Heaven’ , from monumental sculpture of a Bowl with Eggs to large portraits of Jeff Koons and his then wife Ilona Staller.
The Gallery 4 contains iconic works from the basketsballs floating in a glass tank (1985) to works from his series ‘ Luxury and Degradation’ with Jim Bean- JB Turner Train (1986) in stainless steel and the bust of Italian Woman (1986).
From the ‘Popeye’ series, inflatable pool toys that interact with ready made objects are designed to fool the eyes. Looking like vinyl, they are cast in aluminium and meticulously painted to appear exactly like the real thing.
The last gallery features Jeff Koons’s ongoing Celebration’ series from 1994 to 2014. The illusory Elephant (2003) and Titi (2004 -2009) appear to be fragile, air -filled inflatables, but are cast in heavy-weight stainless steel that mirrors the viewers. The most technically challenging work of his career Play Doh (1994-2014) faithfully reproduces (in an enormous size) a small lump of modelling clay fashioned by his son. The twenty seven individual pieces are cast in aluminium and held together with their own weight.
Curated byZiggy Hulot from the ZH Agency, Julien Cottret and l’Envers , Generations Boum Boum is celebrating until 4th June the underground techno culture with a wealth of events in Bordeaux (FR) from concerts , documentaries, workshops and exhibitions. From electronic music including electro, breakbeat, trance, techno to visual installations, the Generations Boum Boum retraces the artistic movement across generations since the 90s.
At Laboratoire BX, leading multidisciplinary artist from the underground techno scene <++ (covered) is presenting a multi sensorial exhibition called ‘FUTURE IZ PAST’, featuring an installation with kinetic machines and black and white rotoreliefs as well as original visual display sets .
Originating from Marcel Duchamps, the name ‘rotoreliefs’ refers to optical illusions which appear as three-dimensional forms when displayed on a rotating surface such as a phonograph turntable. Once in motion they display a pulsating “relief” that oscillates between positive and negative space. Playing with black and white, light and dark, the visual intensity and emotion is increased by the flashing lights of the stroboscope and the viewer is no longer in control, but immersed by the experience.
A series of flyers with original visuals by <++ from the various free parties from the 90’s to date are scattered across the floor, reminiscent of a joyous and festive era. Videos taken during these techno parties enable the viewers to discover or revive the atmosphere of that period while performance artist 1KA also played live during the opening.
View the full set of pics here and the full programmation
of Generation Boum Boum.
<++ FUTURE IZ PAST Until 21 May 2016 Laboratoire BX 4 bis Rue Buhan 33000 Bordeaux (FR)
Icelandic conceptual artist and abstract painter Katrin Fridriks returns to Lazarides Rathbone in London for a new solo exhibition entitled ‘Macrocosm‘.
Alongside the 2014 installation Perception of the Stendhal Syndrome – Gene&Ethics Master Prism with a giant magnifying glass, the exhibition features a whole new body of works, with canvasses bursting with vibrant and swirling energetic coloured shapes of splashing paint.
The role of the magnifying glass is to enhance the intensity of the experience of being overwhelmed by the artwork, evoking a phenomenon that is called “beauty nausea”.
The two dichotomies contained within the gallery space represent the elusive philosophical idea of macrocosm with one canvas being a micro particle of the other. ‘Macrocosm’, originating from Ancient Greek philosophy, refers to everything that exists, an infinite, complex structure that can be regarded as a universe, or the cosmos. The microcosm, however, is just a small representative part of it. Since the time of Plato, human imagination has been drawn to an idea of an analogy between the macro and the microcosm. Thus ‘as above, so below’ was a leading motto in the doctrine of ‘correspondences’ between the two dimensions.
The spatial arrangement of this show invites viewers to participate, to adopt various viewpoints, and to discover new perspectives and hidden depths within the paint through the magnifying glass.
Sotheby’s Contemporary art gallery in London. S|2, is currently showing an exhibition of new works by Charming Baker (covered) entitled ‘Sweet Nothing’, featuring canvasses and a series of studies on paper, and large scale drawings.
Known to purposefully damage his work by drilling, cutting and even shooting it, Baker intentionally puts into question the preciousness of art and the definition of its beauty, adding to the emotive charge of the work he produces.
Working towards his new exhibition Sweet Nothing, Charming Baker hasdescribed his overriding influences as “…Schrödinger’s cat, Pavlov’s dog, bitter nostalgia, sex, joy, folly, loss, Don Quixote, tended gardens, gypsum foundations, concrete ideals, loose morals, nature, nurture, sweet nothing…”
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