Tag Archives: London

London: START Art Fair 2016 Highlights

September 19, 2016 butterfly

START Art Fair returns to Saatchi Gallery in London for its third edition from 15-18 September 2016. The fair focusses on emerging artists and new art scenes featuring 70 international galleries from London, Seoul, Hong-Kong, Dehli, Cape Town to Taipei and Tokyo.

Amongst the highlights we enjoyed intricate microcosm breathing creature paintings by Mariane, a japanese artist (pictured above) from Gallery Jin Projects, as well as delicate ceramics by young Korean artist Yunhee Lee (In and Out Art), hyper-realistic sculptures by Carole Feuerman (Aria Art), and a roaring lion made of stainless steel and used tires by Ji Yong Ho (ATELIER AKI – Korea) to name a few.

START Art Fair Saatchi 2016

Amongst the START Projects complementing the fair, visitors could experience ‘Baghdad Manifesto’, the debut London solo exhibition by Iraqi-born artist Mahmoud Obaid, who also curated a presentation of emerging artists who have recently taken part in the Artist in Residence Programme at the Fire Station in Doha, Qatar, titled ‘Identity, Construction & Deconstruction’.

START Art Fair Saatchi 2016

To kick start the art season in London, START Art Fair is a breath of fresh air with its emerging artists and multicultural selection.

View the full set of pics here and browse through the complete list of participating
galleries here

START Art Fair 2016
15-18 September 2016
Saatchi Gallery

Shows

Studio Visit: Mike Dargas in Cologne (DE)

June 30, 2016 butterfly

We dropped by the studio of hyper-realist painter Mike Dargas in Cologne, Germany ahead of his upcoming solo exhibition at Opera Gallery in London, curated by Jean-David Malat and opening on 6th July.

Mike Dargas - Studio Visit

Drawing his inspiration from masters like Dali, Caravaggio and HR Giger, Mike Dargas studied various techniques and since his youth developed a passion for realism, which he narrowed down to hyperrealism over the years.

A first look at Mike Dargas’ artworks, they can easily be mistaken for large scale photographs. Years of practice mastering the oil painting enabled him to create hyperrealist portraits with very intricate details. The German artist’s love for precision, in an almost obsessive manner, brings models to life under the brush stroke and draws one into a dreamlike world where time has suspended.

Like photography Mike Dargas loves to play with shadows, focus and depth of field to create mesmerising portraits. In his liquid-series, the photorealism of the dripping effect on the faces of his models is breathtaking and exults in sensuality.

Mike Dargas - Studio Visit Mike Dargas Studio Visit

View the full set of pics here

Mike Dargas – Opera Gallery
6 – 20 July
134 New Bond Street
W1S 2TF London

London, Shows

London: Richard Prince ‘Cartoon Over Cartoon’ @ Sadie Coles

May 27, 2016 butterfly

Controversial artist known as the master of re-appropriation, Richard Prince is currently exhibiting at Sadies Cole in London. ‘Cartoon Over Cartoon‘ is a reprisal of the artist’s work with jokes and cartoons via collage and the re-contextualisation of the nude in painting. According to Prince the art of the joke is ‘in the re-telling’.

Juxtaposing humorous text and jokes with lewd cartoon nudes, Richard Prince highlights the inauthenticity of the image.

Richard Prince - Cartoon over Cartoon

“Richard collected some nudist cartoons by this guy John Dempsey. He inked jetted them up and drew a kind of hippie drawing over the collected cartoon… kind of like his hippie drawings that he did back in the late eighties. He turned the nudist cartoon into something about free love. Richard always wanted to be part of a commune, but knew that kind of utopia would never work out. At least that is what he figured. It was a good idea, the commune… but in the end…he ended up painting the commune” – Joan Katz.

View the full set of pics here

Richard Prince: Cartoon Over Cartoon
until 18 June 2016
Sadie Coles HQ
Kingly Street
London

Books, London, Shows

London: Francis Bacon Six Studies in Soho

May 26, 2016 butterfly

Francis Bacon - Six Studies in Soho

To celebrate the forthcoming worldwide publication of ‘Francis Bacon: Catalogue Raisonné’, a one day pop-up exhibition ‘Francis Bacon: Six Studies in Soho’, opened to the public in London Soho on 25 May.

Upon entrance, visitors could enjoy a black and white portrait of Francis Bacon by John Deakin alongside five Bacon paintings as well as the Triptych, 1987.

Francis Bacon - Six Studies in Soho

Eager visitors were flicking through the first editions of the Catalogue Raisonné in advance of the global release on 30th June 2016. Published globally by The Estate of Francis Bacon, Francis Bacon: Catalogue Raisonné is a landmark publishing event that presents the entire oeuvre of Bacon’s paintings for the first time and includes many previously unpublished works.

The impeccably produced five-volume, slipcased publication, containing each of Bacon’s 584 paintings, has been edited by Martin Harrison FSA, the pre-eminent expert on Bacon’s work, alongside research assistant Dr Rebecca Daniels. An ambitious and painstaking project that has been over ten years in the making, this seminal visual document eclipses in scope any previous publication on the artist and will have a profound effect on the perception of his work.

In addition to the 584 paintings, the catalogue contains illuminating supporting material, from sketches by Bacon, photographs of early states of paintings, images of Bacon’s furniture, hand-written notes by the artist, photographs of Bacon, his family and circle to fascinating x-ray and microscope photography of his paintings.

Francis Bacon - Six Studies in Soho

View the full set of pics here

The Catalogue Raisonne contains around 800 illustrations across 1,538 pages within five clothbound hardcover volumes and is priced at £1,000 | $1,500 | €1,400.
For sales information please contact enquiries@henipublishing.com

‘Francis Bacon: Six Studies in Soho’
25 May 2016
6-10 Lexington Street
London W1F 0LB

London, Shows

London: Yoshitomo Nara @ Stephen Friedman

May 23, 2016 butterfly

Following recent solo exhibitions at Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan; Asia Society Museum, New York; Asia Society Hong Kong Center and Reykjavik Art Museum, Iceland, Japanese artist, Yoshitomo Nara is returning to the Stephen Friedman Gallery in London for a fourth exhibition of new works .

This show features new paintings on canvas, paintings on cotton mounted wood panel and the largest collection of new drawings on paper.

Adolescent characters and animals are depicted with nuanced considerations of alienation, anger and curiosity. Juxtaposed with slogans and often salty language, they are at once cheeky, vulnerable and threatening.

Yoshitomo Nara @ Stephen Friedmann

Yoshitomo Nara mentions “This solo exhibition is comprised of ‘paintings’ (on canvas), ‘billboard paintings’ (patched cotton mounted on wood panel) and ‘drawings’ (on paper). These new paintings on canvas are more painterly than other works I have shown previously. They are marked by a conscious use of colour and subtle layering, which has become important in my recent practice. In contrast to my work on canvas, I originally called the paintings on wood panel ‘billboard paintings’, due to their catchy and iconic imagery and the use of flat planes of colour that is reminiscent of the style often used on billboards. Although the ‘billboard paintings’ in this show are still evocative of this style, these ones which are rendered on patchwork cotton are much more painterly, with many layers of colour.

Drawing is natural to me. Without being conscious of the eventual audience, I usually follow my emotions and just draw. For this show I am exhibiting a series of drawings that I think of as being mental images without colour. It is probably the first time that I have shown so many of these drawings all at once. I work in sculpture and installation, but for this exhibition I became very conscious of showing myself as a painter.”

Yoshitomo Nara @ Stephen Friedmann

In parallel to the show Yoshimoto Nara created a large scale billboard, visible from the Waterloo bridge, as part of a new project called the Waterloo Billboard Commissions by the Hayward Gallery where Nara exhibited back in 2009. The humorous, manga-influenced piece, titled Marching on the Butterbur Leaf, depicts a young girl playfully encouraging passers-by to fall in step.

Yoshitomo Nara @ Stephen Friedmann