Cancel culture At a time when art which addresses societal issues has never been so relevant, exhibiting it in institutions has never proved so difficult. In late August in New York, at the epicentre of what is known as “cancel culture”, a...
Centre Pompidou: Why did Christo wrap things?
Thanks a to a hairdresser There are many smaller stories within the larger sweep of history. Christo, the Bulgarian-born artist who died on 31 May 2020, famous for his gigantic wrapping works at the scale of Paris’s Pont Neuf in 1985 and the...
Pinault Collection: When the most magical parts of Los Angeles meet Venice
No longer accessible The hazards and disasters of the coronavirus crisis mean many countries and artists that once seemed to be within reach are no longer accessible, and will apparently remain that way for some time. Excellent exhibition This is why we should...
Charles Stewart CEO of Sotheby’s: “reinventing the auctions model”
https://youtu.be/e94QGzpYduU Patrick Drahi It’s been 12 months since Sotheby’s was bought by the French businessman Patrick Drahi. It’s been 9 months since he appointed a new head of the auction house, former investment banker at...
Murakami’s bankruptcy: the first art market corona shock
Heartbreaking story “This is Takashi Murakami. I’m a contemporary artist. Today’s story is my very heartbreaking story.” At the end of June Takashi Murakami uploaded a 15-minute video to Instagram that had been filmed at his studio on 23...
Art Basel online: artworks in the millions of dollars flood the internet
Online: the new norm In barely three months the online contemporary art market has become the new norm. Nothing can ever replace seeing artworks “in the flesh”, but while we await more favourable times once travelling restrictions are lifted,...
Etel Adnan and Simone Fattal: “we have to tell governments to stop the madness of economic growth at all costs”
47 years together They’ve lived together for 47 years. Those 47 years have fostered a shared interest in painting, sculpture, literature, and poetry. Simone Fattal (born in 1942 in Damascus) grew up in Lebanon. Etel Adnan was born in 1925 in...
Where does the myth of the cowboy fit in a racist America? Cowboy: the book
World afterwards again Since the start of the coronavirus crisis there's been too much talk about what the world's going to look like afterwards, to the point of rendering the expression meaningless even if it's true. No doubt mankind will still be pursuing...
Arthur Jafa about the black experience in America : ” Love is the message. The message is death”
https://youtu.be/iRPVvzwfR68 Injustice to a black man While the United States reverberates with violence over the injustice done to a black man, George Floyd, who died as a result of the racism of a police officer in Minneapolis who believed...
Tribute to Christo: the art of gigantism and the impossible
Christo died on 31 May 2020 at the age of 84. He was one of the very first artists that I interviewed early on in my career. I went to meet him in 1993 at his studio in Soho in New York, where I made his acquaintance through the dealer Daniel Varenne, now also...
Waiting for the art market’s “corona prices”
Silence It’s exceedingly difficult to get insiders to talk about the current evolution of the art market. A number of them refuse to make any statement, others tend to stick to abstract analyses, while a third group prefers to remain...
The world Afterwards (5): Oscar Murillo joint winner of the Turner Prize: “We have locally imagined some measures to mitigate the social collapse”
Between England and Colombia Oscar Murillo is a young artist (born in 1986) who lives between London and the village where he was born in Colombia, and he truly is a multifaceted figure. Sharing the Turner Prize There’s been a lot of talk...