One of the most influential yet under-known artists of the 20th century, Yves Klein virtually reinvented contemporary art in the 1950s with his embrace of space and fascination with the immaterial. From signing the sky and creating his own blue pigment that represented it to painting with fire and flesh, Klein paved the way for the conceptual, minimal, and performance art movements that followed. He made monochromatic paintings and sculptures, constructed a gallery exhibition out of nothing, threw the value of a work of art into a river, used nude bodies like brushes to apply paint to paper, let the wind and rain shape his canvases, and took a monumental leap into the void. A Rosicrucian and martial arts master, Klein had an intellectual and spiritual relationship with art that went beyond what most artists ever consider.
Working collaboratively since 1992, Markus Muntean and Adi Rosenblum, the creative duo behind Muntean/Rosenblum, make realistic paintings of melancholic youths caught up in narratives of urban banality and angst. Composed from a mix of appropriated magazine photos and classical poses culled from art history, their pictures are rendered with rounded corners, which lends them a cartoon-like look, and captioned to add both an introspective voice and an ambiguous philosophical point of view.
One-man interdisciplinary mash-up Rodney Graham tackles photography, filmmaking, acting, and music as elements of his artistic practice.
The Vancouver-based artist has shown all over the world, in galleries from Chicago to Mexico City, and in blockbuster exhibitions at MOCA and the Whitney Biennial. He’s also known for the occasional intimate club performance. But it’s not just genres Graham splices together; a master of lush production values, he’s capable of communicating compelling, comedic, and politically salient messages with a single charismatic gesture.
New Mexico-based multimedia artist Chad Person creates beautifully crafted, ironic indictments of society’s most dangerous flaws.
In TaxCut, Person shreds US currency and fashions meticulous collage-based renderings of military weaponry. Along the way, he tallies the money “spent” and deducts it from his taxes — and thus from the defense budget. Recess, meanwhile, documents the construction and concealment of a post-apocalypse shelter under his home; his upcoming show, Surviving the End of Your World at LA’s Mark Moore Gallery, includes a streaming video of a live performance at the remote location.
Actor James Franco is taking his campaign to Be Taken Seriously to the next level in this MoMA video matching him with artist Marina Abramović and Klaus Biesenbach, chief curator of MoMA cousin P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center. On the occasion of Abramović’s retrospective at the museum, The Artist Is Present, the three sit down for a chat comparing performance art to acting, including the danger of losing oneself in a character and the value of self-expression as a freedom from the strictures of daily life. (And on a sidenote: just look at Marina Abramović’s glowing skin. The woman is 63! What the eff is her secret? Success? Close proximity to Daniel Desario?) Video after the jump.
The art of awkward conversation: role-playing hosts Vicky & Lysander cordially invite you to the dinner party from hell. Unless, of course, your sense of humor borders on the absurd and you find social button-pushing hysterical (we do), in which case get yourself down to the Lower East Side sur le champ. Grand Opening — the revolving art space that previously housed D.I.Y. workshop Trade School — has been remade as a hipster-rustic dining room complete with questionable art and rough-hewn shelves hosting china and leather-bound books. Vicky, a Houston oil heiress played by Shannon Walker, and Lysander, a questionably-straight man about town (Damon Cardasis), are the fictional marrieds who conduct over-the-top conversation while twelve guests chow down on fried chicken and cupcakes. It’s BYOB, and trust me when I say the B considerably helps the proceedings.
Artist Nick Cave turns sundry materials, such as cast-off clothing, flea market discoveries, and dyed human hair, into transformative “soundsuits” that double as sumptuous sculptures.
Cave (not to be confused with the musician of the same name) draws from sources as varied as African ceremonial costumes, Tibetan textiles, and pop-culture creatures. His elaborate suits aren’t just objects pegged to a pedestal; they’re meant to be worn, vitalized through movement and the sounds they make. In fact, the dance-trained artist is working toward a 90-suit performance that he’ll take around the world.
Yoko Ono is turning 77 tomorrow. Keep that in mind as you imagine the performance artist shimmying, writhing, caterwauling, and charming the pants off the audience at Brooklyn Academy of Music on Tuesday night. The show began with a montage of Ono recordings, films, interview clips, and photos from her days with husband John Lennon, and ended with a cavalcade of special guests that frankly kind of blew us away. Rundown of the entire performance by We Are Plastic Ono Band, plus an image gallery featuring Eric Clapton and the Scissor Sisters, after the jump.
And the verdict is in. After much tongue wagging via the art press this weekend (including some Twitter chatter by the likes of artist/instigator William Powhida and Saltz-archrival Tyler Green), MOCA Los Angeles has confirmed the selection of New York gallerist Jeffrey Deitch as the museum’s new director. Way to start 2010 with a boom, LA — never before has a major US museum hired a leader from the commercial side of the market. One has to wonder: Can Deitch man up for such a significant role at a nonprofit? And what will become of his baby, Deitch Projects? (UPDATE: definitely closing shop.) After the jump we take a walk down memory lane.
The celebrity/art world machine doesn’t get much better than this: after a guest stint on a daytime soap and an appearance at Art Basel Miami Beach, we hear through the grapevine that actor/pinup James Franco has scored a gallery show with downtown enclave Deitch Projects. Though we’ve questioned his motives in the past, we’re warming up to the idea of Franco as Warhol 2.0: film and performance art wrapped into one highly marketable package. A rundown of Franco vs. Andy, after the jump.
