Whitney Museum Biennial 2008

Rita Ackermann, Nun/Mother/Whore,2006 Collage on plexiglass, double sided, 83 x 43 in. (210.8 x 109.2 cm) Collection of the artist.

ARTmostfierce wants everybody to start getting prepared for this event.
Get your Prada or Nada ready ! . Let's hope we see something as dramatic and spectacular as Terence Koh bliding light, Marilyn Minter Stiletto's paintings or Mark Bradford Paintings

MARCH 6 - JUNE 1From March 6-23, Biennial extends to Park Avenue Armory

See Article written by Carly Berwik of New York Magazine

The Facebook Biennial
How social networks have taken over this year’s Whitney festivities.
By Carly Berwick
Published Feb 29, 2008

Whitney curator Shamim Momin is walking the West 22nd Street gauntlet. She nods and waves and touches cheeks in the Continental manner to a succession of doe-eyed bearded men and slim-hipped men in large sneakers loitering outside Friedrich Petzel Gallery. It’s not true that Momin knows everyone in contemporary art in New York, but it’s as close to true as can be said of anyone.
Inside, people are drinking beer in celebration of Seth Price’s new wood-veneer-and-plastic wall pieces: enlarged found images of basic human interactions represented via negative space; in other words, the outlines of hand pictures grabbed online. Momin, petite in heels and a tightly belted long sweater over a dark green baby-doll dress, greets Price, a lanky 34-year-old New York artist, then walks up to a tall blonde woman standing in the center gallery. It’s Henriette Huldisch, her co-curator for this year’s Whitney Biennial. Price is one of the 81 artists in the Biennial, and, a few weeks before the show is to open on March 6, his curators have come out to support him. With Huldisch is her taller, blonder husband, Andy Graydon, a film editor and sound artist. It’s past eight and Huldisch, who has an infant at home, is giving Graydon the look that means it’s time to leave. It’s barely perceptible, a flattening of the lips and an intensity about the eyes.
There are other Biennial artists here, too: conceptual provocateur Fia Backström, printmaker Matthew Brannon, sculptor Heather Rowe. The new walls are up on the Whitney’s fourth floor, the curators tell Rowe, and it’s time to install her art—itself a series of drywall supports marking out unbuilt walls. Momin speaks in fast, gushing, interlinked sentences, while Huldisch, who is German, picks her words carefully.
For the rest of the article see link below.

http://nymag.com/arts/art/features/44650/

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/arts/design/29voge.html?_r=1&ref=arts&oref=slogin

http://http://whitney.org/www/2008biennial/

Francis Bacon at Sotheby's London Sells For $39.7 million

Sotheby’s Evening Sale of Contemporary Art tonight achieved £95,030,000 ($189,424,299), the highest total ever for any sale of Contemporary Art held in Europe, against a pre-sale estimate of £72,025,000-£102,855,000. Records were set for six artists.

Francis Outred, Head of Evening Auctions, Contemporary Art, said: “We are absolutely thrilled with tonight’s total – the highest ever for a sale of Contemporary Art in Europe and indeed the second highest total for any auction held by Sotheby’s in Europe, a record established just three weeks ago. The continued strength of the market allowed us to source a group of works which included a number of masterpieces, and our clients responded with appropriate enthusiasm. Pre-sale interest was extremely high and our exhibition was attended by collectors from around the world. We saw frenetic bidding for both figural and abstract works by Gerhard Richter and achieved a triumph for the work of Lucio Fontana – a European abstract artist finally entering the big league.”

Coming so soon after the success of The (RED) Auction at Sotheby’s New York on 14th February 2008, which totalled $42 million, tonight’s record results further demonstrate the appetite for great works of art in today’s market.

The top lot in tonight’s sale was Francis Bacon’s Study of Nude with Figure in a Mirror, 1969, a rare full-length portrait of the artist’s close friend Henrietta Moraes, which achieved £19,956,500 ($39,779,291) selling to a European private collector bidding on the telephone. This remarkable price follows last year’s record $52,680,000 (£26,581,895) for the artist at auction, achieved for Study From Innocent X at Sotheby’s New York in May 2007.

The saleroom broke into applause when Gerhard Richter’s sublime Photo Painting Kerze (Candle), from 1983, sold for the spectacular price of £7,972,500 ($15,891,584) – more than three times its presale high estimate of £2,500,000. This remarkable price came after eleven bidders competed for the work. The result immediately followed another success for the artist, when Struktur (1979) achieved £4,612,500 ($9,194,096), after pursuit by eight bidders and gasps from the audience.

A work widely regarded as one of Lucio Fontana’s masterpieces, Concetto Spaziale, La Fine di Dio dating from 1963, achieved a record £10,324,500 ($20,579,826) for a work by the artist at auction. The result was significantly in excess of its pre-sale low-estimate of £4,000,000. The egg-shaped canvas was one of only two gold works in this series. Pursued by five bidders, its price saw the saleroom once again erupt into applause. The phenomenal result saw Fontana become the second European Post War artist, after Francis Bacon, to break the £10 million barrier at auction.

Three Self Portraits (1986) by Andy Warhol achieved £11,444,500 ($22,812,322). This rare trinity of canvases in the colours of the American flag, came from the artist’s only ever exhibition devoted to self-portraits, held at the Anthony d’Offay Gallery, London in 1986.

Brian Finke At ClampArt

ARTmostfierce just loves the Airlines theme. Saw some signs of it at ART Basel in Miami. Also Pepe Villegas benefit image for ACRIA's benefit back in Nov. 2007 was an airplane wing image(which I own ) and you can still obtain it for a real good mula$$$ (200.00USD).'Titled'' Far Away From You'' a 12 x 16 edition of 25.Check out the ACRIA store.

Take a look also at Brian Finke web site (see below) and you can see the whole ''Flight Attendant'' series plus the whole whimsical and interesting body of work.

Anyway, check out this show looks like a good one, especially for the sky whore in all of us...Ha!
Please see link below for slide show.
Enjoy!

ClampArt 521-531 W. 25th St., New York, NY 10001 nr. Tenth Ave. See Map 646-230-0020 Send to Phone

http://nymag.com/listings/art/brian-finke/

http://acria.org/

http://www.brianfinke.com/

Donna D' Cruz ARTmostfierce DJ!

ARTmostfierce loves Donna D'Cruz. This girl is on fire. Not only gorgeous but, a Fierce Diva DJ.

Please see video of her interview and then you know what she is all about. She is another member of the ARTmostfierce Motorcade Mafia.

She usually spices up Pepe Villegas Art opening shows and videos with her fab music. If you haven't met her or heard her spinning...get on with it. She epitomizes SUSTAINED FABULOUSNESS.

Click on link below to see what she is all about!

Work it Donna!

http://www.rasamusic.com/videos/NDTV/ndtv.php

http://www.rasamusic.com/about_us.html

profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=124988791

London Art Auction Fear Factor

ARTmostfierce is too tired to post a blog tonight (thanks to Jury Duty). I found this article from the NYSun worth reading.The rest of the article you can find on the link.
Enjoy!


London's Grand Finale
By Coincidence Sales Break A Pattern
By Marion Maneker

In London, the auction houses pride themselves on how quickly they dispatch their sales. In what amounts to a long weekend of activity, the London sales usually come fast and furious. New York houses, by contrast, draw out their marquee events into a two-week festival of art.

By sheer accident this February, the London sales, which resume tomorrow, have broken the pattern. Now, set against the uncertain state of the world economy, what used to seem like a one-act play has turned into a grand opera. With the auction cycle caught in a brief intermission, now is a good time to recap the ups and downs of the drama and preview the finale.

Two weeks ago, Sotheby's had a strong Impressionist and Modern art sale held in between Christie's two solid but uneven sales. The results added a little drama to the story. Christie's Postwar and Contemporary art sale hit a high overall number but had an uncharacteristically large number of unsold lots. Some big names — and smaller ones, too — failed to draw bidders. That's the sort of thing that makes the art market's stomach tighten into a knot of uncertainty.

Last week, though, Sotheby's gala (Auction) Red in New York showed the contemporary market's remarkable strength, even if dealer and co-sponsor Larry Gagosian was seen bidding on most of the lots. Nevertheless, star power met wall power — the sale beat high estimates and set a surprising number of records. Please click on the link below for the rest of the article.

http://www.nysun.com/article/71873

Design and the Elastic Mind at the MoMA

ARTmostfierce

highly recommends this show. Went after The Art Show and did the Member's preview thanks to Marisol Delicious and her entourage.

Design and the Elastic Mind is an exhibition about the latest developments in design, and a glimpse into what the future holds. It explores the reciprocal relationship between science and design in the contemporary world, bringing together more than 200 objects, installations, and concepts that marry the most advanced scientific research with attentive considerations of human nature, limitations, habits, and aspirations. The exhibition shows designers’ ability to grasp momentous revolutions in technology, science, and history that demand or reflect major adjustments in human behavior, and to convert them into objects that people can actually understand and use. The objects in the exhibition range from images of nanoscopic devices to vehicles, from appliances to interfaces, and from pragmatic solutions for everyday use to provocative ideas meant to influence our future choices. The exhibition, on view from February 24 to May 12, 2008.The show is highly innovative and makes you realize that the future is already here. Very appropiate for the whole family, computer geeks, cyber girls and any other person interested in design and high end technology. Don't miss it!

The 20th Annual Art Show

ARTmostfierce had to finally get his ass to the land of botox, anorexic, fake tan, bad implants, cat- like surgery faces (or should I say leather faces!) and lets not forget bitchy gallerinas to see the Art Show. With the company of two real (I mean real!) gorgeous women friends Leslie Farrel and Janet Finkel (my mafia body guards) after a tasty brunch, we decided to check it out!

ARTmostfierce and its mafia motorcade arrived and we were all pleasantly surprised. We liked the show and decided that the Art Dealers were safe and smart by showing classic established and pricey (I mean pricey $$$) contemporary works. By selling a couple of some of the classic pricey pieces on their collections, the dealers seem to brave the questionable ART market and keep the inflatable bubble going. ARTmostfierce is always loving the artwork but, also always checking out the price tags.

We bumped and met Chuck Close (I kind of wanted to give him a hug!) and liked him very much. So nice and dignified, was looking at every body's art. He felt like Moses opening the Red Sea (I mean the crowd) with his presence...wow!

Anyway let's talk about the show. We saw some great Ed Ruscha's , loved the David Klamen ''Interiors'' at Chicago's Richard Grey Gallery (leave to the out of towners to take risks). Most of it was Picasso, Miro, Richard Prince, Baldessari, Joan Mitchell, Henry Moore (loved the small sculpture), Calder, Avedon, Pollock, De Kooning... etc...etc. Some lovely Lisa Yuskavage paintings...very pricey ones.

A Vik Muniz photo, stood out among all these pricey established artists. The image was from the Chocolate Syrup series forming the shape of a Matador. ARTmostfierce heard that it was sold for a lot of mula$$$$.

Another piece that caught the eye was a small (very small ) painting by the British artist named Katy Moran. Priced at $18,000.00 USD (who is she?) we decided to do some snooping and found out from Andrea Rosen's gang that she was at a group show at the Tate and Gagosian at some point. Anyway keep an eye on her. She is going to be at Andrea Rosen (another group show?) opening on March 14, 2008.

There was one photo that Artmostfierce went crazy about. The photo was from Burk Uzzle at Lawrence Miller Gallery booth. The title is Desert Prada, Marfa, Texas 2006 a 24 x 30 , edition of 10 for a mere $25,000.00 USD. After salivating for a few minutes and begging (or bedding) the owner to let me take a photo (see above), I started to look for a Sugar Daddy...err(David Geffen) to see if I can have Christmas or a late Valentines present...Ha!

The photograph was kind of reminiscent of the Prada or Nada days! Also will be a good souvenir the day I pack my things and retired to a place like Marfa so I can have my Prada (even if it is on a photo) or Nada surrounding me.No seriously, we loved the photo and its message. Almost towards the end of the show they sold 8 out of the 10 (do the math). If somebody got this photo, please make sure to tell ARTmostfierce so, I can send my mafia after you!

The only thing cheaper than $18,000.00 USD was the benefit print Air Kissing by Jessica Craig -Martin (see above) . At $2,000.00 USD, The image represented quite well the spirit and mood of the fair.

Then ARTmostfierce and the Mafia Motorcade left and went to the MoMA to see the Design and the Elastic Mind show.
Tomorrow you hear about it . It was quite fierce!

Tomorrow also Jury Duty...can Lassie or anybody rescue me from it?

Living Fast and Furious!

http://http://www.artdealers.org/artshow.html
www.burkuzzle.com/

Art Chicago 2008 Attracts World's Leading Contemporary and Modern Art Galleries

ARTmostfierce just loves Chicago. If it wasn't for that cruel, bitter winter ....

A carefully vetted compilation of 181 of the world’s foremost contemporary and modern art galleries will be exhibiting at Art Chicago 2008, running April 25 – 28, at The Merchandise Mart.

A 17% increase in applications was received for Art Chicago 2008, with 350 galleries submitting in contrast to 300 the previous year.

Additionally, 95% of the 132 exhibitors who participated in the 2007 fair re-applied for 2008 -- a dramatic increase from the 75% re-sign of the 104 participating galleries in 2006. Under different ownership, Art Chicago 2005 saw only 50% of galleries reapplying.

International representation has been bolstered 36% for 2008, with 30 cities presenting, up from 22 in 2007.

Is this a slight indication that the ART market continues to thrive regardless the current economic US situation?
Is the ART bubble being inflated and kept insulated from inevitable big crash?
Anyone going to Chicago?
It is still one of ARTmostfierce favorities cities.
Let me know what you think!

Cai Gou-Qiang at The Guggenheim Museum

Inopportune Stage On(2004)


Cai Guo-Qiang with part of “Head On” (2006), an installation of ninety-nine life-size wolf sculptures.

Opening February 22, 2008, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum will present the most comprehensive survey to date of the innovative body of work of Cai Guo-Qiang (pronounced tsai gwo chang). This forthcoming exhibition, Cai Guo-Qiang: I Want to Believe is organized by the Guggenheim and represents the museum’s first solo show devoted to a Chinese-born artist. Designed as a spectacular site-specific installation within the museum’s galleries, including Frank Lloyd Wright’s Rotunda, the exhibition will present a chronological and thematic survey that charts the artist’s creation of a distinctive visual and conceptual language across four mediums: gunpowder drawings; site-specific explosion events; large-scale installations; and social projects. Featuring over 80 works from the 1980s to the present—selected from major public and private collections in the U.S., Europe, and Asia—the exhibition will illuminate Cai’s significant formal and conceptual contributions to contemporary international art practices and social activism.

ARTmostfierce highly recommends this show. This is the type of show that makes NYC a place to be and visit. Please take time of your busy schedule (yes we all are very busy... even when we try to make a date with the wrong person) and check out this show. The Guggenheim Museum is even FREE on Fridays from 6-9 PM. This can be handy for the cheap girls that prefer spend their money on happy hour looking for Mr. Right Now than getting an education and maybe finding Mr. Right. Folks, check it out and let me know your thoughts. You will not be disappointed!

http://www.guggenheim.org/exhibitions/exhibition_pages/cai.html
http://http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/gallery/2008/02/22/GA2008022202015.html?sid=ST2008022202526%3C/div%3E

http://www.caiguoqiang.com/

Lassie to the rescue...

There is a lot of back and forth these days in Blogosphere!
What it might look like meow mix cat fights sometimes is just plain Gay bitchy ART bar banter.
I surely learned the hard way today so on that note... I am sending Lassie to the rescue.

ARTmostfierce will like to dedicate this video to the folks at MAO (Modern Art Obsession) and Kenny T and DC of DCKT Gallery Opening March 20,2008 in LES(Lower East Side).
And just remember Lassie is always there for you all...Ha!
By the way this way I get to try if I know how to post a video !
Many thanks to Pablo Colon for sending me this video.

Frida Khalo at Philadelphia Museum of Art

ARTmostfierce has always been a great fan of Frida Kahlo' work and her bohemian lifestyle. Such a great excuse to visit Philadelphia...now if I can get to see Zoe Strauss also while seeing this show it will be a double whammy!

The Philadelphia Museum of Art will be the only East Coast venue for the first major exhibition in 15 years to be devoted to Frida Kahlo in the United States. Frida Kahlo (February 20-May 18, 2008) examines the art of one of the most influential artists of the last 50 years. The exhibition includes more than 40 of the Mexican artist’s self-portraits, portraits, allegorical and symbolic paintings and still lifes, among them paintings that have never been exhibited before and others that will be seen in the U.S. for the first time. The exhibition is drawn from more than 30 collections in the U.S., Mexico, France, and Japan. Two of the most important and extensive collections of Kahlo’s work – the Museo Dolores Olmedo in Mexico City and the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection of Modern and Contemporary Mexican Art, Cuernavaca – have lent many of their most treasured Kahlo paintings.

http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=22627

Art Market in for Early-’90s-Style Bust?

Art Market in for Early-’90s-Style Bust?
Boone sees a boon.

New York Magazine
By Andrew M. Goldstein
Published Feb 18, 2008
Is the art world about to hit hard times? It looks that way to artists and dealers who remember the end of the last boom. “We are definitely in a recession,” gallerist Mary Boone said at the Tribeca Ball on February 12. Artist Eric Fischl agreed. “I think everybody’s going to take a hit,” he said. “The last time that happened, the prices of everybody’s work were cut in half and then within months cut in half again. So yeah, I think it’s going to have the same effect.” But, he added, “There are a lot of artists with an awful lot of money invested in them, and no one’s going to let them go down.” On the other hand, Boone said, “I think a recession is actually very good for the art world and very good for artists. You don’t have to worry about collectors’ motives, that they’re for investment.”

Ok... folks what do you think ?

Would love to hear your opinion.

http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=23296

''Incurable Still'' by Suellen Parker

Photos by Suellen Parker

1. Glamour Shot
2.Life Preserver 2004
3.Awkward Stage

ARTmostfierce highly recommends Suellen Parker's ''Incurable Still'' as innovative photography series, a most see and collectable art.

Stux Gallery located at 530 West 25th Street is currently showing the ''Incurable Still'' series from February 7- March 8, 2008.
Suellen Parker in these series addresses the ubiquitous desire for perfection: the unending quest for the perfect tan, body and life.

Parker explains herself on her website:

''The media I have chosen are significant to both the process and the meaning of the work. The characters are first formed in plasteline clay, which never dries. This allows me to continually manipulate features and forms, paralleling our bodies' constant state of change over time and our attempts to cover up, reshape, and alter our appearances. Next, a picture is a taken of the sculpture... My use of the photograph demonstrates leaves out informations about the realities of the situation and freezes that moment in time''.

''The eyes and the lips of each sculpture are created by inserting photographs of real human features, which accounts for the uncanny sensation of watching flawed fairly-tale characters come to life''.

ARTmostfierce thinks that in the current ART market, Photography as a media has to some degree over saturated the market with tons of images some rather commercial, some way too familiar (appropiations from other media say ala Richard Prince) and some photo themes or ideas are like over exposed (we seen it too many times over and over). The relevance of Suellen Parker series is that she is dealing with everyday situations that most us experience on a daily basis like,'' I am getting old'', ''do I look good enough'','' how I am perceived by others'' and presents them with a great deal of creativity and a sort of hidden black humor.It is also a refreshing and interesting new way to look at photography and communicate a theme.

ARTmostfierce is very interested in collecting some work from these series.

Considering the current ART market climate if the Stux Gallery prices don't suit your budget, checkout Aperture Foundation.

The Aperture Foundation is offering Awkward Stage as a part of their limited-edition prints for 2007. Please contact Kellie Mclaughlin, Manager of Limited Edition Prints at Aperture Foundation. Prints are only $650.00 USD of a limited edition of 30 and 5 artists proofs.

http://www.aperture.org/store/prints.aspx

http://www.stuxgallery.com/

http://suellenparker.com/

http://prints@aperture.org/

$42,584,300.00 For AIDS In Africa!

Some of the auction results in Top to bottom order.
1.Mark Quinn-Red Sphinx $605,000,00 USD
2.Mark Quinn-Stratospheric Ozone $330,000,00 USD
3.Jeff Koons-Ballon Rabbit Wall Relief $2,035,000.00 USD
4.Gregory Crewdson-Untitled $66,000.00 USD

Last Night the Red Auction at Sothebys raised an oustanding $42,584,300.00 USD to benefit AIDS in Africa.
The Projected estimate of the lots was between 28-29 million USD.Ninety eight percent of the lots performed extremely well considering their original estimate. This auction was rather important considering the actual economic climate and the fact the the works up for action were coming from the most influential and high profile artists right now.
Everybody had a lot at stake. Some the artists created art pieces exclusively for the event.Gallery owner Larry Gagosian represents some of the main artists featured (Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, etc, etc). Sothebys like most auction houses is trying to fight off all the current market fears and prove that the are still insulated in a bubble. Afterall I am quite happy with the results considering that the money is going to help AIDS in Africa.
The Highest bid of went to Damien Hirst’s Medicine Cabinet Titled ‘Where there is a will,There’s a way’’ for $7,150,000.00USD (estimate was 5-7 million) In my opinion this piece is quite stunning. I stood in front of it staring for over ten minutes. The craftmanship, the message and perfection that emanates is just magnificent.
Most pieces went over estimated prices. Rauschenberg's Spartan Series sold way under the estimated price. Please see link below to view auction results.

Still wonder why something of this nature and profile can be done and bring more attention about the Katrina situation in New Orleans.Almost three years later and not much being done. We can do (not like Obama please!) so much better overseas that in our own back yard.

Let me know your thoughts and opinions after reviewing results and comments regarding the ART market on today’s climate.

http://www.sothebys.com/app/live/lot/LotResultsDetailList.jsp?event_id=28863&sale_number=N08421&show_lot_name=Y

http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2∫_new=23284

Happy Valentines!

Photos from top to bottom:
1.Remember-Photo installation by Pepe Villegas
2.PR in December- Photo by Pablo Colon
3.Houston Tunnel- Photo by Pablo Colon
4.Video Still - Warrior Video by Pepe Villegas

ARTmostfierce wishes you all a Hot,Happy and Fierce Valentines Day!
Here are some photos of Artists Pablo Colon and Pepe Villegas expressing their feelings about Valentines.
Everyday should be Christmas and Valentines

Not much to say about the topic.Not in love or in love with myself!

http://www.pepevillegas.com/
http://www.myartspace.com/pablo

THE END OF AN ERA...POLAROID

© 2000 Stacy Apikos-Boge for
Estée Lauder's "Surface"



Above Top: Jeremy Kost ''working it'' with Polaroid
Linsday Lohan Polaroid by Jeremy Kost

It was a wonder in its time: A camera that spat out photos that developed themselves in a few minutes as you watched. You got to see them where and when you took them, not a week later when the prints came back from the drugstore.

But in a day when nearly every cellphone has a digital camera in it, “instant” photography long ago stopped being instant enough for most people. So today, the inevitable end of an era came: Polaroid is getting out of the Polaroid business.The company, which stopped making instant cameras for consumers a year ago and for commercial use a year before that, said today that as soon as it had enough instant film manufactured to last it through 2009, it would stop making that, too. Three plants that make large-format instant film will close by the end of the quarter, and two that make consumer film packets will be shut by the end of the year.

Polaroid instant cameras were the invention of Polaroid founder Edward Land. In 1948, the first commercially available model, the Model 95, went on sale at Boston’s Jordan Marsh Department Store for $89.75. Over the years, as new technology emerged, the cost of the cameras went down, but the company, thanks to the digital revolution, experienced a slump that eventually led to its bankruptcy and an acquisition by the Petters Group in 2005.The company, which will concentrate on digital cameras and printers, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2001 and was acquired by a private investment company in 2005. It started in 1937 making polarized lenses for scientific and military applications, and introduced its first instant camera in 1948.

When I heard the news felt sad for a moment because my whole life at some different stages there has been a Polaroid capturing that moment. Some bad hairdays, some fabulous body shots done in Fire Island (not all the way naked!...well maybe some ha!) when there was time to stay tanned all summer. It almost makes me call home and try to steal all the ones in my family albums...ok not that nostalgic! Maybe I have my brother pick them up for me.

I also thought of three artists among many ones that the use of Polaroids has always been an important element of their work.
These artists are Andy Warhol, Stacy Boge and Jeremy Kost. Andy Warhol was ultimate master of the use of Polariod capturing timeless images of an era that will never will exist again.

Please find below some of their views regarding Polaroid.

STACY APIKOS-BOGE ON POLAROID

Stacy Apikos-Boge says that using the Polaroid 20x24 is a dream come true. "I do photo-documentary, portraiture, and fashion. The advantage and beauty of using Polaroid is its immediacy. I can alter the color and experiment. It allows for accidents—which I believe in, in art. The manipulation comes from exposure time, lens, lighting. There's a real honesty with it."
Apikos-Boge used the 20x24 for a recent Estée Lauder campaign promoting a new men's skin care line called "Surface" (see image above). "I thought because the packaging was so modern that I'd take what was going on in the fashion/music world and show more skin—photographing very close-up portraits of men without their shirts. The 20x24 was the only camera I could use to get an actual reproduction of the models' faces. After the campaign, Estée Lauder put the prints in its art collection. Apikos-Boge also shot for Vera Wang on the 20x24 camera after Wang saw her Lauder images.
"There's this whole experience that goes on between the photographer and the sitter—whoever you're photographing has to remain perfectly still because the lens is an eyelash away. It's truly a collaborative process between the photographer and this incredible piece of machinery.

Jeremy Kost On Polaroid

Jeremy Kost’s adventures began in 2003 when he had a day job marketing antiques. He was living in Washington with his parents. One weekend, while visiting friends in Manhattan’s East Village neighborhood, his host left for a night job at a local bar. A Polaroid camera was hanging on the wall so Kost decided to borrow it for the evening.

“Since I didn’t really know anyone in New York at the time, the camera served as a sort of social catalyst,” Kost recalled with a grin. He found that he made friends wherever he snapped photos. One night, after taking a picture of the actress Pamela Anderson, the well-known fashion photographer David LaChappelle had a look at Kost’s work and encouraged him to take his nightlife hobby more seriously. That was all Kost needed to make a permanent move to New York.

Kost has not put his borrowed Polaroid down since. His instincts and respect for privacy have helped cultivate warm relationships with a number of celebrities, although he acknowledges he’s been turned down his share of times, too.

Kost has turned what used to be a way for making friends into a venture he calls Roidrage. His pictures have appeared in galleries and fashion magazines. He has also created a Web site, www.roidrage.com. Kost says his approach to celebrity “allows people to look at those moments that are treated like press and say they can be artistic, intimate and special."

I was invited by Jeremy to see his work this weekend including a series of silkscreens. I am sure I will be excited by the work but, I still can get out of my head that wonderful Lindsay Lohan Polaroid facing the papparrazi that I saw on my first studio visit (not the one above). It makes me want to have it.Check out Jeremy Kost work at www.roidrage.com. It has a store in it and you can shop for limited editions of Polaroids sets.
Let me know your thoughts and opinions about the end of Polaroid!

World-renowned Architect Zaha Hadid's Design Selected for MSU's Broad Art Museum

Zaha Hadid is one of my favorite architects.Her furniture , drawings and architectural design are just incredible and considered ARTmostfierce enough to have a solo show at the Guggenheim Museum and win The Pritkzer prize.
Are you familiar with her work?
Let me hear your comments.

EAST LANSING, MI.- World-renowned architect Zaha Hadid of London has been selected as the winner in the design competition for the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University . Hadid joined the Broads at two public events today where MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon announced the winner.

“With today’s announcement of Zaha Hadid as the architect of record for the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University , we take one step closer to bringing this extraordinary project to life,” Simon said. “We were fortunate to have the work of many world-class architects submitted for the competition but Ms. Hadid’s design truly captured the spirit of what this iconic building will represent to MSU’s campus and the Greater mid-Michigan community that will benefit from its presence in the area.”

The announcement is the culmination of a competition that began in June 2007 when the Broads gave a gift of $26 million to help fund the new museum, which will focus on modern and contemporary art. The other finalists were: Coop Himmelb(l)au ( Vienna and Los Angeles ); Morphosis ( Santa Monica , Calif. ); Kohn Pedersen Fox Architects, PC ( New York ); and Randall Stout Architects, Inc. ( Los Angeles ).

Hadid, founding partner of Zaha Hadid Architects, was awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2004 and is internationally known for both her theoretical and academic work. In addition to the Pritzker Prize, her work has received numerous awards from the world’s most prestigious institutions, including the Mies van der Rohe Foundation of European Architecture; the American Institute of Architects; the Royal Institute of British Architects; the Royal Academy of Arts; the International Olympic Committee; the Austrian Commissions for Science and Art; Columbia University; and Yale University.

Some of Hadid’s best-known completed projects include the Vitra Fire Station and the LFone Pavilion in Weil am Rhein, Germany; the Mind Zone at the Millennium Dome, London; a tram station and car park in Strasbourg, France; a ski-jump and Nordpark Cable Railway in Innsbruck, Austria; the Lois & Richard Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art, Cincinnati, Ohio; the BMW Central Building in Leipzig, Germany; the Hotel Puerta America interior in Madrid, Spain; the Ordrupgaard Museum Extension in Copenhagen, Denmark; the Phaeno Science Center, Wolfsburg, Germany; and the Maggie’s Centre, Fife, Scotland.

When completed, the Broad Art Museum at MSU will be Hadid’s first building on a university campus and her second completed project in the United States .

“I am absolutely delighted to be building the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University ,” Hadid said. “Art Museums are centers for the exchange of ideas, showcasing the art that feeds the cultural life of the community. I believe we can create buildings that evoke original experiences, inspire people and make them excited about new ideas. The sculptural folds of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum ’s design and enigmatic qualities of its steel and glass surface follow a coherent formal logic, offering a sense of unlimited possibilities.”

The 41,000-square-foot building will comprise three levels, including a basement. It will be constructed of steel and concrete with an aluminum and glass exterior and be adjoined by an expansive outdoor sculpture garden to the east. The museum will stand on the corner of Grand River Avenue and Farm Lane at the Collingwood campus entrance.

The museum will include more than 18,000 square feet of space for the following collections: special exhibitions; modern and contemporary art; new media; photography; works on paper; and the permanent collection -- encyclopedic (pre-1945). Additional space will include an education center, museum shop, visitor café and gathering space and staff offices.

“We are delighted with Zaha Hadid's design and look forward to the construction of a world-class art museum at Michigan State ,” said Eli Broad. “This new museum will create an important cultural connection between the university and the broader Lansing and Michigan community.”

Groundbreaking for the museum is planned for fall 2008 and completion of the project is expected in 2010.

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