Tag Archives: individual art consulting

Fred Sandback at MCA Denver

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“In every block of marble I see a statue as plain as though it stood before me, shaped and perfect in attitude and action. I have only to hew away the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition to reveal it to the other eyes as mine see it.” Michelangelo

The Sandback show at MCA Denver is terrific!

His installations of thread barely create structure but capture the “apparitions” of monumental planes and forms throughout the space.  The pieces slice through the rooms, highlighting the building itself and then go on to challenge the viewers’ perceptions by redefining – breaking away from the physical walls and illustrating planes of nothingness that exist concurrently.

When I first saw the show, I thought it seemed solemn and a bit serious – it’s so structured, so minimal and so devoid of color.  If you felt this way, then I would definitely encourage you to see it again. It is uplifting and hopeful: the optimistic gestures allow the viewer to see the museum as constructed and then offer a glimpse of what could be…of something more. It makes me happy.

My “Top 10” Art Shows in NYC (Oct 2011)

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This past week I went to NYC to see the first art shows of the season  – Wow! What a season it is…this year the museums and galleries are really hitting it out of the park with major retrospectives and beautifully produced shows.  De Kooning at MoMA heads the pack, but there were great shows everywhere.  The galleries are ambitious – they are showing an awful lot of incredibly expensive works (moderately priced works in the $100k-500k+ range) – I did see works range from as little as $500 going beyond  the $1m mark.  

Of course there is no real way to cover it all, especially in 4 days.  I only barely scratched the surface but what I did get to see was amazing.  I walked up and down the city (100-200 blocks a day) and managed to squeeze in 5 museums and about 60 galleries.  Of course I experienced the NY gallery snobbery… I understand it though as I was out of uniform. I wore my sneakers  instead of Pradas and I opted for a white jacket instead of Black…I was actually told that I looked like I was auditioning for “Miami Vice.”

I tend to have a voracious appetite for all things visual so I ate it up; there were a lot of shows that I could have lingered over for hours to look at all the nuances of the works, but I set out with a mission to take in as much as I could so I literally kept moving the entire time. 

Usually when I travel I like to compile a “Top 10” as a record for myself and to share, but with a so much going on, I couldn’t really bare to whittle it down past 7 museum shows and 15 gallery exhibitions:

Museums

  • De Kooning @ MoMA
  • Cy Twombly Sculptures @ MoMA
  • Lyonel Feininger @ Whitney
  • David Smith @Whitney
  • Master Painters of India (1100-1900) @ the Metropolitan
  • Frans Hals @ the Metropolitan
  • Hans Peter Feldman @ Guggenheim

Galleries

  • Do Ho Suh @ Lehmann Maupin
  • Leandro Erlich @ Sean Kelly
  • Agnes Martin @ Pace
  • Frank Stella @ Paul Kasmin
  • Milton Resnick @ Cheim & Read
  • Nicholas Krushenick @ Gary Snyder
  • Ronnie Landfield @ Stephen Haller
  • Ad Reinhardt @ Pace
  • Nick Cave @ Jack Shainman
  • Jenny Saville @ Gagosian
  • Ethan Murrow @ Winston Wӓchter Fine Art
  • Nathan Slate Joseph @ Sundaram Tagore
  • Monroe Hodder @ Andre Zarre
  • Andy Denzler @ Claire Oliver
  • Paul Winstanley @ Mitchell-Innes & Nash

With any luck I will get to go back in November and continue the expedition  – places I was really eager to see but missed this time around included the Neue Galerie (they are installing an exhibition of works from Ronald S. Lauder’s Collection), The Noguchi Museum, the Brooklyn Museum and the New Museum down in the Bowery. I didn’t make it over to Williamsburg or DUMBO this visit so they will be a must and I only got through about half of the Chelsea neighborhood. 

 

Do Ho Suh @ Lehmann Maupin Gallery

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Frank Stella at Paul Kasmin Gallery

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Nicholas Krushenick at Gary Snyder Gallery

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

In NYC – looking at art

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Cy Twombly Sculpture

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Daniel Buren

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

De Kooning, Judgement Day, 1946

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Kent & Vicki Logan – Focused Collecting

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Last Saturday, I got to go with a dozen other members of the new Clyfford Still Museum on a tour of the Kent & Vicki Logan’s art collection…what a treat!  It was a terrific day – the weather up in the mountains was perfect, the group fun and interesting and the art…amazing!!

To be sure, the Logans have a lot of great contemporary art, but for me the key to the success of their collection is really that they personally enjoy the works they acquire and that they are disciplined in their focus.

The Logans are kind and generous – their collection has been gifted to SFMOMA and the Denver Art Museum and they frequently invite the museums and art schools to access the works for exhibitions and study. In 2 decades they have amassed a thousand pieces of contemporary art that represent the best examples from artists working in the past 30-40 years that have influenced the worldwide movement of art.    They have a decidely modern aesthetic, interest in Asian contemporary art and frequently a leaning for pop and shock.

It was exciting to see the works & especially to see the Logans living with the art in their home: Juan Munoz in the entrance, Warhol and Hirst in the living room, Richter in the dining room, Eliasson in the kitchen, Basquiat in the hallway, Marilyn Minter in the bedroom, Yue Minjun, Neo Rauch, Ed Ruscha, Kiki Smith and on and on.

As we passed through the rooms of their home, I began to wonder if there were artists whose works they thought maybe were missing or artwork that they’d like to acquire if only their parameters were different. As a group we came up with a few – either they didn ‘t quite work with their aesthetic, or the Logans didn’t feel they influenced their peers or they were outside the contemporary period of their focus.

All week long I have found myself reflecting on the collection and the parameters they set for themselves: They only buy art that they like; they buy art of the times (1960s-present day) and they buy art from artists that are addressing issues that confront us as a society and that are influencing the movement of art. They resist the temptation to get pieces just because someone else thinks they should & they eschew pieces that they like when they don’t work in the context of their collection.

Andy Warhol, Self-Portrait, 1986
Yue Minjun, the Last 5000 Years, 2000
Yoshitomo Nara, The Girl with the Knife in Her Hand, 1991

Rest of the DC trip – My Top 5

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Last week I got back from a whirlwind tour of the art scene in DC. I was tagging this expedition onto the tail end of a trip to the beach for Labor Day. It turns out that my timing was not the very best – a lot of galleries and museum shows were just beginning to stage new shows for the Fall. Even so, there is always an enormous amount of art to look at – these shows represented my top 5 for this trip:

  1. Kandinsky & the Harmony of Silence: Painting w/White Border (Closing @ the Phillips)
  2. Stella Sounds: The Scarlatti K Series (Closing @ the Phillips)
  3. Chris Martin: Painting Big (Corcoran)
  4. Asian American Portraiture Now (National Portrait Gallery)
  5. In the Tower: Nam June Paik (Closing at The National Gallery)
    Stella Sounds
    Roger Shimomura
    Chris Martin
    Kandinsky
    Nam June Paik

ArtLook art consulting

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ArtLook will primarily focus on helping individual clients (residential) with 3 basic offerings:
 
1) Art Collector’s Boot Camp – The Boot Camp will consist of a home visit and style diagnostic, an art community overview including a museum visit, 1-2 gallery visits, and ideally an artist studio visit. Each visit will be tailored to developing a collector’s awareness of their own personal style, interests, and goals and ultimately to establish a foundation of knowledge to begin collecting with confidence. The Boot Camp is designed to take place in four 2-3hr. sessions, but can be modified for clients in other cities.
 
2) Acquisition Assistance – I see a lot of art…more than most. In the past 10 years, I have seen roughly 1000 museum exhibitions and 2500 gallery exhibitions all over the world; that coupled with books, magazines, websites, television, restaurants, offices, and homes…well, it adds up to a LOT of artwork.  I am happy to assist collectors with finding the perfect piece or pieces to add to their collections. Whether it is to find that specific piece to go into your space or to develop a plan for you to build upon over time, I can help you define your goals and then do the legwork – researching options for you. I will introduce you to artists, dealers, galleries so that you can feel confident in your choices. 
 
3) Assistance with Art as Investment – Most artwork is not purchased as an investment; it is simply purchased by admirers who are willing to pay for it. Almost all artwork, even if it is expensive, is priced very subjectively, and most often will not appreciate in value. That said, if you are interested in buying artwork as an investment, I can assist you in finding works that have investment potential. There are always artists that are up and coming and that are on the verge of greater recognition – their works may have special appeal to collectors with the guts for speculation. Additionally, there are works that are already being bought and sold in secondary markets (dealers & auction houses) and those with strong track records are likely to continue to be bought and sold over time and are often good investments. Working with galleries, dealers and auction houses, I can assist you with finding pieces that you like and that have the potential to appreciate. 
 
Additionally I offer assistance with curation, cataloguing, shipping, framing & installation for artwork. I will be doing exhibition development, some gallery curation and sales and corporate art consulting so if you think of anything to do with art, please keep me in mind because I would love to try to help.

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