An abstract painting by Clyfford Still sold for a record $61.7 million last night, headlining Sotheby’s biggest New York contemporary art sale in three years, while protesters outside chanted “Shame on you!”
The $315.8 million auction at Sotheby’s York Avenue headquarters also broke artist records for Gerhard Richter and Joan Mitchell. Six floors below in the street, picketing art handlers were joined by Occupy Wall Street protesters and unionized musicians playing high-decibel Latin rhythms. Since July 29, 42 handlers have been locked out by the publicly traded auction company over a contract dispute.
“It demonstrates the growing gap between the haves and the have-nots,” said New York art dealer Richard Feigen. “You see people demonstrating out there, people are out of jobs and their houses. And people in here are dumping millions into art.”
The sale, the biggest for Sotheby’s since May 2008, beat the presale high estimate of $270 million, which excludes commissions. Earlier in the day, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index dropped 3.7 percent.
“Blue-chip global artists are properly recognized as part of the diversification strategy,” said New York-based art collector Larry Warsh. “Because of the supply and demand issues, we see this tremendous pressure on pricing.’
The Still painting, “1949-A-No. 1,” shattered the artist’s previous record of $21.3 million, achieved at a Christie’s International sale in 2006. It sold to a telephone bidder, represented by Lisa Dennison, Sotheby’s chairman of North and South America. She won a bidding war against Christopher Eykyn, a New York dealer who had a mobile phone to his ear and his hand covering his mouth.
The work was one of four Stills consigned by the City of Denver that raised a total of $114.1 million for the endowment of the Clyfford Still Museum, which opens in Denver next week. The reclusive artist died in 1980.
Three of the works were completed in the 1940s and one in 1976. The top lot, in deep reds and velvety blacks, more than doubled its presale low estimate of $25 million.
During his life, Still sold very little and frequently rejected exhibition opportunities. His will stipulated that the estate be given in its entirety to a U.S. city willing to establish a permanent museum housing his work alone.
Richter’s “Abstraktes Bild” (1997) sold for $20.8 million, beating his $16.5 million auction record set last month at Christie’s in London. The 8.5-by-11-foot oil canvas, rich in purple, red and blue, was one of eight abstract paintings by the German artist from a private collection. Every painting exceeded its high estimate.
“I wish I had some Richters,” said Miami-based contemporary art collector Mera Rubell.
Francis Bacon’s 1967 “Three Studies for a Self Portrait” on a deep-green background fetched $19.7 million. Mitchell’s vibrant 1960 abstract canvas went for $9.3 million.
John Elderfield, chief curator emeritus of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, placed the winning bid for Donald Judd’s fluorescent red Plexiglas and stainless steel sculpture, which fetched $4.7 million.
Sotheby’s charges buyers 25 percent of the hammer price up to $50,000, plus 20 percent from $50,000 to $1 million, and 12 percent above $1 million. Pre-sale estimates don’t include the buyer’s premium.
One of the evening’s high-profile casualties was Mark Rothko’s “Untitled (Plum and Dark Brown)” painting from 1964. Estimated between $8 million and $12 million, it found no takers.
Only in the rear of the salesroom last night, where bottled water, brownies and cookies were dispensed to clients, could the protesters’ drumming, whistling and chanting be heard.
Michael Sovern, Sotheby’s Chairman and a former president of Columbia University, called the gap between the U.S. rich and poor “outrageous,” but disagreed that the sale and protest were a reflection of the divide.
“It’s a conventional labor dispute,” he said in an interview at the sale. “It isn’t affected by the gap between the rich and poor.”
Dealers and collectors were confronted by several dozen protesters, who screamed “shame on you” at those who entered the building.
“Nothing can a stop a collector,” said Barbara Annis, a New York private dealer. “People believe in art and it goes up and up and up.”
2011年11月9日星期三
Da Vinci Masterpieces Reunited In London
Visitors to the National Gallery hoping to find the Leonardo of Dan Brown novels and printed tea towels will leave this exhibition disappointed. With only 9 of Leonardo’s oil paintings on display, ‘The Painter at the Court of Milan’ provides a radically different encounter with the quintessential celebrity artist, in a much more intimate and engaging exploration of one of the most fruitful periods of his career.
As in past times, the queues for this exhibition stretch well around the corner of the National Gallery’s Sainsbury Wing, with visitors eager to encounter so many of Leonardo’s masterpieces in one place. Upon entering the show we are told that Leonardo’s time in Milan was ‘the most productive period of his career . . . it transformed his ideas on the status and purpose of art.’ Indeed in Leonardo’s introductory letter to his great patron, ‘il Moro’ - Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, he advertised himself first as a military strategist and last as a painter. Certainly, by the end of this exhibition, we are left in no doubt about his transformed priorities.
The exhibition is dimly lit, existing on a plane somewhere between a church atmosphere and a private study – a reverential space that seems appropriate for one of art’s most venerated masters. We are struck repeatedly by the level of close engagement with Leonardo’s work that this exhibition offers, beginning not with a large canvas but with a diminutive notebook leaf showing only ‘Studies of the Head.’ Almost proleptic of the entirety of Leonardo’s period in Milan, the head studies combine anatomy with imagination, framed with direct observation but coloured with fanciful creativity and restless exaggeration.
One of this exhibition’s greatest successes must be seen in the intimacy created with Leonardo’s work. We are not standing in La Louvre, craning our necks to see a painting masked by 3 inches of glass and several security guards, and accordingly one is able to enjoy these works on a personal level. The first major work to be shown, after an early portrait titled ‘The Musician’, is Leonardo’s ‘Belle Ferroniere.’ In a departure from the harsher contrasts of ‘The Musician’, this portrait captures the impossible likeness, gaze, character and poise of its subject. In Leonardo’s combination of mathematical precision and audacious painterly ability we find his vision of ‘perfect beauty’ and a model so lifelike that the parapet against which she leans becomes an almost Brechtian reminder that this is oil on walnut, not living flesh.
Competing only with the Mona Lisa as Leonardo’s most accomplished work, the ‘Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani’ hangs on the adjacent wall and demonstrates succinctly the painter’s extraordinary ability in its harmony with the ‘Belle Ferroniere’. In this work Leonardo captures perfectly the distracted glance of Ludovico Sforza’s mistress as she cradles an ermine in her arms. The portrait is well supported by a series of studies of hands, detailing Leonardo’s growing fascination with the correlation between anatomy and perfect beauty.
This theme is developed by Leonardo’s ‘Saint Jerome’, the first religious subject presented in this exhibition. We are told that this work was ‘profoundly informed’ by anatomical research and the struggle between the depiction of beauty and the anguished subject is plain to see. The elderly face of ‘Saint Jerome’ is discordant with the muscular youth of his body, presenting a conflict of interests between imagination and reality, observation and fantasy, a conflict that remains unresolved in this, an unfinished work.
In further recognition of the diversity of works brought together for this exhibition, the combination, for the first time, of both versions of ‘The Virgin of the Rocks’ must be praised. Seen individually we would consider both works to be infallible masterpieces, but together we are allowed the luxury of a more subjective comparison. Between the two works we see the development of ideas and forms, with the more successful ventures of the first composition continued in to the second and the less pleasing aspects simply dropped. In the later of the two works, Leonardo turns the head of his supporting angel away from the viewer, closing the scene and making us privy to its sacrality. An atmosphere of intimacy again pervades the composition and obscures the busyness of the gallery in which it is situated.
It is in the religious works of Leonardo that the artist seems most comfortable with the development of the style for which he was to become most celebrated. The hazy and smoky sfumato of the Mona Lisa is noticeable in several of his Milanese versions of the Virgin and Child. In these works Leonardo seems more mature, allowing allegory and narrative to inform his compositions, punning the yarnwinder in Christ’s chubby, infant hand with the crucifix of his destined Passion in ‘Madonna of the Yarnwinder.’ In the exhibition’s penultimate room we find the most infamous Leonardo in the National Gallery’s permanent collection, ‘The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and John the Baptist’, or the ‘Burlington House Cartoon’, all but destroyed by a the blast of a vandal’s shotgun in 1987. Questions of restoration and of how present Leonardo’s original brushstrokes are in these conserved works will mar any serious enjoyment of their palpable beauty and are, in this instance, better left unstated.
All too often it seems that works by Leonardo are considered in isolation but, as evidenced by this exhibition, they are given an entirely new significance and relevance when shown together. One of the final works on display, and for many the most controversial, is Leonardo’s ‘Salvator Mundi’, only this year recognised as an original Leonardo and displayed for the first time in this exhibition. Any doubts one harbours about this work’s authenticity should be discarded when it is seen hanging with other examples of Leonardo’s painting. Even considered in isolation the work would show clearly the distinctive geometric undercurrent and hazy use of paint that has been celebrated in a number of other works, but in the context created by this exhibition, the painting is given new relevance, new significance and surely myriad reasons to confirm its authorship.
The exhibition addresses, in its final collection, the deterioration of the rapidly-deteriorating ‘Last Supper’ in the Santia Maria della Grazie chapel in Milan. A high-resolution image of the original is contrasted with a sixteenth-century copy of the ‘Last Supper’ and allows one the novelty of some comprehension of Leonardo’s original intention for the work. Again it is bolstered by countless studies and drawings and again we are struck by the sense of intimacy these insights create. At times it almost feels invasive.
As in past times, the queues for this exhibition stretch well around the corner of the National Gallery’s Sainsbury Wing, with visitors eager to encounter so many of Leonardo’s masterpieces in one place. Upon entering the show we are told that Leonardo’s time in Milan was ‘the most productive period of his career . . . it transformed his ideas on the status and purpose of art.’ Indeed in Leonardo’s introductory letter to his great patron, ‘il Moro’ - Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, he advertised himself first as a military strategist and last as a painter. Certainly, by the end of this exhibition, we are left in no doubt about his transformed priorities.
The exhibition is dimly lit, existing on a plane somewhere between a church atmosphere and a private study – a reverential space that seems appropriate for one of art’s most venerated masters. We are struck repeatedly by the level of close engagement with Leonardo’s work that this exhibition offers, beginning not with a large canvas but with a diminutive notebook leaf showing only ‘Studies of the Head.’ Almost proleptic of the entirety of Leonardo’s period in Milan, the head studies combine anatomy with imagination, framed with direct observation but coloured with fanciful creativity and restless exaggeration.
One of this exhibition’s greatest successes must be seen in the intimacy created with Leonardo’s work. We are not standing in La Louvre, craning our necks to see a painting masked by 3 inches of glass and several security guards, and accordingly one is able to enjoy these works on a personal level. The first major work to be shown, after an early portrait titled ‘The Musician’, is Leonardo’s ‘Belle Ferroniere.’ In a departure from the harsher contrasts of ‘The Musician’, this portrait captures the impossible likeness, gaze, character and poise of its subject. In Leonardo’s combination of mathematical precision and audacious painterly ability we find his vision of ‘perfect beauty’ and a model so lifelike that the parapet against which she leans becomes an almost Brechtian reminder that this is oil on walnut, not living flesh.
Competing only with the Mona Lisa as Leonardo’s most accomplished work, the ‘Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani’ hangs on the adjacent wall and demonstrates succinctly the painter’s extraordinary ability in its harmony with the ‘Belle Ferroniere’. In this work Leonardo captures perfectly the distracted glance of Ludovico Sforza’s mistress as she cradles an ermine in her arms. The portrait is well supported by a series of studies of hands, detailing Leonardo’s growing fascination with the correlation between anatomy and perfect beauty.
This theme is developed by Leonardo’s ‘Saint Jerome’, the first religious subject presented in this exhibition. We are told that this work was ‘profoundly informed’ by anatomical research and the struggle between the depiction of beauty and the anguished subject is plain to see. The elderly face of ‘Saint Jerome’ is discordant with the muscular youth of his body, presenting a conflict of interests between imagination and reality, observation and fantasy, a conflict that remains unresolved in this, an unfinished work.
In further recognition of the diversity of works brought together for this exhibition, the combination, for the first time, of both versions of ‘The Virgin of the Rocks’ must be praised. Seen individually we would consider both works to be infallible masterpieces, but together we are allowed the luxury of a more subjective comparison. Between the two works we see the development of ideas and forms, with the more successful ventures of the first composition continued in to the second and the less pleasing aspects simply dropped. In the later of the two works, Leonardo turns the head of his supporting angel away from the viewer, closing the scene and making us privy to its sacrality. An atmosphere of intimacy again pervades the composition and obscures the busyness of the gallery in which it is situated.
It is in the religious works of Leonardo that the artist seems most comfortable with the development of the style for which he was to become most celebrated. The hazy and smoky sfumato of the Mona Lisa is noticeable in several of his Milanese versions of the Virgin and Child. In these works Leonardo seems more mature, allowing allegory and narrative to inform his compositions, punning the yarnwinder in Christ’s chubby, infant hand with the crucifix of his destined Passion in ‘Madonna of the Yarnwinder.’ In the exhibition’s penultimate room we find the most infamous Leonardo in the National Gallery’s permanent collection, ‘The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and John the Baptist’, or the ‘Burlington House Cartoon’, all but destroyed by a the blast of a vandal’s shotgun in 1987. Questions of restoration and of how present Leonardo’s original brushstrokes are in these conserved works will mar any serious enjoyment of their palpable beauty and are, in this instance, better left unstated.
All too often it seems that works by Leonardo are considered in isolation but, as evidenced by this exhibition, they are given an entirely new significance and relevance when shown together. One of the final works on display, and for many the most controversial, is Leonardo’s ‘Salvator Mundi’, only this year recognised as an original Leonardo and displayed for the first time in this exhibition. Any doubts one harbours about this work’s authenticity should be discarded when it is seen hanging with other examples of Leonardo’s painting. Even considered in isolation the work would show clearly the distinctive geometric undercurrent and hazy use of paint that has been celebrated in a number of other works, but in the context created by this exhibition, the painting is given new relevance, new significance and surely myriad reasons to confirm its authorship.
The exhibition addresses, in its final collection, the deterioration of the rapidly-deteriorating ‘Last Supper’ in the Santia Maria della Grazie chapel in Milan. A high-resolution image of the original is contrasted with a sixteenth-century copy of the ‘Last Supper’ and allows one the novelty of some comprehension of Leonardo’s original intention for the work. Again it is bolstered by countless studies and drawings and again we are struck by the sense of intimacy these insights create. At times it almost feels invasive.
2011年11月8日星期二
Rare Clyfford Still paintings likely to earn millions for Denver museum
The eyes of the international art world will be on the work of painter Clyfford Still on Wednesday evening, when four of the late artist's rare paintings are expected to earn millions at a New York auction, with the proceeds to benefit a new Denver museum devoted to him.
Sotheby's estimates that the works, which date from 1940 to 1976 and offer a cross-section of the abstract expressionist's output, could bring in somewhere between $51 million and $71.5 million.
Fifteen percent of the proceeds or $15 million — whichever is less — will be taken by Sotheby's as a commission.
The rest will go to an endowment that will assure the financial viability of the privately funded Clyfford Still Museum, which opens Nov. 18. The money will be used for everything from research to general operations.
The four works were bequeathed to the city by Patricia Still, the artist's widow, who died in 2005. She endowed about 2,000 pieces from her husband's collection to Denver in 2004 on the agreement that the city would oversee the construction of a museum to house them. After her death, about 400 more works from her estate, including the four up for sale, also went to Denver.
Still is considered one of the most important artists in abstract expressionism, in the company of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko.
According to the November issue of Art + Auction magazine, the quartet of works is the "most impressive offering" in this week's contemporary sales at the major auction houses in New York.
"The audience has been responsive to these paintings," Tobias Meyer, worldwide head of contemporary art and principal auctioneer for Sotheby's, said Monday. "They've been very much admired, and we expect a very good result for Wednesday night."
After showings in London and Hong Kong in October, the four paintings have been on view for two weeks in Sotheby's New York galleries in anticipation of the sale.
The big question, emblazoned on Art + Auction's cover, is whether the largest of the four works, "1949-A-No. 1," will top the record for a Still painting of $21,296,000, which was set in 2006. Noting that the 1949 piece is estimated to sell for $25 million to $35 million, Meyer is confident that will happen.
Driving the market for Still's works is simple supply and demand. About 94 percent of the works he produced will be housed in the Still Museum, and, according to director Dean Sobel, only about 40 pieces by the artist remain in private hands.
"We gave them auction estimates that we felt were appropriate for what has happened in the market before," Meyer said of the four works to be sold. "But it's hard to say what will happen that night because it is such a rare event."
Sotheby's estimates that the works, which date from 1940 to 1976 and offer a cross-section of the abstract expressionist's output, could bring in somewhere between $51 million and $71.5 million.
Fifteen percent of the proceeds or $15 million — whichever is less — will be taken by Sotheby's as a commission.
The rest will go to an endowment that will assure the financial viability of the privately funded Clyfford Still Museum, which opens Nov. 18. The money will be used for everything from research to general operations.
The four works were bequeathed to the city by Patricia Still, the artist's widow, who died in 2005. She endowed about 2,000 pieces from her husband's collection to Denver in 2004 on the agreement that the city would oversee the construction of a museum to house them. After her death, about 400 more works from her estate, including the four up for sale, also went to Denver.
Still is considered one of the most important artists in abstract expressionism, in the company of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko.
According to the November issue of Art + Auction magazine, the quartet of works is the "most impressive offering" in this week's contemporary sales at the major auction houses in New York.
"The audience has been responsive to these paintings," Tobias Meyer, worldwide head of contemporary art and principal auctioneer for Sotheby's, said Monday. "They've been very much admired, and we expect a very good result for Wednesday night."
After showings in London and Hong Kong in October, the four paintings have been on view for two weeks in Sotheby's New York galleries in anticipation of the sale.
The big question, emblazoned on Art + Auction's cover, is whether the largest of the four works, "1949-A-No. 1," will top the record for a Still painting of $21,296,000, which was set in 2006. Noting that the 1949 piece is estimated to sell for $25 million to $35 million, Meyer is confident that will happen.
Driving the market for Still's works is simple supply and demand. About 94 percent of the works he produced will be housed in the Still Museum, and, according to director Dean Sobel, only about 40 pieces by the artist remain in private hands.
"We gave them auction estimates that we felt were appropriate for what has happened in the market before," Meyer said of the four works to be sold. "But it's hard to say what will happen that night because it is such a rare event."
2011年11月6日星期日
Family bank on mini Monet
Kieron Williamson, nine, lived with his parents and sister in a rented flat next to a petrol station in Holt, Norfolk, before using his profits to buy a new £150,000 home in the summer.
The house which was a former 19th century bank in Ludham, Norfolk, will remain in trust until his 18th birthday when the title deeds will be registered in his name.
The Norfolk Broads village of Ludham is especially significant for Kieron as it was the home of his painting hero Edward Seago who died in 1974.
Kieron has become an internationally known art prodigy since he began to paint landscapes on a family holiday in Devon and Cornwall in 2008.
His last major exhibition of 33 paintings sold for £150,000 within half an hour in July last year and he set a new record by selling two paintings for £21,000 each the following month.
Kieron's earnings are due to be boosted further when his latest 12 landscape paintings go on sale next Friday for between £1,250 and £15,595 at the Picturecraft gallery in Holt.
The exhibition is expected to be another instant sell out with buyers pledging to camp overnight outside the gallery to ensure that they get one of his works.
His latest pictures include two views of St Benet's Abbey on the Norfolk Broads the Suleymaniye mosque in Istanbul.
Kieron's parents Keith, 44, and Michelle, 38, have made sure that his earnings have been held in trust for him until he is older.
Former builder Mr Williamson said: "He already has his own house so if he decides he wants to do something completely different when he is older, at least he won't have to worry about a mortgage."
Picturecraft gallery owner Adrian Hill said: "He is unrivalled. There isn't any other child out there who can paint as well in three different media -watercolour, oil and pastel.
"His grasp of the technical elements of working with them really is a wonderful thing."
Kieron's expertise was only recognised when he started art lessons after taking up painting in 2008. His previous artistic talents were limited to colouring in dinosaurs which his parents had drawn for him.
His skill with a brush has amazed art experts who believe his detailed pictures of mainly Norfolk landscapes are way beyond his years.
Kieron's work first came on the market in the summer of 2009 when 19 of his paintings were sold for £14,000 in a sealed bid auction.
Three months later another 16 of his paintings were up snapped for £17,000 in just 14 minutes in his second exhibition at the Picturecraft gallery.
Buyers flew in from as far away as Arizona, New York and South Africa to buy his oils, watercolours and pastels at his third exhibition in July last year.
Some fans camped outside the gallery for up to 48 hours to make sure they did not miss out on one of his paintings priced between £1,825 and £7,995.
Other telephone bidders from Tokyo, Canada and Germany as well as from across the UK ensured the exhibition sold out instantly in 30 minutes.
Kieron later set a new record price for his work by selling two landscape paintings for around £21,000 in a sealed bid auction which attracted interest from around the world.
The pictures had special significance as one was the last he painted when he was aged seven and the other was his first work after his eighth birthday.
The first picture, an oil painting of a Suffolk scene showing rolling fields and a church, was snapped up by a collector in California.
The other was a pastel painting of the desolate shoreline at Winterton, Norfolk, which was bought by a fan from Slovinia.
Many of Kieron's paintings feature iconic locations on the north Norfolk coast such as Morston, Blakeney, Cley, Holkham and Brancaster.
The house which was a former 19th century bank in Ludham, Norfolk, will remain in trust until his 18th birthday when the title deeds will be registered in his name.
The Norfolk Broads village of Ludham is especially significant for Kieron as it was the home of his painting hero Edward Seago who died in 1974.
Kieron has become an internationally known art prodigy since he began to paint landscapes on a family holiday in Devon and Cornwall in 2008.
His last major exhibition of 33 paintings sold for £150,000 within half an hour in July last year and he set a new record by selling two paintings for £21,000 each the following month.
Kieron's earnings are due to be boosted further when his latest 12 landscape paintings go on sale next Friday for between £1,250 and £15,595 at the Picturecraft gallery in Holt.
The exhibition is expected to be another instant sell out with buyers pledging to camp overnight outside the gallery to ensure that they get one of his works.
His latest pictures include two views of St Benet's Abbey on the Norfolk Broads the Suleymaniye mosque in Istanbul.
Kieron's parents Keith, 44, and Michelle, 38, have made sure that his earnings have been held in trust for him until he is older.
Former builder Mr Williamson said: "He already has his own house so if he decides he wants to do something completely different when he is older, at least he won't have to worry about a mortgage."
Picturecraft gallery owner Adrian Hill said: "He is unrivalled. There isn't any other child out there who can paint as well in three different media -watercolour, oil and pastel.
"His grasp of the technical elements of working with them really is a wonderful thing."
Kieron's expertise was only recognised when he started art lessons after taking up painting in 2008. His previous artistic talents were limited to colouring in dinosaurs which his parents had drawn for him.
His skill with a brush has amazed art experts who believe his detailed pictures of mainly Norfolk landscapes are way beyond his years.
Kieron's work first came on the market in the summer of 2009 when 19 of his paintings were sold for £14,000 in a sealed bid auction.
Three months later another 16 of his paintings were up snapped for £17,000 in just 14 minutes in his second exhibition at the Picturecraft gallery.
Buyers flew in from as far away as Arizona, New York and South Africa to buy his oils, watercolours and pastels at his third exhibition in July last year.
Some fans camped outside the gallery for up to 48 hours to make sure they did not miss out on one of his paintings priced between £1,825 and £7,995.
Other telephone bidders from Tokyo, Canada and Germany as well as from across the UK ensured the exhibition sold out instantly in 30 minutes.
Kieron later set a new record price for his work by selling two landscape paintings for around £21,000 in a sealed bid auction which attracted interest from around the world.
The pictures had special significance as one was the last he painted when he was aged seven and the other was his first work after his eighth birthday.
The first picture, an oil painting of a Suffolk scene showing rolling fields and a church, was snapped up by a collector in California.
The other was a pastel painting of the desolate shoreline at Winterton, Norfolk, which was bought by a fan from Slovinia.
Many of Kieron's paintings feature iconic locations on the north Norfolk coast such as Morston, Blakeney, Cley, Holkham and Brancaster.
2011年11月3日星期四
‘Cellini’ & Abe painting to stay in Springfield Lincoln museum
Convicted power broker Bill Cellini undoubtedly whispered in the ear of many a politician during his era of influence in state politics, but none is more famous than Abraham Lincoln.
An uncanny likeness of Cellini is pictured alongside the 16th president in an oil painting at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, and the painting is going to remain hanging despite Cellini’s corruption convictions Tuesday, the museum said Wednesday.
“It’ll stay,” museum spokesman Dave Blanchette said.
Cellini is wearing a black suit and peering over Lincoln’s shoulder while the president sits in a chair and inspects votal totals from the 1864 election. Cellini is gesturing in the painting, as if to make a point to Lincoln.
“The artist never officially told us who the people he used for models in the picture are, so we don’t have confirmation from the person who knows whether that’s him or not,” Blanchette said when asked the rationale behind keeping the painting.
“And second, there’s no reason to change anything in the museum. It’s great the way it is. It’s almost 3 million people who have been through, and it’s the world’s most popular presidential museum. We think everything was done right in the museum.”
State lawmakers took an entirely different tack with convicted ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich, passing a law last year that barred the expenditure of any state funds on any oil painting of the impeached ex-governor.
That law effectively barred Blagojevich’s likeness from being hung in the state Capitol’s Hall of Governors, where an oil painting of every chief executive except him is hanging.
An uncanny likeness of Cellini is pictured alongside the 16th president in an oil painting at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, and the painting is going to remain hanging despite Cellini’s corruption convictions Tuesday, the museum said Wednesday.
“It’ll stay,” museum spokesman Dave Blanchette said.
Cellini is wearing a black suit and peering over Lincoln’s shoulder while the president sits in a chair and inspects votal totals from the 1864 election. Cellini is gesturing in the painting, as if to make a point to Lincoln.
“The artist never officially told us who the people he used for models in the picture are, so we don’t have confirmation from the person who knows whether that’s him or not,” Blanchette said when asked the rationale behind keeping the painting.
“And second, there’s no reason to change anything in the museum. It’s great the way it is. It’s almost 3 million people who have been through, and it’s the world’s most popular presidential museum. We think everything was done right in the museum.”
State lawmakers took an entirely different tack with convicted ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich, passing a law last year that barred the expenditure of any state funds on any oil painting of the impeached ex-governor.
That law effectively barred Blagojevich’s likeness from being hung in the state Capitol’s Hall of Governors, where an oil painting of every chief executive except him is hanging.
2011年11月2日星期三
Rico Solinas' Saw-Blade Paintings Elevate a Folksy Tradition
My grandfather died, quickly and unexpectedly, on Thanksgiving Day in 1987. My mother returned from his Ohio funeral with a suitcase full of Grandpa's circular saw blades. Mom, a prolific oil painter, gessoed the blades and used them as canvases for landscapes that she gave to each of her five children as a remembrance of her father-in-law, a career carpenter who'd loved making things with wood.
I thought she was mad. I didn't know then that saw-blade painting has a long history, dating back to the 18th century, and is among the earliest versions of tole painting, which for a very long time was limited to folk art renderings on tin and other metal ware. (Somehow, tole painting has grown over the years to include any kind of folksy painting on wooden objects and furniture.) I've run across saw-blade paintings since, always done on circular blades and always too pastoral for my taste.
Rico Solinas' saw-blade paintings, now on display at the ASU Art Museum, are neither folksy nor circular. His "100 Museums: Paintings of Buildings That Have Paintings Inside" is a stunning collection of architectural portraits done on old hand saws, and may — if the exhibit travels and receives the acclaim it deserves —elevate saw painting's folksy reputation.
Solinas is a native of Oakland, California, who studied at Corcoran School of Art and who's best known as a painter of figuratives and landscapes. In the late '80s, he created a series of saw-blade paintings of trucks and service vehicles that paid homage to the American work ethic; a later series depicted the homes of fellow California artists. The new series, despite its title, is an exhibit of 102 paintings and features stunning, photo-realistic depictions of the world's museums, painted over a 13-year period. Some are solemn in muted grays and tans, like Rome's majestic Galleria Borghese; others pop with joyous splashes of color, as with the hyper-moderne Museum Ludwig in Cologne (home to Gottfried Helnwein's shocking Last Supper).
Solinas, a preparator at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, brings the genius of a gifted miniaturist to each painting: here, the minute detail of a wee outbuilding of the Stedeljik in Amsterdam; there, the tiny scrolling on the pillars of the Museo Morandi in Bologne. There's some playful irony in these paintings, too — the tension between the rough, old-fashioned hand saws painted with depictions of modern glass-and-chrome structures, the paradox of a hallowed home of exquisite fine art depicted on a homely hand tool.
Those tools — or their gorgeous, often ornate handles, at least — nearly steal Solinas' thunder. Hand-carved, paint-chipped, and rubbed smooth by sweat and a firm grip, the saw handles are themselves a kind of art. I resisted the urge to discuss the collecting of saws when I briefly met Solinas at the exhibit's opening-night party last month. Instead, I asked why he paints on saw blades. "I don't want to make something that's already showing in a museum," he told me. "I wanted something unique that would make sense hanging there, but that you wouldn't find around the next corner."
He's succeeded. Presented in a more traditional manner, these would merely be neat, accurate oil paintings of a lot of interesting buildings. And while their presentation is quite dramatic — five groupings of roughly 20 saws each — it's an up-close inspection of the paintings that reveals their genius.
I thought she was mad. I didn't know then that saw-blade painting has a long history, dating back to the 18th century, and is among the earliest versions of tole painting, which for a very long time was limited to folk art renderings on tin and other metal ware. (Somehow, tole painting has grown over the years to include any kind of folksy painting on wooden objects and furniture.) I've run across saw-blade paintings since, always done on circular blades and always too pastoral for my taste.
Rico Solinas' saw-blade paintings, now on display at the ASU Art Museum, are neither folksy nor circular. His "100 Museums: Paintings of Buildings That Have Paintings Inside" is a stunning collection of architectural portraits done on old hand saws, and may — if the exhibit travels and receives the acclaim it deserves —elevate saw painting's folksy reputation.
Solinas is a native of Oakland, California, who studied at Corcoran School of Art and who's best known as a painter of figuratives and landscapes. In the late '80s, he created a series of saw-blade paintings of trucks and service vehicles that paid homage to the American work ethic; a later series depicted the homes of fellow California artists. The new series, despite its title, is an exhibit of 102 paintings and features stunning, photo-realistic depictions of the world's museums, painted over a 13-year period. Some are solemn in muted grays and tans, like Rome's majestic Galleria Borghese; others pop with joyous splashes of color, as with the hyper-moderne Museum Ludwig in Cologne (home to Gottfried Helnwein's shocking Last Supper).
Solinas, a preparator at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, brings the genius of a gifted miniaturist to each painting: here, the minute detail of a wee outbuilding of the Stedeljik in Amsterdam; there, the tiny scrolling on the pillars of the Museo Morandi in Bologne. There's some playful irony in these paintings, too — the tension between the rough, old-fashioned hand saws painted with depictions of modern glass-and-chrome structures, the paradox of a hallowed home of exquisite fine art depicted on a homely hand tool.
Those tools — or their gorgeous, often ornate handles, at least — nearly steal Solinas' thunder. Hand-carved, paint-chipped, and rubbed smooth by sweat and a firm grip, the saw handles are themselves a kind of art. I resisted the urge to discuss the collecting of saws when I briefly met Solinas at the exhibit's opening-night party last month. Instead, I asked why he paints on saw blades. "I don't want to make something that's already showing in a museum," he told me. "I wanted something unique that would make sense hanging there, but that you wouldn't find around the next corner."
He's succeeded. Presented in a more traditional manner, these would merely be neat, accurate oil paintings of a lot of interesting buildings. And while their presentation is quite dramatic — five groupings of roughly 20 saws each — it's an up-close inspection of the paintings that reveals their genius.
2011年11月1日星期二
New Exhibit of Oil Paintings on Display at Frances Anderson Center
Beginning today, oil bar paintings by K Robinson can been seen thorugh Dec. 14 at the Frances Anderson Center in Edmonds.
The exhibit is sponsored by the Edmonds Arts Festival Foundation and the Edmonds Arts Commission.
According to Kris Gilliespie, cultural services assistant for the City of Edmonds, oil bars are basically oil pastels. Unlike chalky pastels, there are also oil pastels which are more like crayons—they give a depth of color and stability and texture that is different from chalk pastels or paints.
In the display case exhibit “Color of Light,” Robinson demonstrates a progressive study of how to express an idea using different formats and media. “I was inspired to find a way to show these elusive effects of light that changed with the seasons, weather, and time of day," she said. "The medium of oil pastels has the color intensity of oil paint but also allows for interesting strokes, overlays, and weaving of color.”
“Beach Walk,” displayed in the EAF Museum gallery, includes representative pieces from an ongoing series of oil bar paintings inspired by walks along the shore in Virginia and North Carolina. The artist says that the techniques possible with oil bar “express well the scintillating energy … felt at the edge of the ocean.”
Robinson grew up in Virginia, graduating from the College of William and Mary with a bachelor's in fine arts. Adding a architecture master's from the University of Pennsylvania, she practiced architecture for many years in Washington, D.C.
She reconnected with painting in the 1990s in California’s Bay Area and chose to work in plein air oil painting and botanical watercolors, painting with the Glover Group, painters perpetuating the legacy of the Society of Six with artist and teacher Pam Glover.
After moving to Seattle in 2003, Robinson continued her study and painting at Gage Academy, working with mentors Mitch Albala, Margaret Davidson and Tom Hoffmann. In 2008, she became a member of 49th Street Studio in Ballard where, with the influence of years of sailing and living on the water, she continues to draw inspiration from the constantly changing coastlines, luminous skies and endless waterways of the Pacific Northwest.
The exhibit is sponsored by the Edmonds Arts Festival Foundation and the Edmonds Arts Commission.
According to Kris Gilliespie, cultural services assistant for the City of Edmonds, oil bars are basically oil pastels. Unlike chalky pastels, there are also oil pastels which are more like crayons—they give a depth of color and stability and texture that is different from chalk pastels or paints.
In the display case exhibit “Color of Light,” Robinson demonstrates a progressive study of how to express an idea using different formats and media. “I was inspired to find a way to show these elusive effects of light that changed with the seasons, weather, and time of day," she said. "The medium of oil pastels has the color intensity of oil paint but also allows for interesting strokes, overlays, and weaving of color.”
“Beach Walk,” displayed in the EAF Museum gallery, includes representative pieces from an ongoing series of oil bar paintings inspired by walks along the shore in Virginia and North Carolina. The artist says that the techniques possible with oil bar “express well the scintillating energy … felt at the edge of the ocean.”
Robinson grew up in Virginia, graduating from the College of William and Mary with a bachelor's in fine arts. Adding a architecture master's from the University of Pennsylvania, she practiced architecture for many years in Washington, D.C.
She reconnected with painting in the 1990s in California’s Bay Area and chose to work in plein air oil painting and botanical watercolors, painting with the Glover Group, painters perpetuating the legacy of the Society of Six with artist and teacher Pam Glover.
After moving to Seattle in 2003, Robinson continued her study and painting at Gage Academy, working with mentors Mitch Albala, Margaret Davidson and Tom Hoffmann. In 2008, she became a member of 49th Street Studio in Ballard where, with the influence of years of sailing and living on the water, she continues to draw inspiration from the constantly changing coastlines, luminous skies and endless waterways of the Pacific Northwest.
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