Art Of The Day Weekly
#11 - from 6 July 2006 to 13 July 2006
IN THE AIR
Long live black!
We all recall Courréges' white or Klein's blue. Those colours make us think of Summer days. Well, forget them! This Spring and Summer seasons the fashion will be black. We have seen a good number of publications and exhibitions, of which the most recent are held at the Maeght Foundation in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, and –this is no joke - at the White Cube gallery in London as of 7 July. At the same time another paladin of black is receivng all the honours in Paris, at the musem of decorative arts: fashion designer Cristobal Balenciaga, whose name resounds like a bell. A Basque born in 1895, he left his country during the Spanish Civil War and settled at 10, avenue George V, to become one of the major addresses on the fashion map. Why so much black? It is the colour of rigor, of the absolute – is it meant to separate one from the trivialities of mass consumption and the insipid chatter of talk-shows? Or does it reflect the disillusioned spirit of old Europe? We will let the exegetes decide before the colour is no longer in fashion. The poor performance given by the referees during the Wold Cup will probably discourage more than one enthusiast…
MUSEUMS
Glasgow will recover its Kelvingrove
GLASGOW – This is the Scottish city's baby. This encyclopedic museum opened in 1901 through the benefits of the international exhibition in 1888. It holds a very varied collection, of which the back bone is formed by the donations from businessman Archibald McLellan (dead in 1854). We can admire side by side Dali's Christ of St John of the Cross, Rembrandts and Whistlers, a good impressionnist collection, paintings by the Glasgow Boys from 1895 and pieces by Charles Rennie McIntoch, weapons from all eras, a Spitfire salvaged from the Second World War and the exact recipe for haggis served at breakfast…Three years of works and 41 million euros later the building has a new appearance and the technical refinements needed to approach the XXIst century. The Kelvingrove Museum should have no trouble in regaining its status of the museum with the greatest attendance in Scotland: prior to its restauration, it already welcomed one million visitors per year.
EXHIBITIONS
Japan and Van Gogh
AMSTERDAM – The opening of Japan as of 1868 – the Meiji period - was a new source of inspiration that manifested itself to Western artists, made popular in particular through the prints. Vincent Van Gogh was also conquered, as he wrote to this brother Theo that Japanese art «makes one happier». The collection presented at the Van Gogh Museum, one of the most complete in the world, was brought together by businessman Nasser Khalili, born in Iran in 1945. It includes lacquered pannels, cloisonné enamels, porcelain, objects in metal and a spectacular incense burner four metres tall. Paintings of Van Gogh's are placed along the itinerary and show how the Japanese themes – the iris and other flowers, the birds, the country bridges – all penetrated his work.
The actor unveiled by the artist
AVIGNON – The Lambert collection is on Avignon festival time and examines the representation of actors through time. Nearly 400 works make up this gallery of sacred monstres, from Molière or Rachel (painted by Deveria) up to Angelina Jolie or Isabelle Huppert, who opens the exhibition by replaying her major parts in front of the lens of photographer Roni Horn. Two partnerships with the Comédie-Française and the Bibliothèque nationale will supply the larger part of the historic funds, placed face to face with contemporary works. Delacroix, David d’Angers, Géricault and Mucha thus dialogue with Pierre Bismuth, Douglas Gordon or Vik Muniz (a portrait of Romy Schneider in diamond dust). A few sequences are nurrished – on the Commedia dell’arte, on Sarah Bernhardt, on the death of the actor. In the latter we can see a premonitory photo by Dennis Stock: James Dean trying out, for fun, a padded coffin, a few months prior to his own death. It was in 1955 and yet, James Dean is still present. The advantage of the great actor is that he never really dies.
Buffet revisited
THE HAGUE - The title of the exhibition a the Gemeentemuseum, Bernard Buffet: une œuvre controversée, (Bernard Buffet: a contraversial work) says it all. By presenting some sixty paintings, prints, lithographs from the Maurice Garnier collection, the gallery owner in Paris who holds all the rights on the artist's work, the museum invites the amateur to carry out his own interpretation. The decision to hang the works in various rooms, thus allowing the large formats to breathe, and the idea of not sticking to a chronology nor to the miserabilist period - it covers the years from 1947 to 1999 - allows us to look at it all differently. The time of recognition, based on true knowledge of this artist, has maybe come.
The Blue Horseman, an art that obeys no law
SAINT-TROPEZ - «An art form that places itself over the laws and limits established by me is no longer an art form» Emperor William II would warn. Just two exhibitions between 1911 and 1912, and an almanac… How and why did a handfull of artists in revolt against the established art definitely open the way to renascent abstraction? With some sixty paintings and works on paper, the museum of the Annonciade unveils some clues. This is the first exhibition dedicated to Blaue Reiter alone, and to those who did it. Kandinsky and Marc, the leaders, as well as Macke, Jawlensky, Münter, Werefkin, Kubin, Klee, Schönberg, Kampendong, Niestlé… Voluntarily no work by «foreigners» invited to the exhibitions, except for an allusion through the work of French artist Girieud (but by climbing the stairs, you will find in the permanent collection the flamboyant Fauvists who took part in it). Rare works, artists who are not necessarily known, from the surprising Tarier des prairies by Jean Blooé Niestlé to La Grande Route by Marianne von Werefkin, who pulls you, together with Jawlenski, towards the back of the room. Young artists who are still looking for an identity, «internationals», open to the world – we can see reappear here and there the trace of the Nabis, of Marquet or of Pont-Aven - from "Great Realism" to "Great Abstraction". And the triumph of colour...
BOOKS
Art books, an adventure of the XXth century
He was a curious character, mysterious in many ways, who -with his review and his publishing house on rue du Dragon, at Saint-Germain-des-Prés- travelled together over quite a distance with the art of the XXe century. Christian Zervos, born on the island of Cephalonia in 1889, whose childhood we know very little about, published a review with his wife Yvonne for decades. The review, Les Cahiers d’art, was basic (and basically deficitary) but he even burnt his wooden floor for it…The years after the war were kinder to him, marked in particular by the publication of the catalogue raisonné of his friend Picasso and by the unforgetable art exhibition at the Popes' Palace of Avignon in 1947, with René Char: simply the genesis of the Avignon festival as Jean Vilar was called in for a theatre event… All of these episodes are described in detail as well the most important works brought together by Zervos: Braque, Léger, Mirò, Picasso, Laurens, Charchoune, etc. Just before his death, in 1970, he donated his possesions to the municipality of Vezelay, where he had a residence. Twenty five years later, his museum finally exists, in… Romain Rolland's house! His collection can be seen there since the month of May 2006.
IN BRIEF
ALBISOLA - Named Indisciplinata, the 3rd biannual event of ceramics in contemporary art will be held from 8 July to 10 September on the coast of Liguria. Aside from Albisola, the exhibition centers are Albissola Marina, Savone and Vado Ligure.
BOULOGNE-BILLANCOURT – Following the disapointment of the Pinault foundation, gone to Venice, the former Renault lots are no longer the talk of the town. In a rather discreet ceremony mayor Jean-Piarre Fourcade and Nicolas Sarkozy will place on 7 July the corner stone of the new development programme.
LA ROCHELLE – Don Quichotte is four hundred years old but his myth continues to inspire contemporary artists. Some thirty creators – among them Bioullès, Viallat, Di Rosa, Ben, Garouste - will get together until 15 August in the former tide hall, the Lantern tower and the cloister of the Dames blanches.
LONDRES – The Serpentine Gallery contributes to the architectural debate with its temporary pavilions built in the green setting of Hyde Park. The harvest of 2006, with inflatable elements, was commissioned to Rem Koolhaas and Cecil Balmond. It will open on 13 July.
MULHOUSE – The car museum of the Schlumpf brothers has received a lifting and will open on 7 July as the Cité de l’automobile. It holds some 400 models from different periods, of which nearly one hundred Bugatti.
NIAUX (Ardèche) – The Niaux, one of the most beautiful decorated grotto in Europe, will celebrate its one hundred years. To mark the event, a part of the Clastres underground network will exceptionally be left open to some "happy few" (450 visitors from July to September), to access the deepest galleries in the Niaux grotto. To try to register, tel.: 05 61 02 30 80.
PARIS – The Louvre museum has just put the Lafayette base on line. This is the catalogue of the works by Americain artists, done before 1940, and which are in the French public collections. This represents nearly 1700 references.
ROME – Started in 2000, the works have finally ended at the Lapidarium of the Museo Nazionale de Palazzo Venezia, to be inaugurated 6 July. It holds some 130 pieces – fragments of sarcophagus, frieze, tombestones, the Popes' coats of arms –from the Roman times to the Renaissance.
A description of the Lapidarium in the museum of Palazzo Venezia
VILLENEUVE-D’ASCQ – The new school of architecture of Lille, designed by Nasrine Seraji, was inaugurated on 25 May.
ON ARTOFTHEDAY.INFO
This week, do not miss
LACOSTE - As each year, the village in Provence and its castle, which belonged to the marquis de Sade, are transformed into exhibition areas by the Savannah College of Art and Design. The architecture firm from New York ARCHITECTS has designed Wind Shape, an impressive installation of ropes and plastic tubes. It rubs shoulders on the hills of Luberon with works by Piotr Klemensiewicz or Dandy Dwarves.
LLUBLJANA - The national gallery of Slovenia, in the context of the cultural exchanges with Italy, presents some thirty basic works by artists from Siena from the XIVth to the XVIIIth century. Lorenzetti, Sano di Pietro, Sassetta are present as well as illuminated pharmacopoeia and the famous biccherne, the painted covers of the municipality's accounting books.