Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989) was a great artist, not just a great photographer. He will forever be etched in memory as someone who immortalised in black and white those perfectly formed, statuesque naked male bodies in highly constructed environments. The numerous...
While the art world is in thrall to the latest fashions of contemporary art and the market, and while museums are ever more influenced (perhaps too much) by their generous patrons who keep these public institutions alive, New York has witnessed the birth a small...
The Armory Show is an event that is eagerly awaited in New York. The longest-running fair in the world capital of contemporary art, bringing together 205 galleries, appointed its new director, the former art journalist Benjamin Genocchio, last December just as global...
There are those who claim that the art market is globalised but as the Swiss dealer Ernst Beyeler used to say in the '90s, ‘The Italians buy Italian, the Americans buy American and the Germans buy German.’ Arco, which opened on Thursday, provides an interesting...
There’s a strange microclimate in the land once ruled by the Dukes of Burgundy. It’s where you’ll find the impressive tomb of those monarchs of the Middle Ages, but that’s only scratching the surface... Ever since 1977 this town synonymous with mustard has also been...
A stone’s throw from the ugly Montparnasse Tower, which casts its 56-storey shadow over this historic and charming neighbourhood, an extraordinary new art space has recently opened. Be warned, it’s a journey back into time. At 21 Avenue du Maine, on a paved...
The Norwegian art world’s undisputed star is a man who dragged himself through life in a state of existential malaise. His name is Edvard Munch (1863-1944). In his native city, Oslo, the museum that is devoted to him houses an immense treasure, an extraordinary number...
Renowned historian and curator Michael Peppiatt saw his life change one day in 1963 when, by sheer coincidence, someone advised he meet the painter Francis Bacon. From then on a friendship ensued, with its ups and downs, in collaboration and fascination. ...
China is changing at lightning speed, and so are its artists. Communist folklore, gaudy-colored post-Pop artworks and giant portraits of grimacing people are long gone. Today, China’s artists have reached the apex of global relevance, art market practices and new...
A Chinese artist and global art star, Ai Weiwei is an intelligent, quick, smiling, mischievous, facetious, surprising, off-center human being, by turns moral and inflammatory. What else? He doesn’t take himself seriously but is nevertheless able to say: “I am art.”...
This story takes place in a land known as the world’s top gas producer, the owner of the Paris Saint Germain soccer team, the 2002 World Cup Soccer organizer (and attendant controversies), and as the place from where Al-Jazeera’s Arabic- and English-language programs...
In a world region torn by terrible conflicts, a small oasis is betting on the art market in a striking manner. In Dubai, the United Arab Emirates’ epicenter of tourism and banking, Alserkal Avenue is a 46,500 square-meter (500,521 square-foot) area in a former marble...