https://youtu.be/ViGaTcP8XPw Travel hopefully “To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.” This famous phrase from Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson can be perfectly applied to the new large-scale exhibition at the Centre...
Kunstmuseum in Basel: Louise Bourgeois augmented through the eyes of Jenny Holzer
https://youtu.be/5ZQQ5IQ-UQQ Before everyone else It’s not a good thing to be right before everyone else. The artist Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) whose work is haunted by themes of trauma and femininity only started to gain recognition in the...
Centre Pompidou: Why did Christo wrap things?
Thanks a to a hairdresser There are many smaller stories within the larger sweep of history. Christo, the Bulgarian-born artist who died on 31 May 2020, famous for his gigantic wrapping works at the scale of Paris’s Pont Neuf in 1985 and the...
Pinault Collection: When the most magical parts of Los Angeles meet Venice
No longer accessible The hazards and disasters of the coronavirus crisis mean many countries and artists that once seemed to be within reach are no longer accessible, and will apparently remain that way for some time. Excellent exhibition This is why we should...
Charles Stewart CEO of Sotheby’s: “reinventing the auctions model”
https://youtu.be/e94QGzpYduU Patrick Drahi It’s been 12 months since Sotheby’s was bought by the French businessman Patrick Drahi. It’s been 9 months since he appointed a new head of the auction house, former investment banker at...
Where does the myth of the cowboy fit in a racist America? Cowboy: the book
World afterwards again Since the start of the coronavirus crisis there's been too much talk about what the world's going to look like afterwards, to the point of rendering the expression meaningless even if it's true. No doubt mankind will still be pursuing...
The world afterwards (2) Subodh Gupta: “what is happening to us now must not be forgotten”
To reinvent obsessions The main strength of artists lies in their ability to reinvent identical obsessions. We are familiar with Subodh Gupta’s work through his installations – accumulations of metal kitchen utensils that have become the...
Hans Ulrich Obrist goes green: resolutions and warnings. A video interview
https://youtu.be/ot4aupt4VkY History of contemporary art Swiss-born Hans Ulrich Obrist (born in 1968) is now part of the history of contemporary art. The artistic director of the Serpentine Gallery in London has become a phenomenon in his own right thanks to...
Agnès Varda: a tribute to an extraordinary woman, filmmaker, feminist and poet
What sadness to learn that Agnès Varda, the heroine of French cinema, passed away during the night between 28 and 29 March. I was fortunate enough to have rubbed shoulders with this extraordinary woman on many occasions. I published a video interview with her this...
Arthur Jafa in London and Washington: you won’t have seen such an exceptional video in a very long time
He’s a genius in the recent history of the moving image, and his vision in the film“Love is the message, the message is death” (2016) leaves no viewer unscathed. The short extracts which could be available to watch online give nothing away compared to the powerful...
The Middle Eastern modern art market: when an influential collector accrues artists irrespective of the faith or gender
There’s no denying it: the new map of wealthy nations is directly influencing the art market. In the field of modern art, even if Europe with Picasso at the helm (the record price for his work is $179 million, set in 2015) has represented the inner circle of...
David Hockney retrospective at the Pompidou: painting for pleasure, first and foremost
(David Hockney studio did not allow photos or videos in the exhibition even for journalists ) There are artists who dream about pictorial revolutions and there are those who celebrate easel painting as it has always been. Painting has its great adventurers, those who...