Category: visual

“[H]ere’s the most formidable challenge facing the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art as it prepares to enlarge its brick-clad citadel on Third Street: The architecture must soar, or the new wing will mock the museum’s grand dreams.”

LACMA director and CEO Michael “Govan is known for a keen interest in contemporary architecture,” but his recruitment of Pritzker Prize winner Peter Zumthor to reconfigure the campus will be viewed by many Angelenos “as merely the latest in a long line of high-profile architectural plans to remake the museum, none of which has so far come close to fulfilling its early promise.”

“Its creators said the cube represents the space that one metric ton of carbon dioxide would occupy if stored at standard atmospheric pressure — specifically, a space that is the equivalent of 27 feet cubed, or 19,683 cubic feet.” That’s because “[t]he average citizen of an industrialized country releases one metric ton of carbon dioxide per month.”

“Alitalia collected Italian modern art between the 1950s and the 1960s to generate publicity for home-grown artists such as Lucio Fontana, known for his slashes on the canvas, and the Futurist movement, which began in Italy in the early 20th century.”

“MoMA’s cash and investments declined to $610 million from $788 million in the year that ended in June,” but even so, it “has avoided firing staffers to offset budget squeezes.”

“Richard Wright’s shimmering wall painting, a luminous expanse of intricately patterned gold-leaf that seems, as you enter the exhibition’s second gallery, almost to float upon its far wall, is the type of artwork that even a traditionalist can admire.”

“The award, the Future Generation Art Prize, will be given every two years” by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation “and is open to any young artist who applies online. About 100 professionals will also be asked to nominate candidates they think are producing exceptional work.”

“In the last decade, real-estate nutsiness created those rare conditions all over (even at a few spots in Manhattan), but Dubai was the place where the furthest whimsies of architects–rotating towers! A carbon-neutral ziggurat for 1 million people! A hotel designed by Brad Pitt!–were finally matched by the hubris of clients.”

“Bouncing back from last year’s weak showing, nearly 75 percent of galleries at Art Basel Miami Beach said sales revenue grew at least 15 percent over 2008, according to a Miami Herald survey. More than a third reported a sales hike of more than 30 percent at the country’s largest contemporary art show.”

“One bright spot of the worldwide recession: It seems to have restored rigor to the trade show, which ends Sunday. Crowds have been appreciably thinner this year, but gallerists exhibiting everywhere from Basel proper to Scope, Art Miami, NADA and Pulse are reporting strong sales — and they’re smiling a lot more than they did last year, when the economy took a nosedive right before the fair opened.”