Category: visual

“The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council has been selected to run an artists’ studio and exhibition space on Governors Island that will include a year-round artist residency and weekend events. … The selection of the council is the latest effort to transform the 172-acre island in New York Harbor into a destination that is an integral part of city life.”

The Chanel Pavilion in Central Park “certainly oozes glamour. Its mysterious nautiluslike form … reflects the keen architectural intelligence we have come to expect from its creator, Zaha Hadid, the Iraqi-born architect who lives in London. Yet if devoting so much intellectual effort to such a dubious undertaking might have seemed indulgent a year ago, today it looks delusional.”

“By the end of the sale, 27 percent of the works remained stranded. At the press conference held in a subdued atmosphere, a Sotheby’s spokesperson revealed that the auction house had worked hard to persuade consignors to bring down their reserves. As Christie’s took over on Sunday afternoon in a leaden atmosphere, there were empty seats in the room.”

Some dealers appeared to have lowered prices. At London’s White Cube, a richly enameled painting by Anglo-Indian star Raqib Shaw was on hold at 575,000 pounds. In June at Art Basel, a similar-sized work by Shaw sold for 750,000 pounds.

Already the financial-market meltdown has diminished the endowment funds that cover museums’ day-to-day operating expenses. Lehman Brothers, for years a crucial sponsor for museums across the country, is no more. Surviving banking institutions and corporations that also have been the bedrock of exhibition support are likely to give far less or cut off gifts altogether.

London’s Serpentine Gallery has invited a slew of artists to pen manifestos laying out their individual philosophies on life and art in the 21st century, in an effort to revive the written statement of artistic principles that played such an important role in the 20th century art world.

“More than £100,000 worth of art is being given away at the Free Art Fair, in London. Some people have queued overnight to get their hands on work by artists like Gavin Turk and Stella Vine for nothing… The idea was to provide an antidote to the hype that surrounded Damien Hirst’s recent record-breaking sale at Sotheby’s, which raised £111m.”

“Atlanta art collector Paul R. Jones has donated his 1,700-piece art collection to the University of Alabama. Valued at $4.8 million, the collection of 20th-century African-American art is the result of more than 40 years of collecting.”

“New Yorkers Herbert and Dorothy Vogel… working with the National Gallery of Art in Washington and federal arts agencies, chose the University Museum at Southern Illinois University to receive 50 pieces [of the Vogel collection.] The gift is part of a plan announced in April to donate 50 works from the Vogels to one art institution in each state. Ten recipients were named then, and announcements about the remaining 40 are expected this week.”

“Art is selling at this week’s Frieze Art Fair, but nothing like before. After several weeks of financial havoc in stock exchanges across the globe, the feeding frenzy is over… More pervasive was a grim sense that a shake-out of world markets was just beginning, and in the end art would probably be the least of anyone’s worries.”