30/04/13

FESPA 2013 London: Creative Corner Conference speakers announced


FESPA confirms an all-star line-up for its inaugural conference the Creative Corner arriving at FESPA 2013, London, 25-29 June 2013.

Among the line-up are some of the biggest names in advertising and design including keynote presentations from: Coca Cola, McCann NY, TBWA and Unilever. The conference programme will address key topics for the creative community, showcasing what print can do and opening up the relationship between PSPs and end-users.

Founded in 1962, FESPA is a global federation of 37 member associations for the screen printing, digital printing and textile printing community. FESPA’s dual aim is to promote screen printing and digital imaging and to share knowledge about screen and digital printing with its members across the world, helping them to grow their businesses and learn about the latest developments in their fast growing industries.  




FESPA 2013 CREATIVE CORNER

Located on the show floor on stand Q100N in the north hall, the five day conference is free to attend for all FESPA 2013 visitors. Seminars will look at providing tips on design for particular print applications including; retail packaging and instore POP, interior decoration, outdoor media and extra large print. On Thursday 27 June the Creative Corner will host a VIP day for advertising creatives and brand owners, where visitors can see examples of what print can offer when it’s used effectively – including a hosted tour of the Print Inspiration Runway.

Kicking off the conference, the first day looks at retail packaging with Michelle Adams, Founder & President of Marketing Brainology. Michelle Adams will discuss her shopper engagement study which looks at the part neuroscience plays in the instore customer decision making process. 

SASKIA GOETEYN
The afternoon on day one will see the first keynote seminar from Saskia Goeteyn, EU Design Innovator at Coca-Cola Services. She will discuss how businesses can increase brand loyalty and how as an organisation Coca-Cola creates value and drives competitive advantage for its global portfolio of brands. Coca-Cola’s 90-year iconic brand design will be showcased as a case study highlighting the value of good design.

Interiors is the focus of the Creative Corner on day two, where Felipe Araujo and Daniel Perez from Catalonian interior design agency Eque y Seta, will explore how they are using print in the interior realm and the relevance it has within their industry. They will also offer examples of how their clients are using print as well as a case study of a recent project they worked on called ‘Print Avenue’. Debbie McKeegan, Creative Director at Digetex Group will also take to the floor focusing on soft furnishings and the possibilities and capabilities of print in this industry.

Day three is the VIP day dedicated to creatives and brand owners, with a packed programme of topics looking at the effectiveness of print within today’s marketing mix. The sessions will discuss the future integration of print with digital technologies such as QR codes, augmented reality and near field communication, as well as outline how PSPs can embrace these new opportunities to provide value to their customers to increase business performance.

SAM TOMLINSON

Beginning the day Sam Tomlinson, Director at PwC will discuss why media metrics and data analytics are critical in demonstrating ROI to advertisers. Linking to PwC’s work, Sam Tomlinson will also explain how brands can better understand and integrate the behaviours of audiences across multiple platforms. Also stepping up to the platform is Brad Mintz, Director of Print Services at Craft NY. Using a selection of case studies from Craft, a McCann company, Brad Mintz will explore the power of printed media, how he has used print and its variety of possibilities within multiple campaigns.

TILL SCHUTTE
Beginning the afternoon session is Till Schütte, European Head of Design & Graphics Production at Coca-Cola. Till Schütte will discuss the importance of personalisation in print and will illustrate how Coca-Cola has implemented VDP (Variable Data Printing) as part of its latest print offering.

PETER SOUTER
Advertising veteran and respected TV, radio and film writer, Peter Souter, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer at TBWA, will discuss his experience within the industry where he has worked on brands such as BT, Guinness, Sainsburys and Walkers in his seminar titled ‘Set up, expand, twist, resolve’.

BRENDAN COOK
Day four focuses on outdoor media where visitors can hear from the largest outdoor advertiser space holders in Australasia, oOh!media. Brendan Cook, oOhmedia!’s Chief Executive Officer will help the audience define outdoor media and look at case studies of top class global brand campaigns. This is a two part seminar where Keith Ferrel, General Manager at Cactus Imaging will take the reins for the second part by exploring the logistics of working alongside oOh!media and discuss how their integrated campaign was implemented. Brett Haylock, Head of Digital Product at ClearChannel UK will also lead a seminar on mobile platforms and how they can harness the power of print and continue brand conversations online.

“FESPA is planning something very special for the final day of the Creative Corner, we’ve got something up our sleeves so keep your eyes peeled for more information!” comments Duncan MacOwan, Head of Events and New Media. Duncan MacOwan continues, “At FESPA we are always looking to target new audiences to benefit our global print community. Brand owners recognise print is central to their marketing campaigns, the Creative Corner aims to engage those creatives and designers to illustrate how powerful print is across multiple platforms. To have case studies and seminars from some of the biggest brands in the world will hopefully inspire printers and provide them with the opportunity to discuss these creative possibilities with their customers.”

All images of this post courtesy of FESPA.

For more information on FESPA 2013 visit: www.fespa.com

29/04/13

Spencer Finch exhibition, James Cohan Gallery New York - Fathom

SPENCER FINCH

Spencer Finch, Fathom
James Cohan Gallery, New York
May 2 - June 15, 2013

To “fathom” is to comprehend the essence of something colossal or ineffable by translating it into terms we can grasp. For more than twenty years, SPENCER FINCH’s practice addresses such a need to capture and frame experience. In site-specific installation as well as drawing and sculpture, Spencer Finch has combined scientific calibration and calculation with a romantic’s engagement with nature and faith in the limitless rewards of observation.

A fathom is also a unit of measurement approximately six feet in length that is used to measure the depth of water, and a key reference point for the exhibition. After learning about Henry David Thoreau’s 1846 survey of Walden Pond, in which the famed polymath performed soundings to determine the lake’s depth at 102 feet and debunk a popular myth that it was bottomless, Spencer Finch received permission from the Walden Pond State Reservation to take a boat on the lake and perform that seminal survey for the second time. Dropping rope into the pond, as Thoreau had, while also employing an electronic depth meter — combining old and new technology — Spencer Finch further measured longitude and latitude as well as color-matching the water at each sounding point.

The resulting work is a 120-foot long rope – the rope Spencer Finch used in the soundings, and the artist's description of the depth of Walden Pond. It serves as the physical record of the findings as well as an armature: paper tags for each of the approximately 700 soundings appear along the rope at their equivalent measure of depth along with their exact coordinates and a swatch of matched color, applied in watercolor. Neither entirely documentation nor sculpture, the long line may best be considered a drawing of Walden Pond.

The main gallery will include several other works delving into the idea of delineation, from continuous-line drawings of encircling vultures observed by the artist in Spain to abstract renderings of meteorological models used to predict weather patterns. Other new and recent works on view for the first time in New York address themes as varied as the color of the light on Mars, the breeze through Emily Dickinson’s bedroom window and the attempt to render wind through chalk pastel drawings of the movement of the curtains at Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s famous pavilion in Barcelona.

SPENCER FINCH (b. 1962, New Haven, Connecticut) exhibitions and commissions on Wanafoto Blogzine: Spencer Finch installation Following Nature, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN (through August 25, 2013); Spencer Finch, I'll tell you how the Sun rose, Galerie Nordenhake, Stockholm, Sweden (2012); Spencer Finch, Lori Hersberger, Martin Oppel: Weather Report, Ecole Régionale des Beaux-Arts de Rouen, France (2010); Spencer Finch, Amabilis Insania, Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin (2010);  Spencer Finch, In Praise of Shadows, Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin (2007-2008)... 

Next exhibition at James Cohan Gallery, New York: Shi Zhiying, June - July, 2013

James Cohan Gallery New York
www.jamescohan.com

Designers Stefan Sagmeister & Jessica Walsh, The Jewish Museum, New York, USA


First Exhibition by Designers Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh: Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh
The Jewish Museum, New York, USA
Through August 4, 2013

Designers Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh
Sagmeister & Walsh 
Stills from If I Don’t Ask, 2013 
HD video, 2min., 12 secs. 
In collaboration with Santiago Carrasquilla 
© Sagmeister & Walsh

The designers Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh are known for their experimental typography and striking visual imagery. Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh, on view at The Jewish Museum since March 15 through August 4, 2013, marks the first exhibition of their newly minted design firm Sagmeister & Walsh. For the last ten years, Sagmeister has researched the nature of happiness, asking, “Is it possible to train my mind in the same way I can train my body?” In five short films and a sculpture, the studio investigates six things, culled from Sagmeister's diary, that he believes have increased his personal happiness such as: “Now Is Better” and “If I Don’t Ask I Won’t Get.” In addition, intrigued by a recent nationwide survey in which Jews reported the highest levels of well-being of all religious groups, Sagmeister & Walsh are placing a text in the gallery that connects this scientific data to his personal exploration of happiness.

Before this partnership, Stefan Sagmeister was already taking an unusual approach to design. He has created signature album covers for Lou Reed, Talking Heads, the Rolling Stones, and OK Go, and others, and executed indelible ad campaigns for major companies such as HBO and Levi’s. In an iconic 1999 poster for the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), he incised type into the skin of his naked torso like a tattoo. At the contemporary art gallery Deitch Projects in 2008 he stacked 10,000 bananas against a wall. Unripe green bananas among the yellow ones spelled out the rallying sentence, “Self-confidence produces fine results.” The legibility of the text fluctuated as the fruit turned from green to yellow to black over the course of the exhibition. 

To stimulate his own creativity Sagmeister has gone on regular sabbaticals since 2000, traveling and investigating ideas. Over the last decade he has delved into the nature of happiness. Inspired by the psychologist Jonathan Haidt, whose research connects spiritual wisdom with modern science, Stefan Sagmeister developed an intensive regimen of meditation, cognitive therapy, and mood-altering drugs as an experiment in self-discovery. From this emerged a forthcoming documentary entitled The Happy Film and from that The Happy Show, a traveling exhibition and its accompanying publications, organized by the Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia. 

Six Things is a continuation of this project on happiness, in which Jessica Walsh has been an integral partner. In five compelling short videos and a sound-activated sculpture, Sagmeister & Walsh examines six things culled from Sagmeister’s diary that he believes have increased his personal happiness: 

If I Don’t Ask I Won’t Get 
Keeping a Diary Supports Personal Development 
Be More Flexible 
It Is Pretty Much Impossible to Please Everyone 
Now Is Better 
Feel Others Feel 

Sugar cubes, bubbles, and water balloons are just some of the materials used to spell out the phrases. The ambiguous connections between the six epigrams and the objects of which they are composed are left for visitors to decipher, a provocative game based in the pleasure of looking. 

A text in the Six Things exhibition gallery connects this scientific data to the personal exploration of happiness. It notes: “According to a recent nationwide survey, Jewish Americans report higher levels of happiness than all other major faith groups in the country. This finding is based on more than 676,000 interviews conducted in 2010-2011 for the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index. Within each faith surveyed, very religious members are happier than their nonreligious counterparts. For example, observant Jews are generally happier than secular Jews. But a higher proportion of practicing members does not predict greater well-being for the faith. Interestingly, though Jews are among the least religious faith groups in America, with only 16.9% identifying themselves as very religious and 53.5% as secular, they still appear to be the happiest. The Well-Being Index does not definitively say that religious observance leads to greater happiness. It does note that belief in a higher power, prayer, acts of charity, and neighborly love can promote a sense of belonging; alleviate stress and depression; and lead to a positive outlook on life.”

Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh has been organized by Rebecca Shaykin, Leon Levy Curatorial Assistant at The Jewish Museum. 

STEFAN SAGMEISTER & JESSICA WALSHS are the principals of Sagmeister & Walsh, a New York-based design firm. They have been engaged to create a new graphic identity for The Jewish Museum. 

STEFAN SAGMEISTER  born in Bregenz, Austria, in 1962, established the design firm Sagmeister Inc. in New York in 1993. He is the recipient of many awards, including two Grammy awards for his packaging designs, the Lucky Strike Designer Award, and an award from the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. 

Born in 1986 in New York, JESSICA WALSHS  a multidisciplinary designer, has worked at Pentagram Design and Print magazine and counts The New York Times, AIGA, EDP, Computer Arts, and I.D. magazine among her clients. She was named Computer Arts' Top Rising Star in Design in 2009 and an Art Director’s Club Young Gun in 2010, as well as Print’s New Visual Artist for 2011.

Exhibition Related Program: On Thursday, May 2 at 6:30pm, Stefan Sagmeister will talk about his recent projects including the exhibition, Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh.

Among other exhibition on view at The Jewish Museum in New York is the project: As it were … So to speak. A Museum Collection in Dialogue with Barbara Bloom, Through August 4, 2013.

Support: This exhibition is made possible by the Irma L. and Abram S. Croll Charitable Trust. Additional support is provided by StampStampede.org. 

The Jewish Museum, New York, USA
Museum website: www.thejewishmuseum.org

28/04/13

Exposition Keith Haring, Paris, MAM, Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris et au CentQuatre


Keith Haring, The Political Line
Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
CentQuatre, Paris
19 avril - 18 août 2013

Keith Haring
Portrait de Keith Haring par Philippe Bonan
Juin 1989 © Photographe : Philippe Bonan

Avec près de 250 oeuvres réalisées sur toile, sur bâche ou dans le métro, l'exposition KEITH HARING, THE POLITICAL LINE, la Ligne politique, au Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, est l’une des plus importantes jamais réalisées sur cet artiste new-yorkais, icone du Pop Art qui a largement contribué à la reconnaissance du Street Art.

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING, The Political Line
Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, affiche de l'exposition, courtesy du musée
Oeuvre : Keith Haring, Untitled, 1982
Collection de Sheikha Salama bint Hamdan Al Nahyan, Abou Dabi. Emirats Arabes Unis
Peinture vinylique sur bâche vinyle, 365,7 x 375,9 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation

Né en 1958 à Reading en Pennsylvanie, exposé dès 1978 alors qu'il n'a que 20 ans, Keith Haring est l'un des artistes américains les plus marquant du dernier quart du 20e siècle. C'est aussi l'un des plus connu et des plus appréciés du grand public. Posters, lithographies, cartes postales, design et autres produits dérivés, une partie de son oeuvre a été largement diffusée. C'est qu'elle présente un caractère ludique avec un côté enfantin. Mais les apparences sont en partie trompeuses : Keith Haring rend ainsi l'art accessible à tous mais il est aussi un intellectuel engagé, à la pensée subtile. Lorsque sa craie vient animée les fonds noirs des panneaux publicitaires vierges du métro new-yorkais, au début des années 1980, c'est dans l'histoire de l'art qu'il inscrit ses dessins. 

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING
Untitled, 1980
Collection Keith Haring Foundation
Encre sur carton ; 121,9 x 230,2 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation
Keith Haring
KEITH HARING
Untitled, 1982
Courtesy Keith Haring Foundation et Gladstone Gallery, New York et Bruxelles
Encre sumi sur papier ; 271,8 x 406,4 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation


Keith Haring fut l’un des artistes les plus célébrés de son époque, et aujourd’hui encore tout le monde connaît son style  incomparable et son répertoire de signes emblématiques. Il a été exposé avec Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Jenny Holzer et Daniel Buren dans le monde entier.

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING
A Pile of Crowns for Jean-Michel Basquiat, 1988
Collection Keith Haring Foundation
Acrylique sur toile 304,8 x 304,8 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation


A l'image de Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring n'a eu qu'une courte période, celle des années 1980, pour réaliser son Oeuvre, des Subway Drawings du début des années 1980 aux oeuvres publiques monumentales de 1989, en passant, entre autre, par la Documenta 7 de Cassel en 1982, la Biennale de Venise en 1984. Entre les deux dates, l'activité artistique de Keith Haring a été intense, mélant expositions, art urbain. Ses réalisations de street art, dans la rue, le métro et autres lieux publics étant marqués par sa volonté de rendre l'art accessible à tous : Keith Haring a souvent répété que tout le monde à le droit à l'art. Son langage visuel est largement lié à cette philosophie de l'artiste dans la mesure où ce langage est accessible. 

En utilisant délibérément la rue et les espaces publics pour s’adresser au plus grand nombre, il n’a cessé de lutter contre le racisme, le capitalisme et toutes sortes d’injustice et de violence, notamment l’Apartheid en Afrique du sud, la menace de guerre atomique, la destruction de l’environnement, l’homophobie et l’épidémie du sida dont il sera victime. Le parcours de l’exposition rend compte de ses prises de position critiques. 

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING
Reagan Ready to Kill, 1980
Collection Keith Haring Foundation
Collage de coupures de journaux et ruban adhésif sur papier ; 21,6 x 27,9 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation


L'exposition Keith Haring, The Political Line, au Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, comme son nom l'indique met l'accent sur la dimension politique et sociale de l'oeuvre de ce grand artiste engagé. Les messages et les idées politiques qu’il a véhiculés ne constituent pas seulement une part de son héritage, mais ont considérablement influencé les artistes et la société. Ses subway drawings, ses peintures, ses dessins et sculptures, étaient porteurs de messages de justice sociale, de liberté individuelle et de changement. Icône du Pop art, artiste subversif et militant, Keith Haring a multiplié les engagements tout au long de sa vie : très jeune, il était animé par une envie de transformer le monde. 

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING 
Untitled, 1988 
Collection Keith Haring Foundation 
Acrylique sur toile ; 304,8 cm de diamètre 
© Keith Haring Foundation 


Les Dix Commandements de Keith Haring au CENTQUATRE
Dix panneaux d'une hauteur de plus de 7 mètres et de 5 mètres de largeur chacun (769,6 x 502,9 cm) compose cette oeuvre de Keith Haring. Réalisée en décembre 1985, l'enfant prodige de l'art urbain y propose sa représentation des Dix commandements.  C'est à voir au CENTQUATRE à Paris dans le 19e arrondissement (5, rue Curial). Cet espace d'art expose également d'autres oeuvres grand formats, peintures et sculptures, de l'artiste américain décédé en 1990. Une vingtaine d'oeuvres sont exposées en parallèle à l'exposition au Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris. Le visiteur peut pénétrer dans Le Pop Shop, boutique réalisée par Keith Haring, dans un container à Tokyo en 1988.

Keith Haring aimait Paris. Il a notamment réalisé des oeuvres dans le métro parisien et son engagement en faveur des enfants victimes de la maladie l'a amené à réalisé en 1987 un mur peint à l'hôpital Necker à Paris.

Keith Haring
KEITH HARING
Untitled, 1982
Collection particulière
Peinture vinylique sur bâche vinyle ; 304,8 x 304,8 cm
© Keith Haring Foundation


Keith Haring, The Political Line : Catalogue de l’exposition au Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
Richement illustré, le catalogue reflète les différentes problématiques soulevées par l’exposition : l’art dans l’espace public, l’oppression de l’état et des mass media, la position de l’individu au sein de l’espace social etc. Il comporte des essais confiés à des spécialistes de l’oeuvre de Keith Haring que sont Dieter Buchhart, Odile Burluraux, Robert Farris Thompson, Julian Myers, Peter Pakesch, ainsi que deux entretiens avec Julia Gruen et Tony Shafrazi, son galeriste, et une chronologie développée.

Commissaires de l'exposition : Dieter Buchhart et Odile Burluraux
Directeur du Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris (www.mam.paris.fr) : Fabrice Hergott 
Directeur du CENTQUATRE (www.104.fr) : José-Manuel Gonçalvès
L'exposition Keith Haring, The Political Line a été réalisée en partenariat avec la Keith Haring Foundation, fondation a but non lucratif crée par Keith Haring lui-même en 1989 

Horaires d’ouverture
Mardi au dimanche de 10h à 18h (fermeture des caisses à 17h15)
Nocturne le jeudi de 18h à 22h (seulement les expositions) (fermeture des caisses à 21h15)
Fermeture le lundi et les jours fériés

25/04/13

Prix Sobey 2013 : Liste préliminaire des artistes retenus pour le Sobey Art Award 2013

Prix Sobey 2013 / Sobey Art Award 2013 : Liste préliminaire des artistes en lice


Le Musée des beaux-arts de la Nouvelle-Ecosse et la Fondation Sobey pour les arts ont annoncé le 19 avril la liste préliminaire du Prix artistique Sobey 2013, une importante reconnaissance pour le secteur de l’art contemporain du Canada. 

Chaque année, le Prix artistique Sobey est remis à un ou une artiste de 40 ans et moins qui a présenté ses œuvres dans une galerie d’art publique ou commerciale à l’intérieur de 18 mois de sa mise en candidature. Le jury de conservateurs a annoncé les 25 artistes en lice pour l’obtention du Prix artistique Sobey 2013 : 

Côte Ouest et Yukon
• Sonny Assu
• Cedric Bomford
• Isabelle Pauwels
• Mark Soo
• Brendan Lee Satish Tang

Prairies et Nord
• Amalie Atkins 
• Mark Clintberg 
• Brenda Draney 
• Simon Hughes 
• Divya Mehra

Ontario
• Diane Borsato
• Brendan Fernandes
• David R. Harper
• Kristiina Lahde
• Duane Linklater

Québec
• Anthony Burnham
• Jacynthe Carrier
• Peter Flemming
• Pascal Grandmaison
• Nadia Myre

Atlantique
• Tamara Henderson
• Stephen Kelly
• Lisa Lipton
• Michael Pittman
• Hans Wendt

Sarah Fillmore, conservatrice en chef du Musée des beaux-arts de la Nouvelle-Ecosse et commissaire du Prix artistique Sobey, mentionne que : 
« La liste des artistes proposés pour le prix de cette année met en valeur la vitalité de la pratique au pays. Nous célébrons chacune des réalisations des artistes mis en candidature. Ce ne sont pas uniquement les artistes en lice pour ce prix qui sont âgés de 40 ans et moins, mais également les membres du jury composé de conservateurs. Nous espérons que ce processus continuera à alimenter la prochaine génération de conservateurs au pays et insufflera de l’énergie dans le discours de l’art contemporain. »    
Composition du jury de conservateurs du Prix artistique Sobey 2013 :

• Mireille Eagan, conservatrice de l’art canadien, The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery 
• Marie Claude Landry, conservatrice de l’art contemporain, Musée d'art de Joliette 
• Melissa Bennett, conservatrice de l’art contemporain, Art Gallery of Hamilton 
• Jesse McKee, conservateur, Walter Phillips Gallery, The Banff Centre 
• Charo Neville, conservatrice, Kamloops Art Gallery

Les cinq finalistes du Prix artistique Sobey 2013 seront dévoilés à la fin du mois de juin, et une exposition leur sera consacrée à compter du 13 septembre au MBANC. Le grand gagnant sera annoncé le 9 octobre lors du gala qui se tiendra également au MBANC. 

Pour plus d’informations : www.sobeyartaward.ca (en anglais seulement)

21/04/13

Sarah Halpern @ Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn - Paper Plexus

Sarah Halpern: Paper Plexus
Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn
April 20 – May 19, 2013

Microscope Gallery presents Paper Plexus, the first solo exhibition of works by Sarah Halpern at the gallery. Using a palette of primarily black, white and the color of fading book pages, Sarah Halpern’s new and recent paper collage works draw inspiration from the Brooklyn-based artist’s active practice and interest in cinema and film – a medium she works with regularly, along with music, slide projection, and video.

Sarah Halpern’s eight collages on view are meticulous compositions interweaving cut-outs of text and images from writings on film theory, movie fan magazines as well as passages from books by S. J. Perelman. With a passion for comedy, puns and absurd pairings, the artist gives shape to alternative scenarios where perspectives collapse; text – often used simply as image – is displayed in varied sizes and directions; and characters that float free from flat surfaces cast real shadows. Sarah Halpern says of her works, “In film, I carry out an idea or movement through time. With paper I present time and movement within a single fixed image.”

Several of the collages in Paper Plexus are inspired by the artist’s discovery of “The Film Classic Library” – a series of complete re-constructions of Hollywood movies in book form – from which she has appropriated, among others, images of Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor starring in John Huston’s “The Maltese Falcon”. Freeing these references from the confines of character and plot structure, Sarah Halpern creates a layered conversation concerning film iconography and male/female relationships.

Also of significance, is the concept of the Macguffin as articulated in films by Alfred Hitchcock as a specific object driving an entire movie from start to finish. Transposing this idea into her compositions, Sarah Halpern uses minimal elements, usually surrounded by area of white of black space, in her attempt to isolate such object or image in her own work.

SARAH HALPERN works with 16mm film, collage on paper, 35mm slides, music and performance. Her work is largely focused on cinematic time and the active role of the viewer, and has been shown previously at venues including The Museum of Moving Image, The Kitchen, Participant Inc, Anthology Film Archives, and Microscope Gallery. Sarah Halpern holds a B.A. in Film and Electronic Arts from Bard College.

MICROSCOPE GALLERY
1329 Willoughby Avenue, 2B, Brooklyn, NY 11237
www.microscopegallery.com

10/04/13

Le système de caméra à transmission numérique Triax de Sony


Sony présente son tout dernier système de caméra à transmission numérique Triax offrant un enregistrement aux formats 50p/60p

Son lancement a été annoncé officiellement par Sony au NAB 2013. Le nouveau système de caméra professionnel Sony est destinée aux productions en direct et permet en particulier aux sociétés de diffusion sportives de bénéficier d'une excellente souplesse opérationnelle et de produire des contenus de haute qualité en utilisant les infrastructures Triax existantes. Le système de caméra offre une transmission de qualité Broadcast à des cadences de 1080 50p/60p et 1080 100i/120i, et ce, quelles que soient les installations existantes (câbles à fibre optique ou Triax). Outre la capture d'images de haute qualité et une fonction de ralenti, cette solution permet aussi aux sociétés de production de passer rapidement d'une transmission par fibre optique à une transmission numérique Triax en fonction du lieu de tournage.

Caméra Sony HD HDC-2570

Le système comprend quatre nouveaux produits dotés de l'interface numérique Triax : la caméra HD HDC-2570, l'adaptateur d'unité de commande pour caméra Triax HDFX-200, l'adaptateur numérique de caméra Triax HDTX-200 et l'adaptateur de transmission numérique Triax à panneau latéral HKC-TR27.

Caméra Sony HD HDC-2570 
Le système de caméra Triax numérique repose sur la caméra HD HDC-2570. La caméra HDC-2570 est dotée du dernier capteur CCD Power HAD 2/3'' de Sony, d'un dispositif avancé de traitement des signaux numériques (DSP) et d'un convertisseur A/N 16 bits. La HDC-2570 est équipée d'une interface numérique Triax assurant une capture d'images de 50i/60i et 50p/60p ou de 1080 100i/120i, 720 100p/120p, ce qui permet de doubler la fréquence d'image de ralenti.

Caméra Sony HD HDC-2570


               Caméra Sony HD HDC-2570


Adaptateur numérique de caméra Triax HDFX-200
Le HDFX-200 convertit les signaux Triax numériques en signaux SMPTE 311M sur fibre optique. Il est en général positionné dans le car régie ou dans la salle des équipements d'un studio. Grâce à sa conception compacte, il peut être installé dans un seul rack de 19 pouces. Un voyant LED se situe sur le panneau avant alors que les connecteurs pour la transmission Triax et pour la transmission par fibre optique se trouvent sur le panneau arrière ; tous deux peuvent facilement être sélectionnés manuellement ou à distance.

Adaptateur numérique Triax HDFX200


Adaptateur numérique de caméra Triax HDTX-200
Le HDTX-200 convertit les signaux de la transmission par fibre optique en signaux Triax pour les caméras de la série HDC-2000 de Sony situées sur le terrain. Il est parfait pour la production d'émissions sportives en direct, où lorsque des câbles Triax sont déjà installés et utilisés sur le site. Le boîtier de l'adaptateur en aluminium moulé est robuste et adapté aux utilisations en extérieur.

Adaptateur numérique Triax HDFX200


Adaptateur de transmission numérique Triax à panneau latéral HKC-TR27
Le HKC-TR27 est un adaptateur en carbone graphite à panneau latéral conçu pour être utilisé avec les caméras systèmes de la série HDC-2400/2500 et avec la caméra Triax analogique HDC-2550. Robuste et léger, l'adaptateur peut rapidement et fréquemment être changé. Les utilisateurs peuvent facilement changer le panneau latéral pour l'adapter à une transmission Triax numérique.

Adaptateur Sony Triax HKC-TR27


Le système de caméra Triax numérique de Sony sera disponible à la fin du mois de juin 2013. HDTX-200 sera disponible à partir de la fin du mois d'août 2013.

07/04/13

Wynn Bullock: Seeking Answers, de Saisset Museum, Santa Clara University

Wynn Bullock: Seeking Answers
de Saisset Museum, Santa Clara University
April 12 – June 30, 2013

The de Saisset Museum at Santa Clara University explores the work of one of California’s most significant 20th-century photographers in Seeking Answers, a new exhibit of images by WYNN BULLOCK (1902-1975). The show includes six never-before-seen photographs.

Best known for his striking black-and-white photographs of landscapes and figures in nature, the  career of the Carmel-based photographer was marked by experimentation and a quest for deeper understanding. “As long as I can remember, I have been filled with a deep desire to find a means of creatively interacting with the work, of understanding what is within and around me,” he once said. “When I photograph, what I’m really doing is seeking answers to things.”

Though he was active alongside well-known California photographers Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, and Edward Weston, Wynn Bullock’s interest in developing and working with new photographic techniques set him apart from the “straight” photography of his peers. In the 1940s, he investigated solarization, eventually earning a patent for his distinctive process. In the 1960s, he began to work with color and light, experimenting with the elements to see how they would react and interact with one another. His investigations resulted in a suite of vibrant, colorful images at a time when color photography was in its early stages. By the 1970s, Wynn Bullock was using various techniques, like negative reversals and flipped images, to enhance the photographs taken with his camera.

This exhibition features approximately 50 black-and-white photographs and six color light abstractions that speak to the breadth of works within Wynn Bullock’s portfolio. “He always wanted to push the boundaries and develop new ways of working,” said Lindsey Kouvaris, curator of exhibits and collections at the de Saisset Museum. “This exhibition illustrates that on many levels. Six never-before-seen photographs that will be paired with the artist’s final prints to demonstrate his unique working process.”

The works featured in the show not only highlight his interest in experimentation, but call out a lesser known facet of his work—his inclination toward abstraction. Together the photographs illustrate Wynn Bullock’s ongoing journey to self-discovery and his search for a means of communicating nature’s mysteries through the printed image. “Searching is everything—going beyond what you know,” he said. “The test of the search is really the things themselves, the things you seek to understand. What is important is not what you think about them, but how they enlarge you.”

DE SAISSET MUSEUM
Santa Clara University
500 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, California 95053

05/04/13

Marc Desgrandchamps, Fondation Salomon, Alex, Eté 2013


Exposition Marc Desgrandchamps
Fondation pour l'art contemporain Claudine et Jean-Marc Salomon, Alex, Haute-Savoie
Commissaire de l’exposition : Erik Verhagen
4 mai - 29 septembre 2013

Une exposition consacrée à l'artiste MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS est organisée cet été à la Fondation pour l'art contemporain Claudine et Jean-Marc Salomon à Alex, près d'Annecy. C'est une exposition importante puisqu'elle rassemble quelques 50 peintures et oeuvres sur papier, dont des créations inédites, réalisées par Marc Desgrandchamps au cours des vingt dernières années.

Marc Desgrandchamps
MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS 
Sans titre, 2011 
huile sur toile, diptyque, 200 x 300 cm 
Photo : Annik Wetter, Courtesy Galerie Zürcher, Paris - New York

Le choix de la période permet de présenter une rétrospective du travail de Marc Desgrandchamps, non pas sur l'ensemble de sa création artistique, mais depuis le changement de perspective qu'a opéré l'artiste depuis le début des années 1990.

Marc Desgrandchamps
MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS 
Sans titre, 2001 
huile sur toile, 200 x 140 cm 
Photo courtesy Galerie Zürcher, Paris - New York

Le commissaire de l'exposition, Erik Verhagen, cite ce que note Marc Desgrandchamps à propos de l'évolution de son travail : . « Dans les années 80,  j’élaborais mes tableaux ex nihilo, comme la transposition picturale d’images mentales. Au tournant de la décennie suivante j’ai commencé à m’intéresser à mon environnement visuel. Je voulais restituer en peintures les sensations éprouvées à la vue d’espaces ou de lieux au travers desquels je me déplaçais, l’apparence qu’ils prenaient sous certaines lumières. Ma mémoire n’était pas suffisante et la manière dont je travaillais antérieurement entraînait dans le cadre de la réalisation de ce nouveau programme un sentiment de frustration, de manque. J’ai décidé de pallier ce manque au moyen de la photo. Elle me servait ainsi de document, d’aide-mémoire, et venait complexifier une représentation jusqu’alors très linéaire et synthétique. La photo permettait d’incruster dans mes tableaux certains éléments de la réalité extérieure, et ainsi de bousculer le système ou l’ordre que j’avais préalablement établi, tout en aidant au renouvellement de la forme et de son iconographie. Ce changement s’est opéré rapidement, en quelques mois, entre la fin de 1991 et le printemps de 1992 ». 

Marc Desgrandchamps
MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS 
Sans titre, 2010 
huile sur toile, diptyque, 200 x 300 cm
Photo courtesy Galerie Zürcher, Paris - New York

Marc Desgrandchamps
MARC DESGRANDCHAMPS 
Sans titre, 2011 
huile sur toile, diptyque, 200 x 300 cm 
Collection du Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
Photo © Le fotographe

Marc Desgrandchamps  est né en 1960 en Haute-Savoie, à Sallanches. L'artiste vit et travaille à Lyon. Figure marquante de la scène artistique française, ses grands tableaux sont impressionants et marqués par l'originalité de son approche. Le Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris lui a consacré une exposition en 2011. L'artiste Marc Desgrandchamps est représenté par la Galerie Zürcher, Paris-New York (www.galeriezurcher.com) qui a exposé ses oeuvres récemment à New York en 2012. 

Un catalogue de l'exposition Desgrandchamps sera publié par la Fondation Salomon avec un texte du commissaire de l’exposition Erik Verhagen.

Fondation pour l'art contemporain Claudine et Jean-Marc Salomon
191 route du Château - 74290 ALEX
Site internet de la Fondation : www.fondation-salomon.com

03/04/13

Center for Creative Photography, Tuscon AZ Aquisition of the Photographer Oliver Gagliani Archive

Photographic archive of Oliver Gagliani acquired by the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, Arizona, USA


California photographer OLIVER GAGLIANI (1917‐2002) is known for his technically beautiful photographs as well as for his engaging subject matter. His distinct photographic vision imbues ordinary objects with a spiritual quality. For him, abstractions and fragments of the whole reveal the underlying essence. Oliver Gagliani wrote, “It is the photographer, through the medium of light, who must confront these objects directly, not as he would like them to be, but as they are in themselves. It is the measure of his success as to how deeply he is able to perceive the life which they have experienced, and penetrate the surface to tap the wisdom which they have to offer.” Photographer Oliver Gagliani’s inspired color works created in his many trips to Italy also reveal his mastery of the photographic medium.

The Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona, Tuscon, has recently  announced (March, 28) the acquisition of  the photographic archive of Oliver Gagliani which contains over 700 fine print photographs in addition to papers, negatives, contact sheets, detailed exposure tests and notes.


Oliver Gagliani
OLIVER GAGLIANI, Untitled, 1980. Gift of the artist to the CCP
© Heirs of Oliver Gagliani, Courtesy Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona Foundation 82.20.9

Born into an Italian-American family in Placerville, California, Oliver Gagliani lived most of his eighty-five years in South San Francisco. From grade school through college, music was his passion. In 1940, he enrolled in San Francisco State University to major in music with a concentration in conducting. However, after suffering a significant hearing loss during his service in WWII, his plans for a career in music ended. By chance, he saw photographs by Paul Strand at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 1946. At that moment, he realized that a career in the arts was possible with photography. Oliver Gagliani believed that both photography and music share the principles of tones, harmonies, and rhythms. He wrote, “The contrast that Strand could make between light and shade, between object and space, was marvelous. It made me think of music, which I had been studying for a long time.”

Largely self-taught, Oliver Gagliani’s only formal training in photography was seven weeks of study in 1946 with Ansel Adams and Minor White at the California School of Fine Arts (now the Art Institute of San Francisco). He had his first solo exhibition in 1954 at the Peninsula Art Association in San Mateo, California, which was followed by many others, including exhibitions at the George Eastman House, San Francisco Museum of Art, and the Witkin Gallery. Over the years, he taught workshops and had a large group of devoted students. He was a founding member of the Visual Dialogue Foundation in San Francisco in 1969. With a Fischer Grant from the University of Arizona in 1974, Oliver Gagliani traveled to Italy and returned there annually for 20 years, producing over 20,000 images. In 1976, he received a National Foundation of the Arts grant. 

CENTER FOR CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY, TUSCON, ARIZONA

The CCP is located on the University of Arizona campus, Fine Arts Complex, 1030 N. Olive Rd., Tucson, AZ.

Japanese Lacquer, Jacqueline Avant Collection at Crow Collection of Asian Art, Dallas

Gold on Black: Japanese Lacquer from the Jacqueline Avant Collection
Crow Collection of Asian Art, Dallas 
Through September 15, 2013

Showcasing the delicate beauty of Japanese lacquer dating from the early-17th to the early-20th century, Gold on Black: Japanese Lacquer from the Jacqueline Avant Collection on view at the Crow Collection of Asian Art in Dallas, USA, features over 40 Japanese lacquer items that would have been used primarily for arts and entertainment purposes. 

Ancient Japanese Lacquer
Writing Box (suzuribako) with design of Ono no Komachi, Japan, circa 1800. 
Lacquer, gold, silver, carved purple glass, black lacquered metal, gold metal on wood, suzu (tin alloy) rims
Courtesy The Jacqueline Avant Collection, Photograph Susan Einstein, Los Angeles.

Californian Japanese Art Collector Jacqueline Avant’s interest in collecting exquisite lacquer works used for poetry writing, poetry matching games, enjoyment of food or smoking, ceremonial display, wear, or personal care, such as boxes for combs, mirrors, tooth blackening powder, or incense, comprise the majority of the pieces selected for this exhibition. Also on view are boxes to hold objects of religious devotion, such as Buddhist holy texts (sutras), and even weapons for self-defense, including a decorated baton or knife.

“The Japanese have long been attributed with bringing the art of lacquer to its highest technical and aesthetic development,” says Crow Collection of Asian Art Executive Director Amy Lewis Hofland. “However, Japanese lacquer remains a subject rarely presented in American museums. When we learned of these works we knew our audiences would love the beauty and history of this painstakingly refined art form. It is a natural fit for the Crow Collection.”

Many works featured in Gold on Black originated from the dowries of feudal lord families, with family crests recording marriages of power and influence. Others were collected to delight wealthy merchants and reflect their personal tastes in dress and activities, from tea to smoking or composing poetry.

Recent finds suggest that lacquer has been employed in Japan as a protective film for at least 11,000 years. The lacquer is painstakingly harvested from twenty-year-old cultivated urushi trees; each tree is bled for its sap, producing less than a cup of liquid and giving up its life in the process of harvest. The lacquer is then filtered and applied in about thirty thin layers to a paulownia wood or lacquered hemp core. After each layer is polymerized in a humidor and then sanded, the upper layers are sprinkled with gold or silver powders and flecks to create designs. The final coat of clear lacquer is then ground down to reveal the metallic design. The care and skill required for application of both ground lacquer layers and design, and the rarity and expense of materials, meant that lacquer work was the most revered of family treasures in Japan, just as silver would have been in Europe or the Americas.

Hollis Goodall, curator of Japanese art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, selected the works featured in Gold on Black: Japanese Lacquer from the Jacqueline Avant Collection

China Through the Lens of John Thomson remains on view along with Peninsulas and Dragon Tails: Southeast Asian Art from the Crow Collection and with the acclaimed collection of Tantric sculpture from Trammell S. Crow’s private collection.

Trammell & Margaret Crow Collection of Asian Art Website: www.crowcollection.org

Barbara Bloom, The Jewish Museum, NYC - The museum collection in dialogue with the artist


As it were … So to speak. A Museum Collection in Dialogue with Barbara Bloom
The Jewish Museum, New York, USA 
Through August 4, 2013

BARBARA BLOOM has devoted her career to questioning the ways we perceive and value objects. With a light touch and subtle wit, she divines the meanings encoded in the things with which we surround ourselves. The Jewish Museum invited Barbara Bloom to create an installation drawn from its 25,000 works of ceremonial, decorative, and fine art. The artist presentation sets a selection of 276 pieces in unconventional contexts, and offers visitors new ways to view the Museum and its holdings. 

The exhibition materializes the idea of people in dialogue across time and space, inspired in part by Barbara Bloom reflections on Talmudic discourse, which takes place over centuries. Integrating the former Warburg mansion’s historic rooms into her concept, the artist envisions the space as both museum and home filled with imagined historical guests from diverse times – Nefertiti, Duke Ellington, Jimi Hendrix, Marcel Proust, Marilyn Monroe, Albert Einstein and others – engaged in discourse and argument. The subjects are wide-ranging and reflect ideas that have long interested the artist: inferring a whole from surviving remnants, navigating the intricacies of bestowing gifts, representing the unspeakable.

Furniture-like display cases contain collection objects that the artist finds intriguing or appealing. For example, Torah pointers with their delicate hands and extended forefingers stand in for strings inside a piano; a cigar box owned by Sigmund Freud is displayed in a psychoanalyst’s consultation space; and a Dreyfus Affair game board sits on a table with ancient Roman dice. Each tableau is accompanied by written passages suggesting conversations between people. These evocative juxtapositions of found texts, Barbara Bloom’s writings, artworks and cases, create unexpected associations and spark dialogue.

While the artist offers clues on how to read these tableaux, it is up to the individual to draw their own connections among the different elements. In Barbara Bloom’s vision, the objects at the core of the installation often transcend their traditional functions and stimulate new ideas. 

As she searched for a metaphorical structure within which to understand the collection, and sought to envision it in the museum’s historic rooms, Barbara Bloom became fascinated with the Talmud (a collection of Jewish law and lore) and its unique design. On each page, an original text is framed by centuries of rabbinical debates and commentaries that reach across time and space, as if the writers were conversing in the same room. In choosing works from the collection, the artist passed over familiar masterpieces and instead discovered value and beauty in those that she found peculiar in shape, historically resonant, or marked with traces of past lives. She was inspired by the architecture of the galleries, which still resemble the rooms in which Felix and Frieda Warburg once led a lively family and social life.

Barbara Bloom writes: “What if we were to consider objects not for their symbolic or metaphoric qualities, but as intermediaries, or carriers of meaning. Perhaps they could be considered as ambassadors.” She adds, “These rooms are filled with objects. And we are offered an opportunity not only to concentrate on the singular, but to observe the relationships between these many entities, and the meanings implicit in their positioning and combination. The objects are placeholders for thoughts, and when they are situated in proximity to one another, meanings can reverberate and ricochet off of each other.”

The exhibition opens with recorded voices engaged in debate and argument. Six pairs of portraits – masked so only the sitters’ eyes are visible – are placed at the entrance to each gallery, standing in for the guests in this imagined home. They remind us of the dialogues taking place within. 

Highlights include the shell of a piano with Torah pointers in place of strings that explores the friendship of two great composers: George Gershwin and Arnold Schoenberg. Schoenberg enjoyed playing tennis weekly at Gershwin’s Beverly Hills home. As composer Albert Sendrey observed: “Two contrasting giants of modern music…united in one common thought: to make a little ball scale the top of a net, as though nothing else mattered.”

Another tableau suggests the different stages of romantic relationships. Beginning with the sensuality of courtship, singer/songwriter Leonard Cohen and early twentieth-century psychoanalyst Lou Andreas-Salomé are envisioned singing Solomon’s Song of Songs. Love is seen to run its course through legal consummation and dissolution as represented in Jewish marriage and divorce contracts. A section devoted to ideas of a library includes miniature books, some with microscopic writing, nestled inside hollow books. These evoke the layering of text within text that is an important part of Talmudic discourse. An intricate cycle of gift-giving and its Freudian implications are explored through Sigmund Freud’s silver cigar box, a Roman ring from his antiquities collection, and his daughter Anna’s ivory letter opener, all donated to The Jewish Museum by an anonymous analyst. Four players – Nefertiti, Emile Zola, Amy Winehouse, and Jesus of Nazareth – are imagined seated at a table filled with games from different eras. Many temporalities are superimposed on each other, collapsed into a single game. 

BARBARA BLOOM Installation View of As it Were... So to Speak - The Jewish Museum, NY
Photograph © David Heald

As you can see on this Barbara Bloom Installation view by photographer David Heald, in the former dining room of the Warburg mansion visitors can see a table set with twelve glasses from the collection, dating from ancient to modern. Above them hangs a chandelier whose design includes copies of the glasses, upside down, mirroring and illuminating the conversation below. This work was commissioned by The Jewish Museum especially for the exhibition. Further reverberations among works in the gallery begin with the painting Friday Evening, by Isidor Kaufmann, in which a lone woman is seated beside a table prepared for the inauguration of the Sabbath. The chandelier in the painting inspired the commissioned work. Above the fireplace, across from Friday Evening, hangs a reproduction of the mirror from the painting, reflecting what is in Isidor Kaufmann’s scene rather than what is in the gallery. There are many opportunities for takes and double takes.

Chris Mann, a writer and performer, worked with Sepand Ansari to create a new website, www.010011.net, in correspondence with the exhibition. It was launched on February 20, 2013. Initially loaded with a library of 1,000 texts representing a wide range of disciplines, the site enables users to search for an idea and make rich and ever deeper associations among the works that contain it. In contrast to Google, which provides a prepared answer if you ask the right question, 010011.net is a celebration of the question you are trying to learn how to ask. 

As it were … So to speak: A Museum Collection in Dialogue with Barbara Bloom has been coordinated by Susan L. Braunstein, Henry J. Leir Curator at The Jewish Museum. The exhibition designer, Ken Saylor of Saylor + Sirola, worked collaboratively on the visualization and realization of this project.

BARBARA BLOOM was born in Los Angeles in 1951 and lives in New York. She studied with John Baldessari at the California Institute of the Arts and is often associated with the postmodern “Pictures Generation” that includes Cindy Sherman, Louise Lawler, Richard Prince and Barbara Kruger. The Reign of Narcissism (1989), perhaps Bloom’s most celebrated piece, recreates a Neoclassical period room in an imaginary museum dedicated to the artist’s self-image. She is also widely known for her 1994 permanent installation of Thonet bentwood chairs at the Österreichisches Museum für Angewandte Kunst (MAK) in Vienna. In 2008, an extensive survey of her work, The Collections of Barbara Bloom, was shown at the International Center for Photography, New York and at Martin-Gropius Bau in Berlin. The artist’s recent installation, Present (2010), addresses the intimacy of gift-giving and explores how other aspects of a gift - its wrapping, its anticipation, its transfer from giver to recipient – can become just as important as the object itself. 

Support: This exhibition As it were … So to speak. A Museum Collection in Dialogue with Barbara Bloom is made possible with endowment support from The Skirball Fund for American Jewish Life Exhibitions. Additional support is provided by the Alfred J. Grunebaum Memorial Fund, the Leir Charitable Foundations, and the Leon Levy Foundation.

Also on view at the museum is the first exhibition by designers Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh. Upcoming exhibition: Jack Goldstein x 10,000.

THE JEWISH MUSEUM, NY
www.thejewishmuseum.org