August 8th, 2008
The US Embassy in Beijing Highlights Jeff Koons’s Art
This Jeff Koons sculpture sits in front of the new US Embassy in Beijing that opened today. The choice of Koons as a symbol of America in the country with the most consequence in coming years is implicit recognition of the artist’s stature in world culture–not just the art market. Here the New York Sun profiles the building itself. The Art Newspaper gives more details on the rest of the art in the building. But Felix Salmon at Portfolio points out that the art budget was measley in comparison to accepted guidelines for public art. And New York’s redoubtable Jerry Saltz offers valuable discussion of the artist and his work capping off with this observation: Read the rest of this entry »
August 8th, 2008
Why Does this Ukrainian Strong Man Love Art So Much?
This is Victor Pinchuk looking sophisticated in a James Hill photograph taken for the New York Times. The picture comes from Landon Thomas Jr.’s profile of Pinchuk that runs in today’s business section. The art world tends to view the Oligarchs as simply rich men with money to spend on art. But Thomas shows how their new-found love of art is part of a larger campaign and strategy that seeks not only legitimacy for themselves and their fortunes but also for their own country’s cultural status in the globalized world. You can see in this one quote how the international art world is stand-in for global culture and significant enough to stand on an equal footing with Ukrainian political support and US backing: Read the rest of this entry »
July 1st, 2008
No, That’s Not a Law Firm.
Those are the Names that Carried the Christie’s Sale.
Christie’s Contemporary sale totals $171 million. Half of that figure came from four paintings by Bacon, Freud and Koons and $25 million Koons sculpture. The top ten lots account for 70% of the total sale value. Beneath the headlines, the big news was the record set for a Gilbert and George work: $3.7 million for To Her Majesty. Eight other record prices were set. One for a Jeff Koons painting and more significantly, $2.5 million for a Sayed Haider Raza picture as well as records for Yan-Pei Ming, Nicolas de Stael, Michael Andrews and Antonio Lopez.
By lot, the buying was 48% American, 42% European (including UK), 8% Asian and 2% from other regions.
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