Nelson Leirner, the Brazilian artist who took on conceptualism with a healthy dose of satirical humour, has died. Full story.
The Armory Show announced that it will shift to September from next year, and will also get a new home, at the Javits Center, located in Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan, New York City. The convention centre is currently undergoing a $1.5 billon expansion, due to be complete by the time the art fair takes place 9-12 September 2021. At this year’s edition, which closed last week, the $20,000 Pommery Prize, given annually to a presentation for a large-scale work in the Platform section of the fair, was won by Night Gallery for Meme Girl (2020) by Christine Wang. Physical fairs might seem something of an anachronism in the post-Coronavirus world, so a bevy of Hong Kong galleries have banded together to create an online platform through which to sell their wares. Hosted by the Asia Society Hong Kong Center, Art Power HK will featureswork by artists represented by the Asia Art Archive, Axel Vervoordt Gallery, Bonhams, CHAT (Centre for Heritage Arts & Textiles), China Guardian Hong Kong, de Sarthe Gallery, the department of fine arts at the University of Hong Kong, Galerie Ora-Ora, the Hong Kong Art Gallery Association, the Hong Kong Palace Museum, M+, Para Site, White Cube and the Xiqu Centre.
Clashing with the Armory’s new dates is an extra outing for Berlin Gallery Weekend. While the traditional May event will still go ahead, on 11–13 September the organisation will bring together commercial exhibitions by Andreas Gursky, Katharina Grosse, Miriam Cahn, Victor Man, Cathy Wilkes, and others to coincide with Berlin Art Week, which concentrates on the city’s institutional scene.
Alfredo Jaar wins the Hasselblad photography prize. Full story.
The creative director of Dark Mofo (an annual midwinter festival in Hobart, Tasmania), Leigh Carmichael, has announced its cancellation due to concerns about the spread of the coronavirus. Dark Mofo, which was launched by the founder of the Museum of Old and New Art, David Walsh, will be rescheduled. In a statement, Carmichael said: ‘It is with deep regret and sadness that we have made the decision to cancel Dark Mofo scheduled for June this year. After a thorough risk assessment on the potential impact and disruption of coronavirus, we have been left with no option other than to move the current program to 2021.’ Carmichael cited the financial implications of COVID-19 would be out of their control, and that ‘a festival-wide last minute cancellation would run into the millions, and likely end the event permanently. We’ve had to act decisively to ensure Dark Mofo’s long term survival’. However, subject to Government advice, Bon Iver’s sold out performances will still go ahead as planned on 12–13 June, as part of their national tour.
An open letter, signed by over 680 arts organisations and professionals, decries the UK government’s decision to withdraw from Creative Europe. Although funded by the EU, the scheme is not exclusive to member states, supporting projects in EEA countries (Iceland, Norway) and neighbouring EU countries (Albania, Serbia). Addressed to the newly appointed culture secretary Oliver Dowden, the letter expresses concerns that ‘this decision threatens an impoverished future for British creativity and sends the message that the UK is closing itself off to our nearest neighbours’. It also points out the economic impact of such decision, highlighting that the organisation has delivered ‘a net benefit back to the UK creative economy on both soft and hard measures (worth €74m since 2014, benefitting 334 organisations), leveraging additional funding, helping to create employment’.
More prize announcements this week, including Japanese artists Hikaru Fujii and Chikako Yamashiro who are both named winners of the second Tokyo Contemporary Art Award (TCAA). They will each receive ¥3 million (£22,200) on top of the ¥1m (£7,400) grant going towards overseas research and production expenses over the next two years, as well as an exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo in 2022. The prize, founded by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and Tokyo Arts and Space in 2018, seeks to support Japanese midcareer artists. Back in London, Emma Talbot has been announced as the winner of the the Max Mara Prize for Women. Full story.
‘There is a lot of art about AI, but very little that is AI. We’re aiming to change that,’ said Anton van den Hengel, director of the Australian Institute for Machine Learning. Together with the Sia Furler Institute at the University of Adelaide, they are launching Art Intelligence, a new series of initiatives pairing artists with AI and machine-learning engineers. At the core of this new programme is an artist residency, and its first participant is none other than artist, composer and musician Laurie Anderson (whose recent foray into AI and VR is reviewed here). The collaboration and creative experiments will be documented and presented online via Murmur, an online and offline exhibition space (coming soon).
Australian artist Anthony Lister charged with rape. Full story.
The Covid-19 pandemic continues to takes it toll on the artworld calendar. On Wednesday, Tefaf Maastricht, one of Europe’s biggest art fairs, announced it was closing early. The fair opened last Saturday and was scheduled to run through 15 March, but had to move quickly after one of the exhibitors was diagnosed with the virus on Monday. One exhibitor at the fair told The Art Newspaper the decision was the right one, explaining that ‘the day-to-day attendance has been very much down over the past three days, and the mood among the exhibitors has been quite pessimistic since the weekend.’ Meanwhile, Printed Matter, the organiser of the annual LA Art Book Fair, said they were cancelling this year’s edition, slated to run from 3–5 April at the Geffen Contemporary branch of LA MOCA. Over 350 exhibitors from about 25 countries were to take part. In New York, the six auction houses taking part in Asia Week, the city’s annual gathering of Asia-focused exhibitions and events, have announced they will postpone the majority of their sales. While most of the Asia Week programme is still going forward from 12–19 March, the auctions have been rescheduled for the week of 22 June.
Austria and Poland close museums to curb spread of COVID-19. Full story.
Metropolitan Museum and megagalleries in US close amid onset of COVID-19. Full story.
Leiko Ikemura is the winner of the 70th Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Award for Fine Arts for her solo exhibition at the National Art Center, Tokyo in 2019, Our Planet – Earth & Stars. The prize is awarded, on an annual basis by the Japanese government, in recognition of outstanding artists who have made significant contributions to regional culture.The statement cited the Japanese-Swiss artist’s ‘extensive media use’, adding that ‘her work shows the world her view in a sense of a connection of the planet earth through the passage of life, time, and death, and her introspective image of it in an ambivalent atmosphere is excellent as a suggestion to modern society and breaks through the current stagnation.’
