Favorite Show of Frieze Week (so far!)

One of the best shows currently on in London, Hurvin Anderson at Thomas Dane presents only new works. The Jamaican descent British artist is known for his large interiors and landscapes that bear marks of his life: makeshift barbershops, public parks, gardens and swimming pools all evoke memories, adopting visual languages of both England and Jamaica. Some of the paintings on view at Thomas Dane reminds us of the same spacial construction of his Peter's Series (2007-9) depicting make shift barbershops set at home, a popular trend amongst newly arrived Caribbean immigrants in 1950s. Other works on view are landscapes, hinting at lonely journeys and solitary. Still, these are not dark, gloomy paintings but have vivid brushwork and dynamic palette. Our favorite show that opened during Frieze so far, but we still haven't made it to Gagosian for "The Show is Over" and to Sprueth Magers for Cyprien Gaillard/Morris Louis that we heard good news. And not to forget the Mark Bradford show at White Cube, which we are curious about. So many exhibitions are opening this week, it is overwhelming.

1980s Generation Enters the Major League of Evening Auctions in London

This week London offers so many options and distractions for art lovers from around the world, with several art fairs, gallery shows and auctions taking place around the major attraction of Frieze Art Fair. We already made a must have list from a visit to the Christie's contemporary viewing, but it's barely our first stop and we are breaking the bank already, even if it is imaginary. When did even the young good art become so unobtainable? Ryan Trecartin, Oscar Murillo and Tauba Auerbach, all born  in 1980s, are the new young talent making their debut in the major league of Contemporary Evening Auction this week. Those who follow the art market were probably expecting this, as both Murillo and Auerbach have reached amazing auction records this past year: Auerbach's 2010 canvas made 505,875 pounds in June 2013, and Murillo's 2011 work sold for 253,875 pounds at the same sale. It is so encouraging to see a video work by the young Trecartin included in the evening sale too, with an estimate of 20,000-30,000 pounds. We want more collectors buying video works! Another of our favorite is a large work by the brilliant Arte Povera artist Pino Pascali from 1964. Pascali was one of the driving forces behind this Italian movement, and exploded the traditional boundaries between painting, sculpture, language, and performance; all present in the work on view at Christie's. The artist died in an accident at the age of 32, cutting his career short having produced about only 100 works or so. Estimated at 400,000-600,000 pounds, we think it might go for much higher at the Italian Sale on 18th of October.

Fictional Character Moves into V&A Museum

Elmgreen & Dragset new brilliant installation, "Tomorrow" at the Victoria & Albert Museum, is a reconstruction of the apartment of a fictional character, Norman. Here we have Norman's home, we can walk around at this grand South Kensington apartment setting, and touch the items once belonging to the 75-year-old failed architect, and examine his unrealized models in his study. It is no surprise that the V&A directors extended an invitation to the artist duo after seeing their similar work Collectors at the 2009 Venice Biennale.  Watch this informative interview with the artists discussing their works, including this new installation.

http://vimeo.com/74735390

London's 5 Hidden Hot Art Spots

We live in a time of excess, there seems to be too much of anything that becomes remotely popular and in fashion. Just like with art spaces. From established big leagues such as the Tate or Gagosian, to the ones taking first steps, London art scene is buzzing with energy and talent. Here we recommend 5 art spaces that you may have overlooked unknowingly:

Jonathan Viner Jonathan Viner is a contemporary art gallery project based in London, with no fixed abode and with an extremely busy schedule of international shows. Tasked to create a visual identity that would apply to print, site specific and digital collateral, they aim to create a rigorous, manageable and elegant system for each show, explicitly connecting the name of the proprietor, his current activity and the location.

Laura Bartlett Gallery Based in Bethnall Green in London’s east, Laura Bartlett’s contemporary space was among the first to champion the rising art star Cyprien Gaillard.  The gallery is now getting ready for their upcoming show with the Canadian artist Allison Katz, due to open on 28^th of September.

Cell Project Space This gallery operates outside the international, commercial world of art fairs. It is non-commercial and has been designing and creating artists’ workspace in East London for over ten years. As such, it’s a creative hub for the surrounding area and the community, promoting, championing and creating opportunities for collaboration and creative cross-fertilization at every turn. Art is available to buy, but all sales go towards commissioning and exhibition costs. Their new exhibition, Rachel Reupke, ‘Wine & Spirits’ opens tomorrow evening.

Carl Kostyál An exhibition space with twin locations in both Stockholm and London, Carl Kostyál is located on the famous Savile Row of London. Carl is also an avid art collector, and his interest in different media and discovering young talent is reflected in his exhibition programme. In addition to his interest in Scandinavian artists, such as Matias Faldbakken, he also supports young names like Helen Marten and Oscar Murillo, who has just been picked up by David Zwirner.

Project Native Informant Ensconced away in Mayfair’s Brooks Mews, walk past it and you could miss it. However, Project Native Informant is one of the foremost exhibition spaces in London. The current exhibition is of Loretta Fahrenholz, with her video “Ditch Plains” that was shot in Brooklyn around the time of Hurricane Sandy, and free-styles an abstract narrative about the fatal coupling of subjects and systems in a time of permanent crisis.

Irene Kung's Dream-like Photos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gOVPOYPmes Taking inspiration from everything that surrounds us, Irene Kung creates haunting photographs that inspire a pause for reflection and meditation. The Swiss photographer transforms urban spaces and buildings in cities across the world, as she takes snapshots where tourist take pictures but turns these daytime shots into night. She also separates her subjects from any surroundings, and illuminating them in such a way that adds the dream-like quality. When asked what concepts she aims to emphasize her images, she answers:

Silence and immobility. To stop and see, feel, think and dream. I aim to respond to people’s inner being at this time when our world is rushing towards decline. The void. Unfilled space, the darkness around the subject is more important than the subject itself. Today there is too much of everything around us, and I concentrate on elimination and the creation of voids. Empty space offers the chance of giving time a dimension.

Kung works with Michael Goedhuis Gallery in London and Valentina Bonomo in Rome.

Peckham Takeover at Victoria & Albert Museum TONIGHT

We are all getting used to the Peckham art kids appearing everywhere we go these days! Hannah Barry and her team created the wonderful Palazzo Peckham in Venice this year and now this evening Peckham force is taking over the Victoria & Albert Museum for the second part of a four-part series of Friday Lates at the museum (first one was Dalston Takeover in June). For these special free admission nights, the museum invites London's creative communities to take over the museum for an evening, presenting a range of music, art, design, architecture and more. Here is what you can expect from this evening, but be warned the list is long!

MUSIC & PERFORMANCE

Al Dobson Jr

Grand Entrance 18.30 – 22.00 Join Al Dobson Jr as he spins a selection of soul, African, highlife, jazz, funk, and reggae, as well as performing a percussion ensemble in between sets. Listen out for Al’s own productions as well as music from his extended family in Peckham.

Rhythm Section

John Madejski Garden 19.15 – 21.30 Rhythm Section is a twice monthly Peckham-based community; a friendly place to dance your troubles away, all night long. It advocates simplicity at its heart; vinyl only, no set times, no photos and no nonsense. Founder, DJ, host and programmer Bradley Zero brings his records to the Museum, capturing the Rhythm Section ethos and spirit.

Reprezent Radio

Fashion, Room 40 18.30 – 21.30 Tune in to a live set by Peckham’s hot young under 25s DJs. Reprezent 107.3FM broadcasts across the capital to young Londoners and across the world online. Featuring DJ Neptizzle amongst others, join them as they bring their unique line up of house and afrobeat to the Museum.

City Love

Lucy and Jim are alone. To the world they seem to be OK: They have jobs, friends, and ambitions (well sort of). However, their chance meeting on the number 12 night bus in Peckham spirals them into a world of love, pain and (mis)communication. To celebrate their forthcoming production of City Love by Simon Vinnicombe at the Bussey Building, Peckham-based theatre company The Orange Line Collective presents an extract from the play in pop up locations around the Museum.

TAKEOVERS

Day Job

Medieval & Renaissance, Room 50a 18.30 – 21.30 Peckham-based illustration collective Day Job take over an area of the Museum, inspired by their home turf of Rye Lane. Experience the buzz of a bustling and multicultural high street through a playful installation, juxtaposed with the elegance of V&A sculptures. Alternatively, exchange a drawing or object for some Bank of Day Job Peckham Pounds (Pecks) at a value negotiated by a pawnbroker. Watch them displayed over the course of the evening in Day Job’s Pawnshop window.

Hannah Barry Gallery

John Madejski Garden 18.30 – 21.30 A staple of Peckham’s burgeoning reputation as a hub for contemporary art, Hannah Barry Gallery brings the work of three South London-based artists to the Museum. Collectively, these three demonstrate the variety of approaches to art-making embraced by the Peckham movement.

• Tom Barnett performs as Colden Drystone: uniformed in a future-age suit created by Lee Roach, his performance incorporates the recital of poetry and found texts, Dada-esque sound pieces of the artist’s own composition and patterns of repetition and feedback.
• James Capper designs and builds functional sculptures that mark the environments in which they are deployed. Incorporating the strategies and techniques of mechanical engineering, Capper’s work describes a physical relationship to the place in which it is stationed.
• James Balmforth presents a beautiful short film exploring his preoccupation with the fragility of objects and symbols, a concern he also pursues in his sculptural practice.

The Bussey Quarter

Sackler Centre Reception 18.30 – 21.30 Get involved in The Bussey Quarter, a cross-disciplinary collaboration presented by Lou-Atessa Marcellin gathering a selection of creative practices together from the Bussey Building in Peckham. Engage and interpret the notion of portraiture, through literature, set design, photography and locally crafted music by DJ Tristram Bolletti.

• Doost Studio run by Lou-Atessa Marcellin, will present a pop-up photo-booth with a cardboard throne designed by Sarah Medvedowsky, emphasizing the visual and spatial identity framing the sitter.
• Lucie Beauvert and Paol Kemp (LBPK) create a unique atmosphere interlacing the context of the V&A and the practices within the Bussey Building.
• Library of Independent Exchange (L.I.E.) run by Christopher Green and Mark James, will display individual collections of books that reflect readings by local artists throughout the evening.

Peckham Springs

Sackler Centre (1st Floor) 18.30 – 21.30 Peckham Springs is an art gallery and bar situated in two railway arches beneath Peckham Rye Station. The gallery programme features a range of exhibitions, film screenings and live art events by exciting new artists, alongside a bar which serves a range of carefully crafted cocktails. Peckham Springs invite you to experience a typical evening at their space with a selection of work from past and future shows at the gallery and a Peckham Spring Water cocktail in hand.

INSTALLATIONS

Churches

Grand Entrance 18.30 – 22.00 Take in photographer David Spero’s quiet and contemplative photos of unassuming churches in often surprising locations – revealing the lesser known and invisible structures, lifestyles and architecture of Peckham.

Rye Lane Khanga, Gele and Aso Oke

Fashion, Room 40 18.30 – 21.30 A collaboration between South-London design label Chichia and Rye Lane Market dress shop, Pachito: Chichia London College of Fashion graduate and Chichia designer Christine Mhando showcases pieces from her upcoming collection, fusing East African Tanzanian Khanga with contemporary stylings. Pachito Self taught African dress maker Patricia demonstrates a range of African head wraps, including the iconic Nigerian Gele, Aso Oke and Ghanaian styles, using bespoke Chichia fabrics.

Peckham Rising Revisited

Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre 18.30 – 21.30 This installation revisits the exhibition Peckham Rising, curated by urbanist and curator Paul Goodwin at the Sassoon Gallery in Peckham in 2007. Experience a temporary space of contemplation exploring black urbanism and the other side of Peckham through a critical assemblage of street photography, sound and text. Featuring the works of Daniele Tamagni and Thabo Jayesimi and Janine Lai.

WORKSHOPS

Garudio Studiage

John Madejski Garden 18.30 – 21.30 Join Peckham-based creative collective Garudio Studiage in a duo of workshops:

• The Lucky Skip: A Very Peckham Lucky Dip

  Rummage through the delights of a very Peckham lucky dip, through a handmade skip, with a chance to win a dizzying selection of prizes. All prizes are handmade or hand selected by Garudio Studiage, wrapped in hand screen-printed wrapping paper.

• Nation of Shopkeepers

  Create your own fantasy shop for Peckham’s Rye Lane. Using pens, pencils and crayons, customise blank line drawings of every shop on the street, which took over 500 man-hours to draw. Watch the street grow as the evening goes on, and take part in re-imagining this diverse and changing London neighbourhood.

Peckham Space – Peace Blanket!

Sackler Centre Reception 18.30 – 21.30 Peckham Space presents the interactive artwork Peace Blanket, created by Camberwell College of Arts graduate Mhairi Macaulay and over 700 participating residents from Peckham and beyond. In August 2012, Peckham Space invited visitors to stitch a square for peace to celebrate the wall of post-it note messages for Peckham which grew on Rye Lane in response to the riots of 2011. Take a look at the original sayings on the Peace Blanket and contribute your own through the course of the evening.

Peckham Print Studio

Sackler Centre Art Studio 18.30 – 21.30 Installing a series of custom built screen printing units, Peckham Print Studio will transform the V&A Art Studio into their own working studio. Pull your own print and engage with the process from start to finish. The studio will also be joined by a selection of artists and illustrators who will produce a series of custom works to be printed at the event.

Illustrate Camberwell

Lunchroom 1, Sackler Centre 18.30 – 21.30 Firmly rooted in the border between Peckham and Camberwell, Camberwell College of Art has built up a formidable reputation within the area. Enroll as a fresher, learn how to illustrate with current Camberwell BA Illustration students, hang your final work in your degree show and see what grade you get. Don’t forget to top off your newly acquired degree with a photo in your graduation robes.

TALKS & FILM

Artist Maps

Prints & Drawings Study Room (Accessed via the Sackler Centre) 19.30 – 20.15 Inspired by Tom Phillips’ Map Walks Nos. 1 and 2 which focus on the artist’s relationship with the Peckham and Camberwell area, V&A Senior Curator of Prints and Drawings Gill Saunders walks us through the enthralling world of the artist map. Take an intimate look at specially selected maps in the Museum’s collection.

Peckham Past and Present

Seminar Room 1 19.30 – 20.30 Listen to local resident, architect and Peckham Vision conservation specialist Benny O’Looney in conversation with Ben Eastham (Hannah Barry Gallery/The White Review) and Biz K, editor of The Peckham Complex: A Cultural and Social Snapshot of Inner London, as they discuss the area’s cultural scene, architecture and social history.

Peckham Vision

Seminar Room 2, Sackler Centre 20.40 – 21.25 Join local resident and co-ordinator of community group Peckham Vision Eileen Conn as she chairs a Peckham Vision community meeting, starting with a visual tour of Peckham’s diverse parallel communities and economies. Get involved in a lively discussion about wider issues of connections, integration and realising the potential of our town centres.

Aesthetica Magazine Presents

Hochhauser Auditorium 19.00 & 20.00 (50 minutes) Aesthetica presents a screening of films from Aesthetica Short Film Festival (ASFF) 2012, providing a wider context to Peckham as an area. Paper Mountains shows a young girl’s love of ballet in the midst of a hard and difficult life but also presents her aspirations for the future. Notes from the Underground is a portrait of life on the tube, whilst the remaining films question morality and depict the hardships of addiction. The reel aims to capture vignettes of everyday life, offering a glimpse into the lives of others.

Hendzel and Hunt’s Peckham Yacht Club

National Art Library 20.30 – 21.15 Join Peckham-based design studio Hendzel and Hunt as they present their latest project, L’Abeille Noir des Porquerolles. Specialising in working with reclaimed wood, they joined forces with landscape architects Elinor Scarth and Etienne Haller. The group embarked on a three week adventure in the south of France where they built and sailed a seven meter long boat entirely made from scavenged materials.

Peckham Social Archives

Sculpture, Room 21a 18.30 – 21.45 Explore the local entrepreneurs of Peckham’s diverse community, first screened at Peckhamplex as part of Chelsea College of Art and Design’s Consume Peckham event. Chaz Hairdressers by Tom Brushwood, Didi Blackhurst and Shraddha Depala, follows George the owner as he reflects on the history of his shop in Peckham. Born and Bread by Jack Haslehurst, Isabel Gibson and Joe Myers, is a day in the life of a wholesale bakery in Peckham.

Sculptures behind the Renaissance

When you think of the great Renaissance works, one tends to focus on oil paintings and the painters. But without the sculptors who paved the way, we would have no Botticelli, Leonardo or Raphael. Renaissance really began in a few decades at the beginning of the 15th century in Florence, and a superb exhibition "The Springtime of the Renaissance" at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence maps out this artistic revolution and brings together a treasure-studded retrospective of sculpture through Western art's most important era. Speaking of the exhibition, curator Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi says "the exhibition aims to show that the origin of this revolution, which lasted two centuries, was sculpture."

Works by masters including Donatello and Masaccio, Brunelleschi and Paolo Uccello have been loaned for the unprecedented show, with works coming from collections including the Louvre in Paris, the Bargello Museum in Florence, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Bode-Museum in Berlin, the Metropolitan in New York and the National Gallery in Washington.

Amongst the loans is the Cortona sarcophagus, carved with Amazon warriors and plunging centaurs, that Brunelleschi is said to have walked all the way from Florence to see. The Bode-Museum lent a magnificent work by Donatello known as the "Madonna Pazzi" -- a marble statue used to create molds that were then used to cast copies in bronze. Speaking of this work, Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi says:

"These moulds in terracotta or stucco were not that costly so that any store or convent could afford the statues in Florence and elsewhere. This allowed the aesthetic revolution to spread, including outside of Italy."

Copies of the molds were made especially for the exhibition and put on display where visitors are encouraged to touch them.

Congratulations are due to the three institutions behind this show: the Louvre and the Bargello Museum, both of which have amazing permanent holdings, and Palazzo Strozzi. The exhibition ends in Florence on 18th of August, and will travel to the Louvre in September, on view until 6th of January 2014. So plenty of chance to see it.

Vodou Inspired Art

Tired of seeing all similar art works, themes and names? If you are looking for a different flavor in the arts, why not stop by London’s Riflemaker for a very interesting show straight from Haiti!

There has been much focus on Haitian art recently, with Nottingham Contemporary staging the first comprehensive survey of Haitian art in the UK, and with Haitian vodou flags included in the group show curated by the celebrated American artist Cindy Sherman as part of the Venice Biennale this year. In the previous edition of the Venice Biennale, the Republic of Haiti made their first presentation with works from three artists who are part of Atis-Rezistans, the artistic collective from the Grand Rue neighborhood.

Haiti is especially known for the art of its urban and rural poor and the show at Riflemaker brings together sculptors from Haiti’s Grand Rue neighborhood of Port-au-Prince: Celeur Jean Herard and Andre Eugene, presented with Haitian Vodou flags by Silva Joseph and Edgard Jean Louis who are both Vodou priests. These flags are in fact ritual ‘drapos’ originally made for ceremonial use but now part of Haitian contemporary art. Their bright colors make a great contrast with the haunting works of the Grand Rue sculptors, which are made out of ready-made and recycled materials with references to Vadou that evoke a cyberpunk sci-fi vision.

“Kafou: Haiti, Art and Vodou” at Nottingham Contemporary that just closed in January of this year, was a big show including works from different media -- 200 works of 40 artists from the 1940s to the present day. It was able to display these artists’ vivid creativity, especially powerful in works inspired by Vodou - the religion which has been a central part of people's lives since Haiti became the world's first black republic in 1804. Speaking of the exhibition Alex Farquharson, director of Nottingham Contemporary says:

“Haitian art is often shown in a folk art context, which is unfair. If I didn't feel that this work stood up to a lot of work that I think is most interesting in contemporary art then I really wouldn't be showing it here.”

There is still time to go and see the show at Riflemaker, which closes end of the month, and make your own mind if you think Haitian art is as interesting!

Royal Academy Becomes a Movie Set

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JulDCiXBx-s Check out the recently released movie "Summer in February," giving an interesting insight to the life of British painter Sir Alfred Munnings PRA. Set in Cornwall in the early 20th century and based on a novel by Jonathan Smith, the film tells the true but unofficial story of Munnings' first wife, the love triangle formed with Munnings's rival Gilbert Evans and her eventual suicide. Interestingly, there is no trace of a first wife in the biographical pages of the website of the Munnings Museum in Dedham, nor in his three volumes of autobiography. Partly shot at the Royal Academy in London, the academy's website rightly suggests that if you enjoy the TV series Downton Abbey you will love this lushly photographed film!

Add Some Color to Your Summer with Tate Britain Shows

Tate Britain is showing three big artists this summer: Laurence Stephen Lowry, Gary Hume and Patrick Caulfield. Amongst this three, our favorite is the one of Caulfield! We felt that the Lowry show got a bit repetitive and Hume’s exhibition somehow fell short compared to the excitement we felt wondering through the Caulfield galleries.

The Hume and Caulfield shows are in fact paired together by the museum, as two British artists of different generations both engaging with the medium of paint and who are amazing colorists. Drawing inspiration from artists such as Ellsworth Kelly, Donald Judd, Klimt and the great Old Master colorist Vermeer, Hume made his own name as one of the new generation of Young British Artists with his paintings of doors. For the exhibition entrance, he makes reference to these paintings and in fact made functioning doors for the first time!

This is a nice show bringing together Hume’s well-known works alongside recent paintings seen in the UK for the first time, all making up about 24 works charting Hume’s career since he exhibited his hospital doors paintings at the infamous “Freeze” exhibition organized by Damien Hirst in 1988.  Among the works been shown for the first time in the UK is a portrait of Angela Merkel titled “Anxiety and the Horse” 2011 that Hume completed in his home in upstate New York.

Patrick Caulfield is from an older generation than Hume. He first came to prominence in the 1960s and continued painting until his death in 2005. Similar to Hume, Caulfield’s career took off after an important exhibition. Caulfield’s was in 1964, the first of The New Generation exhibitions at the Whitechapel Gallery, where David Hockney and Bridget Riley were also included.   He never painted figures, expect for his iconic 1963 portrait of Juan Gris, the Surrealist painter, which is included in the show.

Caulfield looked up to the previous generation, to artists like Fernand Leger, Edward Hopper, and Stuart Davis who used lot of color. Caulfield was interested in the way these artists used space and light to capture a place and time. Caulfield's skills as a colorist is evident as soon as one walks into the exhibition room: you get taken up by the bright lights, synthetic colors and shiny surfaces of the modern world. We see brilliant examples of Caulfield’s grand still lives and examinations of British culture. For example, he makes references to the 1970s custom of having continental breakfast or wallpaper in the living room with photographed European landscapes - or the late 90s when every bottle of lager had a wedge of lime. As the exhibition curator Clarrie Wallis says, “He is capturing the character of modern life.”

Caulfield was one of the most admired artists of his generation: figurative painters admired him for his sophisticated draftsmanship, abstract artists for his control and inventive use of color, minimalists for his austerity and conceptual artists for his intellectual rigor. If Tate Britain show is not enough dose of Caulfield for you, Alan Cristea has put on a show of the artist's silk screen prints and they are for sale too.