Author: George Greenhill

This Week In Art, London: Monday 4th – Sunday 10th December

What’s happening around the world this week

• Everyone is in Miami! Here is the Art Newspaper’s top ten shows to see there [The Art Newspaper]
• JFK painting outshines Donald Trump’s sketch at Heritage Auction Texas [New York Post]
• Lubaina Himid becomes oldest and first woman of colour to win the Turner prize [Guardian]
• Art Historian, Virginia Surtees, whose celebrated research on Dante Gabriel Rossetti spawned a revival of interest in the Pre-Raphaelite movement, has died aged 100 [Guardian]
• British Museum to move its storage to Reading [The Art Newspaper]

Openings

Art Basel Miami Beach 2017, 6 December – 10 December

Art Basel Miami, now in its 16th year, brings together over 250 of the globe’s top galleries and art museums. Works by over 4,000 artists will be on display, ranging from Marina Abramović to Otto Dix. Aside from the exciting array of art available, a number of audience participatory events will be staged. A particularly noteworthy show is the pop-up Museum of Ice Cream. This will include a pool of rainbow sprinkles and an ice-cream-sandwich swing. If you are lucky enough to go to this cool exhibit, be sure to take hundreds-and-thousands of selfies.

Opening times:
11am-8pm, Wed (Private Day, by invitation only)
11am-3pm, Thu (Vernissage, by invitation only) & 3pm-8pm
12noon-8pm, Fri-Sat
12noon-6pm Sun

https://www.artbasel.com/miami-beach

What not to miss

Don’t miss your last chance to see these exhibitions, now in their closing week:

Gino De Dominicis: Works from the collection of Guntis Brands, until 8 December 2017, Luxembourg & Dayan, London. Focused on the paintings produced in the last two decades of the artist’s life, this solo show will be the first public display in the United Kingdom of works from one of the artist’s most influential patrons and closest friend, Guntis Brands. A solitary figure, who turned his back on the cultural zeitgeist, Gino De Dominicis’s works combine a post-Duchampian approach with an adherence to figuration.

http://www.luxembourgdayan.com/exhibitions/54/works/
Everything at Once, until 10 December 2017, Store Studios, 180 The Strand, London.

The Vinyl Factory has partnered with Lisson Gallery to host an ambitious, multi-disciplinarily group show. Works by admired artists such AI WEIWEI, Susan Hiller, Richard Long, Lawrence Weiner, and Marina Abramović are housed in The Store Studio’s 1971 brutalist office block. The show’s enormous scale is anchored by a quote from composer John Cage (1912-1992), whose influence on postmodern art cannot be overstated. In 1966 he said, “Nowadays everything happens at once and our souls are conveniently electronic (omniattentive).” Of course, this is just as relevant today as it was then. The exhibition has had received fantastic reviews, so if you get the chance to see it before it closes you will not be disappointed.

http://everythingatonce.com
Jasper Johns: Something Resembling Truth, until 10 December 2017, Royal Academy of Arts, London.

Associated with Neo-Dadaism and Pop art, Jasper Johns broke free from the world of Abstract Expressionism, which dominated the artistic sphere during the 1950s. By appropriating culturally significant iconography, Johns subverts the familiarity of their meaning. His flags, maps and targets become contradictions of themselves, much like Marcel Duchamp’s readymades. Something Resembling Truth represents the first complete survey of the artist’s work to be held in the United Kingdom in over 40 years. This exciting (and vast) display reinforces the impact that Johns had on American art.

https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/jasper-johns

Recently opened and unmissable. Make sure you save some time to visit these ongoing exhibitions: 
Speakers, 25 Nov 2017 – 18 Feb 2018, Modern Art Oxford, Oxford

This winter, Modern Art Oxford presents a new commission by Swiss artist Nicolas Party. Party transforms the Piper Gallery into a theatrical set, inhabited by a cast of large female heads. The exhibition celebrates Oxford’s pioneering women and is a direct response to the masculine overtones of the city’s architecture.

Speakers (2017), courtesy of the artist and The Modern Institute/Toby Webster Ltd, Glasgow. Photo by Ben Westoby.

Carmen Herrera, 25 Nov 2017 – 13 Jan 2018, Lisson Gallery, London.

This will be Carmen Herrera’s sixth exhibition with Lisson Gallery, and her second with the gallery in London. It features an entirely new body of work created within the last year. A dynamic symbiosis of colour and shape that creates bold quasi-minimalist compositions has become Herrera’s trademark aesthetic. As Herrera says, “I like straight lines, I like angle, I like order.” This exhibition is not one to miss.

Estructura Roja (1966/2012), image courtesy of the artist and Lisson Gallery

Print Project Space: Gillian Ayres, Antony Gormley, Howard Hodgkin and more, 22 Nov 2017 – 6 Jan 2018, Alan Cristea Gallery.

Not only does this show include renowned works by Howard Hodgkin, Anthony Gormley and David Nash, but also new woodcuts by Gillian Ayres and a series of splatter screen prints by Ian Davenport. If you enjoy this exhibition, you will be pleased to know that the gallery’s Print Project Space features an ongoing series of public displays, with prints and editions by the gallery’s roster of international artists filling the space.

David Nash, Red Column, Black Column (2015), image courtesy the gallery and the artist

Gilbert & George: THE BEARD PICTURES AND THEIR FUCKOSOPHY, 22 Nov 2017 – 28 Jan 2018, White Cube Bermondsey, London.

THE BEARD PICTURES are powerful, unnerving, outrageous and sensationalistic. They reveal a world of fear and obsession, of madness and spirit. The intensity of their colours and the absurdity of their images confront the viewer with relentless aggression. In contrast to the clean-shaven, smartly dressed, Victorian aesthetic with which they have styled themselves over the years, the simple and ironic addition of facial hair elicits darker undertones. As George says, “we see it as an exploration of our modern times… you switch on the news and you see barbed wire and bearded people.” Their distinctive works (and their equally distinctive artistic identity) are not only on display in London but in seven simultaneous shows around the world, from New York to Naples.

Beard Run (2016), image courtesy the gallery and the artist(s)

Phillip King, Colour on Fire & Ceramics 1995-2017, 29 Nov 2017 – 3 Feb 2018, Thomas Dane Gallery, London.

For his second show at Thomas Dane Gallery, Philip King presents an exhibition that exists in two contrasting halves. This visual juxtaposition is not only a pleasure to behold, but it is revealing of the artist’s multifaceted approach to materials, which has evolved over the past 60 years.

Installation view, image courtesy the gallery and the artist

Karla Black, Modern Art, 17 November – 16 December, London.

In this new collection of works, Karla Black emphasises the importance of mark-making in her practice. In this display, the artist gives emphasis to the importance of colour and light in her sculptures. Her large-scale sculptures, installed with precarious delicacy, combine objects of domesticity with more traditional mediums. These new works include free-standing sculptures made with Vaseline, glass and paint, as well as hanging objects in clay, wool and spray paint.

Installation view, image courtesy the gallery and the artist

Cover image: Lawrence Weiner, Whole Cloth Stretched to the Limit (2013). Image courtesy Lisson Gallery and the artist.