News

29.05.2018

In the space of art “Art TsUM” will open a personal exhibition of one of the most famous contemporary Ukrainian authors Ivan Marchuk. In the exposition called “Roots”, more than 40 paintings of five author’s cycles of a wide artistic range have been combined. The artist will also offer the viewer a new monumental cycle of works “Colored Preludes”, which is also exhibited for the first time.

Much of the exhibited collection consists of works that traveled around the world over the last few years – they were shown in the leading museums and galleries of Lithuania, Germany, Poland, Belgium, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Luxemburg, Hungary, Thailand, Tunisia, Jordan and Turkey.

“I love improvisation, but I finish the picture to the micron. As a musician: he wrote a melody, and then it should be arranged, polished … And finally, everyone comes and exclaim: oh, what picture is already ready. No, I say, here you need to draw two thousand pieces. I search for perfection, and if I can not reach it, I am overwhelmed with discomfort. I write at an enormous speed: dozens of smears per second. I work in extraordinary ecstasy. This is only such state, I manage to bring the work to on it would be my trademark, so that without a signature it was visible: this is the art of Marchuk, and more draw, “- tells about his work Ivan Marchuk. The exhibition will run from May 29 to June 27, 2018.

25.05.2018

The Academy of Carrara in Bergamo revised the attribution of the “Resurrection of Christ” of the XV century – now the work is attributed to the famous master of the Renaissance

“The Resurrection of Christ” (circa 1492-1493) is again attributed to Andrea Mantegna.

The Academy of Carrara in Bergamo, Italy, discovered the “new” picture of Andrea Mantegna, who all this time was visible in her own collection. Curator Giovanni Valagusse restored the attribution of the “Resurrection of Christ” (tempera on the board, circa 1492-1493) to this master of the Renaissance in the new complete catalog of the museum Dipinti Italiani 1300-1500 (“Italian painting 1300-1500”), published by the publishing company Officina Libraria and including 110 paintings created in the XIV-XV centuries.

The artist’s name is written in capital letters on the back of the wooden board with a pen or a fine brush; apparently, the inscription was made at the same time, when the picture itself. In the catalog of the collection of Guillermo Lokys, a member of the board and later an honorary director of the Academy, compiled in 1846, it appears as the original work of Mantegna called “The Resurrection of the Lord; six figures; one of the most beautiful works of the famous master. ” In the same year, a document confirming that the work was restored during this period was dated. Lokis died in 1859 and bequeathed his villa and Bergamo art collection. “Resurrection” was among 240 paintings, transferred to the museum in 1866.

However, in subsequent years, various art critics disputed this attribution. Ironically, the first doubt about the “Resurrection” was expressed by the collector and great theorist Giovanni Morelli, who guided the transportation of works from the collection of Lokys to the Academy of Carrara. Morelli’s confidence that the painting was “spoiled by the interventions of restorers”, gave rise to art critics of the early 20th century to suggest that if the idea of composition belonged to Mantegna, the work itself was created either by his students or his son Francesco. In the 1930s, the American expert on the Italian Renaissance, Bernard Berenson, reduced the picture to the status of “a copy of the lost work”.

This view was fixed: after the Second World War, the picture was not a permanent exhibition and the catalog was listed as a copy. But Valagusse noticed a small gold cross at the bottom of the board – exactly the same as the shaft in the hand of Christ at the end – which indicated that the painting originally had the second, lower half. He managed to establish that this is the “Descent of Christ in Purgatory” (about 1492) – the signed work of Mantegna, sold in 2003 at the New York auction of Sotheby’s for more than $ 28 million. The assumption of Valagusse is confirmed also by the expert on the creativity of Mantegna Keith Christiansen, the curator Department of European Painting at the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

According to the Wall Street Journal, next year the Academy of Carrara wants to organize an exhibition in which the two halves of the work will unite again; Now the museum is negotiating with an anonymous private owner of the second half. In addition, the museum announced its intention to restore the Bergam part, tarnished due to the varnish applied in the XIX century.

24.05.2018

TAN figured out what was behind this: taking care of the master’s good name or self-interest

Piero Manzoni. Ahrom. 1958-1959.
The Piero Mandzoni Foundation announced that as early as December 2017, it destroyed 39 works, mostly paintings attributed to this artist. The act of destruction was preceded by long litigation: the work can only be recognized as a forgery and only the court can give permission for its destruction in Italy.

Piero Manzoni, who died in 1963 at the age of 29, is one of the most sought-after Italian artists in the postwar period. Among his works – a series of monochrome paintings – “achroms”, created by immersing the canvas in liquid kaolin. The prices on them reached auctions up to $ 15 million.

In the period from 2000 to 2002, opera singer Giuseppe Dzekkillo, who knew the artist personally, passed a number of works from his collection, including achroms, to the examination in the Archives of Piero Manzoni (now the Piero Manzoni Foundation). Dzekkillo asked the institution to confirm the authenticity of the works that belonged to him and to include them in the catalog-reason, which was prepared by the Italian curator Germano Celant. However, the archive declared fakes of 39 works from the collection and filed with the collector in court in order to obtain an official permission to destroy them.

First, the case was heard in a civil court. In 2006, the judge, based on the results of a graphical analysis of the artist’s signature, announced that the pictures were false, and ordered them to be destroyed. Against Dzekkillo immediately opened a criminal case, he was accused of having ordered the manufacture of fakes for sale. However, the arguments of the graphologist and the results of the stylistic examination seemed inconclusive to the criminal court. In 2009, the judge removed all the charges from the collector and decided that the paintings should be returned to the owner. There was a purely Italian legal conflict: the decisions of the two courts contradicted each other. But in Italy, civil and criminal justice systems work in parallel, and one ruling does not cancel the other.

In 2011, Giuseppe Dzekkillo died, and the controversial works were transferred to his son Graziano. Apparently, the fund managed to agree with him. (The fund declined to comment on this topic, and Graziano Dzekkillo wrote in an e-mail that he could not discuss this matter.) Jekkillo Jr. and the Piero Manzoni Foundation filed a joint motion with the Civil Court to enforce the 2006 decision. The request was granted, and the fund was able to destroy the disputed work.

However, with the owners of alleged fakes, this organization is often sued – it has already won 17 trials. During the hearings of the next criminal case, the lawyer of the accused Lionel Cherezi said that the fund’s employees may be personally interested in destroying the artist’s works – fake or not – to inflate the prices of his works from his own collections. In order to confirm his assumptions, the lawyer asked the director of the foundation Rosalie Pascualino di Marineo, who is now responsible for the examination, because Germano Celant no longer cooperates with the institution. DiMarineo replied that, since 2004, she herself is attributing herself with the brother and sister of the late artist, Helena and Giuseppe Manzoni di Kyoska, the president and vice president of the fund, respectively. According to Cherezi, now the attribution is done by people who are “directly interested” in its results, as they themselves own the works of Piero Manzoni. He is sure that the fund “declares a fake any work at its discretion, for the sake of its own purposes, rewriting entire episodes of the artist’s life.”

Asked how many of Piero Manzoni’s works are owned by the foundation, di Marineo replied: “The family does not own a lot of work, and it intends to sell them as little as possible.” In 2017, the organization began cooperation with one of the world’s largest art dealers – the international gallery Hauser & Wirth. However, according to DiMarineo, the purpose of the alliance is not the sale of works, but the “dissemination of information about the artist.” The intentions, of course, are good. The question remains: is it acceptable, when courts condemn works of art to death?

21.05.2018

A young artist and illustrator, known under the pseudonym Aitch, impresses with the originality of his paintings. The girl decided that the pictures at all do not bring benefits, so it makes no sense to draw them. That is why she embodied the childhood dream in reality – he created a weird alphabet. Each fruit or vegetable corresponds to the letter of the alphabet.

Strange fantastic creatures began to draw while studying at the University of Art and Design in Timisoara, Romania. This was a way of unusual expression of human anatomy. The artist gives preference to bright, warm tones, images of illustrations are distinguished by elegance, charm and some sort of original charm. The pictures are unusual characters and characters.

In addition to drawing, Aitch is fond of creating handmade leaflets and toys, which also distinguishes the unique style of the artist. The girl’s work can be purchased at various masters fairs and in art shops in Bucharest, Berlin, Hanover, Barcelona or Madrid.

18.05.2018

The young French illustrator, Xavier Casalta, shows the miracles of patience and endless talent when creating images in a unique drawing technique dot.

“This style requires diligence, accuracy and attentiveness, and I began to work with a solid black color, but I was always attracted to pointillism, then I decided to try different methods, and drawing points was my favorite technique. Of course, this is not the best option in terms of high performance, but very exciting, “- said the artist.

His latest work, “Autumn”, is a magnificent still life of interwoven colors of daisies, roses and aster. And still ripe vegetables – pumpkin, onions and tomatoes, fruits of grass, sea buckthorn and other autumn gifts of nature of Southern France. It is anticipated that there will soon be a continuation in the form of images of other seasons.
Surprisingly, all these detailed images with a finely transmitted game of shadows and gradients of white, gray, black are created by drawing – a special pen – tiny ink dots with a diameter of 0.10 mm.

The artist calculated that he spent 370 hours, working at a speed of 5-8 strokes per second. So, a series of works entitled “Autumn” contains seven million points, which can be detected only at a close consideration.

Source: https://ukraineartnews.com/news/news/frantsuzkij-hudozhnik-divuje-unikalnoju-tehnikoju

16.05.2018

The painting “Reclining Nude” (Nu couche (sur le cote gauche), 1917) by the Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) on Monday sold for a record $ 157.2 million at the Sotheby’s auction in New York.

The estimated value of the lot was $ 150 million, which was also the highest estimation among all works of art ever exhibited at this auction. The painting, reaching a diagonal of 147 cm, is part of a series of 22 canvases that can be seen in the world’s largest museums, including the Metropolitan Museum and the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in New York, the British Institute of Art of Courtois and the Long Museum in Shanghai.

The realized picture was bought by an Irish billionaire at an auction in 2003 for $ 26.9 million. In 2015, another canvas with a reclining nude woman from the same series was sold for $ 170.4 million.

Other notable lots realized during the auction in New York were the canvas of the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) “Rest” (Le Repos, 1932), sold for $ 36.9 million at an estimated value of $ 25-35 million, and a picture of the French the painter Claude Monet (1840-1926) “Morning in the Seine” (Matinee sur la Seine, 1896), which went under the hammer for $ 20.6 million (with estimated $ 18-25 million).

14.05.2018

More than half a billion for one collection: at the evening auctions in New York, new price records for the work of Claude Monet and Henri Matisse. All the proceeds will go to charity.

The collection of the Rockefellers is so great that it is sold in several receptions. The most valuable works were put up for the evening trades on May 8. As a result, a new auction record was set for a collection owned by one owner – about $ 646.1 million dollars (originally the auction house cautiously estimated the entire meeting as a whole at $ 500 million). The uniqueness of the auctions is also in the fact that all proceeds will go to charity – according to the will of David and Peggy Rockefeller, they will go to ten chosen spouses during life to non-profit organizations. The new owners found all the lots – 44 paintings, including works by Picasso, Monet and Matisse, and one sculpture – “The Monument to Claude Debussy” by Aristide Maillol. At the same time eight price records were set for different artists. “Among the buyers were not only private collectors, but also institutions,” – admitted Jessica Fertig, head of the evening auction of impressionism and modernism Christie’s.

 “A Girl with a Basket of Flowers” by Pablo Picasso in the library of the Rockefeller House on Manhattan’s 65th Street. The picture is sold for $ 115 million. Photo: Christie’s

Top-lot, as expected, was “The Girl with a Basket of Flowers” (1905) by Pablo Picasso. Portrait of a nude teenage girl, referring to the pink period of the artist’s work, once belonged to Gertrude Stein. Specialists Christie’s assumed that the work would go for 90-120 million, and they were not mistaken. The hammer of the auctioneer fell when the figure of $ 102 million was sounded – the final cost of work for the buyer together with the commission was $ 115 million. The picture was taken to the client who participated in the bidding by phone. Thus, it became the second most expensive work of Picasso, ever sold at auction (after the “Algerian Women” (1955), two years ago, went to the same Christie’s for $ 179 million). In 1968, David Rockefeller assembled a group of collectors to make a contribution to buy the legendary collection of Gertrude Stein and her friend Alice B. Toklas. The right to select for themselves those or other works from it collectors – deal participants distributed among themselves by lot, pulling out pieces of paper with numbers from the hat. Rockefeller was lucky – he got the opportunity to make the choice first. He, along with his wife, Peggy, among others, left behind him a “Girl with a Basket of Flowers” and hung it in the library of his house on Manhattan’s 65th Street.

Eugene Delacroix. “A tiger playing with a turtle.” 1862. Photo: Christie’s

Another important item – “Water Lilies” (1914-1917) by Claude Monet – was sold after a long battle of buyers in the hall with a client from Asia, who was on the phone. He was so eager to take over the work, which twice raised the price of several million in one step of the bidding. The picture, with an estimate of $ 50 million, was sold for $ 84.7 million (including commission) – a record for the artist. The work, included in one of the most famous series of the artist, has an unusually large size for this cycle. “Because of its scale, there is a feeling that you are inside this landscape,” said Jessica Fertig and added that the demand for this type of work on the market is very high. “Water-lilies” (1914-1917) by Claude Monet sold for $ 84.7 million Photo: Christie’s

The third hit of the auction was the sensual “Sleeping Odalisque with Magnolias” by Henri Matisse – the canvas was written in Nice in 1923. The estimate was $ 70 million, the final price – $ 80.75 million (including the commission). The price was also a record for the artist. The picture went to another (and perhaps the same) Asian client who participated in the bidding on the phone.

It is very likely that Christie’s was able to secure a third-party guarantee for 13 lots, so the lots in the second half of the auction did not remain unsold, despite the small interest of buyers. Christie’s president Jussi Pylkkanen, personally conducting the auction, announced that it was “a great day for charity.”

11.05.2018

The French museum only recently discovered that half of its collection is a fake. More than half of the works in the collection of the French museum of the XIX century, dedicated to Etienne Terrus (1857-1922), were recognized as fakes. Everything turned out after the museum was visited by an art historian, who warned employees that the work seems suspicious.

The Etienne Terrus Museum, located in the tiny hometown of the artist Elne, hired art historian Eric Forcade to re-select his collection after the recent restoration of the building. The historian discovered that 82 paintings, or about 60% of the works in their collection, were not written by Terres. According to Forkad, he almost immediately noticed that the work was fake. “In one picture, even the signature was erased,” he told reporters. An art historian informed the Minister of Culture of the region and convened a group of experts who confirmed his suspicions. “At the stylistic level, it’s pretty rough. Cotton stands do not correspond to the canvas that Terrus used to use. Also in the works there are some anachronisms, and it’s hard not to notice them. ” For two decades, the local council collected a collection of 140 paintings and watercolors for the museum. And such disappointing conclusions of the experts shocked local residents, including the mayor of Ives Barniola. “Etienne Terrus was a great artist Elne. He was part of the community, he was our artist, “Barniol told local media. “We are very upset by the fact that people visited the museum and saw a collection, most of which is a fake. This is a real catastrophe for the municipality. ” The mayor opened an investigation into counterfeits and insisted that the guilty be caught. It should be noted that the officials of the Etienne Terres Museum refused to comment on the situation and talk about their further actions.

Source: http://art-news.com.ua/yskusstvoved-posetyvshyi-frantsuzskyi-muzei-sdelal-shokyruiushchee-otkrytye-19194.html
© Art News Ukraine. Under the guidance of Sotheby’s.

07.05.2018

The auction house Christie’s puts on sale “Portrait of the daughter of artist Clara Sérene” by the famous painter Peter Paul Rubens. Experts estimated the canvas at 3 – 5 million pounds sterling. By May 5, a portrait can be seen at a pre-sale exhibition in New York, then it will appear before the public in Hong Kong, and then – in the British capital.

“Rubens’ image of family members is more free and courageous than portraits of wealthy clients. This image of Clara Serena, the only daughter of the artist and his first wife, Isabella Brent, was written shortly before the untimely death of a girl aged twelve and a half. This is the first major work of Rubens who appeared at Christie’s in London after a record sale in July 2016, “said Henry Pettifer, a representative at the auction house.

We remind you, two years ago, a picture of a biblical theme relating to the early period of the work of Rubens, was bought for 44 million 882.5 thousand pounds after the intense battle between the four bidders. “Portrait of Clari Sereny” – a very personal picture with a unique character, which occupies a special place in the work of Rubens. It was not intended for public appearances and, unlike other portraits, was written without preparatory sketches. Evening sales of the works of old masters will be held in London on July 5th.

04.05.2018

US police have found who spoiled the canvas of the American artist Christopher Wool “Nameless”.

Recall that in the gallery of the city of Aspen a year ago a product worth $ 3,000,000 was cut by the son of the owner of the painting, Harold Morley. Nicolas Morley has already filed an official allegation of damage to the picture. According to the investigation, the cause of vandalism could be the quarrel between Nicholas and his father.

“We were able to fully track down the offender’s route to the gallery in the morning, Morley Jr. flew from London to Aspen on the eve of the crime.” A day later, a bearded man in black dress and sunglasses came to the gallery, knocking a couple of times in the picture of Wool and disappearing. the airport noticed a similar husband who returned to the UK, “- told police officers.

Interestingly, after the event, the owner of the painting tried to persuade the dealer to increase the value of the work. Morley wrote the gallery that the work can be “easily restored” and offered to give her a price of $ 3,500,000. He explained his intentions to the fact that the picture had “glorified”.