In Conversation
Anselm Kiefer and Michael Govan
On the occasion of his exhibition Anselm Kiefer: Exodus at Gagosian at Marciano Art Foundation in Los Angeles, the artist spoke with Michael Govan about his works that elaborate on themes of loss, history, and redemption.
Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Winter 2022
The Winter 2022 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Anna Weyant’s Two Eileens (2022) on its cover.
Louise Bonnet: On “Red Study” and Supporting Reproductive Rights
Louise Bonnet speaks with Freja Harrell about her new painting, her donation to Planned Parenthood Los Angeles, and the role of art in the fight for reproductive justice.
Friends and Relations: Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon, Frank Auerbach, Michael Andrews
Join Jake Auerbach, Richard Calvocoressi, Bella Freud, Martin Gayford, and Florence Hallett as they discuss the work and legacy of four era-defining artists. Friends and Relations: Lucian Freud, Francis Bacon, Frank Auerbach, Michael Andrews, on view at Gagosian, Grosvenor Hill, London, elucidates the connections between their respective practices, and also features some of the artists’ portraits of each other.
Languorous undulations (in the temple of my familiar)
Alexandria Smith and Akwaeke Emezi take up themes of queerness, hybridity, and embodied memory in their respective visual and literary works. Here, Emezi responds to Smith’s painting Languorous undulations (in the temple of my familiar) (2022) with an eponymous piece of flash fiction.
On Centering Latinx Video Art
In late 2022, Gagosian, in collaboration with Anthology Film Archives, presented a selection of videos by Latinx artists curated by Susan Breyer. Here, Quarterly film writer Carlos Valladares responds to each work in prose or with a poem.
Sterling Ruby: TURBINES
Join Sterling Ruby in his Los Angeles studio as he works on new abstract paintings ahead of his exhibition TURBINES at Gagosian in New York.
Jenny Saville: Latent
In this video, Jenny Saville describes the evolution of her practice inside her latest exhibition, Latent, at Gagosian, Paris. She addresses the genesis of the title and reflects on the anatomy of a painting.
Glenn Brown: We’ll Keep On Dancing Till We Pay the Rent
In conjunction with his exhibition Glenn Brown: We’ll Keep On Dancing Till We Pay the Rent at Gagosian in New York, the artist sits down to discuss his new paintings, sculptures, and drawings.
Duane Hanson at Fondation Beyeler
To celebrate their twenty-fifth anniversary, Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel, Switzerland, staged an exhibition entitled Jubiläumsausstellung—Special Guest Duane Hanson. The presentation featured several sculptures by Duane Hanson alongside more than one hundred works from the foundation’s collection. Alice Godwin considers the fertile dialogues produced by these juxtapositions.
Fashion and Art: Madonna’s Sex and Saint Laurent Rive Droite
This year’s edition of Art Basel Miami Beach brought Saint Laurent to America for a special exhibition curated by creative director Anthony Vaccarello celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of the publication of Madonna’s groundbreaking book, Sex (1992). Staged on the Miami beachfront, the ephemeral exhibition was presented on the occasion of the reissue of Sex by Rive Droite and Callaway, New York, and featured large-format prints of Steven Meisel’s iconic photographs from the book, as well as unpublished images from the original photo shoots. Rennie McDougall reflects on the momentous impact of the publication, tracing Madonna’s ongoing influence on and provocation of popular culture.
Artist to Artist: Spencer Sweeney and Peter Doig
Peter Doig visits Spencer Sweeney’s studio and the two discuss automatism, ambiguity, and anguish in the creative process.
Events & Announcements
Donation
Louise Bonnet
Planned Parenthood Los Angeles
Red Study (2022), a painting by Louise Bonnet, was sold recently to Lauren Taschen, an advocate for women’s rights, generating around $100,000 to benefit Planned Parenthood Los Angeles. The donation reflects Bonnet’s desire to spark public discussion of the discomfiting topic of abortion. “I think it’s important to make public statements . . . about basic human rights,” she says. “No one wants to have an abortion—it’s a very difficult thing to live through. Not to trust women to make that choice for themselves is oppression.”
Louise Bonnet, Red Study, 2022 © Louise Bonnet
Tour & Book Signing
Cy Twombly
Thursday, February 23, 2023, 6pm
Gagosian, 980 Madison Avenue, New York
Art historian and lecturer Thierry Greub will lead a tour of the exhibition Cy Twombly, on view at Gagosian, 980 Madison Avenue, New York, through March 4, 2023. Guiding guests through the selection of paintings, sculptures, and works on paper produced in the final decade of Twombly’s life, Greub will discuss the artist’s handwritten notations, placing them in context with their literary sources, including the poetry of Charles Olson. Following the tour, the Gagosian Shop at 976 Madison Avenue will host a reception and book signing to celebrate Greub’s recently published monumental six-volume catalogue, Cy Twombly: Inscriptions, which traces the artist’s relationship with poetry and incorporation of writing into his compositions from 1953 until his death in 2011. Published by Brill | Fink, the book will be available for purchase at the event.
Cy Twombly: Inscriptions (Paderborn, Germany: Brill | Fink, 2022)
Performance
Body/Head
Kim Gordon and Bill Nace
Wednesday, February 15, 2023, 6:30pm
Gagosian, Beverly Hills
Join Gagosian for a live performance inside the exhibition Jim Shaw: Thinking the Unthinkable at Gagosian, Beverly Hills, by Kim Gordon and Bill Nace, performing as the electric guitar duo Body/Head. Gordon and Nace will create an improvisational composition in dialogue with the show, drawing on the exploration of the unexpected found in both their experimental music and Shaw’s dreamlike paintings. Attendees will receive a new zine featuring reproductions of drawings by Shaw, in advance of its official publication in the Spring 2023 issue of Gagosian Quarterly. The event has reached capacity.
Bill Nace and Kim Gordon, Silencio, Paris, 2012. Photo: courtesy Bill Nace
Artist Spotlight
Alexandria Smith
January 25–31, 2023
Alexandria Smith’s art addresses issues of identity as informed by autobiography, fiction, myth, collective memory, and history. She depicts metaphysical beings in primordial settings who embody states of growth and transformation. Her interest in hybridity and experimentation encompasses drawings with collage elements, paintings with sculptural assemblage, and immersive installations. Smith builds up dimensional components in her painted works, recently further articulating their surfaces through the incorporation of 3D-printed parts.
Photo: Ollie Adegboye
Museum Exhibitions
Closing Today
Georg Baselitz
Six Decades of Drawings
Through February 5, 2023
Morgan Library and Museum, New York
www.themorgan.org
This exhibition celebrates Georg Baselitz’s gift of fifty drawings to the Morgan Library and Museum in New York, as well as a donation to the Albertina Museum in Vienna. Shown together, these works present a retrospective of Baselitz’s artistic development and highlight the central role that drawing plays in his practice.
Installation view, Georg Baselitz: Six Decades of Drawings, Morgan Library and Museum, New York, October 21, 2022–February 5, 2023. Artwork © Georg Baselitz 2023. Photo: Janny Chiu
Closing Today
Helen Frankenthaler
Late Works, 1990–2003
Through February 5, 2023
Baker Museum, Naples, Florida
artisnaples.org
Marking the first museum presentation exclusively dedicated to the late work of Helen Frankenthaler, this exhibition features ten paintings and twenty works on paper dating from 1990 to 2003, some measuring more than six feet in length. Through her invention of the soak-stain technique, Frankenthaler expanded the possibilities of abstract painting while referencing figuration and landscape in unique ways. In later years, her practice continued to evolve through her use of diverse media and processes, as she shifted from painting canvas on the floor to using larger sheets of paper laid out on the floor or on tabletops for easier accessibility. The continuity, in terms of content and execution between the late work (post-1990) and what came before it, is striking. Graced with memorable encounters, a vast art-historical image bank, and technical prowess, the aging artist moved in whatever direction suited her mood and imagination. This exhibition originated at the New Britain Museum of American Art in Connecticut.
Installation view, Helen Frankenthaler: Late Works, 1990–2003, Baker Museum, Naples, Florida, September 6, 2022–February 5, 2023. Artwork © 2022 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: RoseBudz Productions, courtesy Baker Museum, Naples, Florida
Closing Today
Theaster Gates
Young Lords and Their Traces
Through February 5, 2023
New Museum, New York
www.newmuseum.org
Theaster Gates: Young Lords and Their Traces presents a selection of the artist’s paintings, sculptures, videos, performances, and archival collections that together memorialize both heroic figures and more humble, everyday icons. Gates’s elevation of these quieter sources of knowledge, and his assertion that collecting is a form of devotion and remembrance, has made his work reverberate on both local and international levels. In this exhibition the Chicago-based artist honors the radical thinkers who have shaped his practice and his world.
Installation view, Theaster Gates: Young Lords and Their Traces, New Museum, New York, November 11, 2022–February 5, 2023. Artwork © Theaster Gates. Photo: Dario Lasagni, courtesy New Museum, New York
Closing Today
The Voice of Things
Highlights of the Centre Pompidou Collection, Volume II
Through February 5, 2023
West Bund Museum, Shanghai
www.westbund.com
The title of this exhibition is taken from the iconic collection of prose poems published in 1942 by French poet and resistance fighter Francis Ponge (1899–1988). In it, he describes the beauty of banality and opens up a new way of looking at everyday objects and bringing them to life. Organized as part of a five-year partnership with the Centre Pompidou, Paris, this exhibition brings together emblematic artworks from the Centre Pompidou’s collection, ranging from the early twentieth-century avant-garde to contemporary works that question our globalized world. Work by Man Ray, Pablo Picasso, and Tatiana Trouvé is included.
Tatiana Trouvé, Polder, 2001, installation view, West Bund Museum, Shanghai © Tatiana Trouvé. Photo: Liang Xiaobo