Installation Views

Works Exhibited

About

Gagosian is pleased to announce the opening of Continuing Abstraction, a group exhibition to inaugurate the new gallery in Basel. The new space is located at Rheinsprung 1, and opens on the occasion of Art Basel 2019.

The exhibition explores the trajectory of abstraction in the United States and Europe from the immediate postwar period to the present, tracing artists’ diverse approaches to materiality and gesture—from the dripped and poured paint of Abstract Expressionism to the multireferential innovations at the forefront of painting today.

The earliest works included are by Willem de Kooning: January (1947–48) and Untitled (1948). These paintings serve as a fulcrum between the observation-based abstraction set in motion by Cubism and Expressionism and the nonobjectivity that characterized much of postwar American abstraction. In de Kooning’s paintings, biomorphic forms appear as fragments that transform into thick painterly strokes; while in Jackson Pollock’s Moon Vibrations (c. 1953–55), the figure disappears entirely, and the canvas becomes a record of an event—the act of painting itself. In Helen Frankenthaler’s With Blue from the same year, the events unfold more slowly, with areas of semitransparent paint soaked into the canvas over time; and in works by Cy Twombly and Robert Ryman from the late 1950s and early ’60s, gesture teeters between legibility and obfuscation, pattern and chaos. Mark Grotjahn’s Untitled (Capri 50.85) (2018) takes repetitive gesture to a new extreme, with its arcs of thick paint evoking sedimentary cross sections or horizonless landscapes.

For Mark Rothko and Brice Marden, the materiality of paint and the evocative nature of color are key, pulling the viewer into seemingly immeasurable voids. The meditative power of color in these works is countered by the measured seriality of Donald Judd’s aluminum wall sculptures and by the delicate and imperfect geometries of Agnes Martin’s untitled canvas completed around 1999, wherein carefully rendered graphite lines create horizontal bands of luminous, pale blue space. In Mary Weatherford’s Ruby, Ruby (2019), a red neon light casts an artificial glow across the canvas, combining the industrial coolness of Minimalism with the unique tactility of Flashe paint, applied in thin transparent layers.

Remembering Brice Marden

Remembering Brice Marden

In conjunction with the memorial service for Brice Marden held at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Mirabelle and Melia Marden produced a short film directed by Chiara Clemente to honor the late artist. Featuring interviews, archival photographs, and family videos, this film captures Marden’s vibrant life and enduring cultural impact.

Roy

Roy

Michael Ovitz, cofounder of Creative Artists Agency (CAA), looks back to 1989, the year he and the architect I. M. Pei commissioned Roy Lichtenstein to create the Bauhaus Stairway Mural for the then new CAA Building in Los Angeles. Through the experience of working with Lichtenstein, Ovitz formed a meaningful friendship with the artist.

Donald Judd: Untitled: 1970

Donald Judd: Untitled: 1970

In this video, Flavin Judd, the artist’s son and artistic director of Judd Foundation, discusses a historic large-scale work by his father from 1970, ahead of its presentation at Art Basel Unlimited 2024.

Bauhaus Stairway Mural

Bauhaus Stairway Mural

Alice Godwin and Alison McDonald explore the history of Roy Lichtenstein’s mural of 1989, contextualizing the work among the artist’s other mural projects and reaching back to its inspiration: the Bauhaus Stairway painting of 1932 by the German artist Oskar Schlemmer.

Picture by Picture: Revisiting Frankenthaler

Picture by Picture: Revisiting Frankenthaler

John Elderfield and Lauren Mahony of Gagosian speak with the National Gallery of Art’s Harry Cooper about the new and expanded version of Elderfield’s 1989 monograph on Helen Frankenthaler that Gagosian, in collaboration with the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, will publish this summer. The conversation traces Elderfield’s long interest in Frankenthaler’s work—from his time as a young curator at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, to the present—and reveals some of the new perspectives and discoveries awaiting readers.

Gagosian Quarterly Summer 2024

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Summer 2024

The Summer 2024 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring a detail of Roy Lichtenstein’s Bauhaus Stairway Mural (1989) on the cover.

Richard Armstrong

Richard Armstrong

Richard Armstrong, director emeritus of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation, joins the Quarterly’s Alison McDonald to discuss his election to the board of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, as well as the changing priorities and strategies of museums, foundations, and curators. He reflects on his various roles within museums and recounts his first meeting with Frankenthaler.

Willem de Kooning and Italy

Willem de Kooning and Italy

In tandem with the 60th Biennale di Venezia, the city’s Gallerie dell’Accademia is featuring the exhibition Willem de Kooning and Italy, an in-depth examination of the artist’s time in Italy and of the influence of that experience on his work. On September 20 of last year, the curators of the exhibition, the American Gary Garrels and the Italian Mario Codognato, engaged in a lengthy conversation about the exhibition for a press conference at the museum. An edited transcript of that conversation is published below for the first time.

Mary Weatherford: The Flaying of Marsyas

Mary Weatherford: The Flaying of Marsyas

In conjunction with her exhibition The Flaying of Marsyas at Museo di Palazzo Grimani, Venice, Mary Weatherford discusses the featured paintings, which are directly inspired by Titian’s late, eponymous masterpiece of circa 1570–76 and reflect her enduring fascination with the painting.

Brice Marden

Brice Marden

Larry Gagosian celebrates the unmatched life and legacy of Brice Marden.

Irving Blum and Dorothy Lichtenstein

In Conversation
Irving Blum and Dorothy Lichtenstein

In celebration of the centenary of Roy Lichtenstein’s birth, Irving Blum and Dorothy Lichtenstein sat down to discuss the artist’s life and legacy, and the exhibition Lichtenstein Remembered curated by Blum at Gagosian, New York.

Daniel Belasco and Scott Rothkopf on Roy Lichtenstein

In Conversation
Daniel Belasco and Scott Rothkopf on Roy Lichtenstein

Gagosian and the Art Students League of New York hosted a conversation on Roy Lichtenstein with Daniel Belasco, executive director of the Al Held Foundation, and Scott Rothkopf, senior deputy director and chief curator of the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Organized in celebration of the centenary of the artist’s birth and moderated by Alison McDonald, chief creative officer at Gagosian, the discussion highlights multiple perspectives on Lichtenstein’s decades-long career, during which he helped originate the Pop art movement. The talk coincides with Lichtenstein Remembered, curated by Irving Blum and on view at Gagosian, New York, through October 21.

Roy and Irving

Roy and Irving

Actor and art collector Steve Martin reflects on the friendship and professional partnership between Roy Lichtenstein and art dealer Irving Blum.

Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield

In Conversation
Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield

In conjunction with the exhibition Drawing within Nature: Paintings from the 1990s at Gagosian in New York, Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield discuss Helen Frankenthaler’s paintings and large-scale works on paper dating from 1990 to 1995.

Gagosian Quarterly Winter 2022

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.

Richard Serra: Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by Alina Ibragimova

Richard Serra: Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by Alina Ibragimova

Violinist Alina Ibragimova performs Bach’s Sonata for Solo Violin No. 1 in G Major: Adagio (BWV 1001, c. 1720) from within Richard Serra’s sculpture Transmitter (2020) at Gagosian, Le Bourget. Organized by Bold Tendencies, a nonprofit organization that commissions artists to produce site-specific projects and present performances, in collaboration with Gagosian, this recorded performance took place on May 8, 2022 before a live concert of Olivier Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet for the End of Time, 1941).

Richard Serra: Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by Mario Brunello

Richard Serra: Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by Mario Brunello

Cellist Mario Brunello performs Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major: Prelude (BWV 1007, c. 1717–23) within Richard Serra’s sculpture Transmitter (2020) at Gagosian, Le Bourget. Organized by Bold Tendencies—a nonprofit that commissions artists to produce site-specific projects and present performances—in collaboration with Gagosian, this recorded performance took place on May 8, 2022, before a live concert of Olivier Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet for the End of Time, 1941).

Gagosian Quarterly Fall 2022

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Fall 2022

The Fall 2022 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Jordan Wolfson’s House with Face (2017) on its cover.

Cy Twombly: Imperfect Paradise

Cy Twombly: Imperfect Paradise

Eleonora Di Erasmo, cocurator of Un/veiled: Cy Twombly, Music, Inspirations, a program of concerts, video screenings, and works by Cy Twombly at the Fondazione Nicola Del Roscio, Rome, reflects on the resonances and networks of inspiration between the artist and music. The program was the result of an extensive three-year study, done at the behest of Nicola Del Roscio in the Rome and Gaeta offices of the Cy Twombly Foundation, intended to collect, document, and preserve compositions by musicians around the world who have been inspired by Twombly’s work, or to establish an artistic dialogue with them.

There is No Neutral Space: The Architecture of Donald Judd, Part 2

There is No Neutral Space: The Architecture of Donald Judd, Part 2

In this second installment of a two-part essay, Julian Rose continues his exploration of Donald Judd’s engagement with architecture. Here, he examines the artist’s proposals for projects in Bregenz, Austria, and in Basel, arguing that Judd’s approach to shaping space provides a model for contemporary architectural production.