PRINT WEEK IN NEW YORK
Faced with an economic recession, the National Guard mobilization and a tourist drought, New York print dealers have done the New York thing -- declare the first annual Fine Art Print Week in the city, Oct. 29-Nov. 4, 2001, complete with an official proclamation from NYC mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. The impressive number of exhibitions and other programs on view for the week are a testament to the enduring vitality of the New York art scene as well as to the hard work of the International Fine Print Dealers Association (IFPDA) and others who pitched it to organize the event on short notice. Some highlights:
A "Searching for Prints" symposium at the Museum of Modern Art on Oct. 29 featured presentations by MoMA print curator Wendy Weitman on educational sites on the web for print-lovers; by Spencer Museum curator Stephen Goddard on using cyberspace resources for art historical research; and by Art on Paper editor Faye Hirsch on the online print market. Weitman also took the occasion of the symposium to announce the launch of MoMA's first ever online-only exhibition, titled "Artists of Brücke", a fabulously high-tech look at 125 images of Expressionist prints.
The annual Print Fair that would ordinarily be held at the Seventh Regiment Armory on Park Avenue (currently occupied by the National Guard) has been cancelled; in its absence, 26 out-of-town print dealers have booked rooms at the Lyden Gardens Hotel at 215 East 64th Street. Visitors are welcome on Nov. 1-3 from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
At the same time, top print dealers in Manhattan have gone all out with exhibitions ranging from "Etchings by James McNeill Whistler" at C.G. Boerner on East 73rd Street and "A Century of American Color Woodcuts" at Hirschl & Adler Galleries on East 70th to a Wayne Thiebaud print retrospective at Jim Kempner Fine Art on West 23rd and "Thomas Ruff Nudes" at Edition Schellmann at 210 11th Avenue.
Several New York dealers are hosting shows by their overseas colleagues: Frederick Mulder of London is at David Tunick, Inc., on East 65th; August Laube from Zurich is at Ursus Books and Prints; and Paul Proute of Paris is at Boerner.
For more info, check out the IFPDA website at www.printdealers.com or call (212) 759-4469.
The "Editions & Artists' Book Fair" 2001 opens Nov. 1-4 down in SoHo at Brooke Alexander gallery and Deitch Projects. Among the dealers participating are Counter Editions from London, Editions Fawbush and Carolina Nitsch from New York, U.L.A.E. from Bay Shore and point d'ironie/Agnes B from Paris. The publishers of artists' books include Bound & Unbound, Jan van der Donk Rare Books, Granary Books and Printed Matter, Inc. Admission is free, but a special $100 benefit ticket gets you Barbara Kruger's "Business as Usual" two-color screenprinted canvas messenger bag containing a selection of artists' books from Printed Matter. For more info, call (212) 925-4338.
Print-related museum exhibitions around town include "Damien Hirst, The Last Supper, 1999" at the Brooklyn Museum, "Hirschfeld's New York" at the Museum of the City of New York and "Charles Burchfield, Works on Paper" at the Whitney Museum. The Cooper-Hewitt's new study center for drawings also has an open house; contact (212) 849-8376.
Print week wouldn't be complete without action at New York's two big art auctioneers. Christie's started the fun today, Oct. 31, with the sale of over 300 lots of modern and contemporary prints, beginning at 10 a.m. Sotheby's picks up the gauntlet Nov. 1-3, with a three-day endurance run of over 800 prints, starting off with the incredible Mexican print collection of Reba and Dave Williams.
GEMINI G.E.L. AT THE N.G.A.
Speaking of prints, the National Gallery of Art is putting on view its archive collection of one of the great U.S. printmaking workshops, Gemini G.E.L. (those initials stand for "graphic editions limited"). "Best Impressions: 35 Years of Prints and Sculpture from Gemini G.E.L.," Nov. 4, 2001-Jan. 21, 2002, features about 50 works, ranging from Robert Rauschenberg's large-scale 1967 Booster to David Hockney's computer-enhanced Going Round of 1994. Curator of the show is Charles Ritchie, who has also completed a new online Gemini G.E.L. catalogue raisonné, now viewable at www.nga.gov.
SWANN DOES CONTEMPORARY
Auction lovers were pleased to find something new in their mail -- a catalogue for the inaugural auction of contemporary art at Swann Auction Galleries in Manhattan. The handsome catalogue includes approximately 170 lots of cutting-edge art, and features on its cover David Robbins' Talent, a suite of 18 black-and-white studio shots of groomed and gussied downtown 1980s art stars -- from Cindy Sherman and Jeff Koons to Michael Byron and Peter Nagy. The emblematic work carries a presale estimate of $10,000-$15,000, and can be yours at the sale, which commences at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 13. The auction is jointly organized by Swann photo specialist Daile Kaplan and print and drawing expert Todd Weyman. Other hot lots include a 1980 diptych by Richard Prince and Cindy Sherman in which the then-roomates don identical androgynous costumes (est. $90,000-$120,000), a 1988 pair of white cotton overalls decorated with a drawing of a snake by Keith Haring ($5,000-$8,000), a set of four 1970 black and white photos by Vito Acconci documenting a performance called Openings in which the artist plucked out all the hair around his navel ($5,000-$7,500) and a great 1973 offset color litho (admittedly in a large edition of 250) by Gerhard Richter showing two oceanscapes, one standing in for the sky (est. $2,500-$3,500).
POLLOCK-KRASNER ANNOUNCES $4.3 MILLION IN GRANTS
The Pollock-Krasner Foundation in New York has announced 233 grants to individual artists totaling $4,341,400 for fiscal 200-2001. The grants are designed to support an artist's living and working expenses for one year; since its inception in 1985, the foundation has awarded over $30 million to artists in 62 countries. For grant applications and more info, go the Pollock-Krasner website at www.pkf.org.
Grant recipients are: Wolfgang Aichner, Yuri Albert, Clytie Alexander, Jan Ambruz, David Andrus, Richard Anuszkiewicz, Michael Asente, Lucia Autorino-Salemme, Ilan Averbuch, Olive Ayhens, Nina Bachhuber, Sohyun Bae, Lane Banks, Lucy Barber, Ronald Baron, Miriam Beerman, Louise Belcourt, Amnon Ben-Ami, Martin Bennett, Tamara Berdowska, Carlo Bernardini, Luca Bertolo, Waldo Bien, Robert Blackburn, Nancy Blum, Seymour Boardman, Daniel Bodner, Juan Bolivar, Gaza Bowen, Katherine Bradford, Thomas Brady, Tomislav Brajnovic, Eric Bransby, Colin Brant, John Brekke, Derrick Buisch, Hugh Byars, Wilfred Calvo Bono, Yamandu Canosa, Ladislav Carny, Scott Chamberlin, Steven Charles, Carl Fu Kang Cheng, Michael Childs, Eun-Mo Chung, Eugene Constan, Catherine Cook, Ann Cooper, Claire Corey, Curtis Cuffie, Erik d'Azevedo, Kevin Dagg, Francois Daireaux, Jasmina Danowski, Lajos Dargay, Nancy Davidson, Teresa Viana, Donna Dennis, William Dennisuk, Elizabeth Di Giorgio, Redas Dirzys, Hamlett Dobbins, Rosalyn Drexler, Stanislaw Drozdz, Mary Beth Edelson, Sally Egbert, Karina El Azem, Peter Ellis, Margaret Evangeline, Anoka Faruqee, Rochelle Feinstein, Paul Fenniak, Almudena Fernandez Farina, Jose Gabriel Fernandez, Michelle Fierro, Rebecca Forster, Charles Frazier, Susan Freda, Nancy Friedemann, Don Fritz, Michael Gellatly, Charles Ginnever, Anita Glesta, Alan Glovsky, Phyllis Goldberg, Gerardo Goldwasser, Cassia Goncalves, Robert Goodnough, Susan Graham, Alan Greenberg, Ron Griffin, Kestutis Grigaliunas, Nancy Grossman, Zbigniew Grzyb, Madan Gupta, Georgi Gurianov, Nicolas Guzman, Ira Joel Haber, Claes Hake, Kara Hammond, Patrick Harris, Burton S. Hasen, Julian Hatton, Victoria Haven, Frederick Hayes, Willy Heeks, Linda Sue Herritt, Charles Hewlings, Chris Hipkiss, Ann Holcomb, Rebecca Holland, Nicholas Hondrogen, John Hultberg, John Ingram, Michael Joliffe, Adam Kalinowski, Stan Kaplan, Aaron Karp, Herbert Katzman, Kurt Kauper, James A. Kelly, Michelle Kelly, Milan Klic, Justin Knowles, Jae Ko, Richard Kostelanetz, Laurent La Gamba, Ronnie Landfield, Gary Lawrence, Patricia Leighton, Catarina Pereira Leitao, Zoe Leonard, Marc Lepson, Bruno Victor Leti, Joan Linder, Antonio Lizarraga, Loio-Persio, Carlos Luna, Cameron Martin, Daniel Massad, Claudia Matzko, Stefana McClure, Bruce McColl, Kelly McCray, Ada Medina, Penelope Metcalf, Guillermo Molinero, Michael Moore, Michael Mulhern, Kellie Murphy, Yuki Nakamura, Jiri Nekovar, Simeon Nelson, John Newman, Susan Norton-Taylor May, Giacomo Nottiani, Aric Obrosey, John F. Obuck, Ludwika Ogorzelec, Haynes Ownby, Pedro Pacheco, Louise Mary Paramor, Jelena Peric, Gilda Pervin, Irene Peslikis, Kamol Phaosavasdi, Benjamin Polsky, Charles Pompilius, Richard Posner, Liz Whitney Quisgard, Raquel Rabinovich, Tony Raczka, Grzegorz Raczka, Scott Reynolds, Stephen Riedell, Volf Roitman, Herman Rose, Bradley Rubenstein, Zuzana Rudavska, Juan Sanchez, Susan Sauerbrun, Jane Schiowitz, Adolfo Schlosser, Louise Schmid, Matt Schwede, John Scofield, Arden Scott, Roy Secord, Sheba Sharrow, Yuan Shen, Iztok Smajs, Mikolaj Smoczynski, Beth Solin, Michael Solomon, Jane South, Joe Stefanelli, Gwen Stone, Kenji Sugiyama, Sarah Sutro, Yasufumi Takahashi, Jozsef Taller, Ev Thomas, Erla Thorarinsdottir, Ana Tiscornia, John Toth, Tam Van Tran, Alan Turner, Marco Ugalde, Richard Van Buren, Costa Vavagiakis, Mark Vinci, Dusan Vrga, Douglas Wada, Micki Watanabe, Dan Webb, David Webster, Betty Wilde-Biasiny, Aeneas Wilder, Frauke Wilken, Anthea Williams, Christopher Williams, Chuck Williams, Joan Witek, Katarina Wong, Jo Yarrington, Lin Yilin, Daniel Zeller, Tatyana Zhurkov, Carl Zimmerman.
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