July 2018 Art News

Skinner’s tradition of notable Americana sales continues with auctions on August 12 & 13 and an online auction August 6-14. The two-day and online sales comprise nearly 1500 lots of fine American folk art, furniture, ceramics, and maritime antiques.

Conservator Hayley Tomlinson takes us behind the scenes in Conservation to discuss the cleaning of Rosa Bonheur’s The Horse Fair.

This month the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) presents the first west coast retrospective of award-winning documentary photographer Susan Meiselas. Mediations, which was first exhibited in Barcelona and Paris, is accompanied by a book of the same title. Known for her work in conflict zones and in documenting human rights abuses, Meiselas has been a member of Magnum Photos, an international cooperative of photographers, since the 1970s.

LOS ANGELES–During the seventeenth century, Dutch political and religious freedom as well as maritime trade and military strength ushered in an era of economic prosperity. In this golden age, artists inspired by the everyday made vast numbers of highly finished drawings. Masterful Likeness: Dutch Drawings of the Golden Age, on view July 24–October 28, 2018, at the J. Paul Getty Museum, brings together landscapes, topographical views, portraits, and scenes of daily life, underscoring Dutch artists’ masterful description of the world around them.

Multidisciplinary artist and TED Fellow Paul Rucker is unstitching the legacy of systemic racism in the United States. A collector of artifacts connected to the history of slavery -- from branding irons and shackles to postcards depicting lynchings -- Rucker couldn't find an undamaged Ku Klux Klan robe for his collection, so he began making his own. The result: striking garments in non-traditional fabrics like kente cloth, camouflage and silk that confront the normalization of systemic racism in the US.

In a new exhibition, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) showcases their collected works of Constantin Brancusi, one of the most influential sculptors of the 20th Century. The exhibition includes eleven sculptures, shown together for the first time, as well as drawings, photographs, and films, some of which Brancusi made in his studio with his friend Man Ray. Rare archival material illuminates the artist’s process and many of Brancusi’s relationships with friends, patrons, models, and museums.

A dedicated exhibition at Christie’s in London explores themes of religion, faith and divinity in post-war and contemporary art.

Themes of religion, faith and divinity have pervaded art throughout the centuries. Sacred Noise, a dedicated exhibition of 30 works at Christie’s in London on show until 21 July, charts the reinterpretation and subversion of these themes in the 20th century.

On June 29, the collaborative project Condo, which invites galleries to stage exhibitions outside their home city, opened its second New York iteration. Founded in London in 2016, Condo has since expanded to host cities across the world, including Mexico City, Shanghai, and São Paulo. This year’s New York roster of 47 galleries across 21 spaces is similarly international, engaging participants from Cairo to Dubai to Auckland with particularly robust domestic and Western European representation.

In this video, artist Huma Bhabha and curator Shanay Jhaveri discuss her sculpture We Come in Peace, the 2018 site-specific installation for The Met's Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden, the sixth in a series of commissions for the outdoor space. Bhabha's work addresses themes of colonialism, war, displacement, and memories of place. Using found materials and the detritus of everyday life, she creates haunting human figures that hover between abstraction and figuration, monumentality and entropy.

A fine late-17th century quarter repeating table clock by Thomas Tompion sold for £248,750 at Bonhams Fine Clocks Sale in London on Wednesday 11 July.