Millions of refugees are homeless, tens of thousands have been killed, Syria’s pile of rubble, Detroit’s a wasteland, poverty’s rife, unemployment’s rising, kids now earn less than their parents did… But what the hell, apart from Ai Weiwei, Banksy, Jimmy Cauty and a few others, the now generation of big-name artists don’t give a flying […]
Deep in August, gazing at the rather forlorn contemporary art landscape that is standard for this time of year, when major exhibition openings are lacking, I’m left wondering why in fact it seems a good deal more forlorn than I expect. This, despite the fact that the new extension at Tate Modern continues to attract thousands upon thousands of visitors. Also […]
Edward Lucie-Smith’s excellent article in Artlyst posed the problem of what to do with Tate Britain, now that Tate Modern has become, “the epicentre of the booming global contemporary art world.“ It simply can’t compete with either the Tate Modern, or the National Gallery in terms of size and sits uncomfortably between the past and […]
August is nearly here – the time when the contemporary art world in London begins its annual snooze, to wake up, hopefully refreshed, some time in mid-September. It’s the moment to draw breath, sit down and take stock. It’s hard to think of any comparable six months when events have been more tumultuous. In the art world itself, there […]
The Brexit vote has not come at a happy moment for the various Tate galleries. The new extension of Tate Modern, launched the moment before the vote in a blaze of publicity, was immediately swamped by thousands of visitors. Yet the vote very clearly demonstrates the huge cultural gap that exists between the cultural elites who live and work in London, […]
There are increasing signs of conflict between the two wings of the avant-garde – currently so-called – in the visual arts. I say ‘so-called’ because in fact neither wing has a firm claim to this much-coveted description. On the one hand there is the increasingly crazy and shady world of the big art fairs and major auction rooms. On […]
Art16, the Olympia Art Fair this year was considerably more fun than its immediate predecessor. It was more spacious in feeling, better laid out, better lit. Large art fairs often leave me, when I finally stagger out of them, feeling in urgent need of two things – a stiff drink and a quiet lie-down. This time I had none of those symptoms. […]
In light of the recent events in Paris, Artlyst reflects on the artists engagement with society in times of socio-political crisis; either influencing or being influenced by events; surely works should remind and speak directly to concerns relating to human rights, and freedom of speech? There were seven coordinated terror attacks in Paris carried out […]