Tag: modern art

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Lise Malinovsky (1957)

Born in 1957, Lise Malinovsky received her education first at the School of Applied Arts and then at the Academy of Fine Arts. As early as 1982, while still a student at the Academy, she made her mark with her virtuosic pastiches at Charlottenborg’s Spring Exhibition. Here, she showcased her grounding in both fauvism and art history dating back to the Baroque period. While her works were not as wild as those of her contemporaries, there is – and still is to this day – a vibrant vitality and expressiveness in her spontaneous expression, especially through her bold colors and gestural brushstrokes. Lise Malinovsky’s artistic language is sensual and tactile, and while she has a clear message for the viewer, the subject is subordinate to her urge to express herself through painting. She has created a wide range of decorations and has also painted portraits, including that of former Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen. Lise Malinovsky resides and works in both Denmark and Spain, constantly infusing her art with enigmatic complexity and linguistic dynamism that captivates viewers.

www.ftn-books.com has now the Willy Scvhoots publication on Malinovsky available.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Richard Deacon (continued)

Richard Deacon is a leading figure in British sculpture, renowned for his voluptuous and abstract forms since the 1980s. His extensive influence is reflected in the prominent public commissions of his works across the world. Deacon’s ingenuity lies in his insatiable desire for material, as he deftly transitions between laminated wood, stainless steel, corrugated iron, polycarbonate, marble, clay, vinyl, foam, and leather. As he eloquently puts it, “changing materials from one work to the next is a way of beginning again each time (and thus of finishing what had gone before)”.

Deacon himself identifies as a “fabricator”, highlighting the underlying construction of his completed pieces. Although his works are often cast, modeled, or carved by hand, the logic of their fabrication is laid bare. Sinuous curves may be bound by glue oozing between layers of wood, or screws and rivets may protrude from sheets of steel, exposing their inner workings. This transparency serves to underscore the interactive nature of the artistic process, as a constant dialogue between the artist and his chosen medium transforms the mundane into the metaphorical.

The concept of “fabrication” also conveys a sense of inventiveness, of creating something false rather than true. This clever play on words is evident in Deacon’s titles, which often juxtapose unexpected ideas or imbue new meaning in familiar phrases or cliches. Some noteworthy examples include Let’s not be Stupid (1991), No Stone Unturned (1999), Water Under the Bridge (2008), and Shiver My Timbers (2016).

www.ftn-books.com has several Deacon titles available.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Agoes & Otto Djaya

In the midst of the Indonesian War of Independence in 1947, director Willem Sandberg organized the first exhibition of Indonesian brothers Agus and Otto Djaya at the Stedelijk Museum in the Netherlands. This marked the first time that non-Western contemporary artists were given a solo exhibition at the Stedelijk. The Djaya brothers’ work was fueled by their involvement in the Indonesian struggle for independence after the proclamation of the Republic of Indonesia in 1945. The Stedelijk Museum’s research over the past year into the presence of the two brothers in the Netherlands sheds new light on their accomplishments. These new insights will be featured this summer at the Stedelijk in a thought-provoking exhibition spanning two rooms, a symposium, and other activities.

New research by independent curator and researcher Kerstin Winking into the work of the Djaya brothers in the Stedelijk’s collection reveals that there is a wealth of information about the brothers in Dutch archives. Agus and Otto Djaya were in Europe from 1947-1950, mostly in the Netherlands, where they secretly worked to promote Indonesian independence. The Stedelijk will showcase a selection of paintings from this period. In addition to works from the collections of the Stedelijk, the National Museum of World Cultures, and Leiden University Library, the exhibition will include revealing archival material demonstrating the entanglement of art and politics, as well as the brothers’ surveillance by the Dutch secret service and support from Dutch intellectuals for their efforts in the struggle for independence.

www.ftn-books.com has now the Willem Sandberg designed catalog from 1947 available.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Edwin Zwakman (1969)

In his response to the excessive proliferation of images that bombard us daily and fabricate a simulated reality (as seen in the CNN coverage of the Gulf War), Edwin Zwakman crafts a carefully constructed, fictional scenario that nonetheless appears undeniably real. He employs clever tricks and fabricates falsehoods to reveal uncomfortable truths, in sharp contrast to the overt lies perpetuated by those in positions of power. Though power and authority are hinted at rather than explicitly portrayed, their stereotypical presence adds a potent impact. These pervasive stereotypes have been ingrained in our collective consciousness, which Zwakman masterfully juxtaposes to create contradictory scenes that stir up previously undefined but vaguely familiar anxieties. Through this dissonance between images, he unveils the true depth and magnitude of the abyss that lies just beneath the surface.

www.ftn-books.com has the van Abbemuseum catalog Façades now available.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Peer Veneman (1952)

a classic photo of Peer Veneman

It must have been written in the stars since many dutch artist swho became household names in the 80’s and 90’s were born and raised in the city of Eindhoven. There are of course Henk Visch and Piet Dirkx to whome i have devoted multiple blogs and now you can add Peer Veneman to that list. Also born and raised in Eindhoven, but this time with a different career. Where Dirkx and Visch stayed initially in Eindhoven, Veneman moved to Amsterdam and soon became part of the LIVING ROOM art scene. Here he had his first successful exhibitions and later his name would become more familiar and his works more successful resulting in exhibitions at galerie Onrust and at galerie Hafemann.

He became known in the 1980’s with colorful sculptures that somehow filled the space between abstraction and figuration. Ever since he took the liberty to make abstract and figurative works at the same time, denying the traditional gap between the two. One constant factor evident throughout all his work is his apparent refusal, even within a single piece of sculpture, to do the same thing twice. He aims to give new meaning to sculpture (form), painting (the surface) and architecture (spatial construction). Not only are the formal aspects of visual art questioned by Veneman in his work, but his connotative intentions also undergo that process as well.

www.ftn-books.com has some nice Living Room and Veneman publications available.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Avery Preesman (1968)

 

Born in Willemstad Curacao, Avery Preesman was educated in the Netherlands. He entered the ATELIERS in 1992 without any pre education and because of his exceptional talent he soon received the second price in the Prix de Rome 1998 contest and in the same year the WOLVECAMPPRIJS. He became soon after a galerie artist of the famous ZENO X gallery in Antwerp and received solo exhibitions at the SMAK and Kunstlerhaus in Vienna and to end this lightning career of Preesman a solo exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in 2001. Within a period of 9 years, Preesman had established himself as one of the leading contemporary artists in the Netherland. You can only admire such an artist. During the last 20 years , Preesman has been a regular contributor to the art and museum scene in Europe and beyond.

www.ftn-books.com has the 1999 NAi catalogue available. It is the catalogue which shows why Preesman has become so famous within a period of 10 years. He is a true natural.

preesman

 

 

 

Posted on by — Leave a comment

100 Meesterwerken by Willem Sandberg

Schermafbeelding 2020-03-24 om 14.13.48

This is arguably one of the best Willem Sandberg publications of all time. An impressive cover, the use of multiple kinds of paper, the best art works from the Paris Modern Art Museum and an unbeatable price, because these are still available, but become more rare every year. I managed to collect 4 copies of this excellent 1952 catalogue of which 2 are now for sale at a special price of USD 35.00.

Please inquire at wvdelshout@ziggo.nl for a direct sale at this price.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Posted on by — Leave a comment

John Davies (1946)

Schermafbeelding 2019-11-25 om 16.55.18

“I call myself a haunted house… we all have ghosts and histories.” – John Davies

Davies’ interest in the human presence set him apart from many of his contemporaries in British sculpture at the beginning of his career. Of his early figures, often cast from life and clothed, Davies has said, ‘I wanted to make a figure, not like a piece of sculpture, more like a person…. I wanted my sculpture to be more like life in the street’.

His more recent works are modelled in clay, before being cast in polychrome polyester and fibreglass, or bronze. Davies arranges these figures in carefully choreographed relationships. Animals and inanimate objects such as houses also appear in works whose thematic concerns are always with human experience.

Of The Deerson Series, shown for the first time in this exhibition, John has said: ‘This series of scarecrow-like figures, with their moons, are a kind of self-portrait. I never intended to make these images, having other ideas to the fore, when I had a car crash in 2010. My life always leaks into my work, so inevitably and reluctantly these images emerged. They are works processing my long recovery. Now to me they seem to have a life of their own, independent of my story. Mad dancing ‘scarecrows’ coming to life, a protest against fate and physical frailty, like the figures in the Watersons’ song, ‘The Scarecrow’.’

Drawing, often in series, has always been an important aspect of John Davies’ practice, and the sculpture and drawings are equally important to him. The drawings in this installation demonstrate how the two practices influence each other.

The above text was found in Fuse magazine

www.ftn-books.com has some John Davies catalogues available

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Lawrence Weiner (1942) + discount

Schermafbeelding 2019-04-08 om 15.03.44

Lawrence Weiner and the Netherlands is a combination which now exists for almost 50 years. His connections with dutch directors and curators is legendary and he has made several special projects with them in dutch. Weiner is considered as a post minimal artist and one of the founders of Conceptual art and that is the reason why his works blend so well within the collections of the more important dutch museum. The van Abbemuseum, Stedelijk and Gemeentemuseum have all works by Weiner in their collections.

Schermafbeelding 2019-04-08 om 15.10.09

But Weiner is much more than a conceptual artist. He is a book designer and poet at the same time  and these little sketches with words can be blown up into facades and objects with words. One of the most memorable to me was the facade at the Ljubljana Modern Art museum with a Weiner object on one of the outside museum walls. Impredssive, recognizable. So to celebrate the longtime history that Lawrence Weiner has with the Netherlands there is a discount this week of 10%  on all items at www.ftn-books.com . use the discountcode : LawrenceWeiner10 and receive a 10% discount on all items including some marvelous Lawrence Weiner publications.

weiner sm a

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Lettering by Modern Artists

The above title is the same title as the exhibition held at the Museum of Modern Art in 1966. I recently acquired this catalogue which is now for sale at www.ftn-books.com and for me it makes clear the importance Modern Artists have for Modern typography. this is not the printed letter, but the much more free and personal lettering by artists on paper and canvas, making this a source of inspiration for modern typographers and designers and it shows clearly the way lettering can be used to make a splendid composition and be informative at the same time. A catalogue i can truly recommend.

lettering