Tag: paris

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The ultimate Christmas Tree by Paul McCarthy

For those of you that are interested in the news start reading the Guardian , a truly excellent newspaper and one that has a great perspective on modern art. Because i was looking for a special Christmas Tree i found this one by Paul McCarthy on the place Vendome /Paris .

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An inflatable work of art resembling a large green tree. His work is not unfamiliar with us dutch , because in Rotterdam there is statue of a Gnome holding a giant butt plug and it is somewhat similar to the one presented in Paris. The difference is of course the figure holding the plug which is only present in the permanent statue presented in Rotterdam.

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Because Christmas is near and you probably have some spare time please bookmark this page:

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2014/oct/20/paul-mccarthy-paris-tree-sculpture-butt-plug-controversy

and start reading the great article on Paul McCarthy in the Guardian.

Merry Christmas

 

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Jean Lurçat et “La Creation du Monde” ( 1949)

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Jean Lurcat, is not forgotten by those who are interested in the art of the 40’s and 50’s from last century. A contemporary and ground breaking artist who’s works can be considered among the best that french art has produces in those decades.  When i have to describe his art it would be something in between a Picasso and Matisse style, but totally Lurcat and original. Sandberg recognized his importance and made an exhibition with his works in 1959 in the Stedelijk Museum.

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My interest was awakened last year , because i had the opportunity to buy possibly the most important book published with Lurcat lithographs. Published in an edition of only 99 copies, signed by the artist and numbered in print ( This is no. 20). The book LA CREATION DU MONDE, was published by Les Exemplaires with a story by Andre de Richaud and contains in total 56 original lithographs by Jean Lurcat. The book was printed by Mourlot/ Paris who was the leading printer for original lithographs in those days . Because of their qualities they were commissioned by the Galerie Maeght for their art publications too. The book is one of the highlights in my inventory and would grace many art book collection, but as always pictures tell a better story than words. Therefore i give you an impression of this magnificent publication which is now for sale together with the Sandberg designed catalogue at www.ftn-books.com

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Jean Arp and Denise Rene 1959

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Those of you following this blog , know of my admiration for the gallery Denise Rene and in 1959 they presented one of my favorite artists…..Jean Arp.

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Jean Arp was at that not the name he is nowadays but his works were collected by some who thought his works were great. If ever there is an Arp for sale, it draws interest from all over the world , but at the time of this 1959 exhibition at Denise Rene there were so many great works for sale. Drawings, Paintings, sculptures, bronzes….all were presented and for sale. I can not offer an original Arp at www.ftn-books.com, but this great and rare catalogue comes for sale  at my site today.

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Heinz Berggruen (1914-2007)… AAA publications

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What is the resemblance between Ernst Beyeler and Heizn Berggruen? ….. both are grand masters of the Modern Art dealer world, both have become famous and both have started their own galleries and the result was that in the end they both had their own museum. Beyeler in Riehen and Berggruen in Berlin.

This blog tells something about the history of Heinz Berggruen, who started his art dealer career with buying some Paul Klee’s in a time that money was scarce and good quality art and appreciation of modern art even more problematic. Still he bought one of his first water colours by Paul Klee for $ 100,- of a jewish person who was in need of money. This way he started dealing and collecting art and continued to do so , even after he resigned from his Paris gallery in 1980, and continued building his own collection into one of the great collections of modern art in the world. The collection contained, Paul Klee, Braque, Klee, Matisse, Giacometti and a very large collection of over 80 Picasso paintings. All this great art made it invaluable. The result …he wanted  the collection to stay together and sold his collection to the Berggruen Museum at a reduced price where his collection is now on show. Over 100 masterpieces still together at one place, the Berggruen Museum.

http://www.smb.museum/museen-und-einrichtungen/museum-berggruen/home.html.

What made me look up the story of HeinZ Berggruen?  About two years ago i had a chance to buy a small collection of Berggruen catalogues at auction and had the final bid. At home i was struck with these beautiful little books. In many cases there was original art in them or on the cover. The best for me is the Arp catalogue , but all these small gems together give a great impression of the quality Heinz Berggruen realized with his art publications of his favorite artists. These are all AAA publications.

The ones in the picture are for sale at www.ftn-books.com

berggruen set

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Geneviève Claisse (1935) and Herbin

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I always wondered why the works by Geneviève Claisse looked so familiar and were at the same time original and authentic. After reading some parts of her biography i found out that she is related to Auguste Herbin and that shows. Her use of form is somehow different from Herbin’s, because Geneviève Claisse is a fierce supporter of the rounded shapes where as Herbin uses Geometrical ones. At the same time the use of color and contrast is with both almost the same. Geneviève Claisse is represented by, galerie Denise Rene, one of the best galleries in the world, which also made some great catalogues which are available at www.ftn-books.com

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A relative to Auguste Herbin, born in the same place, her painting vocation was born through reading the magazine Art d’aujourd’hui, tribune of geometrical abstraction.

Claisse is the great niece of abstract painter Auguste Herbin, a founder of the Parisian association of artists Abstraction-Création. Herbin saw Claisse’s work for the first time when she was eighteen years old, and encouraged her to continue painting. In Herbin’s mind, Claisse was “le successeur désigné par le destin et par l’hérédité” (“the successor appointed by destiny and heredity”). Like Herbin, Claisse’s work shows a devotion to the ideals of formal purity and the perfection of execution. At this young age she worked tirelessly, often working at night after a day in the studio, carefully painting abstract forms on bold, colorful canvases.

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Fashion with Claudia Schiffer (1970) and Chanel

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As Monty Python would have said ” and now for something completely different”…..

but is it really different?…. when you consider true fashion is great art and know that Karl Lagerfeld is not only a great fashion designer, but also one of the great photographers from the last century, you may consider Claudia Schiffer his “muse” and being that, she is an almost perfect work of art and therefore i am delighted to write this blog on one of my favorite fashion models of all time, Claudia Schiffer.

In the early 1990s, she starred in campaigns for Guess?.Guess? co-founder Paul Marciano said in E! Forbes Top 15 Supermodel Beauties Who Made Bank, “Guess? name became really much more known around the world because of Claudia”. After several other magazine appearances including the cover of British Vogue, shot by Herb Ritts, Schiffer was selected by Karl Lagerfeld to become the new face of Chanel. In May 1997, Schiffer was featured on the cover and in the pictorial of Playboy.

Schiffer appeared on the November 1999 millennium cover of Vogue as one of the “Modern Muses”. Named one of the most beautiful women in the world,[by whom?] her ability to appeal to a global audience assured an internationally successful career spanning over 25 years. Other magazines Schiffer has appeared on the covers of include Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, People, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Cosmopolitan and Time. Schiffer has walked in fashion shows for numerous fashion houses, including Versace, Karl Lagerfeld, Chloé, Yves Saint Laurent, Christian Dior, Fendi, Michael Kors, Dolce & Gabbana, Ralph Lauren, Balmain, Louis Vuitton, Chanel and Valentino.

www.ftn-books.com has some nice books on Schiffer, Fashion, Chanel and Karl Lagerfeld

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Gabriel Orozco (1955)

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Yes ….it takes time to appreciate the works by Gabriel Orozco, but fortunately we have had the chance to experience his works on several occasions including the exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential contemporary artists of his generation. Employing a diverse practice that includes installation, sculpture, painting, and video, Orozco’s work is characterized by its focus on reinterpreting everyday objects: in his seminal La DS (1993), the artist cuts out the middle third of a Citroën car, resulting in an object that is at once familiar and totally alien. “What is most important is not so much what people see in the gallery or the museum,” he has said, “but what people see after looking at these things, how they confront reality again.” Born on April 27, 1962 in Jalapa, Veracruz, his father was the Mexican muralist Mario Orozco Rivera. Through him, the younger Orozco was exposed to the world of galleries and artists at a young age, and he went on to study at the Circulo de Bellas Artes in Madrid. He has been the subject of several major exhibitions, notably including a 2009 mid-career retrospective at The Museum of Modern Art in New York which went on to travel to the Kunstmuseum Basel, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and finally the Tate Modern in London in 2011.

Only one monographic publications on Orozco is available at www.ftn-books.com, but his importance is growing every year and he has participated in some major exhibitions which catalogues are available too.

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Kees Maks (1876-1967) .

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Another painter of daily life in the Netherlands, but only known in the Netherlands , is Kees Maks. The same as Mondrian, Sluijter and Gestel, he tavelled to Paris in his younger years before the first World War. There he entered the Salon the Automne and became a member, where he met Kees van Dongen ( see blog yesterday) and became influenced by this painter. Maks was fully recognized as an important painter when his painting Nightcafe was purchased by the Musee de Luxembourg in 1927.

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Contemporaries often placed Maks’s modernity in his figures, who were clothed and coiffed according to the latest fashion and demonstrated the latest dances, such as the FURLANA. Maks himself chose the clothing for his models, undoubtedly assisted by his wife who worked at Hirsch and later became and independent fashion designer.

As DE TELEGRAAF put itin in 1920….MAKS proved himself a painter who dares to go into raptures over the fashion of time. But despite all this qualities Maks in only known in the Netherlands and is rarely encountered in collections outside our borders.

There are a few tiles on Maks available at www.ftn-books.com

maks shop

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Kees van Dongen (1877-1968)… fauvism

Born in Rotterdam, but French in all his veins , there is still a discussion going on if he is a dutch or a french painter. For me he is 100% french. Practically all his subjects and his registration in paint or drawing of daily life is done in France and influenced in every way possible by French society. He was famous for his portraits of society men and woman ( possibly his most famous portrait is of Brigitte Bardot), but his strength for me is when he watched and depicted french daily life.

For instance the painting which he made on the Moulin de la Galette ( 1904-1905) is one of the very best paintings of the end of the early 20th century and a breakthrough in Modern art and for van Dongen himself, finding eventually a style which in bright unnatural colors ( like green and pink, reality was depicted). Fauvism was born in the work by van Dongen.

www.ftn-books.com has some nice titles on this great artist

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Jacques Lipchitz (1891-1973)

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The importance of Lipchitz can not be underestimated, because he was was probably the first who worked out cubism in 3D. His cubist sculptures are highly recognizable and because the artist has a strong following in the Netherlands, where he had in the late 50’s some Stedelijk MUseum presentations curated by Willem Sandberg, his works can be found in most of the large museums in the Netherlands. Paris is where he studied and found soul mates .

It was there, in the artistic communities of Montmartre and Montparnasse, that he joined a group of artists that included Juan Gris and Pablo Picasso as well as where his friend, Amedeo Modigliani, painted Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz.

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Living in this environment, Lipchitz soon began to create Cubist sculpture. In 1912 he exhibited at the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts and the Salon d’Automne with his first solo show held at Léonce Rosenberg‘s Galerie L’Effort Moderne in Paris in 1920. With artistic innovation at its height, in the 1920s he experimented with abstract forms he called transparent sculptures. Later he developed a more dynamic style, which he applied with telling effect to bronze compositions of figures and animals.

For more publications on cubism and Lipschitz please visit www. ftn-books.com

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