Bowdoin — Art Advisory

Art Advising & Special Projects

Sterling Ruby, SPECTER (2019). © Sterling Ruby.

When you hear the name Coachella you’d be forgiven for your mind leaping to one thing; the famous annual Coachella music festival. But the Coachella Valley is also making waves on the contemporary art scene as the home of Desert X, a biennial contemporary art show now in its second edition. Desert X was founded in 2015 ‘t o bring the finest international artists to the Coachella Valley to create art, engage viewers and focus attention on the valley’s environment.’ The first edition was held in 2017. Running February 9 to April 21, 18 artists have created site-specific installations in an area spanning 55 miles, influenced by the varied, often barren landscape, its people, history, architecture and economics in an effort to explore how art behaves outside of institutional walls.  Neville Wakefield, the Desert X artistic director, said, “What’s exciting about a site-specific show, which is what this is, is that really the place is the curator. The place creates and curates the objects, and I think the experiences.” Read the Artnews Article here .

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 12, 2019STERLING RUBY, NEVILLE WAKEFIELD, DESERT X, California, Matthew Schum Amanda Hunt, Matthew Schum, Amanda HuntComment

It’s early February which can only mean one thing; the contemporary art spotlight falls again on Mexico City, playing host to two of Latin America’s major art fairs from 6-10 February. The bi-annual Zonamaco is running its 16th edition showcasing over 180 galleries from the Americas, Europe and Asia. Expect to see big names, new galleries, innovation and experimentation in the exhibition spaces and the concurrent conference program. Zonomaco will also be holding its Diseño, Salón and Foto exhibitions alongside the main event at the Centro Citibanamex. Now in its sixth year, the Material Art Fair will be once again holding court at the Frontón México after a hugely successful 2018 edition in the same location. 73 exhibitors from 37 cities in 22 countries will be representing next generation, emerging and established commercial galleries, as well as not-for-profit and artist-led exhibition spaces. As artists, galleries, buyers and celebrities alike descend on CDMX, there are parallel events, gallery openings, talks, conversations and performances all against the stunning backdrop of Chilangolandia, the City of Palaces. For the latest updates on the fairs and new artists setting the contemporary art world alight, follow us on Instagram .

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 5, 2019Material Art Fair, Art Fair, Mexico City, Mexico, Zonamaco, contemporary art, Art Advising, Bowdoin Projects, Houston, Houston Art Advising, Houston Art AdvisorsComment

It’s no secret that money market investors are in the business of chasing the best possible returns. What we think of as traditional assets, that’s to say stocks and bonds, have performed poorly in recent years amid ongoing market volatility; 2018 saw significant swings and was one of the most turbulent years on record.   Meanwhile, the art market grew 12% in 2017 to an estimated $63.7bn with the USA holding the number one position, according to a report published in March 2018 by Art Basel and UBS. This growth continued through 2018, increasing c.10.6% as at November, outperforming stocks and bonds and coming in ahead of other luxury assets including fine wine and classic cars. The chart reproduced above was published in the Wall Street Journal in December 2018, a sure sign that investors are taking notice.  As they seek to enhance returns in tough markets, investors find themselves increasingly looking towards luxury alternative assets for their returns potential and as a means of diversifying their risk. So-called ‘real assets’ tend to be uncorrelated to large market swings and provide something more tangible for an investor; gold was the traditional preserve of the real asset however it too has struggled. At this point, art is becoming a more compelling proposition for many.  You can download and read the full Art Market Report here .

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 1, 2019Comment

Reading now: The Playful Geometrics of Minimalist Still Life Artist Holly Coulis

Bowdoin ProjectsJanuary 30, 2019Comment

Miami Art week is upon us. Here is a great little cheat sheet from Artnews . So many things to see in so few days, so follow Bowdoin Projects on instagram for art fair updates, images and hot new artists.

Bowdoin ProjectsDecember 1, 2018Comment

The Menil Drawing Institute (MDI) will open to the public on Saturday, November 3, 2018. Designed by Los Angeles-based architects Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee (Johnston Marklee), the MDI is the fifth art building to join the Menil neighborhood. ‘Architects Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee have delivered a marvel of light, shadow and lines defined by the slant of a razor-thin metal roof andrecessed walls of dark gray cedar and glass. In some interior areas, the ceiling is punctuated by deep, diagonal angles that suggest folded paper above the white oak floors. Virtually every element of the building and most of the furniture is custom-designed, but purposefully simple.’ Can’t wait to welcome this work of mastery to the neighborhood. Read More Here

Bowdoin ProjectsNovember 2, 2018Comment

This New York Times article is about 10 years late, but still good advice: Want to Get Rich Buying Art? Invest in Women

Bowdoin ProjectsSeptember 28, 2018Women, Artist, Invest, New York Times, Art AdvisingComment

Exciting news - After 6 months of renovation and reinstallation, the Menil Museum will reopen to the public this weekend. Menil members are invited to a special viewing of the newly refreshed galleries this Thursday, September 20th. “We want people to be surprised,” senior curator Michelle White said. “We want people to encounter old friends, but we also want them to see entirely new things — and they will.” Read more at www.houstonchronicle.com

Bowdoin ProjectsSeptember 18, 2018Menil, Michelle White, Houston Art Scene, museum tourComment

Reading Now:  Gallerist Mary Boone Pleads Guilty to Filing False Tax Returns. "In a statement, Geoffrey S. Berman the United States attorney in Manhattan, described Ms. Boone as “playing a shell game with bank accounts to hide her true assets,” adding: “As Boone has learned, tax laws are not abstract.”

Bowdoin ProjectsSeptember 6, 2018Mary Boone, New York Times, Art News, Tax, Fraud, Julian Schnabel, David Salle, Jean-Michel Basquiat Ross BlecknerComment

Reading Now:  Artist Vincent Valdez Made a Painting So Provocative This Texas Museum Waited a Year to Unveil It. Now It’s a National Sensation . “My work often relates to past events in American history that have been marginalized or silenced or entirely erased,” Valdez told artnet News. “With a large image in black and white, it’s very cinematic. Some viewers may glance at this and assume this is a haunting image of the Klan in 1939 in the American South, but when you look very closely, I lure you in with those details. It’s really critical that I blur that line between past and present.”

Bowdoin ProjectsJuly 24, 2018Vincent Valdez, Blanton Museum of Art, David SheltonComment

The 2018 Toni Beauchamp Prize in Critical Art Writing is now open for sumbissions! This year's guest judge is Wendy Vogel , independent writer, art critic and curator based in New York. A former editor at Art in America, Modern Painters and Flash Art International, Vogel contributes to a variety of art and culture publications, including Artforum, art-agenda, Art Review, frieze, The Guardian and Mousse. Deadline is September 15th! See more information on the Gulf Coast Website !

Bowdoin ProjectsJuly 12, 2018Gulf Coast, Gulf Coast Journal, Wendy Vogel, Critical Art WritingComment

Reading Now:  New York magazine’s art critic Jerry Saltz deliver a speech on the state of the art : 1. Your number one job as an artist is to embed thought in material. That means your idiot idea has to be there in your idiot art. 2. Being an artist is tough. So only be one if you really, really, really,  really  have to be. 3. If you’re in a relationship, when you are lying awake in the middle of the night fretting over something (or everything), for god’s sake, do not wake up your partner. 4. Work late, stay up late with your peers, and support each other. You’re only as strong as the weakest among you. 5. You will be poor, but your life will never be boring—accept it. 6. Make an enemy of envy today—tomorrow is almost too late. 7. Remember that you do not own the meaning of your work. As Oscar Wilde said, “The minute you think you know a work of art, it is dead to you.” 8. Have an elephant skin—and grow a pair of… whatever you need a pair of. 9. If you have the opportunity to travel, go to the Prado Museum in Madrid. Fly in coach, be jetlagged—but whatever you do, drag yourself to that museum. Then spend three days there. You don’t need to go anywhere else. 10. You only need to convince seven people that your work is worth taking a chance on: four collectors, one art dealer, and two critics. Just seven! 11. Be vulnerable, expose yourself, have an opinion. And remember: You know a lot less than you think you do.

Bowdoin ProjectsMay 7, 2018Frieze Art Fair, Jerry Saltz, State of Art, New York MagazineComment

Reading Now : Great article on Dario Robleto's new exhibition,  The First Time, The Heart. If you haven't seen it already, you must. Showing at Inman Gallery until May 26th, 2018.

Bowdoin ProjectsApril 12, 2018Comment

Reading Now:  The Burlesque Worlds of Mary Reid Kelley and Patrick Kelley

Bowdoin ProjectsMarch 30, 2018Comment

The Sirens is an exclusive sensory experience in Asteroseismology, taking place at the Integratron on March 1, 2018. Piloting the sonic journey will be special guest, Geologist (Animal Collective’s Brian Weitz).  After an introduction to the history of the Integratron, audience members will be led in a time travel boot camp by Los Angeles-based performance duo DANyDANY. A telescope, custom built by Simon, will rotate through the night sky, converting light waves of celestial objects into audible frequencies. Conducted by Geologist, the music of the stars will echo within the Integratron, amplifying the sound to spectacular effect, vibrating the space and creating a nearly psychotropic experience in the audience’s brains. A light installation by Abbey Luck (Meow Wolf, Jeff and some Aliens) will illuminate the interior. “For me,” Kyle muses, “contemplation of the universe and the future, with all its philosophical questions, can feel like Homer’s siren’s song leading to madness. The Sirens is about our journey as humans in the search for hidden truths on a universal scale, and the difficulty inherent in confronting these truths. As we continue to evolve as a species, we devise new methods for solving problems and interpreting the unknown, but our perspective remains extremely limited. The Sirens is meant to be a humbling reminder that as a species, we must continue on our journey without becoming paralyzed in the face of the increasing complexity of an ever-expanding universe.” The Integratron was built in 1959 by UFOlogist George Van Tassel. Inspired by free energy theories first put forth by Nikola Tesla, Van Tassel believed the building would establish communication with extraterrestrials and achieve time travel. The dome is supported by a central spine of gigantic wooden beams sourced and delivered from a shipyard in Seattle, WA. It holds tremendous acoustic properties; like being inside the body of a guitar. Built in the middle of the arid Mojave Desert, it is a ship that will never touch water. It is Ulysses’ vessel, an early experiment in exploring distant planets.

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 28, 2018Kyle Simon, Asteroseismology, DANyDANY, Los Angeles, Performance Art, Telescope, Stars, Geologist, Integratron, Abby Luck, Meow Wolf, George Van Tassel, UFOlogistComment

To great anticipation, the official portraits of Barack and Michelle Obama were unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery on Monday. In true Obama fashion, the former president and first lady chose Kehinde Wiley  and Amy Sherald  (respectively), two of the most relevant contemporary artists working today. New York-based Wiley and Baltimore-based Sherald, are both known for their paintings of black Americans but are also the first black painters to receive a presidential portrait commission from the museum.  "The ability to be the first African-American painter to paint the first African-American president of the United States is absolutely overwhelming," Wiley said. "It doesn't get any better than that. "

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 13, 2018Obama, Michelle Obama, Barack Obama, NPR, New Yorker, Kehinde Wiley, Amy Sherald, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, New York, BaltimoreComment

Reading Now:  At Zona Maco, Artists and Dealers Strive to Find the Positives of US-Mexico Relations in the Age of Trump

Bowdoin ProjectsFebruary 9, 2018Zona Maco, Mexico City, Art Fair, Trump, Gabriel Orozco, Damián Ortega, Javier Pes, Latin AmericaComment

Reading Now: Sean J. Patrick Carney recalls a studio visit with late artist Jack Whitten on his blog Humor and the Abject 'During our visit, Whitten shared many stories from over the years and talked with unbridled enthusiasm about the portion of every year that he and Mary spent at their house on the Greek Island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea. The island's isolation from Europe, Africa, and Asia, he said, resulted in a truly unique landscape with an interesting biodiversity. If I'm remembering correctly, he and Mary had olive trees that they cared for and he described in great detail their flavors that few of us would ever have the opportunity to encounter. Whitten was a gifted orator, and I think I could have listened to him talk about anything for hours; I don't even particularly like olives.'

Bowdoin ProjectsJanuary 23, 2018Jack Whitten, Sean J. Patrick Carney, Europe, Africa, Asia, CreteMediterranean SeaComment

Reading Now:  A Kerry James Marshall painting sold for $5 million, but he didn’t see any of it. The U.S. is the only major market that freezes artists out of resale profits.

Bowdoin ProjectsJanuary 22, 2018Reading now, Kerry James Marshall, Still Life With Wedding PortraitComment