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The New Contemporary Art Magazine
Nomadic artist Stefano Ogliari Badessi crafts installations full of wonder across the globe. At Museo Civico Di Crema last month the artist kicked off a major project features his inflatable and found object-crafted pieces in an exhibition called “Wonderland.” His works often work as costumes and towering creatures with transparent portions that reveal the humans underneath.
Lucy McRae's new "Compression Carpet offers a full embrace for those who feel like they need a hug, a meditation on how technology can aid intimacy or support. The "body architect" recently showed the device at Festival of the Impossible in San Francisco. For some, the device may recall the hug machine created by Temple Grandin for stress relief and therapy. With her device, McCrae says, you "relinquish control to the hands of a stranger as your 'servicer' decides the firmness of your hug."
Cai Guo-Qiang's work, including the monumental “Sky Ladder,” transforms the space with seemingly minimalist strokes. However, much of the work comes out of meticulous planning and labored execution. Recent portraits also continue the artist's use of surprising materials, such as the gunpowder portraits below.
Rina Banerjee, known for dazzling sculptures crafted from material sourced around the globe, has her first mid-career retrospective in an exhibition at San Jose Museum of Art, kicking off this month. “Make Me a Summary of the World” begins on May 16 and runs through Oct. 6 at the space. The exhibitions is curated by the museum staffer Lauren Schell Dickens and Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts curator of contemporary art Jodi Throckmorton.
Aristarkh Chernyshev uses contemporary technology to rethink the figurative sculpture and explore our relationship to the digital. In a new set of works currently at Ekaterina Cultural Foundation, the artist offers his latest examples of this. In the group exhibition “Breakthrough,” the artist’s work, "Critical Update," “is focused on an 'undownloadable' self-portrait made with the author's own technique for texturing 3D objects,” the group says. The foundation exhibition supports palliative care and new medical technology.
French artist JR's elaborate installation consisting of more than 700 electric train wagons is now permanent at Villa La Coste in France. The work, which only momentarily reveals images as the trains circle, calls back to the artist’s own travels across the world, creating massive works and pieces on this scale. The work was first commissioned by Chateau La Coste. JR was last mentioned on HiFructose.com here.
Manuel Calderón’s animated works use the artist’s body as its primary element, but these aren’t exactly self-portraits. They reflect on the space we inhabit and the broader implications of our day-to-day movements. His recent work, in particular, pushes even further the idea of abandoning any specific story to tell and instead conveying a broader narrative of existence.
Looking toward Hi-Fructose's 14th year in publishing, the atrium at SCOPE Miami Beach (Dec. 4-9) will host three installation projects from the HOT TEA, Okuda San Miguel, and AJ Fosik. In the below Q&A, we talked to one of those artists, HOT TEA, about the evolution of his installation practice, traveling the world, and what he plans for the fair.
With "Melting Memories," media artist Refik Anadol created a massive LED installation “comprising data paintings, augmented data sculptures and light projections” that offer interpretations of movements within the brain at Pilevneli Gallery. A statement sats that it's the artist's latest experiment that looks at "the materiality of remembering."
Aakash Nihalani’s street installations and gallery works give the illusion of three dimensions and a more malleable reality, allowing passers-by to inspect and engage with his new perspectives. The artist uses acrylic and Flashe paints to create these seemingly simple geometric forms. Nihalani was last featured on HiFructose.com here.
Tanya Schultz creates vibrant, immersive installation art under the moniker Pip & Pop. This month, the artist unveils her U.S. debut exhibition at Corey Helford Gallery in Los Angeles. "Here Comes Sunshines" kicks off on Jan. 13 and runs through Feb. 17. Pip & Pop was prominently featured back in Hi-Fructose Vol. 36, in a multi-page feature story.
Chiharu Shiota has called her thread installations “drawings in space.” Using antique furniture and other objects evoking memory, her work has explored how we're tethered to the past and each other. Shiota's work, and her performance art, has recently taken over spaces at KODE-Art Museum of Bergen in Norway, Museum Nikolaikirche in Berlin, Kenji Taki Gallery in Japan, and SCAD Museum of Art in Georgia. The artist was last featured on HiFructose.com here.
Each year, hundreds of tons of ice from Sweden's Torne River are used to create strange, art-filled experiences dubbed ICEHOTEL. This 28th edition of the temporary hotel, an idea founded in 1989, opened on December 15 and has rooms for guests until mid-April. The structure has 35 rooms, with contributions from 36 artists.
Dennis McNett, creating works under the moniker "Wolfbat," creates wild woodcarvings, sculptures, and installations A new show at Heron Arts in San Francisco, titled "Hallowolfbat," is an ornate, largescale adventure into McNett’s practice, with some of the creatures crafted for this show up to 10 feet tall. At the opening, the street was closed off and rock act High on Fire performed.
French duo Forlane 6 Studio uses an atypical backdrop for their art installations: the depths of the sea. Hortense Le Calvez and Mathieu Goussin debuted Disoriented this year, an exhibition set in Vlychos Beach in Greece. Each of these show "explores themes of environmental dystopia, eco-anxiety, and the anthropocene.”
Japan-born, Iowa City-based artist Sayuri Sasaki Hemann creates underwater worlds with fabrics and felt in installations. Projects like “Urban Aquarium,” which started in 2009 and appeared throughout Portland, recreate jellyfish and other sea inhabitants in places them in an airport and other unexpected places.
Skunk Control is an ensemble of educators, scientists, and engineers who create installations designed to inspire wonder and “prompt audiences to reflect, question and engage them in the art of discovery.” This immersive pairing of art and science implements electronics, advanced lighting and optics, and other technologies. Yet, often, the group’s gorgeous designs are the points of entry into the works, with the tagline "Where Science Meets Art." The group is based in Australia, at the College of Engineering and Science at Victoria University.
German artist Monika Grzymala describes her art as being more like drawing than installation works, drawn with sticky tape which wraps and transforms the surrounding space. “Whenever I leave a work, I feel as if I leave a part of me, a part of my body behind,” she says, referring to the performative aspects of her work, where creating each piece requires a physical effort on her part. Her energy as the artist lends itself to the fluidity and dynamic appearance of the tape, which seems to explode from the walls with force.
Linz, Austria based German artist Toni Spyra transforms the stuff we see and use everyday into conceptual installations and sculptures. His works have appeared on the streets and in places where objects are completely out of context and with a twist of humor, provoking us to consider their usefulness beyond their design. Of his work's amusing qualities, Spyra says that he sees jokes as a perfect approach to art- though his kind of work may not strike a chord with everyone who encounters it, is it undeniably attention-grabbing for its unconventionality.
Netherlandish artist Suzan Drumman makes dazzling, playful installations that climb up walls and over people. Crystal, chrome-plated metal, precious stones, mirrors and optical glass of various sizes and colors respond and reflect their surroundings. The designs are derived from a variety of sources, including traditional Islamic geometries and Eastern mandalas, to form patterns that dance between negative and positive space. The end result is kaleidoscopic, yet balanced. However, because the individual pieces are placed on the raw surface, they are innately ephemeral. This lends the works a mystical quality.
Scott Hove's (Hi-Fructose Collected 3) art is much more than just three dimensional cake- it also tells story. His former studio in San Francisco, better known as "Cakeland", featured a funhouse made of sweet, yet nightmarish cake sculptures. Now living and working in Los Angeles, Hove brings a piece of Cakeland to his current exhibition, "Pussy Jihad" at La Luz de Jesus Gallery. This exhibit plays with opposing ideals in society, while taking a look at the ethos of masculinity and femininity.
She’s been dubbed as “the artist who can work anywhere”, and this is especially true of Crysal Wagner’s most recent installation, “Fall”. It can be found inside the campus of University of Tennessee, 4 stories of blue cascading down the school’s Art & Architecture building. “Fall” is exactly 60 feet tall, but its flowing mesh, made of party table clothes, chicken wire, and screen printing, feels almost never ending. More photos after the jump!
Fans of recently featured duo Pip & Pop will enjoy Japanese artist Yuko Kanatani, one of their inspirations. Kanatani recently gained international momentum after the launch of her Nike sneakers and 'Tight of the Moment' line, which features her psychedelic designs. Her works comprise of drawings, paintings, animation, and immersive large-scale installations where one feels like they are walking into a kaleidoscope. Her bright and dazzling ornamental imagery represents varying emotions, and themes of infinity and movement.
Tokyo-based teamLab is a group of 9 creators- artists, video, sound designers, and programmers- who transform spaces with their interactive installations. Their most recent installation "Flowers and People – Gold and Dark" is now on view at the Japan Society in New York. It is part of a larger exhibition that includes works by Manabu Ikeda and Hisashi Tenmyouya, their "Garden of Unearthly Delights". A monster tsunami has just uprooted a major city. teamLab's contribution represents a perpetual blooming and withering of life.
There, but not really. That’s the context for Barcelona-born artist Jaume Plensa’s public sculptures. They might seem like intrusions. They’re large. They’re set where people congregate. And the figures themselves are huge monumental heads. They sit in business districts and in front of an art museum. They emerge from the ocean. They hover above unsuspecting pedestrians. They rest in the neighborhood that surrounds the Venice Biennale.
French artist Mathilde Roussel has been turning heads with her strange suspended installations. (We first posted her living grass sculptures on our Facebook page here.) Roussel’s work expresses complicated feelings and life’s changes through manipulation of the material. She previously explored the human form, shown endlessly falling or embracing in mid air, sometimes leaving behind a shell of clothing or skin. Like the empty chrysalis of a butterfly, these ‘skins’ serve to represent the memory of our former selves. Read more after the jump.