CONDO 2017, 14 January – 11 February
This is a once-a-year opportunity. In Condo’s second edition, 15 London galleries host 36 international galleries, inviting artists that we would find difficult to see otherwise as they don’t have UK representation. Galleries are invited from US, Germany, Japan, China, Sweden, Switzerland, Guatemala, Brussels, Brazil, Poland, etc.
The event was launched in 2016 by Vanessa Carlos, founder of Carlos Ishikawa gallery, as an alternative to the fair model. This is a great chance to have a day of total discovery of emerging and mid-career artists. The mix of galleries makes it for an exciting/somewhat unpredictable melting pot. I anticipate eye rolling, confusion and blank stares but also (hopefully) thrilling moments. That is the art world!
Revolt of the Sage, Blain|Southern until 21 January
Don’t miss this impeccably curated exhibition. The exhibition takes its title from a painting by Giorgio de Chirico in 1916. The Revolt of the Sage is an example of what the artist would call a ‘metaphysical interior’. In its crowded pictorial space, objects pile up and overlap, while a strange perspective recedes into an irresolvable background.
Picking up on de Chirico’s vision of a ‘metaphysical interior’, Revolt of the Sage gathers a range of artists who use collage, juxtaposition, fragments, framing devices and layered imagery to explore ruptures in time and the alluring mysteries of the everyday. The exhibition features new and work by contemporary artists alongside late postwar artists such as Lynn Chadwick, Hanne Darboven and Sigmar Polke. Curated by artist-curator Simon Moretti and Craig Burnett, Blain|Southern’s Director of Exhibitions.
John Baldessari, Miró and Life in General at Marian Goodman Gallery, London until 25 February
Throughout his career, John Baldessari has explored the correlations and contrasts between painting and photography, and between image and language. Beginning with his early text and photo-text paintings from the 1960s, he has explored these dichotomies through hybrid
compositions of photography, text and painted images. In the last five year, Baldessari’s focus has turned to the art historical canon and he has made the medium of painting the central subject of his work. This pairing of disparate elements from art history, popular culture and language, throws us into a mix where we need to build our own code.
Varnished inkjet print on canvas with acrylic paint 95 11/16 x 49 in. (243.1 x 124.5 cm)
Courtesy the artist and Marian Goodman Gallery, London 2017
