Jonathan Jones's Blog, page 72
June 19, 2020
An everyday archive and a virtual trip to Rembrandt's Amsterdam – the week in art
Socially distanced exhibition slots are available for Ella Kruglyanskaya and Jim Dine, while online offerings include Amazonian artist Abel Rodriguez – all in your weekly dispatch
Unquiet Moments
If the slower world of lockdown has led you to contemplate the ordinary more closely, this online exhibition may strike a chord. Curated by Courtauld students, it creates an alternative archive of the everyday featuring artists including Rembrandt, Sunil Gupta and Karl Ohiri.
• Somerset House and Courtauld online
June 15, 2020
Tracey Emin: 'My cousin died of Covid-19'
As she reveals a set of works made during lockdown, Emin describes the way the pandemic has changed her – and the artworld
In Tracey Emin’s intimate blue paintings of her life in lockdown we see her daydreaming and remembering, looking out of windows or at a familiar old sofa as the interior of her 18th-century house in London becomes a stage set for her private meditations. She depicts herself positively basking in isolation. Emin once said her favourite artist is Johannes Vermeer. The new paintings in her online White Cube exhibition, entitled I Thrive on Solitude, which has just launched, are domestic reveries in the tradition of Vermeer or, if you prefer a modernist comparison, Pierre Bonnard.
The show’s title is self-explanatory. But in a Zoom event to launch it, she revealed to the 40 invited guests exactly how perversely inspiring she has found the coronavirus lockdown. Appearing from her studio in leopard-print specs with a huge volcanic red painting behind her, she enthused about the experience of being socially distanced and how it has unleashed a new creative happiness.
Tracey Emin’s I Thrive on Solitude, White Cube online until 2 August.
Continue reading...June 12, 2020
Monumental metal for the art-starved as London's commercial galleries reopen – the week in art
London’s commercial galleries are back in business with Paul Klee, Urs Fischer and Charles Ray. Meanwhile, Tracey Emin shows her lockdown drawings online – all in your weekly dispatch
Crushed, Cast, Constructed
The most exciting thing about this exhibition is that it is happening at all as London’s commercial galleries reopen, under strict social distancing and by appointment. Urs Fischer, John Chamberlain and Charles Ray should make an intriguing ensemble for the art-starved.
• Gagosian Grosvenor Hill, London, from 15 June to 31 July.
June 10, 2020
The 10 best statues in Britain – chosen by our critic
There’s more to British statues than the ones of Colston and Rhodes highlighted by BLM. From Damien Hirst’s sword-fighter to a cat called Hodge, our critic picks his top 10
The ship, which sank in 1912 with more than 1,500 souls drowned, has become a symbol of the precariousness of existence. It is commemorated by this marble monument in the city where the doomed ocean liner was built. A female mythological figure of Fate looms over a drowning sailor held in a mermaid’s embrace. Created by sculptor Thomas Brock and erected in 1920, it’s a passionate exception to the often tight-lipped statuary of imperial Britain.
Continue reading...June 9, 2020
'It needs guts': commercial galleries are reopening – why aren't the rest?
Hurrah! The real thing returns on Monday. But why is it only commercial galleries – and when will our great public museums follow suit?
The art world is coming back to life. Almost unbelievably, when so much of the UK remains closed, London’s leading commercial galleries all reopen next week. White Cube is to open its Bermondsey space and Mason’s Yard branch, while Gagosian launches three brand new exhibitions across its London venues. Other galleries due to open on 15 June include Cristea Roberts, Hauser & Wirth and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac.
In the struggle against Covid-19, as in a war, we’ve all suppressed some basic and obvious facts in the interests of the greater good. One is the simple truth that however much energy and ingenuity go into online alternatives to the living presence of art, virtual exhibitions can only ever be spectral, sadly unsatisfying substitutes for the real thing. In effect, all the online curator’s tours, video visits and newsletters have replaced art with public relations. And out of goodwill and support for artists it didn’t seem right to question any of it.
Related: UK could become 'cultural wasteland' due to coronavirus, say leading artists
Continue reading...June 8, 2020
What Bristol should erect in place of the toppled Colston statue
Instead of complaining about ‘vandalism’ and ‘mob rule’, the powers that be should replace the statue with a bold artwork that shows the hell of life aboard a slave ship
You might think, given some of the responses, that the statue of slaver Edward Colston was one our best-loved national treasures. Priti Patel, the home secretary, called its toppling and dumping in Bristol harbour by Black Lives Matter protesters “utterly disgraceful” and “sheer vandalism”. The policing minister Kit Malthouse chipped in that it was “mob rule”.
Related: BLM protesters topple statue of Bristol slave trader Edward Colston
Continue reading...June 5, 2020
Stuffed mermaids, baroque masterpieces and David Hockney at dawn – the week in art
Books gather treasures from Europe’s strangest collections and show what we’re missing at the National Gallery, and artists respond to George Floyd’s death – all in your weekly dispatch
Cabinets of Curiosities
With museums closed, a richly illustrated book of artistic wonders is the next best thing. This new extra-large volume is full of photographs of some of Europe’s most surreal collections. The cabinet of curiosities was a Renaissance ancestor of the modern museum that mingled natural and human rarities. Dive into a world of carved amber, magic coral and stuffed mermaids.
• Taschen, out now
Ghost, angel, martyr: the brutal brilliance of George Floyd murals from Syria to Belfast
In Minneapolis, he’s an unforgiving ghost. In Naples, a saint weeping blood. In Nantes, a revolutionary. Our critic on how the killing has inflamed street artists worldwide
Continue reading...June 2, 2020
Walking to infinity: my virtual odyssey through Britain's finest art
In a series of short films, Jonathan Jones takes a therapeutic virtual tour of some of the greatest treasures in our locked-down museums, from Rothko’s cosmic grandeur to Turner’s eternally hopeful sunrise
How important is art? It’s not as important as life or love. I recently found that out the hard way. My relatively comfortable lockdown was blown apart when I started haemorrhaging and was taken to hospital. From lying on the bathroom floor covered in blood to losing consciousness in the operating theatre as PPE-wearing doctors injected me with ketamine, I can’t say I thought about art once. I just thought about my wife and daughter. As I woke in the intensive care unit what most struck me was the courage, kindness and skill of the NHS staff.
But this might not be the full picture. Images of art also swam into my mind. I’m not sure when this started. I think it may have been on the operating table, with the anaesthetist holding my hand as he explained why they needed to put a tube into my groin, that I started picturing the tender, nuanced forms of organs and tree-like branches of veins in Leonardo da Vinci’s anatomical drawings.
Continue reading...Love and loss: Rembrandt's portraits at the National Gallery – video
A revealing look at Rembrandt's most intimate portraits, on display in the locked-down National Gallery in London.
The Guardian's art critic Jonathan Jones reveals his favourite portraits, of vulnerable and unpretentious people the artist had known and loved. Jones asks what we can learn from these great masterpieces, especially during lockdown
Continue reading...Jonathan Jones's Blog
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