Friday, November 20
Magazzino to Add 13,000-Square-Foot Pavilion to Grounds
Magazzino Italian Art, a private museum with a focus on postwar and contemporary Italian art in Cold Springs, New York, has revealed plans to erect a new 13,000-square-foot pavilion. Designed by architect Alberto Campo Baeza and Miguel Quismondo, the pavilion will host special exhibitions, educational offerings, and public programming. Magazzino is expected to break ground on the new space next year. In a statement, Magazzino director Vittorio Calabrese said, “The new pavilion will enable us to better serve our community with expanded resources for visitors and provides us flexible spaces so that we can expand our programmatic offerings in Cold Spring.”
Hammer Museum Names Eight Board Appointments
The Hammer Museum, which is part of the University of California, Los Angeles, has made several appointments to its board. Artist Charles Gaines and Mary Osako, UCLA’s vice chancellor for strategic communications have joined the institution’s board of directors, which has been expanded to 22 members. Artist Lari Pittman and collectors Komal Shah, Keith Rivers, Dee Kerrison, Christine Meleo Bernstein, and Ann Soh Woods have joined the Hammer’s board of advisors, which consists of 32 members. In a statement, Hammer director Ann Philbin said, “The range of their expertise and perspectives will help us navigate the many challenges ahead, including the necessary work of upending the status quo for museums and working toward equity and racial justice.”
Art Students League Names Michael Hall Director
Michael Hall will depart his post as global head of operations and logistics at Art Basel to become director of New York’s Art Students League. Hall had been with Art Basel since 2015, and he has also held posts at the Armory Show, Hauser & Wirth, and elsewhere. He begins in his new position next week. “Being able to join the League at this unprecedented time in our history fills me with so much energy,” he said in a statement.
Thursday, November 19
Mari Robles Named Director of Headlands Center
The Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausalito, California, has named Mari Robles as its new director. Robles is currently programming partner on the forthcoming Prospect New Orleans biennial, and she previously worked in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s education department. “I hope to be able to create more opportunities for people to celebrate and experience creativity in the coming years,” Robles said in a statement.
Artissima Names Winner of Inaugural Carol Rama Prize
Artissima, the international art fair in Turin, Italy, has named Kurdish artist and journalist Zehra Doğan as the first winner of its Carol Rama Prize, which is supported by the Fondazione Sardi per l’Arte and is awarded to a living female artist whose work is shown at the fair. The award comes with a cash prize of €2,000 and a residency at Carol Rama’s former home and studio. Doğan is the cofounder of JINHA, an all-female Kurdish press agency, and she was imprisoned for 2 years and 9 months over charges of terrorism after posting to Twitter a drawing of hers that reinterpreted the Turkish conquest of a Kurdish city. Doğan’s work at the fair, presented by Milan’s Prometeogallery at the Museo d’Arte Orientale as part of Artissima Unplugged, shows a reclining female figure over a map of Kurdistan.
Marianne Boesky Gallery Now Represents Suzanne McClelland
Marianne Boesky Gallery, which has locations in New York and Aspen, Colorado, has added Suzanne McClelland to its roster. McClelland, a New York–based artist, is known for exploring verbal and visual communication in her abstract works. Her work is included in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum, the Detroit Institute of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York, among others. The gallery will feature a solo presentation of her work at Art Basel’s Miami Beach viewing rooms, which are slated to run December 2–6. Works by McClelland will go on view at the gallery’s New York space in December.
Wednesday, November 18
Armory Show Announces 2021 Curatorial Team
The Armory Show in New York has revealed the curatorial team for its 2021 edition, which will take place September 9–12 at the Javits Center. Wassan Al-Khudhairi, chief curator for the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, will organize the Focus Section; Claudia Schmuckli, curator-in-charge of contemporary art and programming for the Fine Arts Museums of San Fransisco, will organize the Platform section; and Valerie Cassel Oliver, curator of modern and contemporary art for the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, will chair the Curatorial Leadership Summit.
Tuesday, November 17
VIA Art Fund Names Recipient of 2021 Curatorial Fellow
The Boston-based nonprofit VIA Art Fund has announced Wassan Al-Khudhairi as the recipient of its 2021 curatorial fellowship. Al-Khudhairi is chief curator at the Contemporary Art Museum in St. Louis (CAM), where she has worked since 2016. Al-Khudhairi was curator of the Asian Art Biennial in Taiwan in 2017 and the co-artistic director for the Gwangju Biennial in South Korea in 2012. Additionally, she served as the founding director of Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Qatar, which opened in 2010.
Various Small Fires Now Represents Glen Wilson
Various Small Fires, which maintains spaces in Seoul and Los Angeles, now represents Glen Wilson. Wilson’s multimedia practice includes sculpture, filmmaking, installation, and assemblage. His latest body of work is rooted in photography, featuring scenes from the Oakwood community in Venice, California, where has been based for the last 20 years. A Wilson solo exhibition is at VSF’s Los Angeles space through December 19.
Dallas Art Fair Foundation Gifts Two Works to Area Museums
The Dallas Art Fair Foundation has donated two artworks to museums in Dallas from its “Four x Five” exhibition. The Dallas Museum of Art will receive Cynthia Daignault’s 2019 painting, Elegy (Los Angeles), and the Nasher Sculpture Center will get Gabriel Rico’s new sculpture Cincuenta from the series “Reducción objetiva orquestada (2020). The Daignault is the 32nd work to be donated to the DAM by the foundation. In a statement, Kelly Cornell, the fair’s director, said, “We deeply value our close, ongoing relationships with the DMA and the Nasher and it’s an honor to bolster their already world-class collections. The synergy we have, and moments like these, further the arts in Dallas and make sure the city continues to be a cultural destination.”
Monday, November 16
Room57 Gallery Opens in New York
Room57 Gallery, which will explore the intersections of art and design in an immersive environment, opens today in New York. Located at 235 East 57th Street, the enterprise will stage exhibitions in a manner that reflects “an upscale home,” rather than a conventional gallery setting, according to a release. The inaugural show at the gallery is titled “Chapter One,” and it features works by 20th-century and contemporary artists. Among the artists and designers in the exhibition are Robert Motherwell, Helen Frankenthaler, Grear Patterson, Roxanne Jackson, Danni Pantel, Campana Brothers, Peter Halley, and Allison Zuckerman.
Croatian Sculptor Ivan Kožarić Has Died at 99
Ivan Kožarić, a Croatian modernist sculptor and leading figure in the avant-garde of the late-1940s former Yugoslavia, has died at the age of 99. Kožarić was best known for his public sculptures which were guided by a sense of spontaneity and mischief, though his artistic output also spanned painting, installation, and photography. He was a founding member of the influential Croatian collective the Gorgona Group, which operated a gallery and “anti-art” magazine in Zagreb between 1959 and 1966. Kožarić achieved international recognition, participating in the 1976 Venice Biennale and the 1979 Bienal de São Paulo. In 2013, he was the subject of a survey at Munich’s Haus der Kunst organized by Okwui Enwezor in cooperation with the Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb.
Alexandre Gallery Moves New York Spaces
The New York–based Alexandre Gallery will leave its home of 20 years on 57th Street and open in a new space at 25 East 73rd Street in December. The gallery’s final show at its current location is a solo outing of work by Tom Uttech, which runs through November 28. The gallery will also open a second location in fall 2021.