Posts Tagged ‘new york’
Friday, August 27th, 2010
By Kiša Lala
Acqua Alta in Venice, An image from “Beautiful Islands,” Horizon Features
A recent surge in apocalyptic films indicates the mood of the zeitgeist. With 2012 fast approaching, our oceans at peril, and the gloom of global warming, the average recession-hit consumer cannot see past their shrinking funds to worry about other mammals going extinct.
The hottest Pakistani summers on record followed by uncharacteristic floods seems to all underscore the creeping panic, while for those on the other side of the debate, the future’s so bright, they’re just happy to wear shades.
Lucy Walker’s film Countdown to Zero, on the likely threat of a nuclear holocaust, is the latest venture by Lawrence Bender of An Inconvenient Truth, in which Walker asserts that, “steps needed to be taken to blow up New York City not only could happen but had already happened.”
Another documentary, Beautiful Islands, by Japanese director Kana Tomoko, examines three sinking islands with widely different cultures, Tuvalu in the South Pacific, Shishmaref in Alaska and Venice, Italy. In her attempt to show the plight of the indigenous people of Tuvalu, the first nation reportedly scheduled to be under water by 2050, her camera becomes infatuated by the sun, sea and the island’s blissful inhabitants – painting such an idyllic picture that one almost feels a pang of schadenfreude at their imminent demise.
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Tags: 2012, 28 Days Later, apocalypse, Beautiful Islands, Countdown to Zero, Kana Tomoko, Kisa Lala, Lawrence Bender, London, Lucy Walker, new york, Richard Hardy
Posted in Art, Film | No Comments »
Monday, August 23rd, 2010
One by One Gallery: photo Gloria Suzie Kim
Alphabet City is a part of the East Village that has only been slightly more immune to the charms of gentrification than its more westerly psychogeographical* end; it’s an ethnographic hodge-podge of Dominicans, transplants, hipsters, and assorted New York crazies that roam the streets like ghosts, sometimes wearing their pajamas, sometimes throwing a fit, sometimes both.
Embodying a brilliant synthesis of transplanted culture and crazy street-talk, is an art and design gallery located in a small, non-descript apartment on Avenue D. The gallery is owned by Madrid transplant and one-woman show, Celina Alvarado. The gallery is called One by One and is located in the foyer of Alvarado’s apartment.
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Tags: Celina Alvarado, East Village, new york
Posted in Art, Interview | No Comments »
Friday, August 20th, 2010
Phillips de Pury's new location at 450 Park Avenue, Manhattan
Phillips de Pury & Company, the world’s third largest auction house, has been expanding their ventures worldwide – and this may not come as a surprise in view of recent auctions such as at Sotheby’s, which announced record sales, an indication that the art market isn’t softening in this recession, and that investors are willing to bypass the stagnant stock market for the safety of old masters and blue-chip moderns.
Apart from their recent Contemporary Art sale with record auctions of $50 million worth of art sold, Phillips de Pury had also begun a series of innovative and profitable “theme” sales titled BRIC, MUSIC and AFRICA. The highly successful BRIC auction in April in London focused on the so-called BRIC nations, Brazil, Russia, India, and China. Repackaging art around themes has had lucrative pay-offs, and now with the economic rise of Asian countries, Phillips de Pury and other auction houses are creating a new buying frenzy among these nations’ patriotic elite.
Phillips’ move uptown to the new 25,559 square feet space, at 450 Park Ave will attract buyers who may find their other Meatpacking District location a bit out of reach – and put them in closer proximity to midtown rivals Sotheby’s and Christie’s.
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Tags: Auction, BRIC, China, Christie's, India, Kisa Lala, new york, Phillips de Pury & Company, Russia, Simon de Pury, Sotheby's
Posted in Art | No Comments »
Friday, August 13th, 2010
A scene from Lucy Walker's Countdown to Zero. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.
At Sundance this year, director Lucy Walker was one of few filmmakers present with two feature films being screened. The first was Waste Land, a collaboration with the artist Vik Muniz on a recycling project with the inhabitants of the world’s largest garbage dump ‘Jardim Gramacho’, just outside Rio. The film is an inspiring depiction of trash-pickers who recreate photographic images of themselves out of garbage and through the process, begin to re-imagine their lives.
Her second film though, Countdown to Zero, is very different but just as powerful and enlightening, on the subject of a global nuclear arms crisis. The film was produced by Lawrence Bender (An Inconvenient Truth), and Walker was given the go ahead to create a film without any particular mandate. At the film’s screening in Sundance she said that while researching the project and speaking to experts on the actual realities of nuclear proliferation, she was shaken out of her own complacency and forced to reeducate herself.
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Tags: Countdown to Zero, Kisa Lala, Lawrence Bender, Lucy Walker, new york, Waste Land
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Thursday, July 29th, 2010
By Kiša Lala
Lord Monckton against consensus, a bemused Mr. Tracy Morgan, and the restrained Mr. Eric Bates
Despite the heat, hundreds gathered outside Manhattan’s Bowery Hotel to hear Christopher Monckton, the Viscount Monckton of Brenchley (known widely as Lord Monckton, former policy advisor to Margaret Thatcher) debate Eric Bates, the editor of Rolling Stone and a vocal critic of the opponents of global warming, the so-called climate killers.
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Tags: Eric Bates, Ewan McGregor, Kisa Lala, Liev Schreiber, Lord Monckton, new york, Tracy Morgan
Posted in Environment, Interview, Performance | No Comments »
Thursday, June 24th, 2010
Image courtesy of Renzo Piano Building Workship in collaboration with Cooper, Robertson & Partners
The High Line is about to get a new neighbor. Nestled next to the southern entrance of the park at Gansevoort and Washington streets, the Whitney’s Downtown Building Project takes root. The expansive building boasts 50,000 square feet of indoor gallery space and 13,000 square feet of rooftop exhibition space. The uptown location by comparison, has 32,000 square feet of gallery space. Designed by Pritzer-Prize winner Renzo Piano, the downtown building joins a growing list of powerhouse structures built along Manhattan’s far west side. Other developments include the IAC building by Frank Gehry, luxury high-rise apartments by Richard Meier, and a 23-story tower by Jean Nouvel.
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Tags: guyton\walker, kelley walker, new york, scott rothkopf, tauba auerbach, the highline, the whitney museum, wade guyton, whitney downtown
Posted in Architecture, Art | No Comments »
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010
By Michelle Cheung
The only table in the house, Cesar Ramirez's chef table in the Brooklyn Fare's kitchen
Chef Cesar Ramirez of Brooklyn Fare, gourmet food market by day and fine dining destination by night, is not your famed media-hungry celebrity chef. So the fact that reservations for his nightly dinners are booked through June is very telling. In Ramirez’s 10-seater stainless steel kitchen table, craftsmanship stays alive with culinary artisans at work every night serving more than 15 courses of salacious dishes featuring impeccable quality and creativity.
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Tags: Brooklyn Fare, Cesar Ramirez, David Bouley, new york
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Monday, February 22nd, 2010
By JRS
Mr. Brainwash, aka Thierry Guetta, holding court over his maze on West 13th Street
“If you do something you love, you become an icon, because you do it so well that in one moment, everybody appreciates it,” says Thierry Guetta, leaning back in a paint-splattered Eames lounge chair in the middle of his newest exhibition, Icons. The street artist-turned gallery sensation went on to talk about his time spent decorating the walls and sidewalks of New York: “The street is just a large gallery to me. Even the people that don’t like it are obligated to see it. There are no rules on the street, there is just freedom. Thousands of people can see it.”
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Tags: Andy Warhol, Banksy, Jimi Hendrix, Madonna, Meatpacking District, Mr. Brainwash, new york, Shepard Fairey, Thierry Guetta
Posted in Art | 2 Comments »
Friday, February 19th, 2010
Derrick Cruz of Black Sheep and Prodigal Sons
“Like paradoxical black sheep and prodigal son” wrote Anatole Broyard in his autobiographical tale, “Kafka Was the Rage,” as he described the outcasts and rejects, who lived in Greenwich village after the Second World War. When Derrick Cruz read these words more than five years ago, he knew right away that it would help name and shape the story for his accessories brand. Broyard’s words captured Cruz’s repatriation to New York as an adult. “Like paradoxical black sheep and prodigal sons,” he said, “we all come here [to New York] kind of outcasts, being rejected, seeking something new, seeking redemption of some sort. When I saw that line, I knew that was going to be the name and, aesthetically, it became more about archetypes that, in my head, were both wise and stubborn at the same time.” (more…)
Tags: Anatole Broyard, Black Sheep and Prodigal Sons, Derrick Cruz, Kafka Was the Rage, new york
Posted in Art, Fashion, Jewelry | No Comments »
Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
By JRS
One film. Three parts. Six hours. Do you have the time? Probably not, but we do. SPREAD ArtCulture took up residence in New York’s IFC Center for “The Red Riding Trilogy,” a film that was made last year for British television and a film that critic David Thomson billed as “Better than the ‘Godfather.’” Though the two films are complete opposites in almost every way, sans their length, it made for an interesting day to be shut out of the sun.
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Tags: Anand Tucker, Andrew Garfield, David Peace, David Thomson, IFC, IFC Center, James Marsh, Julian Jarrold, new york, Paddy Considine, Red Riding
Posted in Film | No Comments »
