Paris Art Guide - January

Recommendations of what to see in the Parisian art world this month by our local guide, Judith Souriau. Explore more in a private art tour.

I.

Exhibition: Sophie Calle & Serena Catone
Artist: Sophie Calle
Venue: Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature
Dates: Until February 11th, 2018

Only one month left to visit Sophie Calle’s version of the Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature ! The small museum was already one of the most charming & mysterious places in Paris before the conceptual artist took it over : a 17th century hotel particulier filled with stuffed animals, aged wood furniture and other collectibles that all relate to the art of hunting… Calle drags and drops her own works in the museum permanent collection to embellish the fairy tale (and insert humor). She also invited her friend Serena Catone’s bestiary. If you do not know the museum yet, it is an unmissable occasion to wander in its rooms!

Image courtesy of Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature

II.

Exhibition: Dada Africa : Non-Western Sources and Influences
Artist: Various Artists
Venue: Musée de l’Orangerie
Dates: Until February 19th, 2018

The Rietberg Museum (Zürich), the Berlinishe Galerie (Berlin) and the Musée d’Orsay (Paris) raised a burning question in the 20th century art history : why and how did Dada, a prolific and subversive art movement that first emerged in Zurich during World War I, get to know African and Asian art and decided to integrate them in their own art forms ? What’s the story behind the appropriation ? The exhibition is brilliantly documented, and it also features installations by the young Nigerian born Otobong Nkanga as a contemporary counterpoint. 

Sophie Taeuber-Arp (1889-1943), Motifs abstraits (masques), 1917
Stiftung Arp e.V., Rolandswerth/Berlin
© Stiftung Arp e.V., Berlin / Rolandswerth. Wolfgang Morell

III.

Exhibition: Louise Bourgeois : Editions
Artist: Louise Bourgeois
Venue: Galerie Karsten Greve
Dates: January 9th, 2018 until February 24th, 2018

The Galerie Karsten Greve is about to open an exhibition of Louise Bourgeois works on paper, engravings and illustrated books from the 80’s to 2009. As few copies remain available (although the artist was quite prolific then), prints and drawing are usually seen by 2 or 3 on art fairs or auctions. It is quite exciting that the gallery (who held Bourgeois first solo exhibition in Paris in Paris) gathers an ensemble of 50 pieces, of varied techniques and supports.

Image courtesy of Galerie Karsten Greve Paris

Take an art tour in Paris to discover more!

Tel Aviv Art Guide - January

Recommendations of what to see in the Tel Aviv art world this month by our local guide, Shani Werner. Explore more in a private art tour.

This month’s recommendations may be considered as “brave”, with three exhibition dealing with some untraditional or even un-spoken of subjects. Take a walk on the wild side with this month’s highlighted art events. 

I.

  
Exhibition: Muzarnism
Artists: Group exhibition
Venue: Hayarkon 19 Gallery
Curator: Boaz Arad
Dates: Until February 2nd, 2018

The name Muzarnism is a smart word game combining Muzar which means “strange” in Hebrew and Modernism. This is another exhibition in the series curated by artist, lecturer and curator Boaz Arad in which he researches the local and global art history. Arad recognizes a resemblance in the dealing with the self in early Modernism and today, this is the starting point of the show. 

II.

Exhibition: I Was Looking at You When You Were Looking at Me
Artists: Group exhibition (Gidi Gilam, Noa Ginzbug, Anat Martkovich)
Venue: Alfred Gallery
Dates: Until February 2nd, 2018

Every year the Alfred gallery chooses a yearly subject that the shows will react to - and this time it is failure. The first exhibition for the year takes the risks of failure to the next step as the artists tried a new and ambitious concept. Each one made a sketch for an installation and the other continued and realized it. The outcome is a hybrid of both artists, a translation of one’s ideas with the other’s artistic means. 

III.

Exhibition: Winnie, Real Daughter
Artist: Efrat Vital
Venue: The Artists Residence, Herzeliya
Curator: Ran Kasmy Ilan
Dates: January 6th, 2018 (no closing date published)

It’s quite obvious that the United-States are going under major changes in the past few years. With that, we see the uprising of radical and racist groups, violent protest and more. During 2012, Vital spent a year in the United States’ Deep South and documented the changes there. Coming as a stranger gave her the chance to dig deeper and reveal unsettling truths which usually stay in the dark. 

Take an art tour in Tel Aviv to discover more!

Berlin Art Guide - January

Recommendations of what to see in the art world this month by our local guides in Berlin. Explore more in a private art tour.

I.

Exhibition: The Crack-Up
Artists: Claire Fontaine
Venue: Neue Berliner Kunstverein (n.b.k.)
Dates: Until January 28th, 2018

Collective Artist. Art & Politics. Ready-Made. Authorship. Capitalism. Foreignness. 

IMAGE Credits: Claire Fontaine, The Crack-Up, exhibition view Neuer Berliner Kunstverein, 2017 © Neuer Berliner Kunstverein / Jens Ziehe

II.

Exhibition: FOREVER
Artist: Barbara Krüger
Venue: Sprüth Magers
Dates: Until January 20th, 2018

“You know that women have served all these centuries as looking glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size.”

Image Credits: Barbara Kruger, Forever. Installation view, SPRÜTH MAGERS BERLIN, 2017
Photo: Art Tours Berlin

III.

Exhibition: 3612,54 M³ VS 0,05 M³
Artist: Monica Bonvincini
Venue: Berlinische Galerie
Dates: Until February 26th, 2018

“You can avoid people but you can’t avoid architecture.“

Image Credits: Monica Bonvicini, Passing, 2017, site specific installation. Courtesy the artist and König Galerie, Berlin; Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zürich; Galleria Raffaella Cortese, Mailand, Ausstellungsansicht, Berlinische Galerie, 2017. © Monica Bonvicini und VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2017. Photo: Jens Ziehe

Take a tour in Berlin to discover more!

London Art Guide - January

I.

Exhibition: Cezanne Portraits  
Artist: Cezanne
Venue: National Portrait Gallery
Dates: Until February 11th 2018 

I love Cezanne and I will go see this exhibition again so many times before it ends. Each portrait bears so much brutal sincerity. The best get away from our Instagram filters. 

II.

Exhibition: Monochrome: Painting in Black and White
Artists: Rembrandt, Ingres, Picasso, Richter, Eliasson, and more
Venue: The National Gallery
Dates: Until February 18th 2018

Grey gives you so much to imagine from, notice and appreciate. It's always so incredible to see how many artists are drawn to experiment with shadow and light. It's beautiful and it's bold. 

III.

Sir John Soane Museum  
(Open all year, no specific exhibition) 

My favourite cabinet of curiosities, Sir John Soane has an incredible eye and a thirst for knowledge. Every wall, every corner is covered with art and antiques. The dream for an art collector. 

Take an art tour in London with Marine to discover more!

Notions of Modernism from 1818 to 2018

2017 has been an exciting year for us over here at Oh-So-Arty! It marked our first year as an international platform with local guides in over 20 international cities. Because of this we’re oh-so-looking forward to 2018 and all that the new year has in store for us. That is why we were so excited to hear about Maya Attoun’s new art book which celebrates 2018 through the form of a weekly planner.

As the planner organizes 2018 it also looks back 200 years to 1818 and the publication of Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein. “Frankenstein was published on the first day of 1818 and I wanted to address this date by creating a book which starts exactly 200 years later,” Attoun explained when asked why she chose the medium of a weekly planner for her work. Shelley’s ominous and at times eerie novel has been interpreted into 160 pages of beautiful graphite illustrations. While the correlation between 2018 and 1818 may seem indistinct, Attoun beautifully describes the innate relationship between these years two centuries apart:

“I think there is an interesting correlation between the neo-gothic times which were the beginning of modernism and our times which are the disintegration of modernism.” She continued, “I feel that the monsters we confront today are the blasting of digital and visual information; the condition of post-truth where true or false, important and marginal lose their hierarchy.”

Attoun in her studio in Tel Aviv

As we enter a new year we grapple with our own fears or monsters and it is exactly these mundane models of modernity that are dissected in Attoun’s intricate illustrations.

While the overarching theme of the planner is Frankenstein, a major motif of Attoun’s oeuvre, not all of the illustrations are direct references to Shelley’s text. For example some images are taken from everyday photos that Attoun posted on her social media or her “instagram diary” as she refers to it. There are also depictions of plants, climate models, anatomical illustrations, graphs and other technical devices.

The power of Attoun’s project resides in its interactive component. Each illustration is given a new purpose when acted on by whomever the planner belongs to. None of the 160 pages bound in this book are static works of art and each piece takes on a new meaning every time it is written on. Attoun described her choice of a planner, saying, “I go back to using a planner because I wanted to do something which is interactive in the sense that is really involving the viewer or user.”

Simultaneously an object, an illustration, an artist book and a piece of performance art, Attoun’s weekly planner has elevated keeping track of time to an art form for the modern age.

To learn more about the Tel Aviv art scene join a private art tour with us, here.