Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Editions|Artists' Book Fair, November 4 - 7, 2010, 548 W 22nd St, NYC



The 2010 Editions|Artists' Book Fair http://www.eabfair.com will take place Friday, 5 November to Sunday, 7 November, at the former Dia/X Initiative building, 548 West 22nd Street between 10th & 11th Avenues.

Opening night preview:
Thursday November 4, 6 - 9 PM
Tickets: $20.00.

First look at the latest in contemporary publishing while enjoying a glass of champagne and an extraordinary view of the Hudson River from our rooftop lounge. Attendance will assure an opportunity to purchase the highly sought after E|AB commissioned print which subsidizes FREE general admission during the run of Fair.

Founded in 1998 by Susan Inglett of I.C. Editions and Brooke Alexander Editions, the Editions|Artists' Book Fair has grown in size and stature to become the premier showcase for contemporary publishers and dealers, presenting the latest and greatest in prints, multiples and artists' books. The Editions|Artists' Book Fair is well known for its vibrant energy and innovation, thanks to over sixty exhibitors, presenting hundreds of artists representing New York, Johannesburg, Amsterdam, London, Paris and points in between. The Editions|Artists' Book Fair was the first fair to offer FREE admission, initiated with the intent of introducing a broader public to the medium of prints, multiples, and artists' books. Thirteen years later the Fair continues to do just that.

Exhibitors at Editions/Artists' Books represent the leading publishers and distributors of fine art prints, multiples and books produced today. This compendium serves not only as a roster of exhibitors but as an unparalleled resource and connection to the world of contemporary editions.

20X200/JEN BEKMAN PROJECTS A
21ST EDITIONS A
ADAMSON GALLERY / EDITIONS
ALDRICH EDITIONS
BROOKE ALEXANDER
ALEXANDER AND BONIN PUBLISHING, INC.
aRTKITCHEN / GALERIE A
BARON/BOISANTÉ EDITIONS
OM FROM INDIA
BARTLEBY & CO.
BENEFIT PRINT PROJECT
BENGTSSON FINE ART
ROBERT BLACKBURN PRINTMAKING WORKSHOP
BRODSKY CENTER FOR INNOVATIVE EDITIONS
BURNET EDITIONS
BYWATER BROS. EDITIONS
CARROLL AND SONS
CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY PRINTMAKING
CIRRUS GALLERY & CIRRUS EDITIONS LTD.
CHRISTOPHE DAVIET-THERY LIVRES ET EDITIONS D'ARTISTES
JOHAN DEUMENS GALLERY
mfc-michèle didier DIDIER
DIEU DONNÉ
DORFMAN PROJECTS
GALERIE DRUCK & BUCH
ESOPUS
EXIT ART
FEATURE, INC.
FORTH ESTATE
GALERIE A /aRTKITCHEN
GRANARY BOOKS, INC.
GRENFELL PRESS
HARLAN & WEAVER, INC.
HIGHPOINT EDITIONS
I.C. EDITIONS, INC.
INVISIBLE-EXPORTS
JUNGLE PRESS EDITIONS
MIKE KARSTENS
DAVID KRUT PROJECTS
KUNSTHALLE GALAPAGOS
LANDFALL PRESS, INC.
LINCOLN CENTER / LIST ART PROGRAM
LOWER EAST SIDE PRINTSHOP, INC.
LUISCIUS ANTIQUARIAN BOOKSELLERS
MARGINAL EDITIONS
JOHN McWHINNIE@GLENN HOROWITZ BOOKSELLER
MORE ART
JEAN-YVES NOBLET CONTEMPORARY PRINTS
ONE EYE PUG / SUE SCOTT GALLERY
THE PRINT CENTER
PURGATORY PIE PRESS
SCHROEDER ROMERO & SHREDDER
KARSTEN SCHUBERT
SOLO IMPRESSION INC.
SPECIFIC OBJECT / DAVID PLATZKER
MICHAEL STEINBERG FINE ART
THREE STAR BOOKS
CADE TOMPKINS EDITIONS • PROJECTS
TWENTIETH CENTURY ART ARCHIVES
WESTERN EXHIBITIONS
MICHAEL WOOLWORTH PUBLICATIONS
WORLD HOUSE EDITIONS
IRVING ZUCKER ART BOOKS

This year's special edition is by American conceptual artist BARBARA KRUGER. A founding member of the Pictures Generation, Kruger continues to challenge our assumptions by pairing images and texts in provocative and enlightening ways. The limited edition will be available in an edition of 200 for $200.00 and may be purchased only on site by cash or check. Credit cards will not be accepted. The Kruger image will appear also on the covers of the E|AB catalogue which will be distributed FREE at the Fair.

For further information:
Susan Inglett/I.C. Editions, Inc.
212.647.9111
Barbara Baruch/Brooke Alexander Editions
212.925.4338

info@eabfair.com

Sponsorship generously provided by Farmcart and Henriot.


Monday, October 25, 2010

Warhol Foundation Lawyers Quash Antitrust Lawsuit

Warhol self-portrait, 1964, was twice rejected by the foundation's authentication board.

ARTINFO, October 24, 2010, 2:28 pm
by Jason Edward Kaufman
Warhol Foundation Lawyers Quash Antitrust Lawsuit
The biggest legal brawl in the art world is coming to a crashing halt


NEW YORK - The closely watched federal lawsuit in which a private collector is suing the Andy Warhol Foundation and its subsidiary Art Authentication Board is about to reach an abrupt and unexpected end. Joe Simon, the London-based American whose 2007 complaint challenges the board’s rejection of the authenticity of the 1964 Warhol self-portrait that he owns, says that he and his lawyer, Seth Redniss of New York, will withdraw from the case at the next hearing, scheduled for November 10 in federal court in the Southern District of Manhattan. A parallel lawsuit in which Redniss is counsel, filed last year by U.S. collector Susan Shaer after the rejection of a self-portrait from the same series, also will be dropped, says Simon.

Simon...cites a lack of “financial resources” to continue the case, as well as the Warhol Foundation’s threat of punitive countersuits. The full text of Simon’s statement is below. Redniss declined to comment when contacted by telephone, and lawyers for the Warhol Foundation could not be immediately reached.

“The case is done,” says Simon. “I can’t do it anymore.” The reason is that Redniss, who has been working for years without pay in exchange for a percentage of a prospective settlement, is unable to respond to the numerous motions filed by lawyers for the Warhol Foundation. Simon says he does not have funds to hire additional counsel and is unable to enlist other firms willing to work on contingency.

A work from the series was reproduced on the dust jacket of the 1970 Warhol catalogue raisonne.

Simon and others had hoped that the lawsuit would uncover the committee’s secretive deliberations and open the door to claims that could result in reassessment of numerous rejected works, potentially resulting in many millions of dollars worth of art being reinstated in the Warhol canon. The stakes are extremely high. The auction record for a Warhol is $71.7 million paid for his 1963 Green Car Crash silkscreen canvas at Christie’s in May 2007.

Simon’s complaint further alleged that the Warhol Foundation and its authentication board engaged in an illegal conspiracy to control the Warhol market by limiting the number of approved Warhols, and thereby increasing the rarity and value of the hundreds of works owned and sold by the foundation. They sought damages and an injunction against the Warhol Foundation, the authentication board, the Warhol estate, and executor Vincent Fremont — the sales representative for the foundation’s paintings — alleging antitrust violations, collusion and fraud.

Read more, including a full statement by Simon, here.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Kiki from Kiki Smith



Kiki from Kiki Smith

Kiki is the new fragrance from contemporary artist Kiki Smith, designed in collaboration with the award-winning French fragrance designer, Christophe Laudamiel. Kiki is a study of balance and contrast and is unabashedly green and fresh while deeply and unexpectedly, lush, warm and dynamic. The fragrance evokes Kiki’s most significant olfactory memories: musks, boxwood, patchouli and sandalwood next to fresh, ripe foliage and fig leaf notes. The uniquely soothing, enveloping warmth and herbaceousness of blue chamomile and the bright and summery smell of narcisse create an incandescent, satisfying and fearless scent that is diffusive and illuminating.

from November 2010 W Magazine: Kiki on boxwood shrub, cat pee and "plant sex". http://artwareeditions.com/news/pdf/75_news.pdf

Limited to an edition of 4,000 bottles. 1.6 fl. oz. / 50 ml. Produced by Artware Editions.

retail: $175 (wholesale pricing is also available)

Artware Editions
327 West 11th Street
New York, New York 10014

t 1 212 463 7490 f 1 212 463 7491

info@artwareeditions.com

GALLERY HOURS:

Mon - Fri 11AM - 6PM
Sat 12PM - 5PM

Swedish Brillo boxes ruled "dubious" by Warhol Authentication Board



Artnet News
Oct. 19, 2010

SWEDISH BRILLOS ARE BUNK: WARHOL AUTHENTICATION BOARD

It’s one of the most famous arguments in all of art theory: Arthur Danto’s claim that Andy Warhol’s Brillo Box sculptures represent the "end of art," because they don’t have any distinguishing features -- it’s just art because the artist says it is. Well, the Andy Warhol Authentication Board begs to differ. In a 27-page encyclical (available for perusal courtesy the L.A. Times’ Christopher Knight), the board rules that a slew of more than 100 boxes are of dubious authenticity, essentially fabrications by free-wheeling Swedish curator and sometime Warhol collaborator Pontus Hulten (1924-2006). The board also lays out precise formal guidelines designed to separate the real Brillos from the clones.

In essence, the tortuous saga of the art fakes boils down to this: For a 1968 show at Sweden’s Moderna Museet, rather than include the actual Brillo Boxes from Warhol’s 1964 Stable Gallery show, Hulten had some 500 actual cardboard Brillo cartons shipped from the Brooklyn-based Brillo Factory to represent the sculptural side of the artist’s works. Later in 1968, Hulten had "ten to fifteen" new boxes fabricated in wood, based on the design of the cardboard containers, which he then gave away as "souvenirs" to collaborators, or kept for his own use. He even used two as "bedside tables for his children." Much later, in 1990, Hulten had some 105 new boxes produced as "sceneography" for a show he was curating in Leningrad, based on his own 1968 replicas. These were then identified as 1964 originals when the show traveled.

This misattribution, combined with later assertions by Hulten that the works were produced in 1968 under Andy’s supervision, has led to an enduring confusion for Warhol collectors, even snookering the board itself, which certified the Swedish boxes as the real thing in 1994. It’s a confusion that the Warhol board is now endeavoring to put to rest with this heavily footnoted report, which even quotes Hulten’s own Marcel Duchamp-inspired musings to prove that he had little respect for concepts of originality.

So, where does that leave the question of the ontology of the fake Brillo Boxes? The Warhol Board doesn’t quite say. It stops short of calling the Swedish Brillos outright fakes. Instead, their new official designation is "exhibition copies." And the matter does, it seem, all come back to the intention of the artist himself. The report notes that other Brillo Boxes were authorized remotely by Warhol for museum shows, though in those cases documents exist to verify his intention. No such documentation exists in the Swedish case -- but Hulten always claimed that he was working with the consent of the artist, and the board concedes that "[g]iven the friendship between Warhol and Hulten, it is possible that a verbal agreement existed between the two" to create the disputed works, which would make them, essentially, originals.

Since the board’s has been embroiled in at least one long-running lawsuit over its authentication procedures, its hesitation to be definitive seems understandable.



Warhol Brillo boxes downgraded to “copies”
Authentication board says famous museum director “falsified” their history


By Clemens Bomsdorf and Melanie Gerlis | From THE ART NEWSPAPER, issue 217, October 2010
Published online 21 Oct 10 (News)

STOCKHOLM. More than 100 Brillo boxes, said to be works by Andy Warhol, have been declared “copies” by the Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board after a three-year investigation.

It centred on two series of boxes produced by the late Pontus Hultén (1924-2006), the founding director of the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art. Hultén claimed that Warhol authorised the production of the boxes for the seminal exhibition that Hultén curated in Stockholm in 1968. But in 2007, the Swedish newspaper Expressen discovered that no wooden boxes had been displayed in the show and that cardboard boxes from the Brillo factory had been used instead. It set out to research the date and manufacture of Hultén’s boxes, many of which had entered the market.

In 1994, the Belgian dealer Ronny van de Velde bought 40 boxes from Hultén for $240,000. Van de Velde told us in 2007 that he had certificates from Hultén confirming he was authorised by Warhol to extend the series. Between 2004 and 2006, Van de Velde secured stamps from the board confirming these were 1968 Brillo Soap Pads Box [Stockholm Type]. In 2004, the London dealer Brian Balfour of Archeus Fine Art bought 22 boxes from Hultén for around £640,000. Ten were sold through Christie’s shortly afterwards to a UK buyer for £475,650, who turned out to be the art dealer Anthony d’Offay. Balfour also had letters from Hultén and the Warhol authentication board.

In July, the board sent a report to Lars Nittve, director of the Moderna Museet, which holds six of the disputed boxes in its collection. It said it had “examined and re-examined” the “box sculptures”, Hultén’s personal papers and other museum archives, and were now downgrading the boxes to “copies”.

The board now says there are two sets of Hultén-­produced boxes: a small number (about 10 to 15) made in 1968, straight after the show. The board refers to these as “Stockholm type boxes”. The rest, 105, were produced at Hultén’s request by carpenters for a 1990 exhibition in Russia. The board refers to these as “Malmö type boxes”.

According to the board, one differentiating factor between Warhol’s undisputed 1964 Stable Gallery boxes and Hultén’s, is a large “semi-circular blue field with the notation 1A400; 24/18; Pad Giant” on the upper corners (pictured). The board also states: “Neither the Stockholm type boxes nor the Malmö type boxes were made by Andy Warhol, to his specifications or under his supervision; and there is no known documentation that Warhol authorised their production.” The board now classes the Stockholm boxes as “exhibition-related copies” and the Malmö boxes as “exhibition copies”.

The board accepts that it can “neither verify or invalidate any verbal agreement” that may have existed between Warhol and Hultén, but it is damning on the latter’s version of events. Hultén’s boxes first came to the attention of the estate, it says, in December 1994. Hultén told them that the boxes were all made in 1968, “according to Andy Warhol’s instructions”, and that they had all been in the 1968 Moderna Museet exhibition. In doing so, the board says he “misrepresented these works and falsified their history”.

Brian Balfour told us he has been left in an uncertain position. “The board hasn’t revoked these certificates, but they’ve given a certain impression,” he said. “In any event, the [board] protect from the front end,” he added, explaining he had to sign a no-fault disclaimer before he received his authentication.

The board avoids using words such as “fake” or “inauthentic” in its report, and failed to respond to our requests for clarification. Nor would it say whether or not it will stamp any boxes presented to it as “denied”, or revoke existing letters of opinion.