Walking In My Mind
If you want to wander inside an artist’s head, this new exhibition at London's Hayward gallery is a good place to start. The exhibition brings together ten big name artists who each have created giant artworks about the process of thought and the creative mind. Yayoi Kusama’s room full of enormous inflatables (all red with white polka dots) and Alice in Wonderland-style garden outside on the roof terrace is the real pull. As is Yoshitomo Nara’s little shed filled with his signature naïve drawings. There are white wedding dresses caught in a dense web of black thread care of Chiharu Shiota and a surreal bird covered closet on the roof by Charles Avery, where you can glimpse a mirrored fun house. Creative chaos seems to be the unifying theme behind these brilliant and varied installations.
By Francesca Gavin
Elmgreen & Dragset: The Collectors
Artist duo Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset took over the Danish and Nordic Pavilions at the 53rd Venice Biennale this year with a curated installation full of black humour, fashion, architecture and pathos. Bringing together pieces by Terence Koh, Maurizio Cattelan, Wolfgang Tillmans and their own work, the pair created a fake pair of domestic interiors that formed a fictional world. They look as though they've been transported out of a Bret Easton Ellis or Jay McInerney novel – complete with a dead body floating in the pool outside, a pair of Prada shoes and YSL socks. At the opening of the exhibition, estate agents gave tours of the two spaces as if selling them to the public. Full of lightness and humour, the pavilions also explore the meaning of collecting and make us think about how the objects we surround ourselves with define us. For more info see danish-nordic-pavilions.com.
By Francesca Gavin
Bob and Roberta Smith: This Artist is Deeply Dangerous
For those at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival who fancy a break from a the Scottish city’s month long obsession with performance, British artist Bob and Roberta Smith – which is actually just one man – is exhibiting the largest painting he's ever shown (11 meters high across 9 panels) as part of the Edinburgh Art Festival. The piece, exhibited at The Grey Gallery, is called This Artist is Deeply Dangerous and was inspired by an article that appeared in the Guardian earlier this year. The article in question was experimental art criticism by the newspaper’s tennis correspondent, Steve Bierley. It's a great example of Smith’s signature style - bold, vibrant and full of humour, with texts hand painted on to slabs of old wood he finds in skips.
By Francesca Gavin
Carmen Herrera
Until now, Cuban painter Carmen Herrera has only ever had four museum shows during her career, and those were between 1956 and 1985. Determined her work should neither be ignored nor forgotten, Birmingham’s IKON gallery redresses the balance this month with a well overdue retrospective of her work from the 1930s to the 1970s. Herrera studied in Paris and Cuba in the 1930s before settling in New York where she still lives, aged 96. Her abstract paintings are full of harmony and geometry, beauty and lines – and are now gaining serious attention from major institutions in America. Proof that good things do indeed come to those who wait.
By Francesca Gavin
Paul McDevitt and Cornelius Quabeck: Bierstadt
British artist Paul McDevitt is one of the most talented artists on the scene. Based in Berlin, he uses Biro pens and pencils to create his colourful drawings that bring to life everything from Disney references to Henry Moore-style sculptures. He's recently focused is on perfectly executed paintings filled with flowers and pop ephemera – using beer mats as his unconventional canvases. McDevitt takes the history of art and squeezes it through a modern mentality with immense skill. In his latest London show, at the Stephen Friedman Gallery, he is exhibiting a collaborative work with German artist Cornelius Quabeck.
By Francesca Gavin
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