THIS WEEK IN THE ART MARKET - FRIDAY 18TH OCTOBER 2024
Art Market News, Press
ART WORKS GROUP’S CASSI YOUNG IS BRINGING A FRESH EYE TO FINE ART IN SINGAPORE
SourceAs the global fine art director of Art Works Group, Cassi Young shares her thoughts on the art world in Singapore, her career at auction houses, and her vision for Art Works. Young also discusses what drew her to the art world initially, including her memories of visiting art galleries in Adelaide with her mother growing up. As for her goals for her role at Art Works, Young aims to support local artists while bringing contemporary artists from across the world to Singapore. Finally, she shares more about the upcoming exhibition at the Art Works Gallery, titled perception, featuring three UK-based artists: Araminta Blue, Max Boyla, and Callum Harvey. On the exhibition’s title, Young says that, “each artist looks at reality, their perception of space, and how that is perceived on the surface of the compositions.”
$9.5 MILLION JULIE MEHRETU PAINTING LEADS ART BASEL PARIS OPENING SALES
SourceThis year’s Art Basel Paris opened on October 16th at the Grand Palais, with White Cube’s sale of Julie Mehretu’s Insile (2013) marking the end of the opening preview day. 195 galleries from 42 countries participated, 53 of which were first-time participants. Here Artsy rounds up the top sales from the fair, including sales by galleries like White Cube, David Zwirner, Hauser and Wirth, and Sprüth Magers. Artists sold included Christine Ay Tjoe, Tracey Emin, Ha Chong-Hyun, Ed Clark, and Isamu Noguchi.
Julie Mehretu (b. 1970),
ASIA NOW TO FEATURE PERFORMANCE AND PARTICIPATORY WORKS
SourceNicolas Bourriaud and his curatorial collective Radicants is leading this year’s Asia NOW programme at Art Basel Paris. A global curatorial group, Radicants was founded in 2022 by Nicolas Bourriad with Kuralai Abdukhalikova, Barbara Lagié, and Cyrille Troubetzkoy. This year’s programme, Entitled Ceremony, features 19 artists, including Leelee Chan, Isaac Chong Wai, Zadie Xa, and Trevor Yeung. The programme explores the power of community celebrations, from dances to processions and festivals. Co-curator Alexander Burenkov stated that “this project contributes to [Radicants'] will to create not just an encyclopaedic range of different ceremonies peculiar to Asian culture as seen by contemporary artists, but to design spaces for slowing down in the numerous intermediate spaces of La Monnaie to disrupt the traditional dynamics of the art fair.”
Charwei Tsai (b. 1980),
FROM A.I.’S ‘DIRTY SECRETS’ TO BETTER HARNESSING DATA, 5 KEY INSIGHTS FROM THE ART MARKET 2050 CONFERENCE
SourceDuring Frieze week, art-world professionals, policymakers, and artists alike, gathered for Art Market 2050. A tech-focused conference hosted by the organizers of The Art Business Conference, topics covered included the issues of sustainability and ethics with regards to A.I. and the increasing role of data and blockchain in art. Here the top 5 takeaways are listed, and the reasoning behind these concerns. One of the major concerns of utilising A.I. is the environmental impact, with even a simple A.I. conversation consuming half a litre of water. Overall, the question arises of how the traditional art market can adapt to the speed of advancing platforms and systems.
FONDATION LOUIS VUITTON PRESENTS POP ART EXHIBITION “POP FOREVER, TOM WESSELMANN &…”
SourceRunning from October 17 2024 through February 24 2025, the exhibition explores the Pop Art movement that emerged in the late 1950s. Focused on Tom Wesselmann, a leading artist of American Pop Art, the exhibition features 150 of his paintings alongside 70 works by 35 artists from across the world. Guest curators Dieter Buchhart and Anna Karina Hofbauer explain that it is more than a retrospective as “it contextualizes Tom Wesselmann’s work within art history and proposes fascinating perspectives on Pop Art, past present and even future.” Furthermore, it highlights connections between Pop artists and Dadaist precursors such as Marcel Duchamp or contemporary artists such as Ai Weiwei or Jeff Koons.
CENTRE POMPIDOU, WITH HELP OF CHANEL, ADDS 15 WORKS OF CONTEMPORARY CHINESE ART TO COLLECTION
SourceThe 目China: A New Generation of Artists exhibition has opened at the Centre Pompidou, bringing the works of 15 contemporary artists into the museum’s permanent collection. Notably 7 of the 15 artists were women and the new additions have expanded the permanent collection by more than 20%. Among the artists included are Alice Chen, Chen Wei, Cui Jie, Hu Xiaoyuan, and Lu Yang. These acquisitions were made possible by Chanel, the fashion house recently announcing a partnership with Shanghai’s Power Station of Art. Centre Pompidou has historically supported Chinese contemporary artists and these recent acquisitions have further strengthened the French-Chinese cultural collaborations.
PORTRAIT BY ROBOT AI-DA TO SELL AT AUCTION IN ART WORLD FIRST
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A portrait titled AI God by robot artist Ai-Da, powered by AI, is due to go under the hammer at a Sotheby’s online auction next month alongside a number of digital art forms. Depicting mathematician Alan Turing, the estimates for the painting are between £100,000 and £150,000 (US$130,000 and US$196,000). Ai-Da herself has been designed to resemble a human woman and is one of the most advanced robots currently. Aidan Meller, gallery owner and founder of Ai-Da Robot studio, worked on the robot with a team of artificial intelligence specialists at Oxford and Birmingham universities respectively. With cameras in its eyes and bionic hands, the robot uses AI algorithms to create the portraits.
Robot Ai-Da
Jordan Tan holds an MA in History of Art from the prestigious Courtauld Institute of Art. With a passion for fine art and the art market, Jordan plays a key role at Art Works by researching and interpreting trends across the primary and secondary markets, delivering valuable insights and business intelligence for the fine art department.