"Just happy to be here"
"Expired"
The following pieces are included in the exhibition Alone Together at Two Window Project:
"Electra" Goddess of your technological world !
The "Desire" for power, beauty, control. Inspired by those war mongers and politicians who rule our daily life's. This painting explores the glamour yet subtlety reveals the corruption and ultimate decay hidden within the quest for power.
"Love, Greed, Hate and Envy"
Submit or destroy your leader, the latest global trend !
"A Big Thumbs Up For Destruction"
A reflection of our shameless need for horrifying news content, updated on an hourly basis. With a feeling of total helplessness we carry on clicking and consuming, barely getting excited unless the next event is bigger and badder than the last.
"Bored"
Inspired by the paired portraits of Robert Campin, this modern twist aptly titled "Bored" examines the modern phenomena of our times, an overload of data and information with our dependence on the computer screen to feed us, stimulate us. Sedated by boredom we carry on clicking.
NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) – An Andy Warhol self-portrait purchased in 1963 for $1,600 on an installment plan is poised to fetch $30 million or more when it hits the auction block at Christie's in May.
"Self-Portrait," a four-panel acrylic silkscreen depicting the pop artist wearing a trench coat and sunglasses, is being sold by the family of Detroit collector Florence Barron.
Barron first commissioned Warhol to paint her portrait, but changed her mind and suggested the young artist depict himself, telling him, "Nobody knows me ... They want to see you."
The result was Warhol's first self portrait, four images taken in a coin-operated photo booth rendered in hues of blue.
"My mother didn't look at collecting in terms of 'is this important or not important,'" Guy Barron told Reuters.
"She looked at it from the standpoint of what resonated with her, and of 'I want to live with it.' It was not done as some people do today, as wall power."
The portrait graced the living room wall of the family home in Detroit. It also went on public display, serving as the cover image for catalogs from major Warhol exhibitions and retrospectives at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain.
Brett Gorvy, Christie's international co-head and deputy chairman for post-war and contemporary art, said the work marked the beginning of Warhol's own stardom.
"With dark sunglasses an oblivious gaze, Warhol was ahead of his time in creating a new archetype of glamour," Gorvy said.
"The painting is remarkable not only for its visual impact and the introduction of the photo booth genre, but for marking a key moment in the history of art, when Warhol takes his place in the pantheon of celebrity alongside Marilyn, Elizabeth and Elvis."
Barron, whose family includes two married sons and several grandchildren, said they were auctioning the work because "dividing is not possible, so selling makes the most sense."
"I feel that Andy Warhol himself would appreciate this, because he always talked about everyone in their lifetime having their turn in the spotlight for 15 minutes. Who'd have thought that his self-portrait would play such a role in our lives?"
The record for a Warhol self-portrait is $32.6 million set last May at Sotheby's in New York. The record price for any Warhol sold at auction is "Green Car Crash (Green Burning Car I)," which Christie's sold for a whopping $71.7 million in 2007.
SHADOWS SHIFT, Ingrid Simons
Antwerp, 21 November 2010
Dear Ingrid,
In your studio I have been observing your works with fascination. But the specific and intense viewing of your paintings I had the privilege to experience cannot possibly be put into words. And that indeed is a good thing, for viewing remains primordial and words do not suffice.
However, a promise is a promise, hence this first verbal attempt in the form of a letter.
It is astonishing how you make landscapes appear on the canvas in such a suggestive manner using a minimum of means. These are not nature based images but interiorised landscapes that appear from the subconscious memory and acquire a powerful individuality during the painting process. This is achieved not only by limiting yourself to just about two basic colors like, for instance black and parties next to bright beige-like tones but also the nervous touches in particular. Simultaneously a spontaneously elaborated and thoughtful method that creates an image which, as it were, a paradox existing between a romantic feeling and an indeterminate threat.
The fact that, as you told me, you enjoy walking in nature by night at full moon is obvious. It is the moonlight that creates the sharp contrasts whereby the confines between light and darkness become indistinct. And despite the strong effects of the contrasts, there exists in your images a soft and sad atmosphere of something that can no longer be recovered.
These are alternative images of landscapes stimulating our sensual observation; we think we recognize something to which we mentally add our own images from memory and passed experiences. When you get closer the recognition disappears more and more being replaced by the pure art of painting.
You only notice the rich strokes of the brush, vivacious and pasty. Your canvases become half-reliefs.
It appears as if you not only draw the mountainsides and trees with your brush, you mold them as well. Your individual and subjective interpretation of a landscape reality in which you link harmony to contrast is an ode to viewing and the functioning of our memory.
In friendship and admiration,
Florent Bex
Honorary Director, Museum of Modern Art Antwerp (MUHKA)
Eredirecteur Musem van Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen
