"Alain de Botton gives his top five reasons why art is such a vital force for humanity. Are we wrong to like pretty pictures? Why is some art painful to look at? Can art heal your feelings of urban alienation? Relax, watch and find out."
"An artist and comedian [Miriam Elia] has been told by the publisher Penguin that her new satirical art book breaches its copyright, and if she continues to sell copies it could use the courts to seize the books and have them pulped. ...
Elia's version sees them visiting an exhibition at a modern art gallery and grappling with existential questions about the nature of Tracey Emin–style conceptualist work, much of it peppered with distinctly adult imagery."
(Gareth Rubin, 2 March 2014, The Guardian)
Extract from "Looney Tunes: Back in Action" (2003)
"Established in January 1999 in New York, e–flux is an international network which reaches more than 90,000 visual art professionals on a daily basis through its website, e–mail list and special projects. Its news digest – e–flux announcements – distributes information on some of the world's most important contemporary art exhibitions, publications and symposia.
The daily digest is put together in cooperation with nearly two thousand leading international museums, art centers, foundations, galleries, biennials and art journals. Our focused and selective approach to the information we choose to distribute has been rewarded by an exceptionally high degree of attention and responsiveness from our readers."
(e–flux)
Fig.1 "Pussy Riot" performing on top of Lobnoye Mesto stone platform on Red Square in Moscow. Photograph: Anna Artemeva/AFP/Getty Images.
Fig.2 Sally Mann "Candy Cigarette" 1989. Immediate Family. New York: Aperture, 1992.
"Bryan L'Estrange has been chosen to curate an art exhibition in Sumner on canvases stretched across the container fronts. They will be installed at Sumners' Peacock's Gallop stretch of Containers. In some cases the containers are 12 metres long. ..
Dinesh Patel is the designer, Bryan LEstrange is curator. They are taking submissions from artists and looking for sponsors now. Some of the artists already confirmed include Ben Reid, Tony Delautour and Kees Bruin as well as Simon Kaan, Tony Cribb and Jason Kelly."
(L'Estrange Art Gallery, 06 September 2011, The Big Idea)
[The shipping containers were put in place as barriers to prevent injury by falling rocks, after the September 2010 earthquake in the seaside Christchurch suburb of Sumner in Aotearoa New Zealand.]
Fig.1 Bryan L'Estrange (2011), "Container exhibition Sumner Christchurch".