Round Up Week of March 16th
/The Producer’s picks for this week’s news relevant to the photography, art, design and production industries:
1) Art’s long eye on the female body
© Frida Kahlo,
From Frida Kahlo to the Birth of Venus.
VOMA’s virtual exhibition, Reclaiming the Body, gathers together artistic ideals of womanhood and female sexuality across centuries and the world.
The exhibition explores the ways in which the image of the female body has been used throughout the ages to express ideas of identity and renewal, with the artworks on display reflecting the shifting dominant ideas about women in society. From classical art to contemporary depictions of womanhood and female sexuality, this exhibition allows us a look at the nude over centuries of great artworks. “The pillars of art history are built on some problematic foundations – towering masterpieces with imagery rooted in classical European depictions of male dominance,” says VOMA Director, Lee Cavaliere. “This exhibition looks at how this imagery may have historically helped to bake social prejudice against women into our cultural fabric, while at the same time presenting a new affirmation, in the renewal and reclamation of the female body by contemporary artists.”
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2) Street culture in zanzibar - in photos
© Carl van der Linde
Carl van der Linde captures what it is to be a young man on the Tanzanian island.
Carl van der Linde is a 27-year-old South African photographer from Cape Town, who gravitates towards subjects “whose strong individuality, style and pride” radiate from within. Travelling across the continent — and occasionally overseas to South America — he likes to wander the streets of different cities for days, finding subjects to shoot collaboratively and organically. “When I started out, I was taking a run-and-gun approach where I would try to candidly ‘steal’ a photograph from a street scene or unknowing subject,” he says. “I soon realized that this does not allow me to establish a bond with the person I was photographing.”
To shoot the following series, Carl travelled to Zanzibar in 2020, curious as to what day-to-day life was like on the Tanzanian island, particularly during a quiet period when the usual glut of international tourists weren’t present. The resulting series has a gentle ease to it; no heavy or forced messaging, or attempts to create a particular narrative. Shot between the island’s high streets, pier fronts, boda boda motorbike taxi ranks, and beaches at dusk, these images take a particular focus on what growing up on the island from boyhood to manhood is like.
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© Amy Sherald
3) Exhibition: A tribute to Breonna Taylor
As we reach the one-year anniversary of the death of Breonna Taylor, shot inside her own home by police officers on 13 March 2020, artists and activists around the world are determined to keep her memory alive and have her story be told. In Breonna’s native Louisville, Kentucky, a new exhibition, set to open next month, will pay tribute to Breonna’s memory, as well as to victims of gun violence and police brutality nationwide.
Promise, Witness, Remembrance — opening 7 April at Louisville’s The Speed Art Museum — is a powerful reflection on Breonna’s life, exploring how the city has metabolized her loss, as well as how her story connects to structural police brutality. Curated by Allison Glenn, the exhibition takes its name from a conversation between Tamika Palmer (Breonna’s mother) and Allison herself, who has split the show into three separate entities.
4) the world's most googled artists around the world
© Ken Bromley
With many museums and art galleries having closed their doors during the COVID-19 pandemic, a lot of art lovers have turned to the internet as the only way of viewing the works of their favorite artists. With this in mind, the team at Ken Bromley art supplies wanted to find out which artists were the most searched for in 2020, and who has been most popular in each country throughout the pandemic.
The researchers at ken bromley art supplies used Google search data to reveal the most googled artist of 2020 in each country, then, the designers created seven unique maps to display the results. Leonardo da Vinci might have topped the overall leader board, winning in 82 countries, but he wasn’t the number one choice in many places around the world. The UK favored homegrown artist Banksy, as did the Russians. Interestingly, there were only 2 females out of the 13 winners, with Frida Kahlo the most searched for in the USA, Mexico and Brazil and Artemisia Gentileschi topping the list in both Australia and China.
5) an intimate view of artist yves klein’s world by shunk-kender
© shunk-kender, yves klein
Harry Shunk met János Kender in Paris, where they would become life and work partners. from the 1950s to the early 1980s, the duo photographed the spectacular effervescence of the artistic avant-garde across Paris and New York City, where they mixed with artists such as John Baldessari, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Yayoi Kusama and many others. Among the first to venture outside the photo studio to capture the otherwise private side of the creative scene, Shunk-Kender created an invaluable record of the art world and its most famous figures. The relationships they forged with the artists allowed them to capture private moments and uninhibited experimentation, particularly documented in their close friendship with french artist Yves Klein. A leading member of the French artistic movement ‘nouveau réalism’, or ‘new ways of perceiving the real’, Klein’s life, work and world view can be intimately understood through Shunk-Kender’s lens.
From March to september 2020, MASI lugano has staged a monumental exhibition (see 3D tour here) dedicated to Shunk-Kender’s remarkable photographic archive, among their best-known devoted to Klein, including ‘le saut dans le vide’ and ‘anthropométries’. Designboom visited the exhibition last year and spoke with director of MASI Lugano Dr. Tobia Bezzola who, since taking on the role, has made photography a primary part of the yearly show plan.
6) 15 Artists Share About How They Got Started in Art
© Jarik Jongman
Stories from 15 artists about how they got started in art. These emerging artists come from diverse backgrounds, forging their own paths that have led them to where they are today. They also give us insight into how they were drawn to specific art styles, and how they developed their unique visual languages. Although some of these artists come from varied industries outside the art world, what ties them together is their love for art, and their drive to pursue their passion and build fulfilling careers as artists.