Jon Barwick, Roni Feldman, Elizabeth Ferry, Ryan Peter Miller, Grant Vetter, Casey Vogt The six young American artists in this show have formed a group that they have named ‘Cacophonic’. Forming groups is, of course, the traditional way in which young artists band together in order to get a hearing. Think, for example, of the Futurists at the start of the 20th century and of the Surrealists who followed them. Roni Feldman, a member of the group and my co-curator, says that their work is a reaction to a decade that began with planes crashing into the World Trade Center in New York, and ended with an equally resounding economic crash – a period of “complexity and dissonance, marked by a clamorous rise in technology, especially the technology of information, as well as by wars and other forms of disaster.” He and his colleagues engage with a world of conflicting values, in the visual arts as well as in politics, and welcome the uproar that results. “We are wary of didacticism.” He says, “and recognize that a work of art is, first and foremost, a unique sensory experience. The balance between content and physical presence in our work reflects an enduring optimism in the face of the odds that we believe is typical of our generation of American artists.”

Jon Barwick constructs mixed-media paintings that acknowledge the hyper-paced, technologydriven, media-saturated society of the Twenty-First Century. The multi-layered compositions reflect the complexities of the information age, and capture the singular moment of everything happening at once. Imagery for these works originate as drawings and doodles but are scanned, photographed, printed, or redrawn before reaching the final composition. By maintaining a dialogue between the hand-drawn and computer-generated, Barwick creates visual metaphors for our day-today interaction with technology. The resultant fields of color and imagery are at once beautiful andoverwhelming. They present a sublimation of information. Roni Feldman applies the blurred, ethereal nature of airbrushed acrylic to paint multitudinous human features. He forms tensions between individual and crowd, abstraction and representation.

Using varying degrees of matte and gloss black paint, the imagery may be invisible at first glance, but as viewers pass before them, the figures refract revealing an elaborate composition. In them, whirls of figures celebrate, mourn, protest, consume, dance, and embrace alongside others that drown, burn, and dissolve. Feldman’s crowds evoke the power and ecstasy of unified intention alongside a potential descent into mob mentality. The compositions recall the idealistic pursuit of 1960's psychedelia, van murals, and other airbrush art forms, but in Feldman’s work, airbrushed paint is like a thin veil that separates utopia and dystopia, civilization and chaos.

Elizabeth Ferry blurs the edges between the corporeal and ethereal. Ranging from simple grids to elaborate stacks of folded fabric, Ferry composes color and form into rhythms that perpetually, illusionistically reconfigure themselves. Through carefully cued light and site sensitivity, they shift from mundane materials to enigmatically charged visual sensations. For example, at first glance Ferry’s grids appear as formal white structures set upon a wall painted with bright colors. However, a move from side to side reveals that the edges of the structure are painted with discordant dashes of fluorescent hues that refract upon the wall. Subverting the fast pace of everyday transactions between people, places, and information, Ferry applies abstraction and illusion to offer moments of sensitive reflection.

Ryan Peter Miller uses paint as both his material and subject. Each of Miller’s works expresses an inventive application of paint. In one work, he applies paint as multitudinous stacked units in a tower. In another work he casts acrylic paint as puzzle pieces. In a third piece, Miller casts a full body self portrait in white acrylic paint. For Miller, paint is raw material, loaded with turgid historical significance, that can be grouped and restructured into non-traditional supports. Miller calls painting a democratic process, reflective and responsive to history and culture, but with endless potential for evolution and re-contextualization.

Grant Vetter’s Rendition paintings are slathered with sinewy gobs of fleshy hues. The works effect the transcendent painterliness of Abstract Expressionism, but also the corporeal gore and almost forensic examination of mutilated skin. The word “rendition” implies a subjective experience or recollection, but is also defined as “deportation for war crimes” and “torture by proxy.” Although Abstract expressionism was often seen as a symbol of democratic freedom and individual expression, Vetter explicitly takes up the themes of trauma, subjection and oppression as it relates to the current War on Terror.

Casey Vogt creates ornate, mandala-like compositions that serve as a backdrop for politicallycharged figurative scenes. The most recent figures explore Americans' relationships to drug use, the War On Drugs, and the pharmaceutical industry. The backgrounds are composed of masses of layered dots and myriad colors, recalling a pharmacopoeia of pills.. They act as a painterly and metaphysical contrast to the socio-political narratives presented by the figures. With their euphoric colors and psychedelic compositions, Vogt's work proposes painting as another mind-altering substance.

Optimistic American Discords
Opening Reception: Friday 19th March 2010 at 8 pm
Berlin Collective Presents Artist Talks and Conversation with Marc Glöde, Curator & Sophie Eliot, Art Scholar Sunday 21st March 2010 at 5 pm

Werkstattgalerie
Eisenacher Str. 6
D-10777 Berlin

Location near Nollendorfplatz U1-U4, Bus M19, 187
opening Hours: Tu-Fr 12-20h, Sa 12-18h

phone: +49.30.21002158
email: info@werkstattgalerie.org
web: www.werkstattgalerie.org

ART HK 10 PRESENTS THE STRONGEST EVER LINE-UP FOR AN ART FAIR IN ASIA

Back for its third year, ART HK 10 – Hong Kong International Art Fair will take place from 27 – 30 May 2010 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC). Sponsored by Deutsche Bank, ART HK 10 is delighted to present the strongest exhibitor line-up for an art fair in Asia to date, affirming its position as the leading art fair in Asia.

This year, ART HK 10 will welcome over 140 galleries from 28 countries. Leading galleries such as Gagosian Gallery, Lisson Gallery & White Cube are returning this year and, in addition to top level galleries from Asia, ART HK will present a strengthened line-up of western galleries. New additions include Hauser & Wirth with galleries in Zurich, London & New York, Galerie Lelong from New York, Paris & Zurich, Emmanuel Perrotin from Paris, Bernier/Eliades Gallery from Athens, Almine Rech Gallery from Brussels and Greenberg Van Doren Gallery, James Cohan Gallery, Lehmann Maupin Gallery, Paul Kasmin Gallery, Leo Castelli Gallery, Marianne Boesky Gallery and Sperone Westwater from New York amongst many others.

The strength of Asian galleries represented at the Fair will continue this year with the return of Hanart TZ Gallery from Hong Kong, SCAI THE BATHHOUSE from Tokyo, Kukje Gallery from Seoul and Eslite Gallery from Taipei. Galleries new to the Fair include Long March Space from Beijing, Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery from Sydney and ShugoArts from Tokyo.

The Fair will also feature diverse solo presentations from a number of the world's most respected contemporary artists. Highlights so far include Chinese artist Liu Ye for Sperone Westwater, Japanese artists Yoshitomo Nara for Marianne Boesky, Aya Takano for Emmanuel Perrotin and the acclaimed Glasgow artist Jim Lambie for The Modern Institute.

Magnus Renfrew, Fair Director, ART HK, comments: "We are excited that the role of ART HK takes an even bigger step forward in 2010 with the support of Deutsche Bank. Our shared vision and active partnership will bring us one step closer to affirming ART HK's position as one of the leading art fairs. We are delighted that so many established galleries from around the globe want to show their best work at ART HK 10".

In the last two years, ART HK has fast become a key fixture on the international art calendar. The fact that there are no taxes on the import or export of art, combined with the role of the city as the financial capital of the Far East, geographically positioned at the heart of Asia, are but a few reasons as to why Hong Kong has emerged as Asia's primary destination for art.

Since the Fair's inception in 2008, ART HK has welcomed nearly 50,000 visitors. Last year, ART HK 09 hosted a total of 115 galleries from 24 countries, and the Fair space increased by one-third over its inaugural year.

ART HK also attracts an outstanding mix of international collectors, curators and museum directors. "The calibre of galleries that ART HK has been able to secure has attracted an impressive number of VIPs from across the region," explains Richard Chang, an Advisory Board member of ART HK and major art collector. "ART HK has not only proved itself to be a leading international fair, but a must for those looking to brush shoulders with the 'who's who' of the art world."

ART HK 10 will see the development of the ART FUTURES section, welcoming exciting young galleries for the first time such as Pilar Corrias Gallery from London, who will present a solo exhibition by Shahzia Sikander, and AANDO FINE ART from Berlin, to feature a solo presentation by Aya Ben Ron. Debuting at last year's Fair, the ART FUTURES section is dedicated to showcasing the work of emerging artists from new galleries less than five years old, providing a unique opportunity for visitors to experience the latest developments in cutting edge art.

Accompanying the exceptional exhibitor line-up, ART HK 10 will continue to serve as an important art educator, presenting Backroom Conversations, a series of exciting panel discussions with leading international collectors, curators and contemporary artists, organised by Asia Art Archive, the region's premiere research platform and library for contemporary art. Topics include a Japan country focus, museum focus, activism in art, and building endowments for the arts, as well as documentary screenings. Guest speakers include Shinji Kohmoto, Chief Curator at the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Yuko Hasegawa, Chief Curator at Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Yukie Kamiya, Chief Curator at the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Doryun Chong, Associate Curator at the Department of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Andrew Maerkle, Tokyo based writer and art critic, Dr Gene Sherman, Chairman and Executive Director of the Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation, Daniela Zyman, Chief curator of Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, Agnes Lin, Founder and Director of Osage Art Foundation, Hong Kong, Savita Apte, Art Historian and Director of Art Dubai, Eungie Joo, Director and Curator of Education and Public Programs at the New Museum, New York, Daniel Brine, Artistic Director of Performance Space in Sydney, Adele Tan, Art Critic and writer, Zanny Begg, Australian artist, Wong Hoy Cheong, Malaysian artist, Manray Hsu, independent curator and art critic. Full details of the education program will be released in late February.

ART HK 10 Exhibitors
10 Chancery Lane Gallery / 100 Tonson Gallery / Galerie313 / acb Contemporary Art Gallery / Galeriá Álvaro Alcázar / Alisan Fine Arts / Galerie Anhava / Arario Gallery / ARATANIURANO / Ark Galerie / ARNDT / Art Beatus Gallery / aye gallery / Aye - Eastation Gallery / Ayyam Gallery / Beck & Eggeling International Fine Art / Beijing Art Now Gallery / Beijing Commune / Bernier/Eliades Gallery / Boers-Li Gallery / Marianne Boesky Gallery / BREENSPACE / Ben Brown Fine Arts / CAIS Gallery / Leo Castelli Gallery / The Cat Street Gallery / Charest-Weinberg Gallery / James Cohan Gallery / The Columns Gallery / CONTEMPORARY BY ANGELA LI / Galleria Continua / Contrasts Gallery / Conny Dietzschold Gallery / DNA / The Drawing Room / Eastlink Gallery / Thomas Erben Gallery / Eslite Gallery / F2 Gallery / Galerie Forsblom / Frey Norris Gallery / Gagosian Gallery / GALERIST / Gana Art / Gandhara-Art / gdm / Robert Goff Gallery / Galerie Grand Siècle / GRANTPIRRIE / Green Cardamom / Greenberg Van Doren Gallery / Grotto Fine Art / Hakgojae / Hanart TZ Gallery / Hauser & Wirth / Galerie Kashya Hildebrand / Galerie Ernst Hilger / Michael Hoppen Gallery / Galerie Caprice Horn / Hwa's Gallery / GALLERY HYUNDAI / Gallery IHN / Ingleby Gallery / Taka Ishii Gallery / Galerie Michael Janssen / JGM. Galerie / Amelia Johnson Contemporary / Paul Kasmin Gallery / gbk - Gallery Barry Keldoulis / Keumsan Gallery / Tomio Koyama Gallery / Kukje Gallery / Kwai Fung Hin Art Gallery / L.A. Galerie Lothar Albrecht / Langgeng Gallery / Lehmann Maupin Gallery / Galerie Lelong / LEVY / Lisson Gallery / Long March Space / Galerie Urs Meile / MEM / Mizuma Art Gallery / The Modern Institute/Toby Webster Ltd / Mori Gallery / Nadi Gallery / NANZUKA UNDERGROUND / Anna Ning Fine Art / ONE AND J. Gallery / Osage Gallery / Ota Fine Arts / Other Criteria / Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery / Pace Beijing / Galerie Paris-Beijing / PARK RYU SOOK GALLERY / Pékin Fine Arts / Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin / Plum Blossoms Gallery / Primo Marella Gallery / Max Protetch Gallery / PYO Gallery / Galerie Quynh / ALMINE RECH GALLERY / Red Bridge Gallery / Red Gate Gallery / Röntgenwerke AG / Galerie Stefan Röpke / Rossi + Rossi / Sakshi Gallery / SCAI THE BATHHOUSE / Schoeni Art Gallery / SCHUEBBE PROJECTS / Michael Schultz Gallery / ShanghART Gallery / ShugoArts / Gallery Side 2 / Silverlens Gallery / Singapore Tyler Print Institute / Soka Art Center / Sperone Westwater / Star Gallery / Starkwhite / Sullivan+Strumpf Fine Art / Sutton Gallery / Tang Contemporary Art / Tokyo Gallery + BTAP / Tolarno Galleries / WAKO WORKS OF ART / White Cube / x-ist / YAMAMOTO GENDAI / Galerie Zink

ART FUTURES
140sqm Gallery / AANDO FINE ART / Galerie Lena Brüning / Chatterjee & Lal / Chi-Wen Gallery / Pilar Corrias Gallery / Gallery EXIT / Input/Output / Langgeng Gallery / Man&Eve / Ooi Botos Gallery / Paradise Row / Project 88 / Rokeby / Take Ninagawa / Y++/Wada Fine Arts

Visitor Information
Opening dates and hours:
Thursday, 27 May, 12 noon – 9pm
Friday, 28 May, 12 noon – 8pm
Saturday, 29 May, 12 noon – 7pm
Sunday, 30 May, 12 noon – 5pm

Preview
Wednesday, 26 May, Collectors' Preview: 4pm - 6pm (Invitation only)
Vernissage: 6pm - 9pm (Invitation or pre-booked tickets only)

Tickets for ART HK 10 go on sale from early March 2010 at www.hkticketing.com

For further details on ART HK 10 visit www.hongkongartfair.com or call +852 2918 8793

Media contact
International contact:
Roxana Pennie
Calum Sutton PR
T: +44 (0) 207 183 3577
E: roxana@suttonpr.com

Hong Kong contact:
Erica Siu or Jocelyn Liipfert
impactasia (Hong Kong)
T: +852 2521 1498
E: erica@impactasia.com, jocelyn@impactasia.com

Modern and contemporary prints are an extension of a long and illustrious lineage that goes back to the Renaissance engravings of Albrecht Dürer, and the 17th century prints of Rembrandt, Rubens, van Dyck and Claude Lorraine. The diffusion of printmaking throughout Europe in the 18th century drew in the Italians, Tiepolo, Piranesi and Canaletto, the mystical Englishman, William Blake, and the Spanish master, Goya. The posthumous 1863 publication of Goya’s powerful suite of prints, Disasters of War, was of major import, coincident with and an influence upon the emergent Parisian avant-garde who would come to be known as the impressionists.

During the impressionist period, the woodblock prints of Hokusai and other Japanese printmakers strongly influenced Manet, Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, van Gogh, Gauguin, and virtually every other progressive artist working in France at the time, profoundly affecting not only the style of their print images but impressionist and post-impressionist painting as well. It was at this time that artists began to produce limited editions, signing their prints by hand or with a chop mark (monogram), in the manner of Japanese prints. The signature on a print has since come to indicate the artist’s involvement in the printmaking process itself, this being the criterion by which we now define what constitutes an “original print.”

Picasso and Matisse, the prototypical “moderns,” began making original prints in the first decade of the 20th century, followed in the 1920’s by Chagall. All three of these artists created voluminous bodies of work. Picasso is represented in this show by prints from the 1930’s through the 1960’s. Matisse is likewise shown across a wide swath of time, with works from 1906, the Fauve period, through the Jazz Series of 1947. Examples from Chagall include selections from his first suite of color lithographs, Four Tales of the Arabian Nights, published in 1948.

Marino Marini, though best known as a sculptor and particularly for his bronze horse and rider at the Guggenheim in Venice, was trained primarily as a painter and produced some of the most painterly prints of the 20th century. Favoring the etching and aquatint processes, he was able to achieve subtle effects not unlike those of watercolor and gouache while employing a rich and characteristically Italian palette of unlikely yet sumptuous color combinations. Leslie Sacks Editions has published the English language catalogue raisonné of Marini graphics, documenting the artist’s work in prints from 1919 through 1980. Important Modern and Contemporary Prints includes two of the strongest works from Marini’s Shakespeare portfolios, which are considered the pinnacle of his graphic production.

The artists of the New York School (1940’s and 50’s - Pollock, Rothko, Kline, et al.) are represented with important prints by Robert Motherwell and Helen Frankenthaler. The Motherwells include Burning Elegy and two of his signature red etching aquatints, Gesture and Mexican Night II. Frankenthaler, once married to Motherwell, is the last surviving major figure from the abstract expressionist period. She is represented by her most recent large-scale print, Book of Clouds, a multi-process work in aquatint, etching, woodcut and pochoir with hand coloring. Burning Elegy and Book of Clouds are characteristic of the New York School’s penchant for creating large works that fill the viewer’s field of vision and thereby create an immersive experience.

Frankenthaler and Sam Francis were both associated with lyrical abstraction (aka in France, tachisme and art informel) which followed from abstract expressionism. The Francis work in this show is a dynamic, large scale monotype (unique print) with hand coloring, from the 1980’s, and shares its “super graphic” quality with Frank Stellas from the same period, specifically, excellent examples from Stella’s Polar Coordinates series.

At this point in the chronology we run into a problem of nomenclature as to what differentiates modern from contemporary. One could logically argue that if an artist is alive, the art is contemporary, but the issue of style makes things more complicated. This problem is perhaps most pointedly underscored by the work of the contemporary and quite lively David Hockney, who has explicitly emulated Picasso, Matisse and most recently van Gogh. Several of Hockney’s greatest prints are featured in this show: an important lithograph, Hotel Well III, which references cubism and thus indirectly Picasso, Celia in an Armchair which indirectly references late Matisse, and Rue de Seine which contains a very direct reference to Matisse’s earlier Nice period.

As Hockney is one of the most scholarly and intellectually acute artists of our time, one may assume that apart from personal predilection as to style, he has used style as a statement. If one considers his dedication to draftsmanship – the most fundamental aspect of all artistic practice -¬¬ and his choice of subjects, these being predominantly still life, portraiture and landscape, it may be said that he’s cut against the grain of critical vogue, paying little attention to the conceptual apart from reaffirming the primacy of modern and classical values though his choice of styles and subjects, as evidenced by the selection of prints in this show.

Though reality doesn’t fully cooperate with efforts to put art into neat little boxes, if one had to select a movement or moment that represents a break with modernism, and so signifies the beginnings of what we call contemporary or post-modern art, it would be the advent of pop art ca. 1960, when high concept and irony came to replace romanticism, including the stereotypic image of the artist as a solitary individualist on an esoteric quest for communion with his or her muse. Conversely, with pop we see the appropriation of images from culture at large, as in the works of Roy Lichtenstein whose silk screens, Seascape and Still Life with Red Jar, appear in this show. By appropriating, as the key motif for his style, the benday dots of which photo-mechanical lithographic images are comprised (the tiny dots used to create images in the printing of magazines, newspapers and posters) Lichtenstein referenced mass media and with it popular culture, beginning with his cartoon images. Departing from this imagery, his later works embrace impressionist, modern and even classical imagery in architecture, thus riffing, ironically, on pop art itself. Printmaking was perhaps the art form most relevant to Lichtenstein’s style, being that he appropriated his signature motif from mass media printing technology.

Jasper Johns was at the forefront of pop with such iconic images as the American Flag, but unlike most of his pop contemporaries who were obsessed with image and concept, Johns’ has always maintained a painterly aesthetic. This can be seen in the painterly quality of his prints. In so doing, Johns’ prints, along with his paintings, have preserved the place of painting in a contemporary art world wherein painting has been increasingly subordinated to concept (though this trend seems to be in the nascent stage of changing). The Johns prints in this show include Cicada, Between the Clock and Bed, and one of his best known images, a Savarin Coffee can - holding paint brushes.

Jim Dine has long sustained an orientation similar to that of Johns, achieving painterly effects with print making processes. Additionally, Dine often embellishes entire editions with hand painting. Moreover, he has underscored the primacy of drawing with many editioned prints that are effectively drawings produced in multiplicity (as is the case with many of Hockney’s editions). Be it graphite pencil on paper or lithographic pencil on a stone, a drawing is a drawing nevertheless and it is the mastery of this most fundamental of all artistic skills that separates the merely conceptual from classic art, though it should be said that the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Dine is represented in this exhibition with a large, intensely graphic robe entitled Very Picante, made with an unusual technique employing cardboard plates. Also shown are two of his Venuses in etching and aquatint, classical icons if ever there were.

Chuck Close has become an iconic name in contemporary art, but the underpinning of his signature style - portraits comprised of intricate patterns of pixilated colors - have precedent in neo-impressionism, best known from the late 19th century divisionist, aka pointillist landscapes and seascapes of Seurat and Signac. This said, the thinking behind Close’s work is different than that of the neo-impressionists, and he’s taken the basic form of divisionism to the next level with the development of complex patterns and free form designs within those patterns. Important Modern and Contemporary Prints includes Close’s tour de force self portrait of 2007, a huge 187 color silk screen image measuring 68 x 74 inches. Each color requires a separate screen, and the registration (alignment) of all of the screens is critical, thus a work of this complexity is a staggering technical accomplishment, which in combination with his artistry makes this perhaps the most important print of the new century to date.

Lastly, looking at the amazing 1981 work of contemporary French etcher Erik Desmazieres, L’Atelier Rene Taze III, takes us back to where this narrative began, in reference to the intricate 16th century engravings of Albrecht Dürer, the etchings of Giovanni Piranesi, Jacques Callot and other early masters of European printmaking. Desmazieres’ obsessively detailed, affectionately rendered image of a print shop and its venerable press eloquently express the importance of printmaking, not only in the eyes of this artist, but in the eyes of all of the artists, curators, gallerists and collectors who have fallen under the spell of the print.

Lee Spiro, Director
Leslie Sacks Fine Art

This exhibition may be viewed online at www.lesliesacks.com

Gallery info:
Leslie Sacks Fine Art
11640 San Vicente BLVD
Los Angeles CA 90049

T 310.820.9448
F 310.207.1757
www.lesliesacks.com
Lee Spiro (Director): lee@lesliesacks.com

IRANIAN BODIES
Curated by Edward Lucie-Smith and Janet Rady

Opening Reception: Friday 19th February at 8pm
Exhibition Dates: February 19 - March 12, 2010

Fereydoun Ave, Mitra Farahani, Ramin Haerizadeh, Narmine Sadeg, Nikoo Tarkhani.

Iranian contemporary art, with the exception of the cinema, has only swum into western consciousness fairly recently. Because of the political tensions between the West and Iran, it is still largely misrepresented and misunderstood. Before looking at the specific cases offered by this exhibition, there are some general observations to be made. The first is that Iran possesses an extremely ancient culture, going back some three thousand years. The art of the present day has deep roots in that culture – to an extent often missed by western observers. The second is that Tehran, the largest city in the Middle East, with a population of nearly 8 million, has a lively indigenous art world. Most of the leading Iranian artists still live in their own country, at least part of the time and are proud to do so. The third is that, despite the Iranian Islamic Republic’s reputation for moral repression, the Iranian art of the present is often paradoxically very much concerned with the human body, and is frequently subtly infused with sexual connotation. The present show is designed to illustrate that fact.

Its contents will come as no surprise to anyone who has either visited Tehran, or who has any acquaintance with earlier Persian art and literature. Safavid miniatures from the time of Shah Abbas (1588-1629) often illustrate erotic subject matter. Hafez, Iran’s best-loved poet (ca. 1320-1390), as the entry on him in Wikipedia notes, “took as his major themes love, the celebration of wine and intoxication, and exposing the hypocrisy of those who have set themselves up as guardians, judges and examples of moral rectitude.” Striking features of today’s Tehran cityscape are huge propaganda murals. Many celebrate the tragic heroes of the bloody Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88. They are linked to an age-old Shia cult of martyrdom, but the protagonists are represented as if they were Hollywood film stars, looking out from the billboards on the Los Angeles Sunset Strip. With their handsome features and swimming eyes, these handsome young men seem designed to have an erotic appeal to men and women alike.

This exhibition offers the work of five Iranian artists, two men and three women. The work of the men, Fereydoun Ave and Ramin Haerizadeh, demonstrates clearly how firmly rooted Iranian contemporary art is in Iranian popular culture.

Fereydoun Ave’s series of digital prints, Rostam in Late Summer Revisited, refers to one of the heroes of the great Iranian epic, the Shahnameh or Book of Kings, written by the poet Ferdowsi around 1000 a.d. As Iranians know, Rostam's symbolic attributes of manly strength and martial valor reappear today in the wrestlers known as pahlavans, who are practitioners of a traditional Sufi cult of physical exercise. This cult of wrestling permits a greater degree of male nudity than is usually permitted in Iran, and encourages an admiration of the male body. Ramin Haerizadeh’s Men of Allah series, with its lubricious, effeminate mullahs, based on self-portraits of the artist, is inspired by a kind of Iranian folk theater called Taaziye, popular in the 19th century and still current today, where women’s roles are played by men. In one scene, much liked by the Iranian public, the brother of Imam Hossein, the founder of the Shia branch of Islam, is married to a chador-clad female who turns out to be a bearded man. The result, in Harizadeh’s hands, is a sly satire on clerical manners and morals. It is worth noting that Iran is the only Islamic nation with a strong theatrical tradition, which often relates, as here, to an equally strong tradition of figurative art. This tradition embraces images of effeminacy as well as images of strength, as is witnessed by the numerous portrait miniatures of seductive page-boys from the time of Shah Abbas. The images offered by the three women artists are even bolder than those offered by the men. When westerners discover that women create a good deal of the most interesting art now being produced in Iran, the tendency is to assume, despite this, that women artists are constantly inhibited by a struggle against the conditions Iranian society imposes on them.

The truth is that Iranian art made by women does have a strongly feminist streak, but that this feminism is different from its western equivalent. In particular, women artists living and working in Iran do not want to give up their roots in Iranian culture, and are offended to be thought of as being victims perpetually preoccupied by victimhood. The three artists featured here have been chosen to illustrate women art makers’ approach. Nikoo Tarkhani deals with the female body, and her sometimes fragmented nude self-portraits powerfully convey her sense that women in a contemporary Islamic society are struggling to piece together a contemporary identity. They can be compared, in this sense, with the very different self-portrait images of Ramin Haerizadeh. Mitra Farahani, who is a film maker in addition to being a painter and a maker of graphic works, tends to focus on the naked male body, which she treats on occasion with a boldness that easily exceeds most of the treatments of this subject one sees in the West.

The sculptor Narmine Sadeg seems to refer to the strong tradition of puppet theater in Iran. The puppet plays are closely related to the Taaziye school of live theater. The word Taaziye means ‘elegy’, and productions are typically presented in connection with the Day of Ashura, when Shia Muslims lament to death of the Imam Hossein. They can be thought of as the equivalents of Christian Passion Plays, yet, like the Passion Plays of the Middle Ages, tragic subject matter does not exclude an element of robust humor. It is noticeable not only that Sadeg’s figures can be swung about at will on the rods that pierce and support them, but also that her nude males have conspicuously small genitals. As a result they seem like images of powerlessness - a retort to Fereydoun Ave's images of strength. Iranian contemporary art is constantly in dialogue with the society that surrounds and supports it. Like art in many Middle Eastern and Far Eastern societies, it invites the spectator to read visual images on several different planes, both linear and temporal. This gives a resonance and depth that is now often lacking in western equivalents.

Werkstattgalerie
Eisenacher Str. 6
D-10777 Berlin

Location near Nollendorfplatz U1-U4, Bus M19, 187
opening Hours: Tu-Fr 12-20h, Sa 12-18h

phone: +49.30.21002158
email: info@werkstattgalerie.org
web: www.werkstattgalerie.org

VERGE Emerging Art Fair Announces the Inaugural New York VERGE Art Fair at the Historic Dylan Hotel; Applications Now Being Accepted

DOWNLOAD THE APPLICATION:
http://www.vergeartfair.com/applications/Verge_NYC10_application.doc
DEADLINE FEBRUARY 1

The Only Fair Exclusively for Emerging Art

VERGE emerging art fair is proud to announce its inaugural New York event at the 4-star Dylan Hotel, March 4-7, 2010, coinciding with the New York Armory Show. VERGE is THE source for emerging art in New York, the only art fair exclusively devoted to emerging art throughout the New York art fair scene. Located only 7 short blocks from Volta, The Armory Show's sister fair, and one block from NYC landmarks including Grand Central Terminal, VERGE is well positioned to provide a high visibility platform for the best in new and emerging art.

ABOUT VERGE
Verge is an international platform for the most exciting and interesting in new and emerging art. Verge exists to establish boundaries of the extraordinary as a counter to the natural compulsion towards stagnation in the way art is evaluated and delivered to the public. Staying true to this necessary state for the advancement of art requires a sustained focus on the best new ideas and practices of those marginal or newly emerging to international art audiences. The satisfaction of this fixed requirement for a healthy and competitive artistic culture is at the core of Verge as an international exposition of the highest quality artistic production and the galleries, museums and audiences who sustain it.

ABOUT THE DYLAN HOTEL
Located in the former home of the New York Chemists Club, built in 1903, the Dylan is a lavish environment in which to showcase the best in new and emerging art. Dylan's interiors, by Jeffrey Beers of Jeffrey Beers International, mark a deliberate departure from both the too stark and overly hip designs currently prevalent in the high-end boutique hotel market. Interior design features include rich jewel-toned fabrics, Carrara marble sinks and American walnut fixtures and furnishings. The 11 foot ceilings in each guest room and suite not only complement the design, but offer a feeling of spaciousness not found in the average New York City hotel. Beers has created a timeless look for the property that redefines opulence for a new age while preserving the landmark-quality architecture of the 1903 Beaux-Arts structure. Room service is provided by the popular Benjamin Steakhouse at the Dylan Hotel for breakfast and dinner.

VERGE ART FAIR NYC
The Dylan Hotel
52 East 41st Street
New York, USA

www.vergeartfair.com

Tel: +1-312-612-2270

PROFESSIONAL PREVIEW
Thursday, March 4, 2009, Noon to 6:00 pm

PLEASE NOTE: Admission to the Professional Preview is given to press and VIP (both Verge, Armory Show and Volta cards are accepted) cardholders only. The Opening Night Preview is for those cardholders and for paid public admission.

OPENING NIGHT PREVIEW RECEPTION
Thursday, March 4, 2009, 6:00 to 10:00 pm

PUBLIC HOURS
Friday & Saturday, 5 - 6 March, Noon to 8 pm
Sunday, 7 March, Noon to 6 pm

TICKETS AT THE DOOR
Opening night preview: $20
General admission: $10, $5 for students and seniors

PRESS INQUIRIES
+1-312-612-2270
Request a press pass via email at press@vergeartfair.com

A Press Packet has also been made available for download with an print-quality, high-res image archive and materials for use by media and can be downloaded at www.vergeartfair.com/PRESS_PACKET.zip from the VERGE Press center.

INTERVIEW REQUESTS
Edouard Steinhauer, Artistic Director for VERGE, is available for interviews. Please forward all interview requests to:

Anna-Maria Cerniglia
VIP & Media Relations
press@vergeartfair.com
+1-312-612-2270

'The result of my work is a translation of reality. With it, the spatial object is put into relation while the sum of perceptions reflects the ambiguity of reality.'

Quantum physics postulates that a particle can follow every possible path in space-time on its way from one place to another and thus live through every possible story. Each of these possibilities describes one story and the sum of all these stories results in the only 'probable' path while each possible story holds a probability of its own. Gregor Gaida (*1975 Chorzów, Poland) has taken on this scientific onset and transferred it to life and art. In his philosophical approach of 'sum of histories', he describes the theory of human action as the consequence of the sum of all past events.

In his sculptures, Gaida literally gives shape to this approach and tells stories without writing them out. They are allegories of the contemporary that in their openness and elusiveness suggest different possibilities of a story.

Contradictions in current and historical context and in social value systems generate concepts that condense to imagery. As scrutinizing observer, he documents persons facing a personal decision and, at these crossroads, logs every detail of their mimic and gestures. His sculptures depict singular moments that implicate not only the sum of causes but all possibilities arising from this moment.

In 'Lateral III' the artist merges positively charged components like the motive of the child, the colour white and the pureness of washing powder. Their sum and constellation, however, produce a negative effect and irritate the viewer. Here, the crated image wavers between attraction and repulsion. Something similar happens in 'Kind und Kreide' ('Child and Chalk') which seems to feature the theme of childhood's innocence and purity. Only upon the second, closer look of the viewer, the seemingly playful scene unfolds to its whole extent: In absolute equality the playing children mutate to adversaries who consciously set themselves apart from each other.

The narrative character of the figurative in Gaida's works is always strongly pronounced and the characters whose anatomic minutiae and physiognomies are defined in detail seem strangely animate. A classic and timeless impression is also given by the lightly glazed wood which finds frequent application besides other materials such as aluminium, polyester and acrylic resin. Apart from the delicate wood grain, knotholes and small irregularities shine through the white glazed surface of skin, hair and clothes. Their inner substance which in itself holds an organic vitality is revealed and imparts Gaida's figurines with their ambivalent livelihood.

Gregor Gaida merges approaches from photography and painting to form inimitable sculptures. His objects may be seen as three-dimensional snapshots as the protagonists are cropped at their imaginary image borders and wrest away from their original frame of action. It is this fragmentary character that prompts the viewer to fathom themselves the 'sum of stories'.

Arte Fiera Art First stages its 34th annual exhibition in Bologna from January 29 to 31st 2010.

Founded in the 70s as one of the first ever International fair of modern and contemporary art, under the artistic director of Silvia Evangelisti, brings together art works from XIX Century to the present days and has being set all over the years its identity, playing its role of a showcase for the art market and enhancing new developments in the art scene. 15.000sq, 200 leading Italian and international galleries, are only a few items of the upcoming edition.

For the second year, Arte Fiera Art First offers to the audience a daily program of talks focused on the theme of collecting: art collectors and museum directors provide with their experience a dynamic and inspiring dialogue on how private collections and museums interact in the art scenario.

The Fair aims to encourage a lively exchange by inviting representatives and collectors from the Asian Pacific Area thanks to the synergy with ShContemporary, the first Asia Pacific contemporary art fair organized in Shanghai by BolognaFiere Group.

Arte Fiera Art First is constantly and strongly promoting contemporary tendencies through a section of young galleries sensitive to the challenges of artistic practice, in the art market not more than 5 years, with prices ranged between 500 to 10.000€.

Bologna Art First project Bologna Art First a unique art itinerary around the city of Bologna, now at its fifth edition, will be a curatorial project for the first time in collaboration with Julia Draganovic. The project born from the collaboration between the city of Bologna and Arte Fiera, presents from January 29th to the end of February 2010 installations by participating galleries, featuring a unique group show which visually designs a dialogue between contemporary art and unexpected locations, in the historical city centre and its surroundings.

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