Photos de Cinéma

“Photos de Cinéma: Images of the French New Wave by Raymond Cauchetier,” which includes production photographs from “Breathless,” is the first exhibition outside of Europe to showcase Cauchetier’s motion picture work.  On view will be 125 newly made, black-and-white prints from Cauchetier’s own 35mm negatives. The printing was personally overseen by Cauchetier, now in his 90s, at his preferred lab in Paris.  Other films represented in the exhibition include “Adieu Philippine,” “Baisers volés” (“Stolen Kisses”), “Jules et Jim,” “Lola” and “La peau douce” (“The Soft Skin”). “Photos de Cinéma” is open to the public through June 24 in the Academy of Motion Picture's Grand Lobby Gallery in Beverly Hills.

Bob Dylan 1961 to 1966

Bob Dylan With Top Hat Pointing In Car, Philadelphia PA 1964 © Daniel Kramer

An exhibition on view at the Cité de la musique in Paris retraces the important moments of Bob Dylan between the years of 1961 to 1966, during which Dylan radically changed his artistic approach and sparked a musical revolution. Created by the Grammy Museum of Los Angeles, Bob Dylan, Rock Explosion presents, through previously unpublished photos, objects, rare documents and audiovisual archives, the astonishing story of a personal evolution that marked a societal earthquake. On view until July 15 at the Cité de la Musique. 

Love, Life, & Fashion

Two of the most important people in fashion and design today, Ruben and Isabel Toledo have just released a book which "is a rare look into the mind, life, and journey of one of our generation’s most coveted fashion designers, Isabel Toledo. From the nostalgic and permanent in­fluence of her upbringing in Cuba and the serendipitous love that materialized her vision and fueled her conviction, to the timeless mark she continues to make on the fashion industry....." Ruben who translates Isabel's visions into illustration which then bring her designs to life, first laid eyes on each other since they were thirteen, have been collaborating for over two decades and their romance and love has offered an explosion of creativity. The book, entitled Roots of Style: Weaving Together Life, Love, and Fashion is available now.

Clifford Owens Demands Sex from Audience at MoMA PS1

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This is the last weekend to see Clifford Owens first exhibition, entitled Anthology, at a New York museum – MoMA PS1 – which is comprised of photography, video, and live performance. Anthology features performances scores—written or graphical instructions for actions—that Owens solicited from a multigenerational group of African-American artists. Twenty-six major artists have contributed scores, nearly all of whom composed new works specifically for Owens and his project. This weekend will prove especially challenging when he will "demand sex" from the audience/viewer. This Sunday, for his last performance, Kara Walker has written the score: "French kiss an audience member. Force them against a wall and demand Sex. The audience/viewer should be an adult. If they are willing to participate in the forced sex act abruptly turn the tables and you assume the role of victim. Accuse your attacker. Seek help from others, describe your ordeal. Repeat."  Clifford Owen's performance commences at 3 p.m. on the second floor of MoMA PS1 this Sunday, March 12. 

Me Myself & I

“What do I see in Picasso that makes him Picasso?” wondered Edward Quinn, who took a large number of pictures of the Andalusian artist. Besides Quinn, many other photographers – some of whom were great names in the history of photography – Man Ray, Brassaï, Robert Doisneau, Dora Maar, Irving Penn, Edward Quinn, Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Michel Sima, Richard Avedon and André Villers – also shot portraits of the famous artist, offering their own angle on his work and personality. The result is a profusion of portraits of Pablo Picasso that have become part of our collective imagery and which have contributed to building up a myth around the artist, his life and his work. MemyselfandI, Photographic Portraits of Picasso has been jointly organized by Museo Picasso Málaga and Museum Ludwig, Cologne and will be on view until May 10. After its run at MPM, it will travel to Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe in Hamburg, where it will be on display from 2nd August to 28th October 2012.

18 Years

Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain

It will be exactly 18 years in April since Kurt Cobain took his own life in the green house of his Seattle home in 1994. Last month he would have turned 45. Marking the occasion, two founding members of Cobain's mostly semi-lucid widow Courtney Love's band Hole will be releasing a book and a film surrounding the relationship with Kurt, the band, and the life style of drugs, and the consequences of rapid fame. Firstly, Eric Erlandson, guitarist for Hole, will will releasing a book, entitled Letters to Kurt, which is a collection of poems and free association reflecting on his suicide and its emotional ramifications. Secondly, Patty Schemel, who helped develop Hole's sound and who lived with Kurt and Courtney during some of the more tumultuous times, is releasing a film about her life. Hit So Hard: The Life & Near Death of Patty Schemel is the "portrait of the hell-and-back life of Patty Schemel" and tells the story of her terrible addiction to drugs and how it nearly destroyed her career and life. Schemel is "a true survivor of what we now know was the disaffected 'slacker' generation, Patty found herself, like her friend Kurt Cobain, embraced by the dark side. An unprecedented and unflinching inside look at one of the 90s most crucial and controversial groups." Eric Erlandson's Letters to Kurt will be released April 8th on Akashic Books. Hit So Hard will be premiering this year - first at Cinema Village in New York on April 13, with more dates to follow.

WHITNEY BIENNIAL 2012

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Charles Atlas (b. 1949). Still from Turning (live mix) with Antony and the Johnsons, 2004. Image courtesy the artist and Vilma Gold, London

Sculpture, painting, installations, and photography—as well as dance, theater, music, and film—will fill the galleries of the Whitney Museum of American Art in the latest edition of the Whitney Biennial. With a roster of artists at all points in their careers the Biennial provides a look at the current state of contemporary art in America. This is the seventy-sixth in the ongoing series of Biennials and Annuals presented by the Whitney since 1932, two years after the Museum was founded.

Allegoria Sacra

The Art Gallery presents the Australian premiere of Allegoria Sacra by the internationally celebrated artist collective AES+F. This spectacular video work is, in essence, a digital painting which seduces and overwhelms the viewer through its visual and aural splendor. Allegoria Sacra is inspired and named after a painting by the Renaissance master Giovanni Bellini, which is believed to represent purgatory. In purgatory all souls wait for the Last Judgment. For AES+F, the modern international airport, as a place where people are suspended in time and place, is the contemporary allegory for purgatory. Allegoria Sacra (see trailer after the jump) is now on view until June 3, 2012 at The Art Gallery of South Australia.

Richard Prince & Picasso

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Artist Richard Prince stands in front of one his paintings at the Museo Picasso Málaga for an exhibition entitled Prince/Picasso.  No other contemporary artist could reinterpret Picasso in this particular way. Prince "approaches Picasso by using a tactic of radical cannibalisation of the artist, causing the spectator to feel alienated. By distancing us in this way, we are warned to revise our perceptions and conventional views on sexuality, eroticism and desire." Price/Picasso is on view at the Museo Picasso Málaga until May 27, Palacio de Buenavista San Agustín,8  29015 Málaga, Spain

Lise Sarfati: On Hollywood

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The Rose Gallery in Los Angeles is currently presenting two exhibitions of photographs by Paris based Lise Sarfati.  On view now until March 26, a series of photographs, entitled On Hollywood, is a unique and intimate survey of women in and around Hollywood and starting March 31, another series that explores the identity of women in a post-modern suburban landscape, entitled She, will be on view until May 8, 2012. Visit the Rose Gallery to learn more.

Word Above the Street

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A rendering of work for the Water Tank Project, featuring art by Ed Ruscha

Word Above the Street, a New York-based non-profit organisation, plans to transform 300 rooftop water tanks across New York City into works of art to raise awareness on the global water supply. For 12 weeks during the spring and summer of 2013, the Water Tank Project will host works by artists including Ed Ruscha, Lawrence Weiner, Tony Oursler, Marilyn Minter and Carrie Mae Weems, as well as rapper Jay-Z.

Warhol 15 Minutes Eternal

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Its been 25 years today since Andy Warhol died in a New York hospital and he still permeates popular culture.  This year we will see an explosion of Warhol related exhibitions and retrospective due to the anniversary of his death. On view now the MMK in Frankfurt, Warhol: Headlines, is the first exhibition to cover this type of subject in his oeuvre. Starting in March Affirmation Arts in New York will presentConfections and Confessions, which will include over 50 rare and unique photographs of the artist.  And also starting in March a massive retrospective exhibition of Andy Warhol's artwork will tour five Asian cities over the next three years – Andy Warhol: 15 Minutes Eternal will open in Singapore first and then to Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing in 2013 and Tokyo in 2014.

Bruce LaBruce's Obscenity Show Hugely Controversial

With a priest's face suggestively covered in semen, actress Rosy DePalm biting down on a rosary, and naked nuns, Bruce LaBruce's new show at LaFresh Gallery in Madrid is inciting immense fury among Catholics and conservatives who are calling the exhibition of 50 photographs blasphemous and depraved. See photos from the show and protesters after the jump. "Obscenity" will be on view until April 4, 2012 at LaFresh Gallery in Madrid, Conde de Aranda, 5 28001.

The Aesthetics of The Photobooth

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When the first photobooths were set up in Paris in 1928, the Surrealists used them heavily and compulsively. In a few minutes, and for a small price, the machine offered them, through a portrait, an experience similar to automatic writing. Since then, generations of artists have been fascinated by the concept of the photobooth. From Andy Warhol to Arnulf Rainer, Thomas Ruff, Cindy Sherman and Gillian Wearing, many used it to play with their identity, tell stories, or simply create worlds. Behind the Curtain - the Aesthetics of the Photobooth, an exhibition created by the Musée de l’Elysée, is the first to focus on the aesthetics of the photobooth. It is divided into six major themes: the booth, the automated process, the strip, who am I ?, who are you ?, who are we ?. Provider of standardized legal portraits, it is the ideal tool for introspection and reflection on others, whether individually or in groups. By bringing together over 600 pieces made on different media (photographs, paintings, lithographs and videos) from sixty international artists, the exhibition reveals the influence of the photobooth within the artistic community, from its inception to the present day.

Art of Elysium's PIECES OF HEAVEN Auction

Chris Heads, UNTITLED 11, 2011

The Art of Elysium, which bridges philanthropy with contemporary art, will be holding an auction, in partnership with Christies, on February 23 entitled Pieces of Heaven, featuring an amazing array of artists from Andy Warhol to Pas Un Autre's very own Adarsha Benjamin. February 23, Smashbox Studios, 1011 N. Fuller Avenue Hollywood, California 90046

Worn to be Wild: The Black Leather Jacket

A notable upcoming travelling exhibit has just been announced at the Harley Davidson Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin which pays tribute to the black leather jacket. The exhibit, entitled Worn to be Wild: The Black Leather Jacket, will explore its roots from being worn by aviators during WWI, to bikers, to its modern-day designs from fashion houses such as Jean Paul Gaultier and Gianni Versace. The exhibition will run June 16 to September 3, 2012 at the Harley Davidson Museum.