Hasta La Ideas

In a well-timed moment of cross-cultural exchange, the Corey Helford Gallery partnered with the Bristol City Museum and Gallery to put on a mega American show at the latter’s space, featuring some of today’s heaviest hitting street, pop and fine artists, including several never-before-seen works. Aptly called “Art From the New World,” the exhibit (opening this Saturday, 15 May 2010) includes work from Ron English (pictured), Gary Baseman, Mark Ryden and Camille Rose Garcia, among others. Check out the slideshow below for more images.

“Like the Arts Decoratif of Paris in 1925 or the bright, poppy England of the 1960s, America is gushing forth a new wave of taste and style born of Pop Iconic culture, expanding American diversity, resistance to the mainstream art world and a need to communicate to an art audience looking for relevance in America’s Age of Uncertainty,” said Corey Helford’s owner and curator, Jan Corey Helford, in a statement.

Buff Monster, in addition to painting murals, built a 15-foot-tall ice cream cone balloon sculpture. Bug-eyed characters from Baseman’s works will attend the opening (pictured above) and mingle with patrons.

Museumgoers can also expect to see Mike Stilkey’s painting done on the spines of 2,000 stacked books and Todd Schorr’s “An Ape Allegory,” a surreal artwork full of creative interpretations (pictured top right). AJ Foski (pictured above), Shag and Kent Williams also make up the lineup of works will be spread throughout the museum.

The show runs through August 22.

Thankfully, not everyone has outgrown the shoebox dioramas of their school days. Opening today, 12 May 2010, at Manhattan’s Murphy and Dine gallery, “Small Is Beautiful” showcases miniature cities painstakingly constructed by five artists. Curated by Scion and Theme Magazine, the accomplished group builds upon the headlining motif, tapping into themes such as childhood, urbanism and cultural diversity.

Acclaimed for his wallpaper designs, prints and decorative arts, Dan Funderburgh (pictured below right) uses 2-D cutouts to create a layered 3-D metropolis (pictured below left) inspired by Maurice Sendak’s book “In the Night Kitchen.”

Lori Nix is known for building and photographing epic dioramas of natural and modern disasters. In a CH video, Nix gives a tour of her Brooklyn studio. Her architectural model (sketch pictured below left, model pictured top and below right) is a dystopic vision of the future from the 1940s.

Ji Lee blurs art and commercial design. At CH’s 99% Conference in 2009, he gave a talk about balancing creativity and commerce. Lee’s small-scale work (pictured below) deals with adolescence as an out-of-body experience.

The show also includes wall vignettes by Josh Cochran and runs until 16 May 2010.

Here are some photos from an exhibition of work by over 70 designers including Studio Job, Nacho Carbonell and BCXSY, on show at 21_21 Design Sight in Tokyo, directed by Li Edelkoort. (more…)

Stockholm’s Färgfabriken Gallery is currently playing host to one of the most playful and interesting conceptual exhibitions in recent memory. Entitled “Building Blocks,” the show takes a look at the intriguing relationship between client and architect, but does so with a fantastical twist—the clients were kids from around the world.

Investigating and illuminates the differences between the thought process of an adult and that of a child, the exhibit showcases the startling results that vary between magnificent flights of fancy and some very practical solutions to architectural problems.

While the solutions are far from average, the process itself was conducted as it typically would be to give the scenario full context. Children spanning ages six to 16 were invited to develop a brief for a selected architecture firm. From this brief the architects created a proposal incorporating the kids’ list of demands and needs. (One child insisted that a “pooping owl” be prominent on one wall—their demands were met!).

Once the clients were satisfied, the buildings were erected; some as models with viewing portals, others as semi-full-scale buildings to be explored by the viewer. Multiple floors, secret rooms, football and bowling alleys, a disco, rooftop observatories, a suspended bath, a climbing wall, a fireman’s pole, and fully-customizable wall decoration all feature in the nine different builds.

“Building Blocks” forces the architects (within the context of the exhibition) to think, “Actually, why not?” Indeed, the show really opens up the debate on whether our sometimes dull surroundings are the result of goalless and unambitious architectural practices or clients themselves. While the mind of a child may lack a framework of references for their designs, the limitless imagination more than makes up for that.

“Building Blocks” is the result of a solid year of development, reminiscent of the 1971 Tate show “Bodyspacemotionthings,” which encouraged viewers to get involved and explore the artifacts on show (although that show quickly fell apart—literally).

“Buildings Blocks” differs in that the buildings themselves look substantial enough to withstand the months of exploration they are likely to have before it closes its doors this September. However, there is no doubt that it is one of the most intelligent, well-crafted and entertaining exhibitions currently on show today, inspiring the notion that having a child on a retainer at every architect’s office is not a bad idea.

“Building Blocks” runs through 12 September 2010.

With his move to take over at Los Angeles’ Museum of Contemporary Art coming just around the corner, Jeffrey Deitch had already said goodbye to New York via podcast, but it was finally time to do it in person. With the mural now in place, the final show at Deitch Projects opened up this weekend, showing new work by Shepard Fairey, featuring lots of revolutionaries in the artist’s familiar style (the fact that it opened on May 1st, and was even called “May Day,” feels a little forced, but what can you do?). And since both Deitch and Fairey are both familiar spotlight types and this was an extra special occasion, it wasn’t just lots of dissidents on display, but celebrities as well. Art Info was on the ground at the event, putting together this batch of photos, as well as some details of the gallerist’s last hurrah. Here’s a bit:

Inside that cordon, Deitch bounded about in a pastel-pink suit, a knit red tie around his crisp white collar, chatting with luminaries that included writer Salman Rushdie, actor Adrien Brody, and hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, who was also spotted last week at a party for the new Basquiatdocumentary. (Interestingly enough, one of Fairey’s portraits showed that legendary late street artist, once a close confederate of Deitch.)

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