Gallery France Online

by Claudia Moscovici Surrealist art often combines the best of both worlds: a “realistic” representation of objects, which requires talent and technical skill, and a fantastic imagination that takes us past the threshold of the rational and the knowable, so we can explore the mysteries of the subconscious. Surrealism offers an escape from the real world yet also probes the depths of a perhaps truer and deeper reality: the reality of human desire; of our dreams and nightmares; of our hopes and fears; of our collective past and a visionary future we can barely imagine. Surrealism can also be playful: at least in the hands of an artist like Miró as well as in Magritte‘s linguistic imagination, whose paintings are filled with visual puns and paradoxes. The contemporary Mexican artist  Gustavo C. Posadas continues the Surrealist tradition today. Calling himself a Neo-Surrealist, Posadas has been a visual artist since 1977. He’s also a curator for art exhibits and the Director of ACCORDarte …

Photography and Realism by Claudia Moscovici The aesthetic revolution that occurred during the twentieth-century is unprecedented in the history of Western art. Even the invention of one-point perspective and the soft shading that gives the illusion of depth (chiaroscuro) during the Renaissance didn’t change aesthetic standards as radically as the creation of non-representational, or what has also been called “conceptual” art. Since Marcel Duchamp we have come to believe that a latrine, if placed in a museum, is a work of art. Since Andy Warhol we have come to accept that brillo boxes and other ordinary household objects, if placed in a museum, are objets d’art. And since Jackson Pollock and the New York School of abstract expressionism we have come to realize that what may appear to be randomly spilled paint, globs and other kinds of smudges are not only artistic, but also considered by many to be the deepest expressions of human talent, thought and feeling. Once art took a conceptual…

Two leading experts give their tips for achieving museum-quality illumination at home ‘Taking a priceless piece of art and transforming it so the client sees it in a different way is a joy,’ says lighting consultant Harry Triggs, who founded TM Lighting with product designer Andrew Molyneux in 2012. ‘They may not always be verbose in their praise, but you usually get a little twinkle that tells you you’ve done a good job.’ Having set out with the ambition of becoming the ‘go-to people for lighting art’ by using new high quality LEDs that offer far superior colour rendition, the two art lovers have created an impressive set of discreet picture lights and spotlights, and now head a team based in an office and workshop near Russell Square in London. Triggs and Moyneux’s clients now include London’s National Gallery, Sir Antony Gormley and Christian Louboutin, and we sought them out for their expert advice on lighting a home collection.
1: Create layers of light Triggs and Molyneux are not…

by Claudia Moscovici More than a style of art, Impressionism is a movement and a unique way of looking at the world that was shocking in its day and continues to have relevance to contemporary artists. Originally, the Impressionists were considered subversive. Manet, Impressionism and Postimpressionism have become analogous with the violation of the official academic standards and thus also with artistic modernity. It is said that Impressionism entailed a rejection of the principles taught by the Ecole des Beaux Arts and esteemed by the academic judges of the official Salon. In fact, the works of the Impressionists were repeatedly rejected from the Salon run by the Academy of Fine Arts established by Colbert under the reign of the Louis XIV, which continued to rule the artworld for two hundred years. Because they were unconventional, the paintings of the Impressionists were relegated by Napolen III to the Salon de Refuses (the Salon of the Rejected) in 1863. Rather than accept defeat…

One no longer need be young to be an emerging artist. The news that artists over the age of 50 are, for the first time since 1991, once again eligible for the Turner Prize partly reflects wider efforts to reassess artists who have been unduly neglected, often because their race or gender has excluded them from the dominant narrative of post-war art. But it is also a welcome reminder that, when it comes to art, innovation and potential are not merely the preserve of younger generations. Critics who have complained that the prize risks becoming a lifetime achievement award overlook the fact that, although lifetimes may share certain inevitabilities, their different rhythms of opportunity, experience and inspiration mean that they are otherwise far from uniform. Take the case of Phyllida Barlow, selected at the age of 73 to represent Britainat this year’s Venice Biennale. In an engrossing recent profile of the artist for the Guardian, the writer Charlotte Higgins set out how Barlow spent …

By Claudia Moscovici It would not be an exaggeration to state that Rodin’s artistic career was shaped by women. They were his source of inspiration, his assistants, his models, his sexual and romantic partners, his best friends, his patrons of the arts and, sometimes, his jealous enemies. His life-long partner, assistant and friend was Rose Beuret. She was a country girl, the daughter of a provincial family that owned a vineyard in Vecqueville, Champagne. He met her in Paris in 1864, when she was only eighteen years old. Perhaps largely due to Rose’s devotion and loyalty to the sculptor, they stayed together—in on and off relationship—for over fifty years. Like nearly all of Rodin’s romantic relationships, theirs was tumultuous. It began as a passionate love affair between model and artist. Rose had recently arrived in Paris to work as a seamstress, but she also did part-time work as an artists’ model. This is how she met Rodin. The art historian and biographer Ruth Butler cites one o…

In today's market, collectors often ask themselves: 
should they buy fine art with the expectation that, in years to come, that price will perhaps double or even triple?

We set out to answer that question with the help of Evan Beard, the National Art Services Executive with U.S. Trust, Bank of America Private Wealth Management. Headquartered in New York City, Beard and his team work closely with art collectors to help them in lending against their collection, designing philanthropic or estate planning strategies, negotiation at auction, and structuring and managing private foundations. As an authority on art-related investing and financing, Beard directs the end-to-end provision of services to clients in the art world. We asked Beard how collectors should think about art, how he views the opinions of other thought leaders on the topic, and where the next wave of growth in the art market is likely to stem from.
Let's say a client of yours sees fine art as an investment asset. Wh…