The View from the Edge of the Universe

I'm Going to Try to Crank 'er Up Once More

Today while surfing the web looking for special edition photos by Marilyn Minter, I came across Artware Editions a site full of objects for you home all made by noted artists.  Interested in a Lisa Yuskavage shower curtain?  No problem! How about a Marilyn Minter beach towel? Sorry Sold Out!  You'll have to settle for some Fred Tomaselli wallpaper instead.  Of course, the prices aren't Walmart cheap, but showering with a Yuskavage buxom blonde really shouldn't be.

Matthew Barney - November's Best Buy

I have to catch a plane in 5 minutes, so I'll elaborate later....

This Matthew Barney limited edition is 400 euros...

Limited edition of 100, 30 copies with the artist’s signature on the box
Double-ply card made of Brazilian rosewood and HDPE (card format 10.5 x 14.8 x 0.4 cm) as the cover of a set of ten postcards with reproductions from the project “DE LAMA LÂMINA”. Polyethylene side of the card stamped by the artist. Cover of the postcard box with a detail from “Brazilian fundraiser”.

Available here:

Thanks Cesar!!

"On Collecting" - October's Best Buy (and a cautionary tale)

.
.
.
.
.
.
Shopping on the web for art has become a little slim lately, but here is a very interesting book about collecting that I found to be beautiful and a little heartbreaking.

The accordion style book contains reproductions of the stamp collection of the author's father.  The author, Juan Sebastian Agudelo wrote a poem that appears on the back of the stamp reproductions that recounts the obsessive relationship that his father had with his collection.  Upon his father's death, Agudelo took the collection, believed to be very valuable, to an expert only to find out that the collection was substantially valueless.  As a result and to commemorate his father's life project, Agudelo published the book in a signed and numbered edition of 75.

It's available though my gallery, Quality Pictures for $150.  Email me if you would like to order one.

Jake and Dinos Chapman: August's Best Buy

Love 'em or hate 'em the Chapman brothers' work is almost always memorable.  I also think that they have made some of the best art books of the last few years and now White Cube in London is offering "Another Nice Etching by Jake and DInos Chapman".
Edition of 150
Etching printed on 300gsm Somerset TP
Paper size 55 x 46cm (Image size 25.5 x 32.5cm)
Unframed
Signed and numbered
£300 + VAT  (About $600)

The print, completely repulsive, is vintage Chapman and one of those examples where the artist actually made a special edition that is really a first rate work.  If you have any inkling for the Chapmans here is a "right" print at a "right" price!

If $600 is too rich for your blood, check out one of the Chapmans' recent books, Insult to Injury, where the boys' defaced Goya's are all reproduced.  Its one of the best art books of the last 5 years.  The reproductions are so good you could frame them.

Kehinde Wiley: June's Best Buy

In the nick of time, I spotted this multiple on artnet.  Offered by cerealart, this cast marble dust and resin sculpture comes in an edition of 250, measures 12 x 10 x 6 and is signed.   There will be two more busts forthcoming so you may want to wait and see  which you like best.  The asking price: $1000.

Kojo Griffin: April's Best Buy?

I'm back after some r&r with this month's best buy.  Becasue I couldn't find anything just right on the web (although the MOCP's 2006 limited edition prints came close), I decided to do something a little different.
I'm offering this sketch by Kojo Griffin to the highest bidder.  The sketch is signed and dated and measures 9 x 12 inches.  Last summer a similar size drawing sold at Christies for $1560.  I will take no commission on the sale; all the proceeds will go to Kojo.
Here's how it will work:  Please email me the highest price you are willing to pay for the sketch by May 10th.  The highest bid will be offered the piece first.  This is like a sealed bid auction.  I will not disclose how the bidding is going. 
C'mon!  Give it  a try!  Who knows, you may get a great drawing for $10!

March's Best Buy #2 (literally): Marilyn Minter

Courtesy of MAO here.

March's Best Buy: Blind Spot Tribute Edition

Blind Spot's next issue will be a book, a tribute to the magazine's founder Kim Zorn Caputo who died last year.  There is a special edition of the book for $1,000 that includes five signed and numbered 8" x 10" photos by Uta Barth, Jem Southam, Ed Burtynsky, Vik Muniz and the Starn twins.  There are only 25 copies of the limited edition available as a set for this special price.  The prints are each in an edition of 100 and the remaining 75 can be bought separately starting at $250 per print.   If you want the entire set (an instant photography collection really) at the lower price point, I would act quickly, they are selling fast even before announced to the general public.
Contact Sarah Stout at 212.633.1317.  The above-left image is by Uta Barth.  The others (by respectively (Muniz, Burtynsky, Southam & the Starns) are below.

Zoe Strauss - February's Best Buy

Zoe Strauss has hit the big time.  Although you may never heard of her, this Philly-based photographer is one of the 101 artists selected for the 2006 Whitney Biennial.  Self educated, she started taking pictures at age 30 and now finds herself in the most prestigious biennial exhibition in America. 
The Philadelphia Inquirer ran this story on her and reported that her photographs are available directly from the artist for $300 a pop.  Dozens of images are available for viewing on her website.  If $300 is too much, she'll make you a 5 x 7 color photocopy for five bucks.  Zoe talks at length about her upcoming Whitney experience on her blog.  Shock and awe may be the best way to describe her reaction to the inclusion of her works in the Biennial.

Go Zoe go!

Nikki S. Lee: January's Best Buy

Hatje Cantz is offering a special edition of Lee's "Parts" book that contains the limited edition print at left.  The print, in an edition of 25 (w/ 5 a.p.s) measures 30 x 40 cm. and is a paltry 500 euros. 

From the site:
In her Parts project, artist Nikki S. Lee presents fragments of photographs. It is as if the women in the photos – each representing a specific social group, which Nikki S. Lee portrays with striking perfection herself – had cut away the images of their ex-boyfriends or husbands when the relationships ended. Yet all of the women in these pictures clearly refer through gestures or gazes to their now missing partners, exposing obvious patterns of interaction. Like actors in plays or films, they are perfect and immediately recognizable personifications of their respective roles as wives, lovers, or partners for a night. As incomplete images that reveal only parts, the photographs also expose the fragmented psychological structures of these women.