Marc Gauthier

* It’s this Wednesday evening that the director of the Museum of Comporary Art of Montréal (MACM), Paulette Gagnon, should deliver her first guidelines for the institution.

* Nudity and Censorship: The sculpture of Ron Mueck, A Girl, cannot be shown in the public transport system of Calgary. A case to follow because it promotes an exhibition organized by the Glenbow Museum, where the Quebec National Gallery will move The Nude in Modern Canadian Art in 2010.

* Lacerte art contemporain will attend the 10th edition of the TIAF (Toronto International Art Fair), starting tomorrow. The works of fifteen artists will be displayed.

* Amnesty International may protest against BODIES during the exhibition’s visit to Montreal.

* Did you know? It is a Montreal specialist, Peter Paul Biro, who was behind the authentication of the recently found drawing by Leonardo and valued at 150 M$.

* La Tribune de l’art talks about the Napoleon collection at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

* David Altmejd won the Sobey Art Award 2009, where he represented Quebec.

* The situation between the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation (CMCC) and the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) continues to be tense. There is a strike at the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the Canadian War Museum since September 21st. Negotiations in front of a mediator failed on October 8th. The Canadian Museum of Civilization is still preparing for the opening of the exhibition Afghanistan - Hidden Treasures while the union say that the museum’s real treasures are its employees. In the mean time, the board turns away employees who wanted to talk directly to board members.

* An exhibition about hockey is grinding a few teeth in Toronto.

* The Met now has a blog that allows users to delve into the exhibits.

* What if LEGOs were used to create a life-size model?

* A drawing by Raphael could set a new sale record in December.

[Rapport du marché de l’art contemporain 2008/2009, p. 70]

* Artprice and the International Fair of Contemporary Art (FIAC) launched their market report for contemporary art for 2008/2009. The 144-page document is available on the artprice.com site. Damien Hirst is in a class by himself. Canadians who attain market success are photographer Jeff Wall (46th), conceptual artist Jack Goldstein (160), sculptor Rodney Graham (337), photographer Robert Polidori (358) and painter Marcel Dzama (461).

* Tate Modern and the British Museum will have the money to build their new wings.

* A spiral crossword in the New York Times to celebrate the anniversary of the Guggenheim Museum.

Land Art is an artistic movement that began in the 60’s and the 70’s. One of its main characteristics is that it combines landscape and work of art.

One of the best-known art pieces of that movement is Spiral Jetty by USA artist Robert Smithson. Like its name suggests, the work is a spiral jetty that projects into Utah’s Great Salt Lake.

[Image : Spiral Jetty, Robert Smithson, taken April 17th, 2004, Wikipedia]

As years passed by, human activity and climate changes transformed the land sculpture. Incidently, it once was completly covered by water.

[Image: Google Earth]

Since February of 2008, there’s been a wave of support for the work. It appears that an oil company would like to drill too close, according to bloggers around the world. Since landscape plays an important role in this type of project, opposition sprung rapidly to any transformation in the near environment.

The first strike came from the Friends of The Great Salt Lake and the widow of the artist, Nancy Holt. An email campaign proved successful and sent thousands of emails to the Utah authorities, delaying the analysis of the project by weeks.

[Image: Google Earth]

However, in almost none of the writings on this matter do we find an analysis of the artist’s intents. Kudos to Greg Allen for taking the time to write on this matter. He found that industrial landscape was part of the scenery at the time of conception. This heritage was then taken away and quickly erased from memories, even by the artist.

Montreal Daily Le Devoir printed on March 21st that the oil and mining corporation behind the purposed drilling was a Canadian corporation.

This past Thursday, the New York Times published another article on the controversy after their February editorial.

The debate still rages….

Must-read:
* Greg Allen’s blog on the artist’s intents in the 70’s
* NYT February editorial
* French article by Le Devoir presenting the Canadian company involved
* New March article by the NYT