DIA BEACON FOUNDATION.

This museum on the banks of the Hudson river in Beacon, New York is a must-see for those visiting NYC. The collection consists of various rooms dedicated to the most important artists of the second half of the 20th century. It is certainly the place to go if you want to spend a whole day looking at, reflecting on and interacting with art.

Powerful Hannah Arendt

The horror! The horror!, screamed Kurtz just before dying, as he fell to the depths of moral decay in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

COLOSSAL IVORYPRESS

Photo:Alejandra de Argos

Yesterday saw the opening of a new exhibition at Madrid’s Ivorypress gallery of designer and architect Ron Arad’s work. Elena Foster is the gallery’s founder and current director, fulfilling her role admirably. The gallery’s New York garage-style space is appropriate for the scale and scope of Arad’s surprising world.

PANZA DI BIUMO COLLECTION

In 1999 I visited the magnificent Ducal Palace in Gubbio, owned by Federico de Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino and one of the 15th century’s great wonders. It was there, in the palace’s cold, empty halls, that part of the Panza di Biumo collection is held, containing works from the 1980s and 90s.

Monochromatic paintings in various formats filled the walls of the palace, and each of the participating artists was given a specific space in which to display their talents. The collection included Ettori Spalletti’s simplicity and harmony, metallic monochromatic paintings by David Simpson, geometric paintings by Ford Beckman and even small cubes by Stuart Arends, whose tiny size caught my attention - appearing in different colours on a large wall, it seemed as though they would simply vanish in space. In his book Memories of a Collector, Panza reflects on Arends’ imaginative and sensitive artwork, noting that rather than hiding a certain ideology behind its surface, its sole purpose is aesthetic: beauty, composition and colour. There are times when visitors are grateful for the simple aesthetic contemplation of a piece, without feeling as if they are missing out on a greater message that the artist is trying to communicate.

In September 2012 I had the chance to visit Villa Menafoglio in Varese (near Milan), a splendid building and home to Giuseppe Panza, one of history’s great contemporary art collectors, who lived there until his death. His widow Giovanna, who shared his passion for art, still lives in the Villa today. Panza’s interests were broad, including philosophy, astronomy and biology, the first in particular informing much of his art collection. He was a passionate man who tirelessly pursued his search for truth in life and art.

Photo: Camilayelarte

He bought his first painting, a Tàpies, in 1956, attracted as he was by its pessimism which he recognized as being the result of the social traumas and political upheaval after WWII, and which deeply affected him personally. He was collecting art from the United States, spurred on by the lower prices and a more energetic, exciting art scene, at a time when Europe was not paying much attention to the American art market. Towards the end of the 50s, he starts buying Rothko’s spirituality, the every-day of Rauschenberg as a conceptual form of expression, the endlessness of Kline… In the 60s, he moves towards ever more abstract art, minimalist and conceptual works that are stripped to their essence, adding artists such as Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, Richard Serra, Bruce Nauman and Robert Morris to his collection. In this period he also shows an active interest in the emerging pop art movement, acquiring works by Lichtenstein, Oldenburg and Rosenquist, among others. His collection continues to grow steadily, eventually adding up to over 2,500 pieces: a staggering representation of every avant-garde movement that came out of the second half of the 20th century.

 Photo: Camilayelarte

Today Villa Menafoglio maintains a permanent collection, even though the majority of the original collection was acquired by Los Angeles’ Museum of Contemporary Art and the Guggenheim in New York. What I found most fascinating was a part of the villa dedicated to Dan Flavin, made up of various halls each containing an installation piece by the artist: I’d certainly never seen a larger permanent space dedicated to Flavin before. The space was filled with complete silence, and visitors would walk down corridors lit by lights in adjacent rooms. The halls were set up to induce visitors into an almost mystical state of deep contemplation and reflection. Another artist whose work caught my attention was James Turrell: his work, which changes the environment around it, plays with space, light and our perceptions in general, sometimes tricking our senses in a surprising way. Other artists of note here are David Simpson, Max Cole, Fredenthal, Charlton and Beckman, as well as an excellent collection of African and Pre-Columbian art.

A visit to the museum is highly recommended - through its collection, Panza has tried to understand the society of his time and the profound changes it was going through. This close relationship between art and the passing of time, together with the idea of art as a channel for humanity’s deepest concerns, were the common threads in his life and collection.

Photo: Camilayelarte

ATELIER BERNARDÍ ROIG IN MALLORCA

Entering Bernardí Roig’s workshop one is greeted by a series of disturbing, stark-white sculptures, created by the artist to induce a sense of catharsis similar to that experienced by ancient spectators of Greek tragedies.

DONALD JUDD FOUNDATION. New York.

                                               

Judd Foundation. Photo Paul Katz/ © Paul Katz/Courtesy; Judd Foundation Archive

A few years ago I discovered New York’s Judd Foundation, the residence and studio of minimalism’s most important exponent, Donald Judd, since 1968. My desire to visit it was frustrated due to it being closed for refurbishment. Its doors finally reopened three years later, in June 2013, and I was allowed a visit a few days before the official reopening.

JOURNEY TO KENYA. Living with baboons.

Photo: Alejandra de Argos

It’s one thing to hear stories of what it’s like living with baboons, and it’s quite another to actually visit a baboon community and experience a part of their life. Baboons are Old World primates not too dissimilar from humans - seeing them in the flesh one is immediately reminded of the importance of Darwin’s work.

Essential Trips. VITRA CAMPUS.

Architecture and design lovers should not miss a visit to Weil am Rhein, a town in the German region of Freiburg as well as a suburb of the Swiss city of Basel. Here we find the Vitra Campus, Vitra being the Swiss furniture producer founded in 1950 by Willi Fehlbaum. In 1981 a major fire destroyed parts of the original Campus factory and Nicholas Grimshaw, a British architect, was commissioned to design a new production building, which started a series of contributions by architects adding more and more buildings and constructions on the Campus premises, today a world-class destination for all architecture enthusiasts.

THE HISTORY OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

Greek civilization laid the foundations of our contemporary Western culture - it is in Ancient Greece, specifically in Miletus, where the origins of philosophy are to be found.

The book begins with the Seven Sages of Greece and with Thales of Miletus, the first man to attempt to explain natural phenomena through science rather than myth.

RUDOLF STINGEL AT THE PALAZZO GRASSI, VENICE

One of this year’s Venice Biennale’s most remarkable exhibitions was undoubtedly Italian artist Rudolf Stingel, held in the Palazzo Grassi.

INCREDIBLE GAZING BALLS !

That’s one way of describing Jeff Koons’ latest work, currently on show at the brilliant David Zwirner gallery in Chelsea, New York City.

MAN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING.

The big question: What meaning does life have for human beings?

According to Viktor Frankl (1905-1997), author of the book “Man’s Search for Meaning”, there is not one single meaning to life, rather there are as many meanings as there are people on Earth. It’s not about the search for an abstract, universal purpose of life; it’s more about looking for a purpose in each of the stages of one’s progression through life. These individual stages will be determined by an overall mission, a greater goal.

PROPELLER, WHAT A DISCOVERY!

Why do I like Shakespeare?

No-one has better understood the complexities of the human condition and all its contradictions, and no-one has been able to capture them so deeply and universally into their work as Shakespeare has. This brilliant quote of his perfectly expresses his meaning of life: