$300,000? Mr. Hannity, you were ripped off.
Tuesday, April 03, 2012
Artist Jon McNaughton is suddenly getting some press these days. And not the good kind. And yes, I know that bad press is good press. Anyhooo, the painter, who I will admit I've never heard of, is suddenly popping up in my Google Reader all over the place. Why? Because he loves to hate on Obama in his paintings. In fact, the two article headings on my screen right now are: "Anti-Obama Paintings Selling for $300000" (New York Magazine) and
"Man Who Painted Obama Burning The Constitution Selling His Art For Six Figures" (Business Insider).
I wasn't so much struck by his content (ok, ok...Obama burning the Constitution did get an eye roll out of me), but it was his price point that had me blinking my eyes to make sure I read that right. $300,000...where did that number come from?! Jon McWho? Where does a price like this come from? So I decided to do a little research, starting with the artist's website.
Here we are: at McNaughtonArt.com. At first glance, I'm reminded of Thomas Kinkade. Some of Kinkade's works fetch high prices, so maybe McNaughton is basing his price point on exactly that: a comparable peer group. The "about the artist" gives a bit of background on where he's from, where he studied art, but there's no traditional CV. In fact, no mention of his artwork being shown anywhere, other than this very website. NOTABLE: over 30,000 fans on Facebook. Wow.
Also NOTABLE, in the "about the artist" section is a series of questions, one of them being "what is Giclee?" Despite the very technical answer, this is a word that usually has everyone in the contemporary art world screaming POSTER. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
This site is getting me nowhere--I don't see anything priced anywhere near $300,000. I suppose the answer to my question is that it may have been priced at $300,000 simply because Mr. Sean Hannity (the reported buyer) was willing to pay that. This kind of media speculation about pricing in the art world isn't helping anyone. Morley Safer has added to this incorrect assumption with a recent edition of 60 Minutes, lending to the impression that prices are pulled out of thin air.
Watch the 60 Minutes here.
Comments?
TAGS: news
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Just to put things in perspective
Friday, March 30, 2012
Chance of being attacked by a shark: 1 in 11.5 million. Chance you will win the Mega Millions jackpot: 1 in 175.7 million. (Thank you CNN for this handy factoid).
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Friday Fun Day: Hennessey & Family Business
Friday, March 30, 2012
We were greatly inspired by Hennessey Youngman's extended invitation for art submissions as part of the debut exhibition at Family Business. It's a small, small world a/k/a Clusterf*ck will be on view at the tiny Chelsea venue through April 16th.
Over the years we've been given one or two works of art that have hung on our office walls. It's time for us to give these little works some bigger and better exposure. So we have submitted these works on the artists' behalf to the exhibition.
Be on the lookout for two small dog paintings by Eric Ginsburg, and a small mixed media work by T.Joey Enos!
Heather & Courtney with the Pharaoh Hennessey himself.
TAGS: exhibitions / fridayfunday
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More installation shots
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Read More to see a sneak peek....shhh...
TAGS: installation / shepherd
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Rudy Shepherd: INSTALLATION!
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
It's that time again. INSTALLATION WEEK.
Rudy Shepherd's Psychic Death opens tomorrow, Thursday March 29th, at Mixed Greens.
Join us. And click READ MORE below to see more pics of the installation madness.
TAGS: installation / shepherd
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conflict of interest
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Can you say conflict of interest??Oy. MoMA to Gagosian.
Oy Vey at MOCA's Pacific Design Center Branch. (But love you, fellow Norman, Cameron Silver.)
Oh say it ain't so. A MAC user writes a love letter to Windows 8.
TAGS: news
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Spotted on the subway
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Just announced yesterday (and ALREADY SPOTTED!) is the return of Poetry In Motion on the NYC subways. And the background image is a detail of Joan Linder's Green Weed (71st Street D Line MTA) left and right, 2011! Yay Joan! You'll be seeing it everywhere soon.
From the MTA's website: "Since 1992, when it first displayed an excerpt from Whitman's "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry," MTA's Poetry in Motion program has brought more than 200 poems or excerpts before the eyes of millions of subway riders and rail commuters, offering each a moment of timelessness in the busy day."
TAGS: linder
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West Collection Field Trip!
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Click "Read More" below to see more pics from our day of adventure!
TAGS: adventure / trips
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SHOUT OUT: Artinfo
Friday, March 23, 2012
SHOUT OUT to Artinfo for their coverage of our upcoming project PARIS-SCOPE!PARIS-SCOPE's first exhibition, James Reeder's The Mountain , opens Thursday, March 29th!
TAGS: parisscope
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PARIS-SCOPE: presented by Projective City & Mixed Greens
Friday, March 23, 2012
PARIS—SCOPE JAMES REEDER: THE MOUNTAIN
March 29 – June 2, 2012 Opening: Thursday, March 29, 6-8pm
Mixed Greens is thrilled to announce the start of Paris-Scope, a series of peculiar, collaborative exhibitions that give visitors to Mixed Greens a glimpse into Paris-based Projective City’s newest gallery space. Operating as a kind of alchemical experiment into the possibilities of “action at a distance,” viewers are able to peer into (but obviously not enter) the space both thousands of miles away and inches from their grasp—to mystically be both HERE and THERE simultaneously. The Paris-Scope series allows artists unprecedented control over the gallery space, and focuses on ambitious solo installations. The inaugural exhibition is The Mountain, a solo installation by James Reeder.
“I heard myself close my eyes, then open them.”
(Loys Masson, Icare ou le Voyage)
James Reeder’s subtle investigation of looming, portentous things lurking in our peripheral vision is a complex portrayal of both literal and psychological space. Behind us, as dark forms gather on various horizons, we feel a sense of ominous power and smell the scent of an approaching storm. Yet when we turn to confront these clouds, they have disappeared or shifted to somewhere we cannot quite see. Against these nameless, void anxieties, our defenses appear unsuitable, yet built with conviction and urgency.
Reeder’s ambitious work results from a complex process that includes drawing, sculpture, photography, and installation. Drawings lead to small constructions. Those constructions are often photographed and the photos recombined and incorporated into more complex constructions that once again include drawing. Spatial assumptions are routinely ignored, as miniature elements (a shard of glass, a scrap of wool, a crack in the pavement) take on momentous proportions, while glowering sources of massive potential energy simmer quietly in the corners.
We struggle to occupy Reeder’s spaces, yet they remain intimately familiar. In his words, “My photographs and installations attempt to merge perception and reality and fix the bits of evidence in mind as proof and confirmation.” This urgent desire for “proof” in the face of generally overwhelming natural phenomena, and the hubris of expecting an explanation of the world, is the mystery at the core of Reeder’s practice.
James Reeder currently lives in Bushwick, NY. He was born in Grand Ledge, MI, and graduated from Pacific Union College in CA. He has been included in dozens of exhibitions in New York and beyond. In the last two years, exhibition venues include Brooklyn Fire Proof Gallery, Brooklyn, NY; Storefront Gallery, Brooklyn, NY; NURTUREArt, Brooklyn, NY; and Laundromat Gallery in Toyko and Brooklyn. Solo exhibition venues include Lesley Heller Workspace, New York, NY; A.M. Richard Fine Art in Brooklyn, NY; and ATA Window Gallery in San Francisco, CA. His work has been reviewed on artcat.com and his pieces have been reproduced in Photography Quarterly.
Projective City, under the direction of Benjamin Evans, aims to advance, promote, and make visible the work of emerging artists through an ongoing, flexible, and interconnected series of projects. Working on the assumption that bigger is generally worse, projects are for the most part designed to be smaller-scale and more intimate, aiming for personal encounters between artists, artworks, and audiences. Projective City’s gallery space is located at 34 Rue Hélene Brion, Paris 13eme, and, for the time being, through a peephole at Mixed Greens.
DOWNLOAD the press release here.
TAGS: exhibitions / parisscope
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SHOUT OUT: Earth911
Thursday, March 22, 2012
SHOUT OUT to Earth911 for this great article about Jenna Spevack's upcoming exhibition, Eight Extraordinary Greens, debuting at Mixed Greens on May 3rd.
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Nice video of the VOLTA NY fair
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
For those of your who missed the fair...now you can feel like you visited it. Thanks to VernissageTV.
TAGS: artfairs
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Meghan LeBorious PERFORMANCE tomorrow night
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Just a little reminder that Meghan LeBorious will be at Mixed Greens tomorrow night for a Closing Performance of Emptiness & Its Implications.
Meghan LeBorious @ Mixed Greens
Thursday, March 22nd
7-8pm
We'll see you there.
TAGS: performance / windows
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Moving Matisse: The New Barnes
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Wonderful video time lapse of the Barnes Museum's Matisse being reinstalled in the new museum location. Can't wait to see the new space!
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PARIS-SCOPE countdown
Monday, March 19, 2012
PARIS-SCOPE
James Reeder: The Mountain
opens March 29th @ Mixed Greens
Let the countdown begin.
TAGS: parisscope
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