Sven Kroner

Sven Kroner is German artist creating monumental dramatic landscapes. There is clearly a link here to the german romantic tradition of David Caspar Friedrich and others. In almost every piece the world is portrayed as a vast and mysterious place, in which the human presence seems tenuous at best, barely hanging on to the rough skin of this planet. Kroner's work reminds us of this, and that our ultimate success may still be short-lived. The scale and force of nature remains far beyond our control, even our full understanding. LINK svenkroner

Brut Deluxe

@ Kurfürstendamm 
Photo: Miguel de Guzman

Three light installations were realised on Kurfürstendamm: the first, a huge light dome with a diameter of 7,5m, at Joachimstaler Platz, the second consisting of five big three-dimensional light cubes at the crossing with Uhlandstrasse, and the third, an artificial lanscape build of 50 light shrubs, at the crossing with Knesebeckstrasse. What all three installations have in common is that we want to achieve an atmospheric effect with them. Rather than typical decorations that represent Christmas through objects or symbols that are contemplated from the outside, we want to create a space that can be entered and experienced. LINK brutdeluxe

Santa

Santa Claus is generally depicted as a portly, joyous, white-bearded man sometimes with spectacles wearing a red coat with white collar and cuffs, white-cuffed red trousers, and black leather belt and boots and who carries a bag full of gifts for children. Images of him rarely have a beard with no moustache. This image became popular in the United States and Canada in the 19th century due to the significant influence of the 1823 poem "A Visit From St. Nicholas" and of caricaturist and political cartoonist Thomas Nast. This image has been maintained and reinforced through song, radio, television, children's books and films. LINK

Petra

Wonder in the Desert 
@ The Rijksmuseum van Oudheden 
9 October 2013 until 23 March 2014

A spectacular exhibition on Petra, Jordan’s hidden desert city. Petra, capital city of the ancient Nabataean people, is one of the wonders of the ancient world. With its monumental structures, temples, royal tombs and luxurious villas all hewn from the red rock, Petra is among the world’s finest in cultural history and archaeology. 
LINK Rijksmuseum van Oudheden

The artist in the time of hopelessness

The newest Polish art 
@ Awangarda BWA Gallery Wrocław

7 December 2013 - 19 January 2014

Nowadays the word 'curator' sounds terrible. It's associated with judicial supervision and authority. Whereas originally the word 'curator' meant a friend, an advisor, someone who tries to help. That's more the way I imagine the role of an exhibition curator. I've been dealing with art for 30 years and to tell the truth I haven't met many curators who understood their part properly. Most often it's just a formal function, the true encounter between an artist and a curator doesn't take place. Maybe this time we'll manage to change that," Zbigniew Libera wrote in the invitation to the Masters' Atelier—an artistic subversion, the father of Polish critical art and now the curator of a project under his name. The exhibition The Artist in the time of hopelessness. The newest Polish art was created over the period of one year as a process—a process during which the meetings of the artists and the curator, personal conversations, phone calls, emails and negotiations with the institution and all its limitations were the daily bread. Everything was aimed at making the artists' actions and problems, indicated by them, the real subject of this cooperation. LINK Awangarda BWA Gallery Wrocław

Bunker 599

Rietveld Architecture-Art-Affordances

A seemingly indestructible bunker with monumental status is sliced open. The design thereby opens up the minuscule interior of one of NDW’s 700 bunkers, the insides of which are normally cut off from view completely. In addition, a long wooden boardwalk cuts through the extremely heavy construction. It leads visitors to a flooded area and to the footpaths of the adjacent natural reserve. The pier and the piles supporting it remind them that the water surrounding them is not caused by e.g. the removal of sand but rather is a shallow water plain characteristic of the inundations in times of war. LINK

George Widener

A self-taught artist and a calendar savant, Widener creates mixed-media works on paper that give aesthetic, visible form to complex calculations based on dates and historical events the sinking of the Titanic is one of his favorites. The artist often uses found paper, or a support composed of layers of tea-stained paper napkins, to apply ink and paint upon. His drawings feature simple palettes, sophisticated patterning, and bold compositions of dates and imagery, which transcend centuries of time and the history of art. Widener sometimes likens himself to a “time traveler." LINK

Comics! 200 years of Dutch cartoon

@ Meermanno
till January 12, 2014

This autumn Museum  Meermanno experience for the whole family the world of comics. The exhibition is for young and old and deals with many comic forms, such as strips with animals, heroes, girls, war comics, advertising, comics, illegal spending, political comics, family trip, current strips, educational comics and the latest digital forms of comics. The exhibition is chronological. In the first room, the visitor penny prints, sees precursors of the strip, in the last room of the most recent examples: interactive cartoons that the viewer can influence themselves on the screen. LINK Meermanno

Smallest Printing Company

The latest project of The Letterproeftuin. A mobile printing installation for small posters and books. Since 2013. Part of the International Poster and Graphic Design Festival Chaumont 2013. This project is made possible with the great help and expertise of;
Lara De Greef, Druma, Roco-Ets, Wessel van Offeren, Fieke van Berkom, LATU Werkhanden, Van Son Ink. LINK

Willi Baumeister

@ Kunstmuseum Stuttgart

During his apprenticeship as a decorative painter Willi Baumeister already visited evening classes at the Stuttgart "Kunstakademie". From 1909 to 1912 he attended Adolf Hölzel's composition class where he first met the later "Bauhaus" painter Oskar Schlemmer who was to become a life-long friend. 
In 1919-20 he produced his first "Mauerbilder", panels with a wall-like relief structure - created by adding sand and putty to the paint - and cubist forms. These works brought about Baumeister's international breakthrough. In 1928 the Frankfurt "Städelschule" appointed the artist to run the applied arts, typography and fabric printing class. Willi Baumeister joined the "Cercle Carré" in 1930 and in 1931 he became a member of "Abstraction Création". During the "Third Reich" Baumeister was banned as a "degenerate" artist and rarely showed himself in public. During the war Baumeister wrote the book "Das Unbekannte in der Kunst" (The Unknown in Art) which was first published in 1947. During these years as a "degenerate artist" he spent his time studying prehistoric and Oriental art, which was to provide him with the motifs for his "Eidos" pictures and "Ideogrammes".
 He resumed teaching after the war when he accepted a post at the "Kunstakademie" in Stuttgart. With his extensive oeuvre and his art-theoretic publications Willi Baumeister is considered one of the most important modern German artists. LINK Kunstmuseum Stuttgart (in German)

Paint Tubes

by Nendo 
Photo: Ayao Yamazaki

Almost six years have passed since Nendo’s “sweet” collaboration with patissier Tsujiguchi Hironobu which dazzled us with ingeniously conceived chocolate-pencils, not to mention the unique pencil sharpener used to grate chocolate shavings onto Tsujiguchi’s desserts. Following on from these delectable creations, Japanese based studio Nendo recently designed a limited quantity of chocolate-paints for the Seibu Department Store in Japan. They describe their new creation as a ''...design that combines the childhood excitement of opening a new box of paints and the thrill of opening a box of chocolates you’ve been given unexpectedly.'' LINK Nendo

Sɪntər'klaːs 2

LINK

Sɪntər'klaːs

Sinterklaas [sɪntər'klaːs] (or more formally Sint Nicolaas or Sint Nikolaas; Saint Nicolas in French; Sankt Nikolaus in German) is a traditional winter holiday figure still celebrated today in the Low Countries, including the Netherlands and Belgium, as well as French Flanders and Artois. He is also well known in territories of the former Dutch Empire, including Aruba, Suriname, Curaçao, Bonaire, and Indonesia. He is one of the sources of the holiday figure of Santa Claus in North America. LINK Sinterklaas

Piotr Uklański

ESL 
@ Bass Museum of Art

Emerging in the mid-nineteen-nineties, Piotr Uklański has created an expansive and provocative body of work that defies categorization. He has engaged with nearly all forms of visual media including installation, large-scale paper reliefs, tie-dye paintings, fiber art, resin paintings, photography, performance and a feature-length film, Summer Love. English as a Second Language or ESL is the unifying concept for this in-depth exploration of Uklański’s protean work. While the title directly references Uklański’s own immigrant status in America, the broad scope of his work addresses more than the themes of identity politics.  Instead, Uklański proposes ESL as an interpretative metaphor for his art practice. This exhibition highlights the relationship between a non-native speaker’s accent and idiosyncratic aesthetics, often found in Uklański’s “meta-painting” practice. LINK guggenheim

Billboard

@ Museumpark
DPhoto

The Museumpark is divided into four zones: a paved zone, a romantic zone with trees and a pedestrian bridge, an asphalted city zone for events, and a well-tended orchard. The car park designed by Paul de Ruiter uses split levels and lots of glass for a light, spacious and transparent look. The water reservoir prevents flooding in the city centre during heavy rainfall. 

Designed by: Rem Koolhaas, Yves Brunier (1988- 1993, 2011) / Paul de Ruiter (2005-2010). LINK architectenweb (in Dutch)

Amelie von Wulffen

Am kühlen Tisch

@ Portikus 
November 30, 2013 - February 2, 2014

Portikus is presenting an exhibition by Amelie von Wulffen, showing recent paintings, a slideshow of her latest comic, and a group of painted chairs. It has only happened on rare occasions that this variety of media, which is deeply rooted in von Wulffen's practice, has been exhibited in this way. The exhibition becomes somewhat of a prototype for the different genres in which the artist operates. The main gallery space introduces a group of new paintings. Mainly large canvases in cool blue hues, they portray the great European painters of the 19th and 20th century, the wake of modernity: Gustave Caillebotte, Max Beckmann, Goya, and van Gogh. Von Wulffen spent the last years returning to books, studying illustrations of French, Dutch, and German paintings from this era. Apart from amateur techniques such as batik, silk painting, dipping lacquer, appliqués (like sand or seashells), or the quick spatula technique, which can be associated with current times, there is nothing in these paintings that actually depicts the contemporary world. LINK Portikus

Jules de Balincourt

@ The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts 
Boys Club, 2011, Oil on panel

Jules de Balincourt was born in Paris in 1972 and moved to the United States with his family in the early 1980s. After studying at the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, where he developed an interest in the art of ceramics, which he practised for some time, he settled in New York, completing a master's degree at the city's Hunter College in 2005. He lives and works in Brooklyn, and is one of its art scene's main driving forces. Dubbed "Starr Space," his Starr Street studio in the Bushwick district serves as a community centre, performance and concert space, as well as an art gallery for neighbourhood artists. LINK julesdebalincourt

Mondrian Cake

As a lover of modern art, Mondrian inspired creative projects, and unusual cookbooks, I was instantly enamored with Modern Art Desserts: Recipes for Cakes, Cookies, Confections, and Frozen Treats Based on Iconic Works of Art by Caitlin Freeman, pastry chef at the Blue Bottle café at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art’s, which she roams for inspiration, then translates the artwork into edible masterpieces. From Matisse parfait to Mondrian cake to Frida wedding cookies to Fuller hot chocolate, the recipes hit the spot for art-lovers and foodies alike, adding an extra layer of whimsical delight to the art of dessert. LINK modernartdesserts

Norbert Schwontkowski

In his drawings and paintings, Norbert Schwontkowski does not explore the path to abstract visualization and instead has discernible objects and figures emerge from the foundation to the images he creates. He records the world and the seemingly vacuous side to everyday life in fragmentary excerpts, and on even the smallest of canvases proves to be a great storyteller. The focus is on human weaknesses and rashness, human inadequacies and the paralysis of existence, but often he also addresses the small moments of movements and happiness. Many of his images are defined by melancholy and yearning, and yet he forever undermines this with humor, such as arises first and foremost from the interaction of pictorial idea and work title. Alongside oil, crayon, water and pigment, Schwontkowski often also adds metal oxides to his pictures, something that can lead to unforeseen changes to the color. In a wet-in-wet process, initially many layers of color and paint are superimposed, and thus a kind of horizontal foundation is laid. The use of metal oxides resembles photographic and film processes in terms of the art’s sensitivity to light. Part of the painting process is left to chemistry, which cannot be controlled, and thus to chance. Schwontkowski makes deliberate use of these arbitrary and surprising effects. The images continue to morph, changing their colors with each day anew. The result are at times impasto, at times fluid surfaces, often shimmering with a vibrancy in a sea of colors associated with the season from November to February. LINK Norbert Schwontkowski

Opening of Museo Jumex

Mexico City

Mexico City is blessed with a number of great contemporary art museums; Museo Tamayo, whether or not it ever expands, in Chapultepec Park; Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC) on the campus of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) in the south; smaller institutions like Museo Experimental El Eco on Reforma and the non-profit Sala de Arte Público Siqueiros (SAPS) in Polanco-however, as a civic point of interest and a feat of twenty-first century architectural showmanship, it's hard to rival this corner of Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, where the Museo Jumex now sits opposite Carlos Slim's eccentrically hubristic Museo Soumaya, which opened in 2011. Indeed, probably the best sight provided by Lopez's new museum this weekend was the picture of the Soumaya, in all its tiled mushroom cloud grandiosity, framed by the outlook of the Jumex's first floor terrace, where the public programs were held (a roundtable on the role of the private museum, a talk between Hans Ulrich Obrist and the architect, and a performative lunch). The city block is like a kernel of an Arabian upstart in the New World: two of the most moneyed private museums anywhere, sprouted beside one another on a commercial thoroughfare en route to becoming a miracle mile. LINK Museo Jumex

Yto Barrada

Cinematheque Tangier 
@ Walker Art Center

As a "crossroads of civilizations," Tangier has long captured the imagination of the West, and been romanticized and immortalized in film and literature. Having grown up around those myths, artist Yto Barrada has been interested in the material history and visual culture of her hometown, particularly its rich cinematic past. She has developed an artistic practice that combines documentary strategies with a metaphoric approach to imagery, resulting in a poetic body of work recognized for its emblematic power.
 LINK walker art center

Joe Rilla

Ostwest

Im Jahre 1997 gründete Joe Rilla zusammen mit den Hip-Hop-Musikern Dave Q und MC Poise die Formation Da Mash. Die Gruppe veröffentlichte zusammen mit der PDM Posse ein Album, welches unter dem Titel Plus & Minus erschien. Wobei die Vinylplatte auf der A Seite der PDM Posse und auf der B Seite Da Mash zugeteilt ist. Joe Rilla tourte in dieser Zeit mit der Sängerin Joy Denalane und dem Rapper MC Poise als Family Affair quer durch Europa. Rillas Debütalbum Zeitgeist erschien 1998. Es folgte 1999 die Bildung der Hip-Hop-Formation Analphabeten, welche ein Zusammenschluss aus den Hip-Hop-Musikern DJ Danetic, SMC, Joe Rilla und DJ N.Y.C.O. war. Sie veröffentlichten die EP Waz Louz über das Label Raid Records und die Alben … Punkt! und 1Deutige 2Deutigkeiten über das Label Upgrade LINK Joe Rilla

Isabelle Beernaert

Red, Yellow & Blue

Red, Yellow &  Blue is the third full-length theater production of Isabelle Beernaert who tours along the Dutch and Belgian theaters. Isabelle has another great performance choreographed especially for you, with stories and emotions that can not then you completely carried away and let it live. Else in your own way For this, an impressive cast of dancers Isabelle brought together, known from So You Think You Can Dance and The Ultimate Dance Battle ... LINK Isabelle Beernaert

Jimmy Nelson

Before they Pass Away

From 1997 onwards Jimmy began to successfully undertake commercial advertising assignments for many of the world’s leading brands. At the same time he started accumulating images of remote and unique cultures photographed with a traditional 50  year  old plate camera. Many awards followed. When he started to successfully and internationally exhibit and sell these images, this created the subsequent momentum and enthusiasm for the initiation of Before they Pass Away. LINK Jimmy Nelson

‪Solomon Burke‬

‪None Of Us Are Free‬

Solomon Burke was an American recording artist and vocalist, who shaped the sound of rhythm and blues as one of the founding fathers of soul music in the 1960s and a "key transitional figure in the development of soul music from rhythm and blues. He had a string of hits including "Cry to Me", "If You Need Me", "Got to Get You Off My Mind", "Down in the Valley" and "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love". Burke was referred to as "King Solomon", the "King of Rock 'n' Soul", "Bishop of Soul" and the "Muhammad Ali of soul". Due to Burke's minimal chart success in comparison to other soul music greats such as James Brown, Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding, Burke is often described as the genre's "most unfairly overlooked singer" of its golden age. Atlantic Records executive Jerry Wexler once referred to Burke as "the greatest male soul singer of all time".
LINK ‪Solomon Burke‬

L.I.S.A. Project

Beau Stanton in Little Italy 
Photo: by Rey Rosa

The L.I.S.A. Project (Little Italy Street Art) was established by Wayne Rada & Ralph Tramontana President of the Little Italy Merchants Association and is under creative direction of Wayne Rada, and RJ Rushmore from his famed website vandalog.com The mission is to bring a diverse group of street artists together in the Little Italy area of downtown on historic Mulberry Street, between Broome and Canal to create Manhattan's only mural district. To encourage New Yorkers, art fans and tourists alike to visit or revisit Little Italy to view and photograph the art work. LINK lisaproject

New (Nieuw)

DPhoto

The Netherlands Architecture Institute (NAI) is more than a museum. It is an archive, museum, library and cultural podium all in one. The NAI holds important archives and collections of Dutch architects from after 1800 and makes them accessible to the public. The NAI is part of The New Institute. Read more... LINK nai

"Bergensbanen"

NRK. A 7 hour long travel (minute by minute) 
from Bergen to Oslo by train (Norway)

Bergensbanen is 100 years in 2009, and the documentary was a wild idea from NRK staff that came through, and was, surprisingly, a big success.
 Millions of Norwegians have watched "Bergensbanen" on NRK2. The longest documentary ever? At least the longest NRK has made, almost 7 1/2 hours, showing every minute of the scenic train ride between Bergen on the Norwegian west coast, crossing the mountains to the capital of Oslo. LINK NRK

Ghetto Biennale 2013

622 Blvd Jean-Jacques Dessalines

Port-au-Prince
 Haiti

The 3rd Ghetto Biennale 2013 will take place from 26th November until the 16th December 2013. All works must be made and exhibited in Haiti. Artists will be invited to pass one to three weeks in Haiti before presenting their work in the neighbourhood to an audience of local people, Port au Prince neighbourhood communities, arts collectives and arts organisations. The 3rd Ghetto Biennale will be co-curated by Andre Eugene, David Frohnapfel, Leah Gordon and Celeur Jean Herard. LINK Ghetto Biennale

Color

New stamp from PostNL

"We have deliberately chosen a different color" a spokeswoman said Friday, but they stressed that this choice is made ​​before the discussion of recent weeks erupted. Obviously afraid to tell you that the choice is made ​​for fear of criticism and threats the company. Rather it gives business in a handful of troublemakers who grant their foundations should allow to set. Supposedly an important social point raised safely From survey and found that Dutch want to keep as it is, so with Zwarte Piet there. LINK NOS (Dutch)