Celebrity Life

By now, your bosses and colleagues have probably seen more of your abode than you would've ever expected to show them.

With many of us working from home these days, meetings held over video conferencing apps the likes of Zoom and Microsoft Teams have become the new normal. Inevitably, this means letting colleagues into our residences — albeit virtually — and having them catch glimpses of it via our backdrop. Depending on where your workspace is located, this view could range from a boring blank wall to windows or cluttered bookshelves.

Your makeshift office may not be the most glamorous, but there are several easy interior design tricks that you can employ to quickly jazz up the background of your Zoom calls.

Textiles and cushions

If your workstation of choice is the couch or bed, all it takes is a few snazzy throw pillows wrapped in eye-catching fabrics and prints to provide visual interest in the space behind you. Consider dressing your cushions in the Armani/Casa Exclusive Textiles by Rubelli collection, which is inspired by modern art — specifically works by Henri Matisse, Vasilij Kandinskij and Paul Klee.

It showcases striking colour blocks embellished with embroideries, ikat details and intertwined motifs. These are available in various patterns and shades ranging from pastel to neutral hues. More details here.

Houseplants and greenery

Adding houseplants to your home office will help the space look less spartan and bland. Smaller plants like cacti, succulents and spider plants can be displayed on shelves or tables, while larger ones such as philodendrons, snake plants and ZZ plant (Zanzibar Gem) can be placed on the floor to break the monotony of blank walls.

Online plant retailer Flora Houses offers a wide variety of houseplants that will thrive indoors and are generally low-maintenance. Its range includes Japanese fir, fiddle leaf fig and Bird of Paradise. The store provides free doorstep delivery with a minimum spend.

Artworks and paintings

Perhaps houseplants may seem like too much of a commitment, or you simply don't have green fingers. This is where paintings and art pieces make an easier alternative. You can simply hang a couple of them on the wall that constantly forms your video call backdrop.

An Andy Warhol or Basquiat will certainly impress your co-workers, but your art doesn't necessarily have to be expensive or by big name artists. Consider procuring artworks instead from indie galleries such as Odd One Out, which boasts an array of creations by local and international printmakers and illustrators. We can't take our eyes off the above acrylic painting by Micke Lindebergh, which is titled 'Small Yellow Flower Pot' and features colourful blooms accented by quirky squiggles and bright hues.

Statement ornaments and furniture

Inject a dose of quirk into your meeting setup by peppering your background with assorted decorative items and statement furniture pieces. These can be anything from figurines to colourful tiles and dramatic room dividers.

Our go-to is Lala Curio, which is a whimsical wonderland of objets d'art such as brass monkey sculptures, cloisonné birds, and, one of our favourites — an adorable trio of cranes adorned with rock crystal feathers and perched on crystal balls.

Wallpaper

Why settle for one specially curated work area, when you can turn your whole room into an Instagram-worthy space? Wallpaper is a bold and easy solution — if every wall in your room is clad in beautiful prints, you can essentially park yourself in any corner and still have an envy-inducing Zoom backdrop.

Designer wallpaper has seen a resurgence in recent years, and we're obsessed with Christian Lacroix's exquisite Oiseau Fleur vinyl wallpaper, which depicts vibrant botanical and bird motifs against a silk effect embossed base. It comes in two colourways of pink and grey.

(Main image: Brina Blum/ Unsplash; Featured image: Christian Lacroix)

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Yayoi Kusama, one of the world’s top selling female artists and most popular exhibitors made famous by her polka dot motifs, can rightly be called the matriarch of Pop Art.

Born in 1929 in Matsumoto, Japan, Yayoi Kusama was the youngest of four children in a wealthy but troubled family. Her father was a womaniser, her mother was cold and distant.

As a young child, Kusama was sent to learn Nihongo, or traditional Japanese painting, and surviving sketches from that time show clearly a talent well beyond her years. Kusama already knew that she wanted to be an artist, but found the traditional master-pupil regimen stifling. But her mother wouldn’t entertain the idea, instead telling Kusama that she was destined to be a dutiful wife to a wealthy husband. The mother frequently confiscated Kusama’s inks and canvases, which probably contributed to her obsessive creative drive.

[caption id="attachment_209248" align="alignnone" width="1078"] Kusama kicks back in a serpentine setting.[/caption]

Kusama’s burning desire to paint continued, and in the late 1940s and early 1950s she looked abroad, impressed by the new generation of American painters. She greatly admired Georgia O’Keeffe, with whom she corresponded for advice. O’Keeffe, who was more than 40 years Kusama’s senior, warned her that artists in America had “a hard time making a living”. Still, she advised Kusama to move to the United States and show her work to as many people as she could.

In her mid-20s, Kusama left to seek fame and freedom in New York, where she lived from 1958 to 1975. She would later acknowledge that “America was really the country that raised me”. Kusama has said that without her art she would have committed suicide a long time ago. Her “Infinity Net” dot paintings, which first won her critical acclaim in New York, originate from visual hallucinations that she claims have haunted her since childhood and became the overwhelming power in her life.

"One day I was looking at the red flower patterns of the tablecloth on a table, and when I looked up I saw the same pattern covering the ceiling, the windows and the walls, and finally all over the room, my body and the universe. I felt as if I had begun to self-obliterate, to revolve in the infinity of endless time and the absoluteness of space.”

[caption id="attachment_209251" align="alignnone" width="957"] A dot room, which started off stark white. Exhibition attendees were given booklets of different sized and coloured dot stamps to place wherever they liked.[/caption]

In 1977, two years after returning from overseas, she booked into a psychiatric asylum in Tokyo where she has lived on a voluntary basis ever since. However, she maintains a large and very productive studio across the road from the institution and describes her work as “art medicine”.

She views her recent paintings as diary entries. Whenever she is overcome with a nightmarish hallucination, Kusama sits down at a canvas and begins to document the vision, completing the work in one sitting. These are always completed on the same size canvas and create a visual log of her obsessive thoughts. Despite their bright colours, the works have titles such as The Far End of my Sorrow and All About Joy, reflecting a troubled soul.

Kusama’s output is prolific. According to Christie's, she was the world’s highest-selling living female artist with her Infinity Net paintings being the most sought-after. Her touring retrospective, Infinite Obsession, attracted the largest global audience of 2015.

[caption id="attachment_209249" align="alignnone" width="960"] Kusama's Infinity pumpkins.[/caption]

She is business-savvy and prolific Kusama’s CV reads like a roll call of creative industries; she founded an erotic newspaper entitled Kusama’s Orgy, has published eight novels, several books of poetry, designed a bus and has produced films – including one with British musician Peter Gabriel.

During her time in US and back in Japan, Kusama has never identified as belonging to any artistic movement, always describing her style simply as “Kusama art” despite her connections to major avant-garde artists. Still, Kusama often tells of how she craved fame when she arrived in New York. As a woman forging a career in a country that harboured post-war resentment towards Japan, it took dogged determination to get the attention she craved.

Sources: Christies, BBC, New York Times

The post Arty Facts: Yayoi Kusama on Connecting the Dots appeared first on Prestige Online - Hong Kong.

The international curated art fair Untitled, Art and online contemporary art platform Artland have teamed up to present the world’s first virtual reality art fair called Untitled, Art Online.

Dubbed the “digital fair of the future,” Untitled, Art Online features an e-commerce platform and commission-based structure designed to minimise up-front costs to exhibitors. Collectors can engage in real time shopping, with features such as "buy now" and chat tools that support instant messaging. Visitors are also able to navigate fair aisles, adding to the sense of discovery and exploration that is lost in static online viewing rooms.

The inaugural edition of Untitled, Art Online, powered by Artland, features some 40 international exhibitors, set within Untitled, Art’s iconic light-filled tent that has come to define the Miami Beach edition. The dynamic online fair, which will be accessible 24-hours a day will showcase unique booth presentations and allow for life-like navigation through space, where visitors can virtually stroll the aisles looking for new discoveries and unexpected juxtapositions that have come to define the art fair experience. Exhibitors will also have the ability to customise their booth designs and exhibit artworks that have been sold.

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“We are beyond excited to be launching Untitled, Art Online at a time when the art world is relying more heavily on digital engagement,” says Jeffrey Lawson, founder of Untitled, Art. “This platform, the only virtual reality experience available in the art market, is something we have been hard at work on with Artland for nearly a year now and have decided to launch it earlier than intended in an effort to help reinvigorate the global art economy. Not only have we created an original and innovative virtual experience that is as close to being at Untitled, Art Miami Beach as virtually possible, but we are also providing our clients with a state-of-the-art e-commerce platform at a time when they need it the most.”

Participating galleries hail from New York to Beijing and include Addis Fine Art, Altman Siegal, Vigo Gallery, The Pit, Jane Lombard Gallery, Denny Dimin Gallery, among others. The fair runs from 31 July to 2 August, 2020.

Shop the fair here.

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Lévy Gorvy Gallery’s latest exhibition provides a rare glimpse into art history with concurrent exhibitions of works by two great artists, France’s centenarian Pierre Soulages and the late New York street artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.

This summer, Lévy Gorvy inaugurated its new global initiative, called Reveal, an ongoing series of single-work focused exhibitions devoted to showcasing post-war and contemporary masterpieces. These are presented along with in-depth contextual materials and educational programming in their gallery spaces and online.

The exhibition, which opened in Hong Kong on July 7, presents a seminal painting by France’s greatest living artist Pierre Soulages, titled Peinture (1953), which hasn’t been exhibited in public in almost 60 years.  As an artist who is still actively painting at age 100, Soulages has offered an extraordinary continuity across his oeuvre. The exhibition strives to provide viewers with a historical perspective on Soulage’s career by contrasting this formative early work with an exhibition of six of his recent Outrenoir paintings, highlighting a period during which he gained international recognition.

[gallery ids="209055,209056,209057,209058,209059"]

Peinture was painted by Soulages as he entered his stylistic maturity and represents a breakthrough moment for the artist. In this work, he introduced a sense of vigorous movement that is also anchored by a powerfully structured composition. The work is also permeated by a compelling sense of inner light created by his brushstrokes in varying hues of black, grey, white and brown, which creates a dramatic luminosity and showcases his lifelong exploration of darkness and radiance. Peinture, along with all six of Soulage’s Outrenoir paintings are for sale, half of which have already been sold.

At the same time, a rare painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat is also being exhibited as a second Reveal exhibition, titled Jean-Michel Basquiat: Royalty, Heroism, and the Streets. This is the first Asia gallery presentation of Basquiat’s work, and Untitled (1982) is one of his most impressive and important works. The work consists of an electrifying portrait of a Black hero figure that is part self-portrait, part idol, standing proud amid the chaos of abstracted forms on a background of blue.

[caption id="attachment_209060" align="alignnone" width="1543"] Jean-Michel Basquiat's Untitled (1982)[/caption]

Untitled (1982) is one of a famous trio of large-scale paintings on the theme of a prophet that Basquiat made in 1982, a pivotal year of the artist’s meteoric rise to international stardom. It was in this year that Basquiat was able to realise an ever-more extraordinary sequence of hauntingly powerful paintings with the support of his first dealer Annina Nosei, who provided him with his first supply of high-quality working materials as well as a dedicated space to paint.

“We are excited to launch Reveal, a new series of focused exhibitions that will bring major works of art to our galleries around the world,” co-founder Brett Gorvy says. “At a time when travel is heavily restricted, we look to engage with collectors and the public on the ground while simultaneously connecting to a global audience using our digital platforms to introduce these preeminent artists and their masterworks.”

The exhibitions run until 10 September, 2020 .

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