Turkey | The Far Right strike out at the Ömer Koç collection and Ron Mueck sculpture
Collector Ömer Koç, whose family is known as “the Rockefeller Turks”, saw a far-right group launch an assault on the exhibition “Doors Open to Those Who Knock” at the heart of the Abdülmecid Efendi Mansion in Üsküdar, Istanbul, organised with the curators Melih Fereli and Karoly Aliotti, exhibiting some of the collection pieces. It was the Ron Mueck piece, Man Under Cardigan (1998), portraying a naked man hunched on the ground, holding a cardigan over his head, which angered the extremists. The protesters seemingly misinterpreted the work, and mistook the fireplace in the exhibition for a minbar, the domed platform indicating the direction of Mecca in a mosque, from which an Imam delivers his sermons. The demonstrators set upon a security guard, and intended to cause damage to the sculpture, before being thrown out. More information via ArtAsiaPacific.
Images posted to social-media of RON MUECK‘s sculpture Man Under Cardigan (1998) in the fireplace of the Abdülmecid Efendi Mansion (left), in the Üsküdar neighborhood of Istanbul’s Asian side, and photographs of security guards restraining protesters who attacked the sculpture (right). Images via T24, Diken.
A new call for projects sent out by Art Jameel
Dedicated to supporting artists from the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey — “as well as those from around the world with an interest in and familiarity with these regions” — the programme spans a three-year cycle. It coincides with next year’s opening of the Jameel Arts Centre in Dubai, and focuses on sculpture, specifically works using light technologies, with a design budget of $70,000. Upcoming editions will consider research and lecture series (2019), and drawing and painting (2020).
Applications must be submitted before November 21, and will be assessed by a jury, at the heart of which sits Sheikha Hoor Al Qasimi, president of the Sharjah Art Foundation, and Elvira Dyangani Ose, senior curator at Creative Time and lecturer in Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths University of London. Read further here.
Jameel Arts Centre, north side view from the Creek, courtesy of Serie Architects
Marion Charlet scoops the Prix Art [ ] Collector
Young artist Marion Charlet (b. 1982) adds her name to a list featuring, amongst others, the talented Clément Bagot, Eva Nielsen, Abdelkader Benchamma, Olivier Masmonteil and Massinissa Selmani. The prize, organised by collectors Evelyne and Jacques Deret, bestows upon the artist — represented by the Galerie Virginie Louvet — a solo exhibition in September 2018 at the Studio du Patio Art Opéra, “uniting recent works with art lent by its collectors, accompanied by a published catalogue.”
The selection committee was made up of — other than Evelyne and Jacques Deret — Philippe Piguet, critic and exhibition commissioner, and collectors Françoise and Jean-Claude Quemin, Philippe Pée, and Daniel Schildge.
Marion Charlet, Inner Space V, 2017 © Galerie Virginie Louvet
A new London gallery for Lyndsey Ingram
On November 7, at 20 Bourdon Street in Mayfair, the first permanent Lyndsey Ingram Gallery space will open. Specialising in mostly British and American “original prints and works on paper by important post-war and contemporary artists”, the gallery will hold three or four exhibitions a year.
The gallery, which shows at the Armory Show New York, Masterpiece London, Art Miami, and the London Original Print Fair, offers numerous works by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Ellsworth Kelly, Frank Stella, David Hockney, Donald Judd, Robert Mangold, Anish Kapoor, Bridget Riley, Peter Doig and Grayson Perry, but also contemporary art from the likes of Harland Miller, Jane Hammond, Miles Aldridge and Sarah Graham.
