Mark Van Proyen examines the history of art’s encounters with technology — as played out against the backdrop of the 2012 Zero1 Biennial.
Special Reports
The Photobook Renaissance
Below the radar, photobooks are embraced as an art form independent of their content, a fact ratified by museums and the market.
Documenta! Manifesta! Monumenta!
Mark Van Proyen reports on the year’s (and maybe the decade’s) most closely watched art events.
Art Basel 2012
Marxist simpletons scream “commodity fetishism!” Slice through the fog of “post-criticality” and there’s plenty to savor. Mark Van Proyen reports.
SF’s Triple-Play Art Fair Weekend
From the waterfront to the Tenderloin to SOMA, it’s a city-wide celebration of visual art.
Sacramento Airport Art Scores a Hit
The $1.3B addition to Sacramento Airport features major works by marquee-name artists. It’s the largest investment in public art in Sacramento’s history.
Swiss Mix: The 54th Venice Biennial
This Swatch of an exhibition, ready-made for hedge-fund consumption, still held plenty to savor. Mark Van Proyen reports.
Art of the Book @ Cantor Art Center & SVMA
For a reminder of what limited-edition fine press publishing looked like in the pre-digital age, two major shows offer a lively, literary display.
SF’s ‘Art Mecca Weekend’: May 19-22
Can San Francisco support three art fairs — all on the same weekend? Promoters say it can. But some dealers wonder.
The All-New Crocker Art Museum
The “oldest museum in the West” has tripled in size. Now, for the first time ever, the Crocker can really show its stuff. A list of its holdings reads like a Who’s Who of Northern California art in the post-WWII era.
Letter From Los Angeles – Part 2
For nearly a week we roamed: from Santa Monica and Hollywood and from Downtown to Pasadena, Pomona and Claremont. We reveled in the wackiness and tackiness of it all and fought our way through traffic. Our reward: a handful of worthy shows, some of them life-changing.
Letter from Los Angeles — Pt. 1
From Boulder to LA, Roland Reiss and his progeny cut a wide swath. Three recent Southern California shows – two from Reiss and one from his former students and colleagues – demonstrate the impact of one of LA’s most revered artists and instructors.
SF Fine Art Fair @ Fort Mason
The Bay Area got a jolt of adrenaline when the SF Fine Art Fair came to town, filling 50,000 square feet of Fort Mason’s Festival Pavilion with $300 million worth of art from 500+ artists represented by 80 galleries from the West Coast, New York, LA, Asia and Europe.
Sacramento’s Stunning New Airport Art
When the new International Airport terminal opens in late 2011, visitors will be greeted by a 56-foot rabbit that appears to be diving from the ceiling into a suitcase. Your first-time of this city will be transformed.
Road Trip: Fallon, NV
Fallon (pop: 7,536) may be the hippest little town in the way-out-there West. Need proof? Check out Bob Brady at Oats Park Arts Center, a cultural oasis where you can also catch big-city jazz. Joe Lovano, anyone?
Special Report: Sacramento Rising
Forget Thomas Albright’s decades-old charge of “stubborn regionalism.” Today, Sacramento has a strong and diverse art scene.