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Nov 26, 2024 | 
theconversation.com | Alison Carroll
Joseph Stalin was no great lover of the arts, unlike other Communist leaders, but he recognised their power to stir his people’s souls in the pursuit of his political goals. Stalin and the writer Maxim Gorky are both credited with defining, in 1934, the new style that would encourage this. Socialist Realism: art socialist in content and realist in style. One of the burdens this new style had to bear in the capitalist West in later years was that it was labelled as formulaic, static and unemotional.
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Jun 23, 2024 | 
theconversation.com | Alison Carroll
On the wall to the left of the door to the central hall of the National Museum of China, Beijing, is a panel saying it works “under the guidance of Xi Jinping thought on culture”. Across Tiananmen Square in front of the museum is the gateway to the Forbidden City, where Mao Zedong’s image is still pre-eminent. He too, of course, has often been quoted for his “thought on culture”. Culture and political life have long been intertwined in China.
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May 12, 2024 | 
artlink.com.au | Alison Carroll
An insight into the 8th Yokohama Triennale can be found in the old capital, Kyoto, over 400 kilometres west of Yokohama. Attached to the walls of Takashi Murakami’s major survey exhibition at Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art (celebrating the Museum's 90th anniversary) are his colourful handwritten screeds about his training in nihonga, the style of Japanese painting that encourages shimmering opalescent space.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
artasiapacific.com | HG Masters |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
Issue What is a monument? What values do monuments project into civic spaces? And what does it mean to work in a monumental format? The three-person collective Tromarama, comprised of Febie Babyrose, Herbert Hans, and Ruddy Hatumena, conceived of their moving-image work (2023) for the giant 65-by-110-meter screen on the M+ Facade as an intimate family tribute.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
artasiapacific.com | Béatrice Grenier |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
YU HONG, The Ship of Fools, 2021, acrylic on canvas, 250 × 900 × 5 cm. Courtesy the artist and Lisson Gallery.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
artasiapacific.com | Jennifer Piejko |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
Issue There is no surer welcome for a graffiti artist than the humble iron gate: ornamental, industrial, and imposing, these barred portals present irresistible frontiers that invite as much as they repel. For Norwegian artist Ida Ekblad the fence circling a bus depot in Oslo was once an oblique point of entry, a place into which she could drift and paint murals on the walls and roof, leave her mark, and turn a municipal complex into a summer hideout with her peers.
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Nov 1, 2023 | artasiapacific.com | HG Masters |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
Issue What is a monument? What values do monuments project into civic spaces? And what does it mean to work in a monumental format? The three-person collective Tromarama, comprised of Febie Babyrose, Herbert Hans, and Ruddy Hatumena, conceived of their moving-image work (2023) for the giant 65-by-110-meter screen on the M+ Facade as an intimate family tribute.
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Nov 1, 2023 | artasiapacific.com | Jennifer Piejko |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
Issue There is no surer welcome for a graffiti artist than the humble iron gate: ornamental, industrial, and imposing, these barred portals present irresistible frontiers that invite as much as they repel. For Norwegian artist Ida Ekblad the fence circling a bus depot in Oslo was once an oblique point of entry, a place into which she could drift and paint murals on the walls and roof, leave her mark, and turn a municipal complex into a summer hideout with her peers.
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Sep 1, 2023 | 
artasiapacific.com | Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin |John Clark
Issue Can the art market in mainland China bounce back to pre-pandemic form and avoid the slowing growth experienced by the country at large? Would the North Atlantic art world shake off a bad auction season in New York in May to find renewed enthusiasm among European fair-goers? And does Asia still have room to expand its annual calendar of art fairs beyond the March-September rivalry of global behemoths Art Basel and Frieze?
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Sep 1, 2023 | 
artasiapacific.com | Jin Meyerson |Alison Carroll |Pamela Zeplin |John Hoskin
Issue Arriving late at the home of renowned Korean artist Park Seo-Bo after fighting Seoul’s traffic, I find him holding court at the head of a long table; on one side sits his daughter-in-law; on the other, a handful of friends and gallerists. At 91, Park remains lucid and sharp, and with the assistance of his family continues to be the epicenter of activity.
