Maya Lin’s Novartis building at 181 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge. Photo by Iwan Baan for the Boston Globe.
This week was all about design for Art21 artists. Jeff Koons designed a snowboard to raise money for the Chill Foundation, and Maya Lin’s latest architectural feat in Cambridge was featured in the Boston Globe. Unveiled last year, the building was designed for the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, and features an exterior of interlocking granite blocks and a double-height atrium paneled in grey elm wood.
In other news:
- One of William Kentridge’s latest works is a collage and colored pencil tapestry commissioned for the Italian men’s fashion store, Ermenegildo Zegna, in London. Titled Dare/Avere, which is Italian for the debit and credit columns in accounting ledgers, the work features four figures the artist describes as “somewhere between human figures and a man who is simply a suit.”
- And Marina Abramović celebrated her 70th birthday at the Guggenheim on Thursday. The festivities began with 70 minutes of “Silence.”
Events & exhibitions
NYC
- Thursday, December 15 | 6:30-8pm—The Metropolitan is hosting “An Evening with Kerry James Marshall” in conjunction with the artist’s retrospective, Mastry, on view at the Met Breuer through January 29.
London
- Friday, December 16 | 6:30-8:30pm—Theaster Gates will be giving the Victoria and Albert Museum’s annual Sackler Lecture, which explores implications for museums within culture and society today.
Amsterdam
- A new exhibition by Hiroshi Sugimoto is opening this Thursday, December 15 at Foam. Titled Black Box, the exhibition is comprised of 34 large-format works that offer a survey of the artist’s career over the past 40 years. [Read a review in the British Journal of Photography.]
Abu Dhabi
- An exhibition at NYU Abu Dhabi features work by Ai Weiwei, Wafaa Bilal, and others. Invisible Threads: Technology and its Discontents “explores the tensions that emerge in our everyday relationships with technology,” such as isolation vs. connectedness, and privacy vs. social media. The show is on view through the end of the year. [See featured artworks in Harper’s Bazaar.]
It’s impossible to include all the incredible exhibitions and art events happening this week in a single post. If there’s something you feel should have been included in today’s roundup, leave a comment below!