Mitamura Midori (Tokyo-based artist) ArtBlog
1. Zilvinas Kempinas
Kunsthalle Wien (2008.10.31 – 2009.1.25)
2. Verner Panton
Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery (2009.10.17 – 12.27)
3. Rebecca Horn: Rebellion in Silence – Dialogue between Raven and Whale
Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (2009.10.31 – 2010.2.14)
4. 8 Days – Beuys in Japan
Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito (2009.10.31 – 2010.1.24)
5. At / From Tamagawa 1964-2009
Fuchu Art Museum (Tokyo, 2009.9.19 – 11.3)
Zilvinas Kempinas Airborne 2008, Kunsthalle Wien
Courtesy der Künstler, the artist and Spencer Brownstone Gallery, New York © Zilvinas Kempinas, VBK, Wien
Photo Stephan Wyckoff, Kunsthalle Wien
Johnny ML (Delhi-based curator and critic) ArtBlog
1. Expressions at Tihar
Mati Ghar, Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (New Delhi, 2009.8.12 – 9.2)
2. Grand Finale of Video Wednesday
Gallery Espace (New Delhi, 2009.7.29 – 8.1)
3. Dual Liquid
Sakshi Gallery (Mumbai, 2009.12.13 – 2010.1.3)
4. LAVA Curated Project by Bose Krishnamachari
Gallery BMB (Mumbai, 2009.12.14 – 2010.1.10)
5. If I were a Saint
Shrine Empire Gallery (New Delhi, 2009.12.1 – 5）
Ohba Daisuke (Toride-based artist) ArtBlog
1. Kawaguchi Tatsuo: Language, Time, Life
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2009.10.14 – 12.13)
2. Nomura Hitoshi: Perceptions – Changes in Time and Field
The National Art Center, Tokyo (2009.5.27 – 7.27)
3. Tse Su-Mei
Contemporary Art Gallery, Art Tower Mito (2009.2.7 – 5.10)
4. Nakanishi Natsuyuki: Behind, Circle
SCAI THE BATHHOUSE (Tokyo, 2009.4.17 – 6.6）
Installation view of Kawaguchi Tatsuo: Language, Time, Life
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
Photo Saito Sadamu
Hans Ulrich Obrist (London-based curator)
John Baldessari: Pure Beauty
Tate Modern (London, 2009.10.13 – 2010.1.10)
Curated by Jessica Morgan. Most amazing retrospective of the year – Ever Baldessari.
Panorama of Brazilian Art
Museum of Modern Art Sao Paulo (2009.10.4 – 12.20)
Curated by Adriano Pedrosa. Beautifully installed show with many new discoveries: Adian Villlar Rojas, Juan Araujo, Gabriel Sierra, Mateo Lopez etc etc.
Harun Farocki
Ludwig Museum (Köln, 2009.10.31 – 2010.3.7)
Urgent and necessary survey of Farocki’s practice which inspires so many emerging artists now.
Etonne moi!
New National Museum of Monaco (2009.10.27 – 2010.1.25)
This survey show for the centenary of Diaghilev showed to what extent Diaghilev is a toolbox for 21st century curating. His Gesamtkunstwerk brought together great choreographers and dancers with the leading visual artists of the 20th century. The future is….Diaghilev.
REMEMBER NANCY SPERO
2009 Nancy Spero died. Nancy Spero, one of the great artists of our time, continued to work with a sense of defiant hope, despite failing health in the last years, and amid the deepening of America’s political crisis and international injustices. It was a hope that she lived and breathed, and besides a body of pioneering and exceptional work charting more than half a century of tumultuous social change, it will be her legacy.
‘Dum Spero/ While I breathe, I hope’
– Nancy Spero
■Oshima Santo (Curator, Suntory Museum Tenpozan, Osaka）
1. Chalo! India: A New Era of Indian Art
Mori Art Museu (2008.11.22 – 2009.3.15)
2. William Kentridge: What We See & What We Know
The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (2009.9.4 – 10.18)
3. Anselm Kiefer: Karfunkelfee and The Fertile Crescent
White Cube (London, 2009.10.16 – 11.14)
4.Ceil Froyer: Show
KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin (2009.8.23 – 10.8)
5. Winter Garden: The Exploration of the Micropop Imagination in Contemporary Japanese Art
Hara Museum (2009.5.23 – 7.20)
Ozaki Tetsuya (ART iT Editor-in-chief; based in Tokyo) ArtBlog
Naito Rei: Tout animal est dans le monde comme de l’eau à l’intérieur de l’eau.
The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura (2009.11.14 – 2010.1.24)
Installations that express infinity with minimal elements, and even make us sense the distance between this and the other world.
Miyanaga Aiko: Dwelling in a boat
Mizuma Art Gallery (Tokyo, 2009.4.22 – 5.23)
Groundbreaking attempt to visualize the ‘art of disappearance’ using naphthalene as a material.
Tabaimo:Danmen
Yokohama Musem of Art（2009.12.11 – 2010.3.3）
New video installations in which the artist shows first the first time, her sense of eroticism hidden behind the grotesqueness.
Platform 2009
KIMUSA (Seoul, 2009.9.3 – 25)
A group exhibition which used the strength of the venue to its fullest and squarely dealt with the heavy theme of memory and history.
The 6th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT6)
Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art (Brisbane, 2009.12.5 – 2010.4.5)
A well-made international festival advocating ‘respect for diversity and others’ with a balanced selection of artists.
What kind of Place was the Earth? 2009
Photo Hatakeyama Naoya, courtesy The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura
Raqs Media Collective (Delhi-based artist unit) ArtBlog
Guiseppe Penone
Ikon Art Gallery (Birmingham, 2009.6.3 – 7.19)
LIVING OFF THE GRID
ANANT ART (New Delhi, 2009.11.30 – 12.21)
Cold War Modern: Design 1945–1970
Lithuanian Art Museum, National Art Gallery (Vilnius, 2009.10.2 – 12.6)
Paul Thek
Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia (Madrid, 2009.2.6 – 4.20)
Nasreen Mohamedi: Notes Reflections on Indian Modernism (Part 1)
Office for Contemporary Art Norway (Oslo, 2009. 3.6 – 6.20)
Sherman Sam (London-based artist and writer)
1. Raoul de Keyser: Terminus: Drawing (1979-1989) and Recent Paintings
David Zwirner (New York, 2009.9.10 – 10.24)
2. Thomas Nozkowski
National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa, 2009.6.24 – 9.20)
3. Robert Bordo: Back Road
Mummery + Schnelle (London, 2009.10.14 – 11.21)
4. Mark Wallinger curates The Russian Linesman frontiers, borders and thresholds
Hayward Gallery (London, 2009.2.18 – 5.4)
5. Sugimoto Hiroshi: 7 DAYS / 7 NIGHTS
Gagosian Gallery (New York, 2008.11.6 – 2009.2.14)
Shikata Yukiko (Tokyo-based curator) ArtBlog
1. Waiting for Video: Works From the 1960s To Today
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2009.3.31 – 6.7)
2. Medicine and Art: Imagining a Future for Life and Love
Mori Art Museum (Tokyo, 2009.11.28 – 2010.2.28)
3. 8 Days – Beuys in Japan
Contemporary Art Gallery, Art Tower Mito (2009.10.31 – 2010.1.24)
4. Otomo Yoshihide: ENSEMBLES 09 – Rest-ful Musical Devices
Vacant, Former junior high school in Tokyo, gallery 45-8 (Tokyo, 2009.7.4 – 11.21)
5. Dr. Koana Zyun and his wonderful lens world
Komaba Museum, The University of Tokyo (2009.7.18 – 9.23)
Shimizu Minoru (Kyoto-based critic)
1. Kaneuji Teppei: Melting City / Empty Forest
Yokohama Museum of Art (2009.3.20 – 5.27)
2. William Kentridge: What We See & What We Know
The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (2009.9.4 – 10.18)
3. Shomei Tomatsu: Hues and Textures of Nagasaki
Nagasaki Prefectural Art Museum (2009.10.3 – 11.29)
4. Varda Caivano: The Inner Me
Tomio Koyama Gallery Kyoto (2009.9.11 – 10.17)
5. Kimura Yuki: Year 1940 was a leap year starting on Monday
Taka Ishii Gallery (Tokyo, 2009.10.10 – 11.7)
Left: Ms. Sumie Hisamatsu and her ornamental hairpin, Nagasaki International Cultural Hall/Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum, Hirano-machi, Nagasaki City 1985/2008 © Shomei Tomatsu
Right: Contemporary art is just easy as pie 2009
Installation view at Contemporary Art Gallery, Art Tower Mito
Photo Kato Ken, courtesy Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito
Shinkawa Takashi (Tokyo-based writer) ArtBlog
1. Contemporary art is just easy as pie.
Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito (2009.8.29 – 10.12)
2. Kawaguchi Tatsuo: Language,Time, Life
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2009.10.14 – 12.13)
3. TANOTAIGA: T+ANONYMOUS
Contemporary Art Factory (Tokyo, 2009.3.7 – 29)
4. Incidental Affairs
Suntory Museum [Tenpozan] (Osaka, 2009.3.7 – 5.10)
5. Beppu Contemporary Art Festival 2009 ‘Mixed Bathing World’
About 20 different places in the city of Beppu, Oita (2009.4.11 – 6.14)
Suzuki Tomo (Tokyo-based art and film producer) ArtBlog
1. Apichatpong Weerasethakul: Primitive
Foundation for Art and Creative Technology (Liverpool, 2009.9.24 – 11.29)
2. Matthew Barney: DRAWING RESTRAINT 9 (Bakuon Film Festival 2009)
Kichijoji Baus Theater (Tokyo, 2009.6.3, 10)
3. The Light: Matsumoto Yoko / Noguchi Rika
The National Art Center, Tokyo (2009.8.19 – 10.19)
4. Born in the Streets–Graffiti
Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain (Paris, 2009.7.7 – 2010.1.10)
5. Rebecca Horn Rebellion in Silence Dialogue between Raven and Whale
Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (2009.10.31 – 2010.2.14)
■Tanaka Koki (Tokyo-based artist)
1. Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield
Hammer Museum (LA, 2009.10.4 – 2010.1.3)
『Collection: MOCA’s First Thirty Years』
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2009.11.15 – 2010.3.3)
Dan Graham: BEYOND
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2009.2.15 – 5.25)
Everyday Miracles (Extended)
San Francisco Art Institute (2009.10.1 – 2010.1.30), Redcat (LA, 2009.11.22 – 2010.1.31)
Taro Chiezo (Tokyo-based artist) ArtBlog
1. Sigmar Polke: We petty bourgeois! Contemporaries
Hamburger Kunsthalle Germany (2009.3.13 – 2010.1.17)
2. Cy Twombly
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (2008.10.28 – 2009.2.15)
3. Paul McCarthy
Hauser & Wirth Zurich (2009.6.7 – 7.25)
4. Ugo Rondinone: The Night of Lead
Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León (2009.7.11 – 2010.1.10)
5. Katharina Fritsch
Kunsthaus Zurich (2009.6.3 – 8.30)
-1. Jonathan Meese: Arch-State of Atlantisis
Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck (Bonn, 2009.5.1 – 8.30)
Left: Sigmar Polke Supermarkets (Wir Kleinbürger) 1976
Gouache, Goldbronze, Lack- und Acrylfarben, Filzstift, Collage auf Papier auf Leinwand, 207 x 295 cm, Privatbesitz, Hamburg © Sigmar Polke, photo Peter Schälchli
Right: Keizo Kitajima 1975-1991 installation view
Tsuchiya Seiichi (Okinawa-based critic)
Waiting for Video: Works From the 1960s To Today
The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (2009.3.31 – 6.7)
Shomei Tomatsu: Hues and Textures of Nagasaki
Nagasaki Prefectural Art Museum (2009.10.3 – 11.29)
The coal mine as cultural resource
Meguro Museum of Art, Tokyo (2009.11.4 – 12.27)
Keizo Kitajima 1975-1991
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography (2009.8.29 – 10.18)
Kojima Ichiro: A Retrospective – Postwar Aomori’s Photographic Millet
Aomori Museum of Art (2009.1.10 – 3.8)