Expo Chicago

How Tony Karman catapulted Expo Chicago into the art world spotlight

Tony Karman, president and director of Expo Chicago at Navy Pier, during the initial setup for the showcase of modern and contemporary art Sept. 13, 2016. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)

"We're building a city," says Tony Karman, walking briskly past a nascent maze of gray-hued walls rising from the floor of Navy Pier's exhibition hall.

Karman, president and director of Expo Chicago, is days away from welcoming the national and international art worlds to the annual fair, the city's biggest art event. His reputation, his business and the international cachet of the city of Chicago are, to varying degrees, riding on it. So he's surprisingly calm when confronted with — the carpet.

If you've got an eye for design — and Karman, known for a dapper uniform of trim jackets, crisp shirts and a signature pocket square, does — the carpeting in Navy Pier's exhibition areas is problematic. It conjures up the lobby of the kind of early-'90s hotel that might have had an atrium. And there's a lot of it.

Karman has spent years battling this carpet; covering it up, wishing it would just go away. But when a supervisor greets him, he shrugs and says flooring won't be a concern this year. "I've made peace with the carpet. I'm embracing it." In Karman's world, details matter. But five years into an endeavor that has put the city he loves back on the international art map, the big picture is coming into focus.

"Tony is the hardest-working man in the art world," says Museum of Contemporary Art chief curator Michael Darling. "I was actually out bodysurfing in Miami, and I came riding up onto the beach, and landed right in front of Tony. I sort of popped out of the water, and we started talking business right there."

This is classic Karman — his energy is a defining quality, and his excitement for his projects is infectious.

It's also the quality that probably most explains why Expo Chicago has managed to overcome the burden of Chicago art fair history. "For years," says international fine arts consultant Helyn Goldenberg, "before Miami and all the other shows that we have now, Chicago had an art fair, which was the best art fair in the country, period. It lasted a long time, and then like many things outlived its usefulness and it went away."

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diego rivera y kurt stavenhagen, grandes coleccionistas de arte prehispánico

En esta ocasión, me complazco en dirigirme a usted con el propósito de extenderle una cordial invitación a la inauguración de las exposiciones temporales que presentamos en el Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo:

Diego Rivera y Kurt Stavenhagen, coleccionistas de arte prehispánico 

&

Diego Rivera, director de la Escuela Central de Artes Plásticas 1929-1930

A inaugurarse el próximo 11 de agosto del presente año, en punto de las 19:30 horas, en las instalaciones del museo, ubicado en Altavista esquina Diego Rivera, sin número, colonia San Ángel Inn, delegación Álvaro Obregón, Ciudad de México.

Esta exhibición surge a partir de la recepción en custodia permanente de la colección de piezas prehispánicas que Diego Rivera regaló a Emma Hurtado, su última esposa y galerista, misma que fue encomendada al Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo a principios de 2016. Dicho acervo se encuentra conformado por 85 piezas de diferentes culturas mesoamericanas y periodos, que sirvieron como marco referencial para varias obras de Rivera.

Kurt Stavenhagen vecino y amigo de Diego Rivera, conformó una colección de más tres mil piezas arqueológicas; gusto que compartió con el artista plástico y con quien intercambiaba puntos de vista sobre la estética prehispánica y el valor de éstas en la historia del arte. Gracias a la preocupación de ambos por conservar y valorar estas obras, pueden ser valoradas en importantes recintos como el Museo Nacional de Antropología, el Anahuacalli, la Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y en el Centro Cultural Tlatelolco.

Con el fin de promover, difundir y darle su justa valía a la tarea de ambos, surge la propuesta de realizar una exposición en la cual muestre a Diego Rivera y Kurt Stavenhagen como coleccionistas de arte prehispánico, además de presentar los vínculos entre la obra de Rivera y la estética prehispánica mesoamericana mediante ambas colecciones.

Además de entrever la colección de piezas prehispánicas mesoamericanas de Diego Rivera y Emma Hurtado desde una perspectiva artística, la exposición busca mostrar los vínculos existentes entre la obra

Además de entrever la colección de piezas prehispánicas mesoamericanas de Diego Rivera y Emma Hurtado desde una perspectiva artística, la exposición busca mostrar los vínculos existentes entre la obra de caballete y los dibujos del pintor con la estética prehispánica mesoamericana.

Para lograrlo, la muestra propone una selección de obras del artista en las cuales plasmó rostros, vida cotidiana, figuras humanas, animales, líneas y formas que guardan relación con el mundo prehispánico mesoamericano y que son apreciables en las piezas arqueológicas que coleccionaron Kurt Stavenhagen y él.

Esta relación entre el artista plástico y el mundo mesoamericano permitirá comprender la pasión que Rivera y Stavenhagen sentían por la estética prehispánica y su dedicación en coleccionar aquellas piezas como objetos de arte nacionales.

Museo CYDT

Hiroshige, Sudden Shower over Shin-Ohashi Bridge and Atake, 1857. Image: Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Next, one should determine impression and state. Impression refers to how early the image was pulled from the woodblock. The earliest printings exhibit visible wood grain and clean, sharp lines, while later impressions present less crisp lines as the block is worn down. Particularly popular designs would be printed so many times that the woodblock would have to be recarved, usually with slight differences from the original. The prints pulled from these blocks would be a different state than those of the original block. State also refers to any color changes that might occur in the printing of a design.

Japan Art Blog

RG

ZsONA MACO 2016 ANNOUNCES ITS “PROGRAM FOR THE PROMOTION OF COLLECTING"

       

With the intention of promoting art collecting and strengthening ties between curators, artists, galleries and collectors, ZsONA MACO announces its “Program for the Pormotion of Collecting”, which highlights pieces sold under $5,000 USD for its fifth year in a row.

The program is the result of an initiative taken by the fair and participating galleries, in which the pieces are identified by a coloured sticker, with the aim of boosting internationally the number of collectors, through accesible prices. This is an effort that has had gradual, but positive results during the last editions of the fair.

 

Established in 2003 by Zélika García, ZsONA MACO is currently one of the most important art fairs in the world, taking plase once a year during the month of February at Centro Banamex, Mexico City.

Additionally to our contemporary art fair, Zélika García establiched ZsONA MACO Antique Salon in 2014 and ZsONA MACO FOTO in 2015, with the aim of including and strengthening the antique, photography and video art sectors in Mexico.

ZsONA MACO

FEBRUARY 3RD - 7TH, 2016

Wednesday 3rd

Official Opening

16:00 - 21:00

Thursday 4th, Friday 5th, Saturday 6th

12:00 - 20:00

Sunday 7th

12:00 - 20:00

Centro Banamex, Hall D

Av. Conscripto 311

Col. Lomas de Sotelo,

México. C.P. 11200

General public $250 MXN

Students and senior citizens $150 MXN

Admission is free for children 12 and under