Ooi Botos Gallery

28/10/2020

Lisa Botos and Joanne Ooi are excited to launch "Art Unchained" in November. The project is a media art installation and two online forums exploring the effect of technology on the art industry and, more generally, the commercialization of creativity.

On November 11th, "Human Study #1, 5RNP", by Patrick Tresset, will go live in Artistree, Swire Properties' art and culture space in Taikoo Place. The performative artwork features 5 robots sketching human sitters in 20-minute life drawing sessions and will be livestreamed every day from 11:30-19:30, November 11-22. Full details will be shared on the page of Artistree.
The two forums, "Technology, Art & Beyond" and "Blockchain: A Brave New World of Consumerism" will take place November 13 and November 20, 12:30 pm, Hong Kong time, respectively. Panelists will be Anna Lowe, co-founder of Smartify, Andy Alekhin, co-founder of Snark.art, Massimo Sterpi, partner at Gianni, Origoni & Partners , Paolo Sbuttoni, Partner, Technology & Privacy, Baker McKenzie and Ashok Venkateswaran, Vice President and AsiaPac Blockchain Lead, MasterCard.
Blockchain expert, Angie Lau, founder of Forkast News will moderate both forums.
Stay tuned for more details soon....
Al

18/10/2017

Great to learn that the Metropolitan Museum of Art recently acquired a work by Ooi Botos artist, Zheng Chongbin. The painting is almost 9 feet wide. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/712209

27/08/2017

Nine influential environmental artists http://www.artspace.com/magazine/interviews_features/in_brief/9-artists-changing-the-way-we-think-about-the-environment

Leaving behind "crunchy granola" aesthetics, these artists have created new ways of visualizing the Anthropocene.

13/02/2017

Although the gallery is no longer operating, Lisa Botos and I continue to follow, observe and participate in the art scene. To wit, I vlog about culture, including art, and wanted to share my latest video, entitled Neon Vaginas, with you.
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Watch this video to understand the deepening gulf between mainstream America and the cultural elite: "Art can't [only] live in a ghetto of liberal elite fascination... That's NOT ok any more." This clip, divided into two parts, documents my allergic reaction to a neon va**na artwork recently exhibited in a feminist art group show in Chicago. At first blush, you might interpret my comments as totally politically incorrect. But in fact, my sentiments and outpouring are rooted in a militant, activist perspective.
For those of you who never met or don't know me: I'm a former art dealer and ALWAYS an activist.
https://youtu.be/W3ODzoIQz88
Here too is the link to the art exhibition review I refer to, http://art.newcity.com/…/new-media-art-makes-new-art-worlds/

No wonder so many Americans are sick of liberal progressives and the cultural elite. Gone is the era when art and artists can live in an echo chamber and mak...

04/01/2014

A seminal photography show at Boston's MFA, She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers From Iran and the Arab World, the content of which is self-explanatory. The work's quality varies but its importance as a show is undeniable. Review:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/27/arts/design/mideast-photography-at-museum-of-fine-arts-boston.html
Slide show: http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2013/12/27/arts/design/20131227-PHOTOGS.html

A show at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, of work by female photographers from the Muslim world, challenges stereotypes.

01/12/2013

The first show of contemporary Chinese art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art EVER starts on December 6th -- and it's themed around our FAVORITE topic, Chinese contemporary ink painting: "INK ART: Past as Present in Contemporary China" http://www.metmuseum.org/about-the-museum/press-room/exhibitions/2013/ink-art

Location: Galleries for Chinese Painting and Calligraphy Press preview: Monday, December 9, 10 a.m. – noon A major loan exhibition of contemporary Chinese art presenting works by 35 artists born in China will go on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, July

03/11/2013

Not surprisingly, fraud is endemic and ubiquitous in the Chinese art world. There is a huge cottage industry that has sprung up to create fakes and look-alikes. Ironically, can this industry of counterfeiting reconnect the 250,000 people engaged in it to the history, provenance, techniques and cultural traditions of the works they are copying? In the process of copying, these copy artists must relearn the rationales and techniques which led to the specific vernacular and modes of expression they dissimulate. That's the ONLY silver lining I could find in this broad expose on the facts of Chinese art forgery. Like all products sold for money in China, art -- like the environment and education -- is subject to the rapacious greed and corruption of today's society. http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2013/china-art-fraud/

In ChinaÆs growing art market, now the second largest in the world, outsize auction prices often overshadow faked sales data and forged art.

17/10/2013

Personally, I think this divisive, brand name project Qatar is AWESOME! Joanne Ooi http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/08/arts/design/damien-hirsts-anatomical-sculptures-have-their-debut.html

In an unusually provocative move, the young sheikha who runs Qatar’s museums authority has unveiled 14 giant sculptures by Damien Hirst, charting an infant’s development in the womb.

15/09/2013

Definitely an all-time fave quote from Zhang Huan:

Asked whether Americans would understand his “Poppy Field” paintings, Mr. Zhang said: “If they are alive, they will love these works. But if they are dead, they will buy them.”

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/09/15/arts/design/zhang-huans-colorful-skull-paintings-at-the-pace-gallery.html

22/08/2013

I was about to post this on my personal wall when I realized it would be even better to share my reflections here -- with those who really do care about art -- even if we no longer have our gallery! Art fairs now resemble online shopping: what's cherished is kaleidoscopic instantaneity. All the familiar dynamics of the flat world are, not surprisingly, rendering today's art increasingly superficial & commercial. http://buff.ly/1dvPV4A

Dealers are now traveling to art fairs from Miami to Hong Kong to Basel to São Paulo, but this globalization of the market is easier for galleries with deep pockets — smaller ones are at a disadvantage.

15/06/2012

If only all museum directors would say this, "I think for a museum to be part of our moment, and not just part of our commercial, boring moment, it should introduce artists that can change the whole institution a little bit.” http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/13/arts/13iht-rartbirnbaum13.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

Daniel Birnbaum, the 49-year-old director of the Moderna Museet, likes to program exhibitions that challenge visitors' expectations.

15/06/2012

Long time no post! Here's a goodie: Giacomo Costa combines the critical observational lens of Burtynsky with hallucinatory visual imagery. His realistic "photos", entirely built within a computer, explode the confinements of reality and physics. Great stuff! http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/13/arts/13iht-rartcosta13.html?pagewanted=all

Giacomo Costa's digitally created photographs surpass the natural world to generate a sublime and apocalyptic new one.