Thank you again, Los Angeles Times Culture Monsters:

Here's the latest installment in the courtship of Eli Broad — and the art museum he aims to plunk somewhere in the Los Angeles Basin, complete with big-name architecture, a spiffy $200 million endowment and the 2,000 works of contemporary art held by his Broad Art Foundation.

Downtown L.A. is officially making a play, courtesy of the Grand Avenue Authority, which today authorized negotiations with Broad toward a possible deal that would wrest the museum from Santa Monica and Beverly Hills, which are also in the running.

After a closed session today of the Grand Avenue Authority, L.A. City Councilwoman Jan Perry, a member of the joint city-county authority that's overseeing development of vacant land and parking lots in the heart of downtown's arts district, said it will deploy a negotiating team “to proceed with discussions with the Broad Foundation to consider his proposal and reach a mutual agreement.”

The Grand Avenue project, of which Broad himself has been a leading advocate, is considered the centerpiece of downtown's revitalization. Designed by Frank Gehry, it includes two towers, condos, hotel rooms and a shopping center….

This great post of a trip to artist Kelsey Brookes studio is one of several lushly photographed articles on current contemporary art happenings around the world from another recent art blog discovery Arrested Motion.

For his debut solo show with the gallery, Kelsey has delivered a stunning new body of work that seems to bridge the best qualities of his earlier work with the more detailed work from his bigger shows last year (like his solo with New Image Art).
 
All his best elements are there, from his day glow color palette to the intensely detailed highlights to his stunning use of text and the human form – “Bigger, Brighter, Bolder” delivers on all three statements and then some. The key to Kelsey’s work is viewing it up close, and many of these new works are in the 3 x 3’ and 4 x 4’ range, so in-person viewing is a must….

artist Kelsey Brookes in his San Diego studio

Kelsey Brookes studio tour, photo by Ross Morrison

Something good coming out of the Lehman Brothers disaster, thanks again ArtDaily.org

PHILADELPHIA, PA (AP).- Even in these trying financial times, you’re not going to see many going-out-of-business sales like this one.

On Sunday, hundreds of works from the art collection of failed banking giant Lehman Brothers will go on the auction block at Freeman’s auction house in Philadelphia.

The 200-plus pieces of modern and contemporary art up for bid once lined the corridors and graced the board rooms of Lehman’s offices in New York, Boston and Wilmington, Del. Highlights of Sunday’s sale include prints by Claes Oldenburg, David Hockney, Robert Indiana, Frank Stella and Roy Lichtenstein.

Anne Henry, vice president of the 204-year-old auction house, valued the collection at $500,000 to $750,000. There is no reserve price on most of the art, save for about a dozen pieces estimated at $10,000 and up.

“Our phones have been ringing off the hook,” she said. “The pieces are interesting, in great condition and appeal to all kinds of collectors.”

Liechtenstein’s “I Love Liberty” on the block

Go here to see the original:
Everything Must Go! Lehman Brothers Art Auctioned Off

Johannes Girardoni at Mark Quint Contemporary Art

Installation image of Johannes Girardoni: UNDISCLOSED photo credit Roy Porello

J o h a n n e s G i r a r d o n i : U N D I S C L O S E D

Opening Reception Friday, October 23rd from 6 to 8PM
7739 Drury Lane, La Jolla, California 92037 directions

Exhibition Dates
October 23 – November 14, 2009
Quint Contemporary Art | 7739 Drury Lane, La Jolla, CA 92037
Gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 11AM – 5:30PM

To learn more about this exhibition click here

ArtDaily.org on Damien Hirst’s latest exhibition:

GATESHEAD.- Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art in collaboration with Tate Connects and sponsored by Newcastle University’s Medical School presents an exhibition by one of the UK’s most high profile contemporary artists Damien Hirst. Pharmacy (1992) will be exhibited within Baltic’s Level 2 gallery from Saturday, October 24, 2009 until Sunday, February 7, 2010. Damien Hirst’s wide-ranging practice has sought to challenge the boundaries between art, science and popular culture.

Damien Hirst's Pharmacy installation

Read the complete write-up:
Damien Hirst’s Pharmacy will be Exhibited at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art

SAN FRANCISCO, CA.- San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) Board Chair Charles Schwab and Director Neal Benezra today announced that the museum is developing a groundbreaking relationship with Doris and Donald Fisher that would provide the Fisher Collection—one of the world’s leading collections of contemporary art—with a home at SFMOMA. The Fishers, who together founded Gap Inc. in 1969, have long envisioned keeping their collection intact for the public in their hometown of San Francisco. The Fisher Collection includes some 1,100 works by leading artists including Alexander

Go here to see the original:
Expanded SFMOMA will Become Home to Gap Founder’s Contemporary Art Collection

What do you see in the image to the left? It appears to be an average cardboard box, the kind used for shipping and storage. But look again — it's actually a prized work of art that it is currently valued at as much as $30,000.

Gavin Turk's “Brillo 5″ (2003) is a bronze sculpture painted to look like a cardboard box. The work, which is less than 2 feet tall, goes on sale Sept. 23 at Christie's in New York as part of a postwar and contemporary art auction, according to Art Daily.

Turk belongs to an informal cohort known as the YBAs, or Young British Artists. The group includes such not-so-young-anymore provocateurs as Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Sarah Lucas and Mark Wallinger.

According to Christie's, “Brillo 5″ has an estimated value of $20,000 to

Follow this link:
Redevelopment Agency Awards the Mexican Museum $250000 in Grant …