"Andrea Cruz Carrer Junta de Camere, Barelona, February 1996" by Craigie Horsfield

"Andrea Cruz Carrer Junta de Camere, Barcelona, February 1996" by Craigie Horsfield. C-print flush mounted on foamcore. 139 x 139 cm. (54 3/4 x 54 3/4 in).

Horsfield has said: 'The work I make is intimate in scale but its ambition is, uncomfortable as I find it, towards an epic dimension, to describe the history of our century, and the centuries beyond, the seething extent of the human condition.' His black and white photographs record the environment around him and people he knows. He attempts to establish an understanding of history that challenges the notion of a mythical past or inexorable future, divorced from human experience of the here and now.

Craigie Horsfield was born in Cambridge, England in 1949. He was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1996, for the continuing development of his work shown in solo shows at the Antoni Tapuies Fundacio in Barcelona and at the Barbara Gladstone Gallery in New York.

Source: image | text

"Venus" (2007) by Jeroen Geel

"Venus" (2007) by Jeroen Geel, Aquarell auf Bütten auf Alu, 43 x 88.5 cm

Previous posts on Venus here and here.

"Famili" and "The Preparation with Green Sky" by Ashley Bickerton

Famili, 2007
acrylic and digital print on canvas in carved wood, coconut, mother of pearl and coin inlaid artist frame
86 x 72 x 7 inches
218.4 x 182.9 x 17.8 cm

The Preparation with Green Sky, 2007
acrylic and digital print on canvas in carved wood, coconut, mother of pearl and coin inlaid artist frame
72 x 86 x 7 inches
182.9 x 218.4 x 17.8 cm

Ashley Bickerton studio, 2007

See also my previous post on Ashley Bickerton.

Ashley Bickerton pushes further into his dystopic, end-times vision for his second solo exhibition (20 March –- 19 April 2008) at Lehmann Maupin Gallery, 540 West 26th Street. The gallery will present a new group of Bickerton’s large-scale paintings called “The Eight Paintings” along with bronze sculptures. These new works are a fusion of painting, photography and sculpture and exude sexuality, exoticism and color.

The eerie quality of the green men from Bickerton’s earlier work has now given way to the raucous and psychedelic-hued adventures of his blue “20th Century-Man” as he navigates a world populated with shamelessly inflated women and littered with the wreckage of “existentialism” and “escapism.” Bickerton represents this world of abundance and sensual opulence while addressing his concerns as a painter.

He employs models and actors whom he paints on directly, then photographs numerous times. Bickerton then manipulates the images with a computer almost to the point of implausibility. These are printed onto canvas and altered further with paint. As a means to question the art object as commodity, these new paintings are displayed in elaborate hand-carved frames. While Paul Gauguin was searching for something intangible in the human spirit, with Bickerton we see a fin-de-siecle malady, and an almost artistic certainty that we are approaching the end of the road.

Ashley Bickerton was born in the West Indies in 1959. He studied at the California Institute of the Arts, graduating in 1982, and continued his education in the Whitney Museum Independent Studies Program in New York. Over the last twenty-five years Bickerton has exhibited extensively around the world and his artwork can be found in many museum collections including the Museum of Modern Art, The Guggenheim Museum, The Whitney Museum of American Art, all New York; The Tate Gallery, London and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. Currently his work may be seen in Fractured Figure: Works from the Dakis Joannou Collection at the Deste Foundation in Athens, Greece and recently, he was included in The Incomplete at the Chelsea Art Museum and the East Village USA retrospective at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. Bickerton was a seminal figure in the East Village scene in New York and one of the original members of the group of artists that came to be known as “Neo-Geo.” He remains an influential figure with younger generations today and since 1993 Bickerton has taken up full-time residence on the island of Bali where he continues to work.

Two paintings by Kevin Lee Allen

"Ecstatic Repose" and "Yellow Boob" by Kevin Lee Allen

Kevin Lee Allen is an EMMY Award winning scenic designer. Mr. Allen’s work has been featured in The New York Times, Newark (New Jersey) Star Ledger, The Washington (DC) Post, Entertainment Design, Scanlines, and other periodicals. Mr. Allen has created scenery for such entertainment luminaries as Imogene Coco, Jack Klugman, Joe Namath and Patrick Swayze, and collaborated with Saturday Night Live Director Tom Schiller, photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders and legendary stage and screen director Franco Zefferelli.

More of his (slightly NSFW) erotic works here and his paintings of "random penises found on the internet" here.

Thanks to Kevin Lee Allen for suggesting his site.

"Fit To Burst (Heather Stephens As The Bird Flu)" (2007) by Barnaby Whitfield

"Fit To Burst (Heather Stephens As The Bird Flu)" (2007) by Barnaby Whitfield, Pastel On Paper, 28.5 by 36 inches

Barnaby Whitfield has a solo exhibition (“Little Deaths, All The Same”) opening tomorrow at 31GRAND (Manhattan's Lower Eastside: 143 Ludlow St. New York, NY 10002). It runs through April 19, 2008.

Press release, bio (pdf), more images (more boobs).

"Untitled (Suzie Hedge)" (2006) by Brandon Herman

"Untitled (Suzie Hedge)" (2006) by Brandon Herman

Archival pigment inks on 100% cotton rag paper print still available for sale at 20x200 for $20.

Brandon Herman was born in Hillsborough, California in 1983 to Bruce and Sue. He studied photography at the Rhode Island School of Design. His work has been shown both nationally and internationally, most notably in solo exhibitions in New York and Los Angeles, and in such publications as Anthem, Dazed and Confused, Eyemazing, Flaunt, Soma, Tokion, V, and Vice. While primarily focusing on photography, recent projects have incorporated sculpture, video, and installation as well. His conceptual focus is with the psychology surrounding the relationship between memory, fantasy, and mainstream media. Acting, elaborate role playing, and assuming false identities are integral parts of his artistic process. Herman is 24 years old and currently lives and works in Los Angeles. (source)

"Amanda" (2003) by John Currin

"Amanda" (2003) by John Currin.

"The Currin canon is swelling again, with nearly a dozen new works, which – assuming he finishes them on time – will be shown for the first time next month at the Sadie Coles gallery in London's Mayfair."

Source: John Currin: The filth and the fury - Features, Art & Architecture - Independent.co.uk

Previous posts on John Currin.

"gr 20" (2003) by Thomas Ruff

"gr 20" (2003) by Thomas Ruff. Chromogenic color print mounted with Diasec face in artist’s wooden frame. This work is from an edition of five plus two artist’s proofs. Estimate: $50,000-70,000

From an auction. Previous post on Ruff.

"You get more salami with Modigliani #16" (1978) by Mel Ramos

"You get more salami with Modigliani #16" (1978) by Mel Ramos. Watercolour and graphite on paper. Image: 30.7 x 45.7 cm. (12 1/8 x 18 in).;sheet: 43.5 x 59 cm. (17 1/8 x 23 1/4 in). Signed and dated ‘Mel Ramos 1978’ along the lower margin.

See previous Art Boobs posts on Mel Ramos. From an auction.

He has a new book coming out soon:

The title of this pocket-sized monograph says it all. Whether painting a gorgeous Monica Vitti-esque bombshell leaning on a Del-Monte catsup bottle in 1971, a Matisse-inspired redhead reclining on an abstracted chair or an Uma-Thurmanish blonde laying on a giant pack of 5 Flavor Life Savers, the rebel figurative painter Mel Ramos is widely viewed as one of the most significant representatives of the California Pop movement. Like his colleagues in the New York Pop art scene, he began his career as a commercial artist and was interested in the everyday myths of his time, from comic-strip figures to the synthetic dreams proposed by the advertising world. Since 1963, Ramos has fleshed out just about every popular erotic fantasy of women, from the cartoon superheroine to the dominatrix to the pin-up girl. He has also turned an ironic eye to the classical female nude, painting cyclical series of the love lives of the ancient gods and painterly paraphrases of classical masterpieces by Ingres, Manet, Modigliani and de Kooning. With an interview of the artist by Belinda Grace Gardner.

"Miss Beehayving" by Albert Watson

BREAUNNA (FRIDGE) by Albert Watson, 24 x 20", 60 x 48"

BREAUNNA (BED) by Albert Watson, 24 x 20", 60 x 48"

BREAUNNA IN CAT MASK by Albert Watson, 20" x 24", 60 x 48"

All Digital c print photograph, source: guyhepner.com

Miss Beehayving, Hamiltons Gallery London, 13 February - 15 March 2008

In his first UK solo gallery exhibition, Scottish-born photographer Albert Watson presents twelve new photographs from his latest body of work, Shot in Vegas. This new work departs from Watson's iconic portraiture initiated at the time of his arrival in America in 1970 and continued for the ensuing two decades. Concentrating on a single dominatrix and burlesque performer, Breaunna, with whom he worked repeatedly over two years, these images form a unique and essential part of the Shot in Vegas series, Watson's forthcoming book project. He met her at a Rock-A-Billy Convention in 2000 and over the years she became his muse, posing for him numerous times.

"When you come from a small town in Scotland, and years later you end up with a camera in Las Vegas, it's truly like being in another galaxy. And meeting somebody like Breaunna was inspiring. She lives in an exotic, erotic world, and that's what fascinated me." Albert Watson.

Watson described Breaunna, whose online moniker is Miss Beehayving, as having a chameleon-like quality. He managed to capture a different facial expression in each photograph, depicting the world both literally and figuratively through her eyes and the places she worked. His use of light creates a meditative atmosphere, drawing the viewer into the image whilst simultaneously demanding a reverent distance.

Watson studied graphic design at The Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee; and film and television at The Royal College of Art, London. He has exhibited internationally in solo shows at The Museum of Modern Art, Milan; Kunst Haus Wien, Vienna; City Art Centre, Edinburgh and FotoMuseum, Antwerp and group shows at The National Portrait Gallery, London; Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow and The International Centre of Photography, New York. His photographs are included in the permanent collections at The National Portrait Gallery and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. A retrospective of his work was published by Phaidon in November 2007.