Fischer's "Untitled (Hole)" surrounded by "Dust Paintings"

I already posted a video about the opening of Urs Fischer’s solo show Oscar the Grouch at Peter Brant’s Greenwich art center, but found a bunch of photos I took at the opening and wanted to share those as well.

Times Square rendering. Photo: Hendershot Gallery

Brooklyn painter Molly Dilworth has been selected to adorn nearly a half mile of Times Square real estate with her artwork.

She beat out 150 other artists who submitted proposals to the reNEWable Times Square Design Competition. She will cover seven city blocks — from 42nd to 47th street on Broadway — with reflective blue-hued paint in an abstract composition, inspired by by NASA’s infrared satellite data of Manhattan. The area is traversed by 350,000 pedestrians a day, according to the city’s RFP for the competition. The installation will be completed in July and is temporary.

The project is intended to “revive the streetscape designs currently at the Times Square pedestrian plazas,” according to a press release from Hendershot Gallery, the artist’s dealer.

Dilworth is accustomed to a large canvas. Since 2009 she has been painting rooftops. A semi-permanent installation is on view at Hendershot at 547 West 27th Street.

Jeff Koons, on right, with student working on 'Head of Zeus'

Jeff Koons’  is famous for outsourcing his paintings to a team of skilled employees who toil for months on precise, labor-intensive canvases.

But one painting created by the hand of  Koons (see photos for evidence) will be sold tonight at the annual ‘ARTrageous’ benefit dinner and auction. The event benefits the Edwin Gould Services for Children and Families.The Head of Zeus, which relates to Koons’ series of mythological paintings, is a gouache on paper estimated to sell for $25,000.

Koons worked on the painting, along with seventeen pint-size and teenage collaborators in late April. I swung by his West Chelsea studio for a peek.  His wife Justine was also hard at work on a collage-based piece, inspired by their recent travels to Southeast Asia.

Francesco Clemente and Chuck Close are among artist guests expected to attend tonight’s festivities. These events have raised $15 million over the past 10 years. Tonight’s honorees include painter Ross Bleckner and framer Eli Wilner.

Abramovic fans..don’t miss this great video, courtesy of my pal Howard Silver. Click here to watch.

The video includes artist interviews, as well as footage of Abramovic in her Hudson warehouse, sorting through her archive in preparation for the MoMA show.

She also discusses plans for transforming the warehouse into the Marina Abramovic Institute for Long Duration Performance Art. Art must be longer than six hours to qualify.

Lawrence Weiner, via Canandian Art

Prints by pioneering Conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner will be sold beginning Wednesday, April 28, at 20×200,  the online purveyor of limited edition artworks.

Weiner’s prints will be available in four sizes, priced from $50 to $5,000. (The $50 version will be 8 x 10 inches, in an edition of 500). As is 20×200’s usual policy, those on the mailing list get early notification, so if you want a first stab at a Weiner, go here. To see Weiner roll a cigarette and diss Helvetica, go to video here.

The Bronx-born Weiner, 68, is among the most established names to collaborate with three-year-old company. 20×200 has previously offered work by emerging newbies, as well as a sprinkling of marquee names, including photographer William Wegman, (see my previous blog posting here) and Mike and Doug Starn, the brothers whose Big Bambu project was recently erected on the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s roof.

Weiner’s evocative text-based installation art was featured in a recent retrospective organized by LA MOCA and the Whitney Museum of…

Schwan on left; Oka Doner in her palm inspired necklace on right

Cruising down Madison Avenue after visiting the new Upper East Side Marianne Boesky Gallery, I noticed the chic duo, PR maven Andrea Schwan and artist Michele Oka Doner, standing inside the Christofle store.

Oka Doner has applied her organic aesthetic to several silver and jewelry items she designed for Christofle. These include a rather stunning silver collar, cast from palm fronds and named the Palmaceae. Oka Doner was wearing one. It retails for $2165.

Ghada Amer "For a Friend" 2008, via Cheim and Read

Egyptian artist Ghada Amer joined Cheim and Read, the Chelsea outpost representing artists Louise Bourgeois and Jenny Holzer, among others, last year. Her first solo show with the gallery opens May 6.

Cheim and Read have one of the strongest rosters of women artists, including ten out of 26 listed on the gallery’s website.

Amer, the subject of a survey show at the Brooklyn Museum in 2008, was previously represented by Gagosian Gallery.  She is best known for her use of embroidery thread on canvas.

The notoriously private Basquiat estate, headed by the late artist’s father Gerard Basquiat, is selling several artworks this spring at Sotheby’s. While the works are said to be mostly minor examples, the sale itself is unusual. The estate rarely sells artworks, according to sources. Income is mainly derived from royalties from merchandise and products.

One possible explanation for the sale is a move to raise cash to pay estate taxes in connection with the death of the artist’s mother, Matilde Basquiat, who died in November 2008. When Jean-Michel died in 1988, he left no will, according to sources. A lawyer explained to me that it is likely that the artist’s assets were split between the his parents who never divorced, but were estranged.

Sources didn’t how much art the estate contains, but one informed person said there are a large quantity of paintings.  Jeffrey Deitch, Tony Shafrazi and John Cheim are among a few dealers who have regularly sold Basquiat over the years.

There is also an authentication committee which includes Cheim, collector Larry Warsh and Gerard Basquiat.

Peter Brant’s Jeff Koons’ sculpture, Balloon Dog (Orange) has departed pastoral Greenwich, Connecticut for Park Avenue. The reflective coppery-hued stainless steel pup is parked in the lobby of Mies van der Rohe’s Seagram Building at 375 Park Avenue, owned by real estate developer, collector and Brant pal Aby Rosen.

The Koons has been installed on Park Avenue for about a month. It is surrounded by a black velvet rope. The sleek Philip Johnson designed lobby is open to the public.

The Balloon Dog is among the most desirable pieces from the artist’s 1994-2000 Celebration series. Hedge fund manager Steve Cohen owns a yellow version, which was installed on the MET’s rooftop in 2008.  Eli Broad owns a blue one and Francois Pinault has the magenta version. It is worth upwards of $20 million.

Brant hasn’t commented on whether the Koons is on loan, or has changed hands, or is for sale. Brant’s recent financial woes have been chronicled here and here. Calls to 375 Park Avenue weren’t immediately returned.

Read my May 2009 Bloomberg News story on Brant and his museum here.

Harvey Shipley Miller lived in a Park Avenue townhouse, received up to $200,000 a year in salary and $100,000 in travel expenses as the sole trustee of the Judith Rothschild Foundation, according to an article in today’s New York Times, found here.

The list of perks goes on. Miller donated $130,000 in foundation funds to the University of California where he created a fellowship named after himself. At MoMA, a curator’s position was named after Miller, not Rothschild, in connection with a monster drawing collection donated in 2005.

One wonders why was Miller the foundation’s sole trustee, with no apparent oversight? Whomever advised wealthy painter Judith Rothschild to structure her foundation in that fashion obviously gave her bad advice.

The Times story does a great job laying out the tale, revealing how Miller’s control over the Rothschild foundation — which included millions plus 10 Mondrians and Brancusi’s Muse — landed  him board slots and committee seats at the MET, Whitney and MoMA. (The article doesn’t explain what happened to the artworks. Do they still belong to the foundation or has Miller been selling them off to…