Something New and Something Borrowed: The New Museum Gala Aimed Big

12 April 2012
by Art Rubynstein

New Museum changed up venues for its 35th Anniversary Gala, moving on up to the Cipriani Wall Street address this year. The event’s best ever crowd came out for the bellinis, special performance by spectacularly named The Pimps of Joytime from Brooklyn, and face time with more A-list artists than we could count. 560 patrons occupied tables on Wall Street and $1.6 million was raised. Here are the highlights:

Hosts: Lisa Phillips, Toby Devan Lewis, and Saul Dennison

Big artist alert: honoree Paul McCarthy, George Condo, Elizabeth Peyton, Roni Horn, Marilyn Minter, Dasha Shiskin, Chuck Close, Jeff Koons, Aaron Young, Tom Sachs, Rob Pruitt, Lisa Yuskavage and Matvey Levenstein, Lorna Simpson, Hanna Liden, Dustin Yellin, Cecily Brown, Wangechi Mutu, Tony Oursler, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Will Cotton, Sue Williams, and many more.

SAG members in attendance: Honorary co-chair Chloe Sevigny and Leelee Sobieski

CFDA members in attendance: Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez, Adam Kimmel, and jean loving Francisco Costa.

Most popular designer of the night: Costa’s work for Calvin Klein. Nora Zehetner, Amanda Brooks, Anh Duong, Yvonne Force Villareal, Minter, Olympia Scarry, and Piper Marshall all wore his designs to the dinner.

Most fascinating accessory: Massimiliano Gioni’s Mickey Mouse like gloves.

Runner-up: Sue Hostetler’s Barbara Kruger blessed column.

Best possible parting gift: Carsten Höller’s mini-version of Giant Triple Mushroom sculpture made especially for the gala. $5K was the minimum bid for the piece.

Best auction item: A George Condo portrait commission, a first of its kind for the artist.

Brazilian Biennial Babies

28 September 2011
by Art Rubynstein

Brazilian art momentum is rising. Just last month, Iguatemi hosted Steven Klein in South America, and now the brand is taking its art sponsorship many steps further. 219 works by the likes of Jeff Koons, Tom Sachs, Richard Prince, Nan Goldin, Matthew Barney, Damien Hirst, and many others, will be making their South American debut in São Paulo next week at the group show at the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art.

Sachs (who’s taking a break from his NASA mission for Creative Time), Nate Lowman, and Norwegian curator Gunnar Kvaran will all be stamping their passports in Brazil to fete the opening of the exhibition. And the works are in pretty big league. “The objective of the Biennal museum is to show what is happening in the world of contemporary art, and the Astrup Fearnley collection is one of the best examples in the world in this sense,” said Heitor Martins, president of the São Paulo Biennial. Sounds like good excuse to get a visa!

David & Goliaths

08 May 2011
by Art Rubynstein

It was a Saturday unlike any other this year in the city. Between the trolleys to Connecticut for the Peter Brant foundation festivities to the high powered David Salle opening at Mary Boone (and the joint dinner with Clifford Ross at Matsuri that followed) this was no sleepy weekend. Near perfect temperatures inspired a flourishing artist A-list attendance to support Salle’s tremendous show and everyone seemed to be in the good mood. Here’s the recap.

Mary Boone Salle supporters: Jeff Koons, Francesco and Alba Clemente, Richard Phillips and Josephine Meckseper, Kim Heirston Evans, Fran Lebowitz, Alex Katz, Cecily Brown, among many others.
Most refreshing Oscar winner cameo: Christopher Walken
Most excited: Mary Boone, who received plenty of great feedback for Salle’s work. “It’s his first new show in three years,” she beamed.
Familiar faces at Matsuri: Will Cotton, Rachel Feinstein and John Currin, Anh Duong, Ross Bleckner, Dana Schutz, Sante D’Orazio, Salman Rushdie, Vito Schnabel, Liz Swig, and Peggy Siegal.
Most curious accessory: Anne McNally’s blue fur collar in the early heat of May
Who needs champers? Koons and Salle went for beer with their sashimi.

Chanel Drill in Tribeca

27 April 2011
by Art Rubynstein

Every year, Tribeca Film Festival hands out artwork as their trophies to the film award winners. And Chanel hosts a dinner to celebrate the donors, alumni artists, and what the heck…put few actors in their samples. For the second straight year, the event took place in Odeon and it was eventful: steak frites, peonies, Robert DeNiro, and more artists than fire marshals would allow. Here are our highlights and impressions:

Artists with the dinner plates: Taryn Simon, Sarah Crowner, Jeff Chien-Hsing Liao, Nate Lowman (all who donated works this year) and Aaron Young, Julian Schnabel, Patti Smith, Julia Chiang, KAWS, Ann Duong, Dustin Yellin, José Parlá, Tierney Gearon, Jane Holzer, Todd Eberle, Jeff Koons, Andres Serrano, Tom Sachs and many others just for the kicks.

SAG card holders: Naomi Watts, Adrien Brody, Zoe Kravitz, Rose Byrne, Lauren Hutton, Chloe Sevigny, and Mr. De Niro of course.

The wild cards: Jimmy Buffett, Danielle Steele, and our favorite, Jean Pigozzi.

Best artist date: Young’s beautiful Proenza clad girlfriend, Laure Heriard Dubreuil. “It also helps that she lives in Miami,” smiled the artist.

Most responsible artist: Koons, who actually was familiar with all the works celebrated at the bash. “I went to New York Academy of Art earlier today to check it all out,” he told us.

Most responsible film goer: Schabel, who attended the opening night at Tribeca. “I though the Cameron Crowe’s Elton John documentary was just fantastic,” he told us.

Most Tribeca guilt: “I live right on Chambers street and I haven’t seen anything yet,” smiled model Linda Vojtova. “It’s a crime, really!”

Most jet-legged: (tie) Smith and Sevigny. Smith came back from Spain and Sevigny from China. “I don’t think they watch the Big Love there,” said the actress of her trip to promote Opening Ceremony. “But surprisingly, they all sort of knew who I was.”

Best quote: “You know Paul Haggis, do you also have the powers to get our food on the tables faster?” Zach Braff to a seatmate.

Photos: Billy Farrell Agency/BFAnyc.com

Loca for MOCA

15 November 2010
by Art Rubynstein

Kate Bosworth, Francesco Vezzoli

For all the art benefits, galas, cocktails, and house dinners we have here in New York, the fall MOCA gala seems to be the only big bash on the mind of the Angelenos who have a Koons in their living room. The 31st edition of the event didn’t feature cameos by Lady Gaga or Angelina and Brad in the cocktail hour (like the last year’s big splash), but the event still pulled in $3 million, plenty of iconic artists, and Chanel accessorized starlets (the brand was the night’s big fashion sponsor). Doug Aitken designed this year’s gala while newly re-branded Californian welcomed the big spenders with hugs and smiles. Here’s who made an impression on the West Coast’s biggest art date of the year.

Artists who flew into LAX: Frank Gehry, Jeff Koons, and Ed Ruscha were the night’s biggest knights

Obligatory celebs: Kirsten Dunst, Rachel Bilson, Chloë Sevigny, Mila Kunis, Gwen Stefani, Gavin Rossdale, a yes…art loving Will Ferell.

Other notables: Michael Chow, Vera Wang, Brian Grazer, and Kate and Laura Mulleavy.

Performers faced with the task of succeeding Lady Gaga: Beck, Caetano Veloso, and Devendra Banhart

Worst idea for the first course: A “hearty” plate of iceberg lettuce

Most surprising auctioneers: A chorus of hustling, loud, endearing formers (and ode to Aitken’s 2007 work at MoMA called “happening”)

Biggest flub: Co-chair Maria Bell who accidentally misspoke that the event raised $300 million on stage, to the gasp of the crowd. She quickly corrected herself.

Meet Me at the Whitney

28 October 2010
by Art Rubynstein

Adam Weinberg and nice folks at the Whitney have this whole museum gala formula down. Sure, we didn’t get Donatella Versace this year (and all her groupies like Shakira and J.Lo), but plenty of big money gentlemen and their significant others showed up this year (wearing Akris in the case of Justine Koons and other artist plus ones) raising a cool $2.65 million in the process. Here’s a breakdown of the guests and facts that ticked our fancy:

A-list artists who survived the three plus hour dinner: Chuck Close, Mickalene Thomas, Tom Sachs, and Jeff Koons

Fancy sounding names that kept them sitting at dinner for more than three hours: Billionaire Izak Senbahar, LVMH’s Renaud Dutreil, Lisa de Kooning, Anne Bass, Susan Hess, and Connor Cruise (no, not Tom Cruise’s son!).

Best feature: Daniel Hirschmann’s interactive AOL installation at the studio party

Best cameo: Lenox Lewis, who was on a very welcome party rampage that night after surprising all at Elle’s 25th anniversary

Evening’s entertainment: Mr. John Legend

Supermodel sampling at the Studio Party: Joan Smalls, Lily Donaldson, Jessica Stam, Chanel Iman, and Sasha Pivovarova