Moscow-born, California-raised Daria Zhukova, 27-year-old daughter of an oil magnate and girlfriend of billionaire Roman Abramovich is the director of Russia’s newest contemporary art space, the Garage Centre for Contemporary Culture. In this article, she speaks with the FT’s Peter Aspden:

“I liked (art), I liked going to Tate Modern in London and then other galleries but I was never directly involved and I didn’t take any art classes.” (Her degree, from the University of California Santa Barbara, is in Slavic studies and literature). She has assembled a formidable team of advisers for the Garage, including Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota and Serpentine Gallery director Julia Peyton-Jones….

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…And reports back, next week.

From the streets of New York City. Image: firstrung.co.uk

Stay tuned for reports on the Calder exhibit at the Whitney, Chagall and Russian Jewish Theatre at the Jewish Museum, VoCA favorite Pipilotti Rist at the MoMA and maybe a couple other things…

New York art dealer Marian Goodman – one of VoCA’s art heroes and rep of Thomas Schutte, our favorite artist – speaks to Art + Auction:

Art dealer extraordinare Marian Goodman. Image: artinfo.com

Read the article HERE

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Fuse magazine editor Izida Zorde and publisher Heather Haynes (of Toronto Free Gallery) are organizing a Town Hall meeting in Toronto to address the recent and upcoming budget cuts to the arts.

Valuing Culture: TOWN HALL REGARDING CUTS TO CULTURAL AND HERITAGE GRANTING PROGRAMS

Who should come? Everyone concerned about the Federal Government’s blatant contempt for arts and culture.

Who will be speaking? Representatives from Government, visual arts, film, video, performing arts

What will we be doing? Strategizing on how to get our voices heard in the next election

Why is this important? Because the wave of cuts and policy changes are radically changing Canadian society.

Wednesday, SEPTEMBER 3, 2008 at 7pm.

The Theatre Centre
1087 Queen Street West, (South East Corner of Queen and Dovercourt)

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Coming up on VoCA:

Paul Thek, Uncle Tom´s Cabine with Tower of Babel, 1976. The Personal Effects of the Pied Piper.
Image: zkm.de

-The Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin
-Paul Thek at the Facklenberg collection, Hamburg
-Art criticism debate in London

…and more!

We will be posting intermittently until June 2, from London, Amsterdam, Berlin and Hamburg….

Stay tuned…

Ronald S. Lauder showed off his $135 million portrait by Gustav Klimt. Image: nytimes.com

VoCA reports from New York this weekend!

Coming up:

-Klimt & the Wiener Werkstatte at the Neue Galerie
-Gustave Courbet at the Metropolitan Museum
-The Whitney Biennale
-Cai Guo-Qiang at the Guggenheim
-Loved and Loathed

…and more! Stay tuned…

The show confirms impressions of a new, gray mood among younger artists, one at odds with the recent prevalence in international art of both commercial glitz and festivalist brass. Call it a decline in producer confidence…

Read the article by the New Yorker’s Peter Schjeldahl HERE

1. Carol Vogel on the enigmatic Jasper Johns:

Read the article HERE

More info on Mr. Johns HERE

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AA Bronson, excerpt from Mirror Sequences, 1969. Image: aabronson.com

1. AA Bronson’s School For Young Shamans at John Connelly Presents, New York

January 10 – February 16, 2008

This performative exhibition features a collaboration with erstwhile Canadian artist Terence Koh and works by nine young shamans including Winnipeg artist Michael Dudeck and VoCA favorite, the Tokyo-based Item Idem:

With a portrait by Bruce LaBruce, original score by Andrew Zealley and AA Bronson’s self portraits from 1969.

Two collaborations with Terence Koh consist of a double toilet cubicle joined by a glory hole: one is a miniature, a three-dimensional model; the other is an architectural installation that invites the performative.

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