Art Industry News: David Hockney Promotes a Completely Bogus Theory That Smokers Are Immune to Coronavirus + Other Stories

Art Industry News is a daily digest of the most
consequential developments coming out of the art world and art
market. Here’s what you need to know on this Thursday, April
16.

NEED-TO-READ

Robin Williams’s
Weirdest Art Is for Sale – The San Francisco-based Clars
Auction Gallery has launched an online auction of pieces from the
collection of the late actor Robin Williams. Much of the actor’s
fine art was sold at
Sotheby’s in 2018—but the San Francisco auction house seems to
be selling off some of his more, well, eclectic items.
Offerings include a taxidermy monkey that starred in Williams’s
2006 film Night at the Museum, gothic art pieces
by Donald Roller Wilson, and a painting titled Ducks in a
Row by Kim Cogan. (Hypebeast)

A Searing Critique of LACMA’s Expansion – Criticism of the controversial plans for
LACMA’s new $750 million Peter Zumthor-designed building
continues after a wrecking crew began demolishing four of its
buildings while Los Angeles was under lockdown earlier this month.
The museum and its director, Michael Govan, are coming under
renewed fire for a lack of transparency, particularly regarding the
final interior plans for the building, which have yet to be
revealed publicly despite promises that they would be released in
March. Detractors are particularly concerned about the amount of
gallery space in the “moose antler”-shaped building, and are
unimpressed by the museum citing the pandemic as an excuse for the
delay. (Los Angeles
Times)

David Hockney Boosts Bogus Coronavirus Theory –
David Hockney—who moved to France
because, he said, it had
become illegal to smoke practically everywhere in America—is
now peddling a conspiracy theory that smokers are immune to the
coronavirus, despite science pointing in the opposite direction.
Hockney, who has been a heavy smoker for more than 60 years, penned
a letter to the Daily
Mail citing a study from
China that recorded fewer smokers being admitted to the hospital
with the disease. In reality, research suggests smokers are more
vulnerable to the respiratory infection than the general
population, due to the frequency with which their fingers come near
to their mouths and the likelihood that they already have reduced
lung capacity or lung disease from the habit. (Observer)

Some Small Museums Won’t Survive Lockdown
– A number of small museums in the UK that rely
heavily on admission fees and do not receive regular government
funding are in danger of closing down for good amid the country’s
prolonged lockdown. The chair of the Association of Independent
Museums, Andrew Lovett, admitted that it was probably inevitable
that some institutions would “just run out of cash and go to
the wall.” Those at risk include the Florence Nightingale Museum,
which generates around 98 percent of its income from admissions and
retail, and the Charles Dickens Museum, which expects admissions
revenue for the summer to be reduced by at least 75 percent.
(BBC)

ART MARKET

The Wealthy Are Borrowing Against Art for a Quick Cash
Infusion – As the economy
tanks, art collectors and dealers are increasingly using their
blue-chip collections as collateral for loans. The move means they
can have their cake and eat it too, as they can get cash while
still hanging the art on their walls. But the risk is that the art
will be headed for the auction block under duress if the economy
does not bounce back. (New York
Post)

Phillips Offers a $1.5 Million David Hammons – Auction
houses are steadily adopting their own versions of galleries’ online viewing
rooms to offer works for private sale. Phillips has landed a
significant consignment for one of its first virtual
offerings: David Hammons’s
African American Flag (1990), available for an asking
price of between $1.5 million and $2 million. Such flags,
which are among the reclusive artist’s best-known works, rarely
come up for sale. (Art Market
Monitor)

UK Auction Houses Are Finding Success Online –
Regional auction houses in the UK
have been pleasantly surprised by the results of their online-only
sales, which are proving, in some cases, to be more lucrative than
their real-life counterparts. “We took the gamble that there would
be a lot of people at home with nothing to do and fewer auctions to
participate in, as so many were cancelled or postponed—and it paid
off,” says Gavin Strang, managing director of Lyon & Turnbull.
(Financial
Times)

Esther Schipper Grows Its Roster – The Berlin gallery has added the artist
Etienne Chambaud, the French sculptor who puts a contemporary twist
on the readymade, to its stable. The Berlin gallery also represents
Pierre Huyghe, Liam Gillick, and Ann Veronica Janssens.
(Press
release)

COMINGS & GOINGS

Art-Fair Conglomerate
Names New Director – The art-fair company Intersect
Art and Design has appointed Becca Hoffman as its new managing
director. The conglomerate owns three art fairs: Art Aspen, SOFA
Chicago, and Art Palm Springs. Hoffman has served as director of
the Outsider Art Fair for the past seven years. (Press
release)

A Caravaggio-Inspired
Photo Wins at the Sony Image Awards – Antoine Veling,
a Sydney, Australia-based photographer, has won the Sony Image
Award’s culture category for his photograph capturing audience
members dancing on stage at an Iggy Pop concert at the Sydney Opera
House in April last year. The chiaroscuro and biblical drama of the
image recalled a Caravaggio painting. (Creative
Boom)

FOR ART’S SAKE

Domingo Zapata Accepts
Caviar as Partial Payment – Here’s how you know times are
tough—even the rich are resorting to a barter economy. New York
City-based artist, writer, and fashion designer Domingo Zapata
(made legendary by this incredible 2013 New
York Times profile) has accepted $6,000 in caviar as
partial payment for a $30,000 artwork depicting a diamond-dusted
panda. (Page
Six)

Art-Historical Posters Tell People to Go Home – The
Glasgow-based artist Ross Muirs has designed a pun-derful series of
Van Gogh-inspired posters that are now popping up around the city
to encourage people to stay home. The designs show a
self-portrait of the Old Master wearing an Adidas tracksuit with a
striped shirt underneath, telling people in Scottish slang to “just
go home.” (Monopol)

The post Art Industry News: David Hockney Promotes a
Completely Bogus Theory That Smokers Are Immune to Coronavirus +
Other Stories appeared first on artnet News.