1. Make Art Great Again? A Response to the Nostalgia and Backlash in Dean Kissick’s Clickbait Manifesto
As if to transgress conventional art writing decorum, Dean Kissick begins his Harper’s debut, “The Painted Protest: How politics destroyed contemporary art” (the 174-year-old magazine’s December cover story) with an unsettling personal tragedy. To transgress in order to shock is a manipulative affair. To use it to write off a generalized category of artists and art-making is, for Kissick, very on brand. The piece seems written from the perspective of someone who has endured the arrows of woke puritanism for too long and has the bravery to declare enough is enough.
Space ships. Spray paint. Otherworldly costumes. George “Dr. Funkstein” Clinton is a rockstar both on stage and on the canvas. The Grammy-award winning musician, who gave funk a new edge in the 1970s with his band Parliament-Funkadelic, is lesser known for his equally mind-bending visual work.
3. Here Are the 12 Must-See Exhibitions on View in New York’s Galleries This Month
As the year races to a close, New York galleries filled their spaces with one last triumphant offering. From Noah Davis's intimate collages to Gary Simmons’s haunting erasures, these shows explore the intersections of history, identity, and imagination. Be sure not to miss a tête-à-tête between Irwin and Bell, or a singular reimagining of van Gogh's legacy.
The peripatetic Serbian artist, often referred to as the godmother of performance art, is perhaps best known for “The Artist Is Present,” her 2009 solo show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where she sat in the museum’s atrium, without moving, every day during opening hours for three months. Outside of meditation or performance, however, Abramović has been on the move for much of her life. Her new project with Massimo Dutti pays homage to her peripatetic nature.
5. Sophia Cohen and Tolga Albayrak on the Origins of Miami Art Week’s Most Raucous Party
What makes a Tolga party? For one, it’s by the art world, for the art world. You're likely to see a gallery assistant who has spent the week processing invoices in a back closet dancing alongside one of Europe’s biggest collectors. Also, the music is key, but you won’t find out who’s playing until you’re inside. Here, dear readers, find unfiltered insider tips from the ultimate art party maven.
6. The Year in Art Books: Our Critics Pick Their Favorite Titles
CULTURED Co-Chief Art Critics Johanna Fateman and John Vincler share the books that sustained them this year. Archival images, tangible offerings from conceptual artists, and decades-spanning monographs are on the list. Even if opportunities for holiday shopping have come and gone, there is no reason not to treat yourself.
7. 10 Art-World Insiders on How to Get the Most Out of Miami During Fair Week
A visit to Miami Art Week can sometimes feel like one long Uber ride with a few stops at beachside tents and convention centers in between. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Just ask the city’s locals, like gallerist David Castillo and artist Antonia Wright. CULTURED canvassed 10 art-world mainstays with ties to Miami for advice on how to squeeze the most pleasure out of the city during the fairs—and beyond.
8. Are Filmmaker Luca Guadagnino and Designer Jonathan Anderson 2024’s Most Influential Power Couple?
Daniel Craig wears a white suit for most of Queer, tainted nearly brown with sweat and grime by the new film’s bitter end. “It’s like heroin,” costume designer Jonathan Anderson says, likening the pale fabric’s increasingly burnt hue to the character’s debilitating vice. Ahead of the film’s release, the designer took CULTURED inside his influential and increasingly prolific relationship with director Luca Guadagnino.
Winding your way up the steep roads of Malibu, it’s easy to forget you’re a quick drive from the Santa Monica promenade and not traveling to some exotic wine region in Europe. As you approach Kim and Michael McCarty’s Douglas Rucker-designed home—with the glinting Pacific and cantilevered tennis court below and the family’s Malibu Vineyard and dotting of wild spring flowers above—it’s clear why the McCartys chose to reconstruct their entire property after the 1993 Old Topanga Fire destroyed the original. Their souls live here.
10. I Spent My Early 20s Locked Down. Here's What I Learned From Leaving Monogamy Behind at 24
How did Roxy Sorkin get here, naked and honestly a little chilly, with a receipt for $84 from Silverlake Liquor crunched in the cupholder of my Jeep? Well, for one thing, she spent most of her life as a serial monogamist. On top of that, she missed out on what were supposed to be carefree New York college years thanks to Covid. When her nearly six-year-long relationship ended, she knew that she had to take the opportunity by the horns and let her freak flag fly. She gives CULTURED a taste of her new lifestyle in the first installment of her new column, Hot Little Mess.
