Exhibitions

The origins of modern art are typically traced back to the formal deconstructions of Cubism or Duchamp’s conceptual games. Comparatively little is said about the earlier influence of the Fauves, led by Henri Matisse and his friend André Derain, who carried the radical ideas of post-Impressionists like Cézanne and Van Gogh into the 20th century.
The movement, known for its painterly style and strong use of color, is finally getting its due with “Matisse, Derain and Friends,” a major survey show that opened last weekend, on September 2, at the Kunstmuseum Basel in Switzerland.
The show, which is on view until January 21, 2024, seeks to challenge the conventional understanding of Fauvism as a boy’s club, by showcasing the contributions of its much lesser known women members. It also highlights the long-overlooked experiences of sex workers who are subject of some of the Fauvists’ paintings.
Installation view of “Matisse, Derain and Friends” at the Kunstmuseum Basel. Photo: Gina Folly.
Perhaps the best known female Fauve was Émilie Charmy who, after becoming orphaned at a young age, refused the kind of teaching jobs someone of her sex and social status would usually gravitate towards. Instead, she chose to study under the artist Jacques Martin and managed to support herself by producing charming, decorative interior scenes and still-lives.
In private, however, Charmy’s practice was highly avant-garde, and she is now best known for her intriguingly ambiguous self-portraits and seductive female nudes. After moving to Paris in 1903, she befriended the Fauves, including Matisse and Charles Camoin, the latter of whom she became romantically involved with. In one 1906 self-portrait, she shows herself lying back with one breast exposed, a daringly risqué choice at a time when a woman’s modesty was of paramount importance.
Émilie Chamry, Self-portrait (1906). Photo: Studio GIBERT, courtesy of Galerie Bernard Bouche, Paris.
“Charmy, it would appear, sees like a woman and paints like a man,” the early 20th century writer Roland Dorgelès once remarked. “From the one she takes grace and from the other strength, and this is what makes her such a strange and powerful painter who holds our attention.”
Another woman member, Marie Laurencin, was variably dubbed la fauvette or la biche parmi les fauves (meaning the lady fauve or the doe among the wild beasts, respectively). She moved in the same circles as many modernist painters, including Georges Braques and Francis Picabia, both of whom she met as a student at the Académie Humbert, and Guillaume Apollinaire, who was at one time her lover. She is represented in the exhibition by a self-portrait of herself in the guise of the Romanic hunting goddess Diana and by her portrait of André Derain’s wife Alice.
Marie Laurencin, Diane à la chasse (1908). Photo courtesy of Musée Marie Laurencin, Tokyo.
These artists, and their male counterparts, owed some of their early success to Berthe Weill, one of the very first women to become an art dealer in Paris when she established her gallery in Montmartre at the turn of the century. She had a knack for spotting legendary modernist talents before they became well known—she was selling works by Pablo Picasso as early as 1900—and began exhibiting the Fauves in 1902, starting with Matisse and Albert Marquet.
At the same time that the group were scandalizing critics at the Salon in 1905, Weill organized her own show of works by Charmy, Matisse, Derain, Marquet, Camoin, Raoul Dufy, Maurice de Vlaminck, and Henri Manguin. The critic Louis Vauxcelles clearly understood her role in promoting these highly experimental artists, remarking that “it was on the walls of [Mademoiselle] Weill’s that the Fauves were first seen. [The male dealers] Vollard and Druet came later.”
Émilie Charmy, Berthe Weill (1910-1914). Photo courtesy of Galerie Bernard Bouche, Paris.
Another little known advocate for the Fauves was Matisse’s wife Amélie Parayre-Matisse, who had been working at her aunt’s hat shop when they met in 1898. At that time, Matisse struggled to make a living from his art, so Amélie supported him and their three children with the money she earned from her textile designs.
Sex Workers as Overlooked Subjects
Most of the 160 artworks included in the exhibition were inspired by everyday life, and therefore provide excellent insight into the social history of Paris in the early 1900s. The show’s catalog has brought to light important new research by the historian Gabrielle Houbre about the experiences of sex workers, who often appeared in these paintings as models.
Hot spots for solicitation that were visited by the Fauves include dance halls like the Moulin Rouge, the artistic café Rat Mort, both in Paris, where they met dancers who posed for both Vlamnick and Derain, as well as London’s Regent Street, where some French women were illegally trafficked. Many of the portrayals sensitively capture a certain style or mood, as in the case of Auguste Chabaud’s Femme à la cravate rouge (Woman with a Red Tie) (1907) of Yvette, a woman that he was hopelessly in love with.
Kees van Dongen, Modjesko, Soprano Singer (1908). Photo courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, USA/Scala, Florence.
In 1908, the Dutch artist Kees van Dongen painted drag performer Claude Modjesko, who had been born in South Carolina in the late 1870s to formerly enslaved parents. He began performing in minstrel shows as a teenager before moving to Europe in 1898, where he sang under the stage name “the Black Patti” and supplemented his income through sex work.
Van Dongen, who often frequented cabarets and brothels to look for subjects, first saw him at the Circus Variété in Rotterdam in July 1907.
Auguste Chabaud, Le Moulin Rouge, la nuit (1907) Photo: Studio Monique Bernaz, courtesy of Association des Amis du Petit Palais, Geneva.
With a similar appetite for a city’s more seedy side, Camoin became a regular observer at Rue Bouterie in Marseille’s notorious red-light district. One sex worker from the strip posed for Nu aux bottines noires (Nude with Black Boots) (1905), which, despite the bold, almost confrontational stance, historian Houbre reads as an idealized, erotic, and healthy subject whose appearance does not reflect the stigma then associated with prostitution. It may be wishful thinking: that same year Marquet wrote to Matisse that he and Camoin had enjoyed a visit to the bars of Saint-Tropez to look for artistic inspiration and left with “some painful memories and a large stock of pharmaceuticals.”

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Curator Azu Nwagbogu has revealed his plans for the first-ever Benin pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Titled “Everything Precious is Fragile,” the group show will feature the work of four contemporary Beninese artists: Romuald Hazoumé, Chloe Quenum, Ishola Akpo, and Moufoli Bello, each of whom has been tasked with creating site-specific work for the ocassion.
Nwagbogu, founder of Nigerian non-profit African Artists’ Foundation (AAF), will co-curate the presentation with Yassine Lassisi and Franck Houndegla, according to the German publication Contemporary And, which first reported the new details about the highly anticipated exhibition. (The biennale has seen an influx of African countries participating for the first time in recent years, including Madagascar and Ghana in 2019.)
The Benin pavilion is expected to deal with issues of decolonization, restitution, and repatriation, which have been in the news of late as Nigeria seeks the return of the Benin Bronzes, a collection of royal sculptures that the British stole during the looting of Benin City in 1897.

The historic artworks, which date to the 13th century, are scattered across some 131 Western institutions—despite growing calls to return them to Africa. (Last year, the Glasgow Museums, the Smithsonian, and the Rhode Island School of Design Museum began repatriating their bronzes, and the German government  transferred the ownership of 1,100 bronzes to Nigeria.)
In Venice, the Republic of Benin hopes to highlight the ties between contemporary artists working in the nation today and its precolonial past by showcasing work inspired by the nation’s rich history and artistic traditions.
Specifically, the pavilion will draw on what’s known as the Gèlèdé philosophy, a feminist Yoruba tradition based on the wisdom of the mother, to consider today’s ecological, political, and social issues. The idea is that contemporary society can benefit from looking back to the old ways, while also strengthening connections to indigenous heritage.

Bello, for instance, is known for her figurative paintings of Black African women with blue skin, inspired in part by the Yoruba people’s traditional use of blue indigo dye in their fabrics. And Akpo uses his photography to blend reality and fiction in series that reimagine cultic practices of Benin’s Nago hunters or honor Africa’s historic queens.
Hazoumé, the most-established of the four participating artists, is best known for creating sculptures that resemble traditional African masks but are made from discarded gasoline canisters.
Romuald Hazoumé, Claudia Maigre (2005). Photo courtesy of Galerie Gmurzynska.
“I send back to the West that which belongs to them, that is to say, the refuse of consumer society that invades us every day,” he has said of the series.
Benin’s presentation in Venice comes on the heels of “The Art of Benin of Yesterday and Today: from Restitution to Revelation,” an exhibition at the at the Palais de la Marina in Cotonou, Benin, of 26 looted Beninese artifacts from the Quai Branly Museum in Paris that the nation of France agreed to restitute in 2020.
Earlier this month, AAF opened the exhibition “Dig Where You Stand: From Coast to Coast” at the Palais de Lomé in Togo. Curated by Rosemary Esinam Damalie with curatorial advisory by Nwagbogu, the show, which debuted last year in Tamale, Ghana, features contemporary African artists dealing with similar themes as the upcoming Venice project, including decolonization and restitution.
“Everything Precious is Fragile,” the first Benin Pavilion, will be on view at the 60th Venice Biennale, April 20–November 24, 2024. 
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Banksy may not have had an authorized solo show in 14 years, but if anything, that seemed to stoke the demand for his recent outing at Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA), which set attendance records for the institution with 180,000 visitors over the show’s 10-week run.
Titled “Banksy: Cut and Run,” the exhibition enforced a strict no photographs rule—all cell phones had to be secured in locked pouches, at the anonymous British street artist’s request. But that apparently didn’t dampen enthusiasm from museum goers, who included actor Johnny Depp and Jarvis Cocker of the band Pulp, according to the Scotland Herald.
“‘Cut and Run’ has welcomed a new and diverse audience, from primary school pupils to octogenarians, from all areas of society and corners of the globe,” GoMA director Gareth James said in a statement, as reported by the Independent, noting that the institution had to implement late-night hours to meet the audience demand. “Every day we open our doors to queues of hundreds of people waiting for walk-up tickets.”
It was the first time that the museum had charged paid admission for an exhibition. The show, which presented an in-depth retrospective of Banksy’s 25-year career, included a replica of the artist’s work station, a massive selection of his stencils, and all the behind-the-scenes details on how he got Love is in the Bin to infamously shred itself after hammering down for $1.3 million at Sotheby’s London.
The original stencil piece for Banksy’s Girl With Balloon, which infamously shredded itself after selling at auction at Sotheby’s London on display in “Banksy: Cut and Run” at Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art. Photo by Jane Barlow/PA Images via Getty Images.
If you missed the exhibition in Glasgow, it appears you can still get another bite at the apple, as Banksy has updated the show’s official website to solicit ideas for where to next present it.
“We want to take this show on the road but have no idea where to go next. Do you?” the website asked.
Banksy’s exhibition at the Glasgow Gallery of Modern Art. Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images.
The artist is encouraging people to email their suggestions for the exhibition’s tour to [email protected], preferably with a specific location or venue in mind—not just a country or city—as well as photographs of the space.
The show does not, however, confirm any details regarding Banksy’s identity, which has sparked countless theories over the years. Last month, a recording from a 2005 episode of NPR’s All Things Considered resurfaced that featured a purported interview with the artist, who is believed to have been born in Bristol, England, around the year 1974. 

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More than two decades ago, when Tetsuya Ishida was still a young emerging artist in Japan, he was already dreaming big. He had his eyes set on New York, wishing that he would one day have his solo exhibition in the center of the contemporary art world. He was preparing himself, saving money from a part-time job and learning English when he was not painting.
Ishida’s dream, however, did not materialize prior to his untimely death in 2005 at the age of 31 due to a train accident. But that was not the end of his story: This fall, the late Japanese artist’s wish will come true next month when Gagosian opens “Tetsuya Ishida: My Anxious Self” at its 555 West 24th Street space in New York on September 12.
Featuring more than 80 works, the exhibition, curated by Cecilia Alemani, is set to be the artist’s largest show outside of his native Japan. The gallery is also now representing Ishida globally in association with the artist’s estate, Artnet News can exclusively reveal.
Tetsuya Ishida, Exercise Equipment (1997). © Tetsuya Ishida Estate. Photo: Rob McKeever. Courtesy Gagosian.
“In getting to know the family over the past several years, we learned that an exhibition in New York was Tetsuya’s greatest artistic ambition, and we are incredibly honored to present his paintings in New York on the 50th anniversary of his birth,” Nick Simunovic, senior director of Gagosian in Asia, told Artnet News.
Born in Yaizu, Japan, in 1973, Ishida grew up as part of the country’s “lost generation,” a term referring to those who graduated during the 1990s and 2000s in a period of recession. During his short-lived artist career, Ishida created about 200 works. The sentiment of loss and despair experienced among this generation during a decade marred by high unemployment and high suicide rates can be felt in Ishida’s poignant paintings and graphic works.
Often meticulously detailed, Ishida’s paintings depict expressionless or sad faces of young men, their human bodies merged with objects surrounding them, including plastic bags, airplanes, buildings, broken satellites, machine parts, and animals like crabs and seahorses. At times, his human figures appear nearly lifeless in his paintings, lying on a conveyor belt or arriving as packaged goods.
Critics in Japan relate Ishida’s work with the country’s dominating manga and anime culture, but at the same time, this “convergence” with objects can also be understood as a visualization of the psychological survival mechanism needed during a repressive time.
“At first, it was a self-portrait. I tried to make myself—my weak self, my pitiful self, my anxious self—into a joke or something funny that could be laughed at… It was sometimes seen as a parody or satire referring to contemporary people. As I continued to think about this, I expanded it to include consumers, city-dwellers, workers, and the Japanese people,” the artist was quoted in a statement.
Ishida’s works were exhibited and collected in some parts of Asia but they did not get to travel beyond the region until November 2013, when Gagosian held a solo exhibition of the artist at its Hong Kong space, the artist’s first outside of Japan.
Tetsuya Ishida c. 1995 © Tetsuya Ishida Estate. Courtesy the artist and Gagosian
Recalling the organization of the exhibition, Simunovic, who was leading the gallery’s Hong Kong operation at the time, was first introduced to the artist’s enigmatic paintings through a Hong Kong collector more than 12 years ago. “I was immediately taken with the work and showed it to Larry [Gagosian], who was equally captivated,” Simunovic said. “We both agreed that it would be interesting to present an exhibition and, as we didn’t know the family at the time, we began making plans to mount a show of work from the secondary market. We secured great loans from collectors across Asia.”
The 2013 Hong Kong exhibition became a turning point for Ishida’s art. Jessica Morgan, a curator at the Tate at the time, saw the show and subsequently included the artist in the 2014 edition of Gwangju Biennale, when she served as its artistic director. “Okwui Enwezor, who was on the Gwangju jury at the time, was fascinated by Ishida and the power of his work, and, in turn, featured the artist in his exhibition for the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015,” Simunovic noted. And then, Reina Sofia’s curatorial team saw the Venice show and subsequently offered Ishida’s family a solo show at the museum in Madrid in 2019.
In between, the artist’s relatives became aware of the growing reputation of his work and reached out to Simunovic. “We slowly began building a relationship and we were given works for sale, which we placed in esteemed collections around the world,” he said.
Tetsuya Ishida, Refuel Meal (1996) © Tetsuya Ishida Estate. Courtesy the artist, Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, and Gagosian.
The gallery and the artist’s family were initially working on a show in New York, which was stalled due to the Covid-19 lockdowns. “We believe in his work and feel it’s extremely important that it be seen and understood in the West,” Simunovic said. The 80 works to be featured in the New York show represent nearly half of Ishida’s entire body of work. Some of them are on loan from the collection of the Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, which is located in the artist’s home town in Japan, as well as other private collections. Others are from the estate and will be available for sale, but Simunovic declined to reveal exactly how many works and the price range.
Simunovic is confident the show will resonate with an audience in the West. Ishida’s art, which addresses the themes of disconnection, alienation, and despair, are universal and highly relevant to the current times, he added.
“We live in a pluralistic art world where there are countless western collectors who enjoy collecting Asian contemporary art, just as there are countless Asian collectors who are avidly collecting western contemporary art,” he said.

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