FERNANDO BOTERO AND THE CIRCUS
This exhibition offers a set of twenty works (paintings and works on paper) by Fernando Botero which he realized between 2007 and 2008 on the theme of circus. This international artist, who lives in Monaco, Paris, New York and Pietrasanta, has been holding one of the artist studios du Quai Antoine 1er in Monaco since 1996.Exhibiting Botero is obvious. Here, of course, we know the artist's monumental sculptures: Adam and Eve and Woman smoking a cigarette mark out advantageously the route to sculptures on permanent display in the gardens of Monaco, acquired during the Biennials organized by the Principality. Botero as painter is less known. However, Fernando Botero is first of all a painter. Since he was very young, he already admired the Mexican muralists such as Jose Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro Siquiero, but he also has a passion for the frescoes of the Italian Renaissance. Botero will explain later his search for monumentality, which the painter perceives very quickly, by the quest for his father, who died too soon, when he was only four years old. What nourishes Botero language, free from influences of his peers, is the search for volume and strength, which he expresses masterfully throughout the exaggeration that characterizes his work. He is not interested in the being or thing per se, but especially how the volumes inscribe in the space. By the generous and abundant figures, one could think that Botero does personify a world of suggested delights. Already in the tauromachy series uneasiness transpires. His series on the torture at Abu Ghraib removes all doubts about the monsters which inhabit the artist. With the circus, another evidence to produce that exposure to Monaco which hosts the famous annual international festival, Botero joins the noble tradition of artists: Picasso, Chagall, Calder, Lautrec, Leger, Seurat are the most famous examples. The series began in 2007, is focused on a more joyful subject . It offers a world of colors and voluptuous forms, but its language is perceived as a watermark. Once again there is this silent and motionless monimentality. The characters are melancholy, isolated, between laughs and tears. As if the party could stop at any time.
PHILIPPE PASTOR & ANTON MOLNAR
Philippe Pastor, the Monegasque and Anton Molnar, the Hungarian, two of the Opera Gallery favorite artists will be honored in December.This contemporary exhibition will successfully close the year at Opera Gallery London.Both of the artists have been part of Opera Gallery artists stable for years. They are thus permanently shown in the 11 Opera Gallery galleries with London, Paris, Monaco, Venice, Miami, New-York, Singapore, Seoul, Hong-Kong, Dubai and Geneva. Beyond their own country, Philippe Pastor and Anton Molnar are part of the international art scene. This exhibition will showcase a set of original and unique paintings, the best of
their recent works. Works are connected to Philippe Pastor and Anton Molnar’s themes and personal universe An exhibition to be discovered exclusively at Opera Gallery London, from the 9th of December.Private View Tuesday 9th December 2008, 6.30-9.30 pm
Show Dates 10.12.08 – 24.12.09 Venue 134 New Bond Street – London W1S 2TF Open Monday-Saturday, 10am-7pm/Sunday 12-6pm
PHILIPPE PASTOR
Philippe Pastor was born in 1961.
One day he dedicated his life to what until then has been his passion for years: art.
« My aim is to be happy with my paintings… and to put over certain messages in a society where communicating is difficult. But above, my aim is to be happy… to want to be happy… outside the usual standards, the usual ways…” The style he developed became thus very personal, using any kind of material like wood, plaster, crumpled paper or cement, and recovering them of colourful pigments and finding inspiration in his day to day, his personal view of life, his encounters at the café terrace in Saint-Tropez or Monaco…Self-taught artist, he is non the less very popular and has exhibited all over the world including Monaco, France, Italy, Rumania, Belgium, China and the
United States. After having presented the Series of the Bulls in June 2007 at the 52° Edition of Biennial of Venice, series which described the codes of appearing, Philippe PASTOR evolves to a more committed work through rough art. The Sky is watching the Earth, his last series is a vision of the quasi programmed dilapidation of nature. The artist is affected by the daily dramas which are played on planet, by the state of the world. The message is dark, the colours sharp. “I am not negative and I do not suffer, I am just sensitive to what occurs around me”. These paintings, on wood leave the traditional framework. Pure pigments are combined with other materials, ground, sand, netting, and glares of wood, paperboard and sheet rusted to represent the ground, our suffocating ground because of pollution. The metal squaring represented the limits imposed by our society. Philippe Pastor observes this remote world, with a realistic eye.He is also engaged in a combat nourished by an acute conscience of the urgency. Urgency to save the planet, our planet and our forests devastated each summer by fatal fires. His Sculptures “the Burned Trees”, placed in Nairobi at UNEP Headquarters, Singapore, New York, testify to the climatic upheavals as well as impact of the man on the Environment. The ultimate vocation of this work lies in the reafforestation of threatened spaces.
CURRENT EXHIBITION until end of January, The Sky is watching the Earth at MONACO MODERN ART
ANTON MOLNAR
Anton Molnar is an artist with a message.
His use of colour in combination with written words makes an outstanding statement reminiscent of an author with a story to tell. His style, juxtaposing modern subjects and antique contexts, creates great ambiguity on the time and the place represented.
Born in Budapest in 1957, Anton Molnar did his education in art in Hungary.
From 1979 to 1986, he got his diploma of qualified teacher of drawing, anatomy and art history at the Academy of Fine Arts of Hungary as well as his diploma of fresco and mural art.During his early years as a student, Molnar destroyed many of his works that failed to meet his own standard of perfection.
In 1988, Molnar left Hungary for Paris, as he couldn’t stand anymore the political climate and the lack of freedom.
Since 1989, he has been exhibited his Hungary and abroad.It includes several exhibitions at the Villa d’Este in Italy, at the Espace Pierre Cardin and the Biennale des Antiquaires, Grand Palais in Paris, and many others in private galleries in Japan, America or France…It is difficult to identify the sources of influence on Molnar’s art since his style is so innovative. Anton Molnar est un artiste avec un message.Son utilisation de couleurs combinée avec des mots écrits laisse place à un exceptionnel discours évocateur d'un auteur avec une histoire à raconter. Son style, juxtaposant les sujets modernes et les contextes antiques, crée la grande ambiguïté du temps et de l'endroit représenté.Né à Budapest en 1957, Anton Molnar a étudié l'art en Hongrie.
De 1979 à 1986, il a obtenu son diplôme de professeur qualifié du dessin, d’histoire d'anatomie et d'art à l'académie des arts de Hongrie ainsi que le diplôme d'art de fresque et d’art mural. Pendant ses premières années en tant qu’étudiant, Molnar a détruit plusieurs de ses travaux ce qui ne lui a pas empêché d’atteindre son propre niveau de perfection.En 1988, Molnar quitte la Hongrie pour Paris, car il ne supportait pas le climat politique et le manque de liberté.
Depuis 1989, il a été exposé en Hongrie et à l'étranger : à la villa d' Este en Italie, à l'Espace Pierre Cardin et à la Biennale des Antiquaires, au Grand Palais de Paris et dans beaucoup de galeries privées au Japon, Etats-Unis, en France.Il est difficile d'identifier les influences artistiques de Molnar puisque son style est très
innovateur.
Kees Van Dongen 1877- 1968
Retrospective
This retrospective, conceived and co-produced by Monaco’s New National Museum, the Museum of Fine Art, Montreal and the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, is, without doubt, the most important manifestation of Kees Van Dongen, after the 1990 exhibition in Paris’s Museum of Modern Art.
200 works are united and include some not seen in public for half a century 
Organised jointly beween the Monaco’s New National Museum and Museum of Fine Art, Montreal, and in partnership with Boijimans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, this extensive exhibition of
Kees Van Dongen (born Delfshaven, Holland 1877 – died Monaco, 1968) has been organised with the help of his family. Thanks to works recently purchased by the New National Museum with the support of the National Modern Art Museum at the Pompidou Centre and
Paris’s Museum of Modern Art, more than
130 important canvases, 40 works on paper as well as ceramics and illustrations, are assembled.
The exhibition reinforces the important role of the artist during the first 15 years of the twentieth century and his unique place as a portrait artist at the beginning of the Fauvist movement. His works dramatically altered the direction of Fauvism as it lurched toward the landscape genre. Van Dongen’s vibrant and extravagant images provoked an immediate reaction abroad, in particular within a group of German expressionist artists known ‘Die Brücke’ and in the same way that oriental art inspired Matisse, Van Dongen became a significant influence in the cult of the Avant-garde.
His works, always eclectic and provocative, are nearly always described as prodigious orgies of light and colour, and bear witness to the enormous influence of his own personal style at the very birth of modern art, beside that of Matisse and Picasso.
This retrospective therefore offers an unedited view and sheds light on new research with the exhibition of little known paintings and sketches. In fact there is a great deal of attention given to his first works in the years before Fauvism; at that time the artist was painting for the important collector, Ambroise Vollard and for the critic, Felix Fénéon. This exhibition unites a number of his early drawings (Done in the most part for satirical newspapers) and giving his works a wider coext.
By the end of the First World War, Van Dongen had gained a certain notoriety as a portrait artist of the cocktail set during high society’s ‘wild years’ The exhibition has a narrow but well defined collection, illustrating a shattered lifestyle, an epoch where desires were satisfied without scruple.
25th June to the 7th September 2008
Sala delle Esposizioni Quai Antoine Ist
4, Platform Antoin 1– Monaco
Treasury of Italian Painting from XVII and XVIII century, Caravaggio to Canaletto
After the success of last year, from the 18th August to the 1st September 2008, Rome’s Cesare Lampronti Gallery returns to the Principality of Monaco, exhibiting an important collection of nearly 250 works of XVII and XVIII century artists at the Sporting d'Hiver Centre. The exhibition, realised in collaboration with the MONACO-ITALY Association and sponsored by the Tourist and Congress Board in Monaco, aims to explain the evolution and development of genre painting in the course of two centuries: history, still life, everyday life (Bamboccianti), landscapes, architectural fantasy, views and portraits.
History is represented by highly selected works based on the Caravaggio school, for example the magnificent San Francesco by Caravaggio, whereas among the followers of this Maestro are Antiveduto della Grammatica, Leonello Spada, Angelo Caroselli, Giovanni Francesco Guerrieri, Mattia Preti and the Dutch Gerard Seghers.
In 17th century Rome and Naples the extraordinary baroque phase began and still life became increasingly important. There is a vast selection devoted to this, comprising nearly 70 works, Italian and others. Amongst Roman artists feature the Maestro della Natura Morta, Acquavella, Michelangelo Cerquozzi, the Stanchi family, Mario dei Fiori and Michelangelo da Campidoglio. The Neopolitans are rappresented by Luca Forte, Giuseppe Ruoppolo, Giovanni Battista Ruoppolo and Andrea Belvedere. A large part of the exhibition is devoted to artists who visited or worked in Italy like Franz Snyders, Abraham Brueghel, Karel van Vogelaer and Franz Werner Tamm.
Everyday life are found represented by artists like the Dutch Jan Miel and Pieter Van Bloemen, the Dane, Monsù Bernardo and Andrea Locatelli, as a landscape artist as well.
The landscape section sees a great deal of space dedicated to XVI century artist Paul Brill, followed in the next century by ‘ruined landscape’ artists like Cornelius van Poelenburg, Bartolomeus Breenbergh and Herman van Swanevelt as well as ‘architectural landscape’ artists like Alessandro Salucci, Viviano Codazzi and the XVIII century Alberto Carlieri.
The ‘roman landscapes’ of the 18th century are represented by the Arcadian artists Jan Frans van Bloemen, Hendrik Frans van Lint and Andrea Locatelli.
At the end of the 17th century the view "secundum veritatem" style was born and the father of this important landscape movement was Gaspar van Wittel, alongside the different but contemporary Paolo Anesi and Antonio Joli. This splendid trend of realistic views was most faithfully reproduced by the 18th century Venetian, Vanvitelli or Canaletto, as he was known, and the exhibition has the splendid ‘Thames at York Water Gate near Westminster Bridge’ as well as works by his followers and nephew Bernardo Bellotto, Francesco Guardi, Michele Marieschi, Apollonio Domenichini, noted as the Maestro delle vedute della Foundation Langmatt, Giovanni Battista Cimaroli. The other important development in this genre was the imaginative artist Giovanni Paolo Panini, inventor of a type of ‘architectural fantasy ’ which can be seen in various canvases, as well as Giovanni Ghisolfi, his master and the French artist Hubert Robert.
As for the portrait section, by far the best picture is the magnificent ‘Portrait of Pope Clemente XIII Rezzonico blessing’ by Pompeo Batoni.
MONACO MEDITERRANEAN SERGIO ROMANO
On the 6th of March this year the Monaco Mediterranean Association organised, as part of series, a conference with the theme: ‘Politics and Religion’ featuring the historian, journalist and ambassador, His Excellency, Sergio Romano. In front of a numerous and attentive audience made up of university professors, economic pundits and local politicians. Romano, introduced by His Excellency, Mario Polverini, Italian Ambassador to Monaco, spoke on the topic: ‘New Religious Wars.’ His Excellency speculated on the motivation behind religious wars, a moot point in today’s news - and the historical factors in the evolution of conflict.
The conference began with a rapid summary of the history of the last century where His Excellency occasionally paused to expand on the political history of religious thought in the southern Mediterranean area as well as outlining religious ideas as far north as the border of the old USSR. This historical context provoked the changes in Egypt, Iran, the Middle East as well as the Israel - Palestinian conflict during the 1970s.
Then His Excellency went further by outlining the basis of the tension between the Muslim and the Catholic, examining the recent Buddhist movements in Myanmar and Tibet, mentioning the military fanatics who manage to use the ancestral political grievances.
H.E. Sergio Romano followed the first part of his discussion with a second section on the ways that new technology and medical evolution have undermined the foundations of religion. He responded to the question of whether the Catholic Church should intervene in the defence of the Jewish faith in Israel. As far as His Excellency is concerned amongst the countries most closely affected by this is Italy, being as it is the place where the Catholic Church is most strongly represented and where the political system is strong enough to cause a sort of Cultural Revolution.
Finally the lecture concluded with the observation that certainly as far as the Monaco Mediterranean Association is concerned the situation appears to indicate that religious tension is the fruit of a crisis in political values at time when religion and politics appear indefinite and ever more ambiguous.
Mimmo Paladino opens the XXIV edition of the Spring Arts festival
The XXIV edition of the Spring Arts Festival, in partnership with the Monaco-Italy Society, was opened on Thursday the 27 March, 2008 with an exhibition by the artist Mimmo Paladino in Monaco’s New National Museum. The exhibition brings together a small but significant number of works and is based around two recently acquired pieces, the sculpture “No title” (1988) and the classic “With two fingers” (1980) the latter having been purchased with the generous help of the friends of the new museum., The exhibition has been assembled with the assistance of the artist and pieces lent by the Christian Stein Gallery, Milan, amongst these the monumental installation ‘without title’ finished in 2007.
S. A. S. Prince Alberto II and S. A. R. Princess Carolina of Monaco were among the Monaco celebrities present at the inauguration ceremony at Villa Sauber. Artists Remo Girone and Alessandro Bergonzoni were also there.
Paladino is the only Italian present at the Spring Festival 2008 which sees a varied programme of art events between 28th March and13th April. There are different music events– contemporary, baroque, chamber music, lyrical, ethnical – the cinema and theatre are open and there are a number of visual art shows... The Festival venues include the loveliest of Monaco’s public rooms and the Basilica of Menton. The Festival, presided over by SAS Princess Caroline of Hanover, has been directed by the composer Marc Monnet since 2003 and has overseen many of the changes that continue to form artistic expression in the 20th and 21st century.
The Spring Arts Festival 2008 will host a number of international groups including the Monte Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Nice Philharmonic Orchestra, Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra and, for the first time in Monte-Carlo, conductor Myung-Whun Chung.
BiographyMimmo Paladino was born in Paduli (Campania) in1948, where he lives and works now. His work is characterised by a strong Neapolitan expressiveness. He became well known in the 1970’s and in 1980 he exhibited his work in the section ‘Aperto Della Biennale’ where he delighted the international art world with his offerings from the Transavanguardia art group. Mimmo Paladino has exhibited at many of the most important International art exhibitions (Biennale, Venice, Biennale, San Paolo, Biennale di Lubjana, Tate Gallery, London, Miro Foundation, Barcelona, Biennale, Paris, Kunsthaus, Hannover, National Museum Peking, Forte Belvedere, Florence, Museo Reale delle Belle Arti, Brussels, Centro Pecci, Prato etc.). The greatest works of this artist, that is paintings and sculptures, are acquired by the most prestigious institutional and private collectors. In 2006 he presented to the Cinema Show, Venice, his first artistic work in short film for Format-Quichote.
The show "Why not make a purchase?" by Mimmo Paladino cam be visited every day from 10 am to 6 pm at Villa Sauber, 17 Avenue Princess Grace, MC - 98000 MONACO