PARIS FUNERAL HOME AS ART CENTER; TATE’S NEW RUBENS; STONE SELLS CHINESE ART
A state funeral parlor where all the coffins for the dead of Paris were once made has been transformed into a modern art center. The macabre building, known as the “factory of grief,” will now play host to dozens of painters, filmmakers, and designers, as part of a plan to revive the city’s moribund art scene, reports The Telegraph’s Matthew Moore. Centquatre, in northeast Paris in one of the city’s roughest districts, was originally built as an abattoir but in 1905 was taken over by the authorities and converted into the city’s central funeral parlor. Although it was not generally used as a morgue, the remains of some concentration-camp victims were stored in the parlor at the end of World War II.
But after a $136 million renovation, the building, in the nineteenth arrondissement, has been transformed into an art space. Artists can set up their studios in the imposing space, in return for allowing the public to wander around and inspect their work. Any reluctance among artists to put themselves on display is likely to be overcome by the shortage of affordable studio space in Paris, which has caused a flight of young talent to Berlin and cheaper European cities. “Paris has a great lack of artists’ work space. This center alone won’t solve that, but it will create an effervescence that the city needs,” Fréderic Fisbach, codirector of the center, said.
In other news, a Rubens sketch made a decade before his death will join the collections of London’s Tate Britain after $9.98 million were raised for it in a six-month campaign. Dated 1628–30, the detailed drawing for the ceiling of London’s Banqueting House was sold to the nation for $525,000 less than originally asked, net of tax. “I am simply thrilled that the Rubens sketch has been saved for the nation,” said Tate Britain director Stephen Deuchar. “By acquiring this painting, we can begin to represent the magnitude of Rubens’s importance in British culture.” The purchase was made possible by the National Heritage Memorial Fund, which gave a total of $3.8 million. The next-biggest donors were Tate members, who offered $2.6 million, followed by Tate trustees, who gave $1.8 million in Tate funds. Another key actor in the purchase was the Art Fund, the century-old UK charity set up to help the nation bolster its collections. It gave around $1 million in its largest-ever contribution toward a single work of art.
Bloomberg also reports that Academy Award–winning director Oliver Stone is selling five Chinese contemporary paintings worth a combined $5.1 million in Hong Kong. The lots, by artists such as Zhang Xiaogang, Tang Zhigang, Liu Wei, and Gu Wenda, will be offered at Christie’s International’s auction of Asian contemporary art on November 30 and December 1, the London-based company said in a statement. The highlight of Stone’s pieces is Zhang’s Bloodline: Big Family No. 2, 1995, which shows a pursed-lipped couple with a tuft-haired toddler painted yellow.
