ArtStage Singapore opens

The third edition of the ArtStage Singapore art fair opened today at Marina Bay Sands Convention and Exhibition Centre – photos here. The brainchild of former ArtBasel director, Lorenzo Rudolf, ArtStage styles itself all-encompassingly as “Asia’s premier international art fair” – as opposed to the competition, ArtBasel Hong Kong. With Singapore’s dedicated art free-port services and a cohesive push by the country to assume a prominent cultural role in the region (recent years have seen the launch of Singapore Art Museum (SAM), frenetic/superficial public art projects, and now the Gillman Barracks – commercial art precinct), all eyes are on the first major international art fair of the year as a possible regional bellwether for 2013. Special platforms this year highlight the art of Indonesia (including a dedicated pavilion), Singapore and Australia, the latter sporting a flush of new collectors due to its infinite mining boom. randian 燃点 editor Iona Whittaker and correspondents will be reporting. (Image: Zhang Huan’s “Berlin Buddha”, 2007, being installed at the entrance to the ArtStage VIP Lounge.)

One-hit wonder Marc Quinn fails to keep to his Self

Jonathan Jone’s in The Guardian was blunt about Marc Quinn’s baby son in Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay: Marc Quinn’s giant baby sculpture infantilises art (Monday, 21 January)

Buhl photography collection auctioned

In wake of Guggenheim curated touring exhibition “Speaking with Hands”, photography collector Henry Buhl auctioned most of his collection at Sotheby’s New York (“A Show of Hands”), selling 281 of 437 works, including a László Moholy-Nagy fotogram for a record USD 1 million, but Alfred Stieglitz did not sell, with estimate of USD 800,000-1.2 million. The sale brought USD 10 million, three quarters of which will go to Buhl’s foundation benefiting homeless people particularly (January 22, 2013, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung )