DIGEST 66: We Come From France
At Auction May 7-13, 2025
I saw a preview of Pierre Huyghe’s In Imaginal at Marian Goodman Gallery last night—a set of works about the human/in-human divide (God/animal/machine). The highlight was Camata (2024) a “self-directed” film produced by a series of cameras, robotic arms, and gimbals (driven by some algorithmic ghost-in-the-machine) that enacts something resembling funerary rites over a real human skeleton decomposing in the Atacama (see here). There are tight shots of human bone becoming almost stringy in decay (I found this sensory detail disturbing). Coupled with the whining robotic arms, the effect was unnerving. I’m not particularly interested in AI and I reject the notion that this is some premonition of the future. What I saw invoked a primal anxiety—who will mourn us (love us) when the last of us is gone? The answer, in point of fact, is no one. But the film’s expansionary thesis is that “we” are those who mourn us, and we may not know who or what that is just yet. Opens today, check it out.
In other, lighter, techno-camp news, Charli XCX was fabulous on Sunday. I saw her previous Crash concert which was also fun, but much less individuated (more traditional sets, gay backup dancers). This show is just Charli, one woman on a stage, with a live camera feed, naked, tech-y components (stage lights, scrims) and fog. The design cuts out every ounce of fat, and we are left with a single, taut filet of star (shoutout to friend-of-the-stack and creative director Imogene—you tore). The confidence of Charli’s nakedness is a lesson to us all!
Higher altitude: it feels like a lot of what I’m seeing is either revanchist nostalgia (bad) or an anti-nostalgia that relies on the language of tech (black powder coated steel, wires, robotics). That now feels metabolized. There is also arbitrary garbage in a few different flavors (ok wait, this needs to be its own post..). It feels like we are stuck in an interregnum. So—what comes next?
Shoutout this week to Paola who people are saying may move to NY. And to Stevie for making me feel v Carrie B this week. And finally Jed who has a show opening tonight (Tuesday 5/6) through his Amity project at 264 Canal St (not far from Marian Goodman so you could do both). Check it out!
I am quietly returning to selling stuff directly. More here. For my precious new subscribers: Landed cost (the final cost you pay) = the hammer price (the highest bid) + the premium (a set percentage added to the hammer price that the auction house takes) + shipping (you’re always on the hook for this) + sales tax
Also, now worth repeating: I don’t get a commission on any of these sales/am not involved in any way with these auctions. To the listings!
So it’s the cone from the Coneheads. I’m too young to have seen the skit on SNL (bitch) but I did see the 1993 movie and I liked it a lot. Honestly a great sculpture. I feel like my Gen Z and EU readers are not going to get the joke of the digest title this week and that is a choice I can live with <3.
Victorian craft practice of “hairwork,” or making elaborate trinkets/decorations out of, you guessed it, human hair. This thing is pretty wild. Also old, dead hair really as a very particular color quality. The perfect addition to any home (???).
Very nice auction in Germany. Somehow always stocked with the finest ceramics (Beate Kuhn, who I still think needs a NY show, and Ruth Duckworth). Otto Meier (German, 1903-1996) was another exceptional ceramicist. Someone will get these 3 for a steal.
Same auction. I’ve run Piene (German, 1928-2014) before. Post-War German avant garde artist, founder of Group Zero (members including Lucio Fontana and Yves Klein). His work was anti-representational, experimenting with light, form, and material—kind of ahistorical formalism that now seems very historically bound up with the not-Nazis-anymore project of Germany in the 50s and 60s, but whatever.
Nan Goldin, consistently just very good. Making it look easy when it is not. And join me in repeating our Arcades refrain: “Are you a photographer or a gay guy with a camera?”
I wanted one of these for Maiden but was outbid :( Very nice for an apartment.
In my mental derangement I was measuring my apartment to see if I could install this. Like, girl?????
I like the rip. Pierre Paulin, so it won’t be cheap. But maybe one of you can get a deal.
I really would put this in my house.
I know I bitched last week about someone posting expensive design stuff in faraway places and I said “design is the art of the possible.” And yet this set in Italy is very nice. Mahogany and brass, deco. 2x2x2x2 seating. A very nice set!
May the hammer fall ever in your favor!