Arthur Tonnerre

Art Journalist

Tag: Art criticism

  • Fanglin Luo

    Fanglin Luo

    How contemporary artist Fanglin Luo channels Aphrodite and Nvwa (Nüwa) to question feminine identity and cultural power

    “hrough the lens we see a dancer in front of a fence. There is a wind-tussled sheet hanging behind her. The sound of crashing waves intensifies as the dancer starts to rise from a crouch and into a series of movements, sometimes balletic, sometimes frantic. On the sheet a circle of flowers moves with quick balletic movements. Part performance, part statement, there is something here that is struggling to be understood. Is this itself the message?

    Multidisciplinary artist Fanglin Luo’s work takes viewers on a broad journey through ritual femininity and exploratory performance art. These are universal themes that she interprets through performance works that restage powerful cultural archetypes as a form of resistance against patriarchal tropes. But history has deep roots and not all of them bear sweet fruit. The question viewers face is whether her myth (re)making marks true growth.”

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    Arthur Tonnerre - Fanglin Luo
    Arthur Tonnerre – Fanglin Luo
  • Dürer to Warhol

    Dürer to Warhol

    A review of ‘Albrecht Dürer To Andy Warhol Masterpieces…’ MASI Lugano

    “Amidst the diversity of the showcased works, some spectators may be lured into issuing grandiose proclamations on the pivotal role of print reproduction within the annals of art history. However, this exhibition transcends the mere thematic or physical consolidation but unfolds as a rare juncture inviting an immersive plunge into the profundity of genius, casting shadows potent enough to obscure the aspirations of contemporary and future art.”

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    Arthur Tonnerre - Dürer & Warhol
    Arthur Tonnerre – Dürer & Warhol
  • Folkestone Trienniale

    Folkestone Trienniale

    How artists transform a seaside town into a living gallery of environmental urgency, historical memory, and collective imagination

    “Their vision of the festival marries contemporary concerns with artistic flourish and remains true to the idea of ‘treating the town like a gallery’. One of the most interesting aspects of Folkestone is how artists embed their works within the town’s context. Where we expect to see artworks in the white cube of the gallery experience, here the locations and their discovery reverberate with power that imparts a sense of magical realism. The expected world redevelops into perfect settings for artistic vision. Often it takes the form of subtle language or communication; the act of walking and discovering each location assumes a potent frequency. While it remains possible to reduce each artwork by intention and execution, the overwhelming installation feeling of the triennial lingers with visitors. All artists attempted location-based work that used the symbolism of their settings to create an immanent frame for what they wanted to convey.”

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    Arthur Tonnnerre - Folkestone Trienniale 2025
    Arthur Tonnnerre – Folkestone Trienniale 2025
  • Jingjing Xu

    Jingjing Xu

    A critical look at an emerging artist‘s synthesis of cinematic language, symbolic narrative, and questions of authenticity

    “This generation of artists also encourages reflection on how they differ from their predecessors. Figures such as Nam June Paik, Cindy Sherman, Bill Viola and Dara Birnbaum once examined the materiality of media from a McLuhanesque perspective, questioning what television is, what cinema can do and how media shape consumption. In contrast, contemporary artists like Xu employ cinematic language with native fluency. Having grown up in an era defined by memes, social media and promotional imagery, they create within a visual vocabulary already saturated with commercial aesthetics, auteur cinema and representational ideology.”

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    Arthur Tonnerre - Jingjing Xu web
    Arthur Tonnerre – Jingjing Xu web
  • Milan 2025

    Milan 2025

    A review of miart and Milan Art Week 2025 

    “For the 2025 edition Rauschenberg isa pivot point for showcasing both painting and multimedia art, the link between modernist art of the 1940s and the individuation which franks contemporary art. Mixed media and conceptual, there are a lot of signifiers in Rauschenberg’s works that anticipated where art would eventually move and several galleries around Milan are showcasing his works as if they were created yesterday. As a celebration of his centenary year the 2025 ninth edition of miart assembles museum exhibitions, talks and projects reflecting Rauschenberg’s ahead-of-his-time commitment to collaboration and syncretic ideas. The fair’s theme of ‘among friends’ projects this with galleries and institutions working together to enhance the city’s vision for artistic re-growth. A vision that’s coming into sharp focus in 2025, with highlights including John Giorno at the Triennale di Milano (until 14 April), Typologien at Fondazione Prada (14 June), the portal section of the miart (6 April), Nico Vascellari’s Pastoral at Palazzo Reale (2 June) and both Yukinori Yanagi and Tarek Atoui at Pirelli HangarBicocca (27/20 July). “

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    Arthur Tonnerre - Amsterdam Art Week 2025
    Arthur Tonnerre – Amsterdam Art Week 2025
  • Paul Sietsema

    Paul Sietsema

    Preview article on exhibition by Paul Sietsema

    “Sietsema’s current exhibition at Marian Goodman Gallery demonstrates this practice in full maturity. The new works on the ground floor (with their unplugged rotary telephones and paint-soaked CDs) exist as archaeological artefacts of our own recent past, whilst the earlier pieces in the basement reveal the artist’s commitment to excavating the material memory embedded in cultural objects. Together, they confirm Sietsema as one of contemporary art’s most rigorous investigators of how meaning accretes through the physical residue of use, time, and exchange. In an era defined by the dematerialised circulation of images, his insistence on the thereness of objects (their weight, their decay, their indexical traces) offers a counterpoint, reminding us that even in reproduction, something material remains.”

  • Golnaz Fathi

    Golnaz Fathi

    An article on Iranian artist Golnaz Fathi.

    Excerpt online full article in print.

    What attracted you to calligraphy? What about it do you find so expressive?

    For discovering calligraphy, I am thankful to my father: one summer at the age of 14 he took me, my sister, and a few of our friends to the calligraphy association in Tehran for the two months of summer classes. His aim was that we would have nice handwriting and in future that would help us a lot if we wanted to get a job—he never knew that there would be computers and we won’t fill out the applications by hand to [need to] have this priority to have nice handwriting! I fell in love with calligraphy in the first section and I was the only one who continued it. For me it was purely a meditation; when I was practicing, I wasn’t in this world, my body was here but my soul somewhere else. This love was that strong that it made me continue professionally in the highest level. I think calligraphy is spiritual and mystical; it’s a kind of deep meditation which needs a lifetime practice.”

    Golnaz Fathi: Calligraphy, movement in Iranian art
The art of Iran is intrinsically bound with religion and the calligraphic interpretation of their sacred texts. Golnaz Fathi