Our Editor Tours The Saatchi Gallery In London ~ Always Controversial - Always Cutting Edge Fine Art

Written by Jason Wollinski Tuesday, 10 April 2012 23:30

The Saatchi Gallery is the product of one man’s devotion to contemporary art. Charles Saatchi, one of the wealthiest advertising moguls in the world, started to collect contemporary art in 1969, amassing a huge collection over the years that followed. When the Saatchi Gallery first allowed Charles Saatchi’s personal collection to be seen by the public in 1985, it occupied a disused paint factory in St John's Wood, North London with 30,000 square feet (2,800 m2) of space. Dedicated to providing an innovative forum for contemporary art, presenting work by largely unseen young artists or by international artists whose work had rarely or never been exhibited in the UK, the gallery made an immediate impact, the first exhibition featuring works by American minimalist Donald Judd, American abstract painters Brice Marden and Cy Twombly and American pop artist Andy Warhol. This was the first U.K. exhibition for Twombly and Marden. In April 2003, the gallery moved to County Hall, the Greater London Council's former headquarters on the South Bank of the Thames, occupying 40,000 square feet (3,700 m2) of the ground floor. 1,000 guests attended the launch, which included a "nude happening" of 200 naked people staged by artist Spencer Tunick. The opening exhibition included a retrospective by Damien Hirst, alongside work by other young British artists, such as Jake and Dinos Chapman and Tracey Emin alongside some longer-established artists including John Bratby, Paula Rego and Patrick Caulfield. In October 2008 the gallery moved to its current location, the 70,000 sq. ft. Duke of York Headquarters building on King's Road, Chelsea. The Duke of York's Headquarters was built in 1801 to the designs of John Sanders (architect), who also designed the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. In 1969 it was a declared a Listed building, due to its outstanding historic or architectural special interest. The building was originally called the Royal Military Asylum and was a school for the children of soldiers' widows. In 1892 it was renamed the Duke of York's Royal Military School. In 1909, the school moved to new premises in Dover, and the Asylum building was renamed the Duke of York's Barracks. After being sold, the site was redeveloped to plans from Paul Davis and Partners as the Duke of York Square. The development includes a public square, upmarket housing and retail outlets, and part of it is the new premises for the Saatchi Gallery. The new site opened with an exhibition dedicated to new art from China. Free admission to all shows, including temporary, curated exhibitions has been enabled through the Gallery's corporate partnership with the leading contemporary art auction house Phillips de Pury & Company. You must visit the museum’s website at: … http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk

The Gallery also includes a dedicated space for Saatchi Online artists to exhibit and sell their work commission free. Corporate sponsorship and Charles Satchi’s vested interest in the artworks has caused controversy over the years, the gallery (and travelling exhibitions) courted publicity and never backed away from negative publicity, if it produced headlines and promoted the art, whilst some artists complained about the (private) collection selling works that formed part of public exhibitions. However, it has certainly been extremely successful in promoting new artists and their works, with names such as Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin now extremely well known and collectable. In 2010, Charles Saatchi announced that the 70,000 sq ft gallery would be renamed MOCA London (Museum of Contemporary Art, London) when he retires, and would feature "a strong, rotating permanent collection of major installations”, including 200 works (worth an estimated £25m) that would be donated to the nation. Since there is already a “Museum of Contemporary Art” in London (who are not best pleased about the appropriation of their name), this announcement continued the gallery’s headline-grabbing traditions. Another news making affair was the "Sensation Show" in New York which offended Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, because of Chris Ofili's painting, Holy Virgin Mary, which incorporates elephant dung.Giuliani, who had seen the work in the catalog but not in the show, called it "sick stuff" and threatened to withdraw the annual $7 million City Hall grant from the Brooklyn Museum hosting the show, because "You don't have a right to government subsidy for desecrating somebody else's religion." John O'Connor, the Cardinal of New York, said, "one must ask if it is an attack on religion itself," and the president of America's biggest group of Orthodox Jews, Mandell Ganchrow, called it "deeply offensive". However, even without the spice of controversy, a visit to the Saatchi gallery will astonish, confound and delight, with an ever-changing selection of the best works from cutting-edge artists from around the world, as the 1.25 million visitors annually will attest to.

Since the gallery exhibits work from a private collection, and the owner’s tastes have changed with time, the exhibitions have changed accordingly. Initially, the gallery had a strong focus on US artists, including, Sol LeWitt, Frank Stella, Richard Serra, Jeff Koons, Philip Guston and Cindy Sherman amongst others. However, in the 1990’s the focus changed to new, young British artists, and this focus has remained ever since, complimented with works by international artists. The permanent collection includes a large number of works from young British artists, including, Damien Hirst's iconic “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living” (the famous “shark in formaldehyde”), Mark Quinn's “Self”, Richard Wilson’s “20:50“ (the “Oil Room” installation), “Tragic Anatomies” by Jake and Dinos Chapman as well as works by Tracey Emin, Emily Prince, Jitish Kallat and Kader Attia. Works from the permanent collection have always featured in themed gallery shows. In 1998 Saatchi launched a two part exhibition entitled Neurotic Realism. Though widely attacked by critics, the exhibition included many future international stars including; Cecily Brown, Ron Mueck, Noble and Webster, Dexter Dalwood, Martin Maloney, Chantal Joffe, Michael Raedecker and David Thorpe. In 2000 Ant Noises (an anagram of "sensation"), also in two parts, tried surer ground with work by Hirst, Lucas, Saville, Whiteread, the Chapmans, Turk, Emin and Chris Ofili. During this period the Collection was based at '30 Underwood St' an artist Collective of 50 studios and four galleries, the gallery made several large philanthropic donations including 100 artworks in 1999 to the Arts Council of Great Britain Collection, which operates a "lending library" to museums and galleries around the country, with the aim of increasing awareness and promoting interest in younger artists; 40 works by young British artists through the National Arts Collection Fund, now known as The Art Fund, to eight museum collections across Britain in 2000; and 50 artworks to the Paintings in Hospitals program which provides a lending library of over 3,000 original works of art to NHS hospitals, hospices and health centers throughout England, Wales and Ireland in 2002.

On view until 17 April 2011, the gallery is exhibiting “Newspeak: British Art Now, Part II”. This is the second installment of the Gallery's museum-scale survey of emergent British contemporary art, providing an expansive insight into the art being made in the UK today. Far from manifesting a visual language in decline, which the Orwellian title might suggest, the exhibition celebrates a new generation of artists for whom the stimulus of our hyper-intensified, codified, contemporary world provides a radical pathway to a host of new forms and images. From sculpture and painting, to installation and photography, artists here employ a hybrid of traditional and contemporary techniques and materials to create a new language with which to articulate the wikified world around them. In this melting pot, east merges with west, celebrity with classicism, fantasy with obsessive formalism. This explosion of new and vigorous forms is an exciting indicator of the ongoing and future strength of contemporary art in Britain. The exhibition includes works by Alan Brooks, Alexander Hoda, Anna Barriball, Anne Hardy, Ansel Krut, Anthea Hamilton, Arif Ozakca, Caragh Thuring, Carla Busuttil, Caroline Achaintre, Clarisse D'Arcimoles, Dan Perfect, Dean Hughes, Dick Evans, Edward Kay, Gabriel Hartley, Gareth Cadwallader, Graham Durward, Graham Hudson, Henrijs Preiss, Idris Khan, Jaime Gili, James Howard, Jonathan Wateridge, Juliana Cerqueira Leite, Kate Groobey, Luke Gottelier, Luke Rudolf, Maaike Schoorel, Marcus Foster, Maurizio Anzeri, Mustafa Hulusi, Nicholas Hatfull, Nicholas Byrne, Nick Goss, Olivia Plender, Paul Johnson, Peter Linde Busk, Renee So, Robert Fry, Spartacus Chetwynd, Steve Bishop, Systems House, Tasha Amini, Tessa Farmer, Toby Ziegler, Tom Ellis and Ximena Garrido-Lecca. On display from 27 May until 16 October 2011, the main exhibition will be “Shape of things to come: New sculpture” and will feature works by artists David Altmejd, John Baldessari, David Batchelor, Matthew Brannon, Peter Buggenhout, Bjorn Dahlem, Berlinde De Bruyckere, Folkert De Jong. Martin Honert, Thomas Houseago, Joanna Malinowska, Kris Martin, Matthew Monahan, Anselm Reyle, Sterling Ruby, Dirk Skreber, David Thorpe, Oscar Tuazon, Rebecca Warren and Yeesookyung amongst others.