Napa, Malibu & NYC

8 August 2014

Next trip was to Napa, which was totally awesome.

Napa, Malibu & NYC
We met up with the Stones and as usual, their hospitality was outstanding. Sampling some of the famous Stonescape wine.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
We then headed to the Art Cave where we saw the most wonderful work from the Stones’ collection. Walking into the voluminous cavity we were treated to Keith Tyson, Ai Weiwei, Theaster Gates, to name but a few. Poju and Ron pointing out a rather poignant work by Ryan Gander.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
Our favourite work was a humungous protest painting by Rirkrit Tiravanija. We took the opportunity to be included with our hosts Ron, Jesse and Jen Beller.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
Then with sadly no time for LA, we headed to Malibu and spotted a fabulous Sam Falls sculpture in pride of place in a friends driveway.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
During a treat of a lunch we bumped into a few wonderful old friends. Beth de Woody and Alex Israel in deep conversation in front of the beautiful Pacific Waves.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
A group photo with Philip Martin from Cherry and Martin, art collector Theo, Beth, Alex, Alex’s sister Andy and my lovely hostess Joyce.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
Next stop on our whistle-stop tour was the Hamptons where we were shown all the sights. The villages had really great art galleries with the The Drawing Room showing the wonderfully intricate sculptures of Brooklyn artist Adrian Nivola.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
Karma in Amagansett provided a nice surprise with a host of beautiful sculptures by Peter Regli.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
A five hour visit to a mostly closed New York art scene meant we weren’t able to catch the Jeff Koons retrospective at the Whitney. After such a great disappointment I was however, cheered by Hito Steyerl’s outstanding presentation at Andrew Kreps. A true post-internet artist.
Napa, Malibu & NYC
Then Karma on the Lower East Side provided the grand finale of our stateside excursions with the most magnificent Sam Falls. Sam had recently created a number of works in Upstate New York which were certainly on par with his recent residency in Sarvisalo, Finland.