Louise Bourgeois, Crouching Spider, 2003, Château La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade, France.
We have taken a liking to that of first booking a restaurant and then buying the flight and looking for a hotel. More and more we travel with the sole purpose of visiting those iconic buildings that are part of the history and idiosyncrasy of a place.
As well, the time has come to do the same with works of art. But not with the classic ones, the ones that have rested perfect and unalterable for years on the walls and showcases of museums.
More than a century of modern and contemporary art goes a long way... Specifically to fill the 560 pages of the book Destination Art: 500 Artworks Worth the Trip, from the Phaidon publishing house (€29.95). "A compendium of international art created for a specific place that celebrates the joy and wonder of experiencing works in their native environment while offering useful information to make travel easier", in the words of the publishing company based in London and New York.
Spread over more than 60 countries around the world, the 500 permanent works that make up the illustrated volume accompanied by your corresponding photo and description, as well as the address, GPS coordinates, schedules and other access data.
Yayoi Kusama, Dots Obsession, 2012, Matsumoto City Museum of Art, 4-2-22 Chuo, Matsumoto, Nagano 390-0811, Japan.
TRAVEL AND INSPIRATIONAL LITERATURE
Destination Art is a source of inspiration for lovers of art and travel, since it includes everything from hidden gems in big cities to unique installations in remote locations: murals, stained glass windows, sculptures, sound installations...
Serve as an example the two works that open this review, Yayoi Kusama's Dots Obsession a vending machine, a recycling bin and a bench decorated with the artist's mark (white polka dots on a red background) that welcome visitors to the Matsumoto City Museum of Art in Japan, and which is the result of the artist's collaboration with Coke, and Louise Bourgeois' giant spider at Château La Coste (France), a property with more than 200 hectares of land in the middle of Provence, which exhibits thirty outdoor works of art signed by artists such as Alexander Calder, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Tatsuo Miyajima and Ai Weiwei.
Paperback cover of the book 'Destination Art: 500 Artworks Worth the Trip', by Phaidon Editores.
CONTEMPORARY TEACHERS
In the pages of Destination Art: 500 Artworks Worth the Trip the reader will find, in addition to the descriptions that follow, the names of renowned artists such as Marina Abramović, Alexander Calder, Antony Gormley, Jenny Holzer, Henri Matisse, Henry Moore, Germaine Richier , Richard Serra... along with others lesser known.
Maurizio Cattelan: Known for his provocative humor, the Italian aims to divert the visitor's gaze from the classic works that surround him to fix his attention on a life-size sculptural self-portrait emerging from the ground in the Museumpark of Rotterdam (Netherlands).
Maurizio Cattelan, Untitled, 2001, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Museumpark 18–20, 3015 CX Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Nancy Holt: The Sun tunnels are four concrete cylinders placed in an X shape on a plain in the Utah desert. The American artist, pioneer of Land Art in the 1960s, aligned them with the sunrise and sunset of the summer and winter solstices and perforated the inner surface with holes in the shapes of the constellations of Draco, Perseus, Columba and Capricorn so that project a changing image inspired by the stars.
Nancy Holt, Sun Tunnels, 1973–76, Great Basin Desert, Box Elder County, UT, United States.
Julia Oram: Floating in the open sea off the coast of Waiheke Island, New Zealand, this ingenious and vindictive giant bath plug is part of the art collection at Connells Bay Sculpture Park and aims to make reflect with humor on a matter as serious as water conservation.
Julia Oram, Bung, 2007, Connells Bay Sculpture Park, 142 Cowes Bay Road, Waiheke Island 1971, New Zealand.
Grayson Perry and FAT Architecture: this green and white tiled house evoking the shape of a chapel is actually an artistic homage to Essex, the artist's home county. With capacity for four people, it can be rented for holidays and getaways, and inside it houses a exhibition of sculptures and tapestries that tells the tragic story of Julie Cope (a fictional heroine during the Canvey Island floods of 1953) invented by Grayson Perry and summarizing the social history of Essex and modern Britain.
Grayson Perry and FAT Architecture For Living Architecture, A House for Essex, 2015, Black Boy Lane, Manningtree, Essex CO11 2TP, England.