|
Welcome
to marcspiegler.com, an online portfolio for my published
articles. Feel free to e-mail
me with comments, criticisms, and questions.
I've been
a journalist for more than a decade now, first
based in Chicago and now in Zurich. Although I've done
a lot of writing on the arts lately, you'll see that the
articles here range wildly in topic, length, style and
venue - everywhere from ArtNews to Sports Illustrated,
by way of Arena and suck.com (no, that's not a porn site).
Which makes me either a wide-ranging writer or a dilettante.
You decide...
The categories (listed above
right) are a little haphazard. When in doubt, I have put
an article on multiple pages. Also, a lot of my older
work is not online yet - such as almost all my 1990s architecture-and-design
writing in Metropolis magazine. If you want to know when
I've posted new articles, use the subscribe
feature and pick the topics that interest you. Nota Bene:
This service falls by the wayside when I'm on deadline,
by which I mean "most of the time."
Newest project:
www.artworldsalon.com
is a new website Iaunched with two friends, András
Szántó and Ian Charles Stewart. It is intended to
become a moderated discussion focused upon the fast-paced
transformations currently taking place in the global
artworld.
This discussion will cover a wide range of artworld
topics, including: the economic shifts roiling its
markets; the internationalization and expanding number
of its players; the impact of technological developments;
and the rapid changes in both the broader perception
of the artworld and the artworld’s perception of itself.
We’re hoping to create something that mixes panel
discussion and open-source think tank, so please come
visit.
Ephemera:
- The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has compared
me to the oracle of Delphi.
- Just like Metallica and Jackie Chan, I've finally
become the
victim of China's intellectual-copyright pirates.
Sue them for my royalties and you can have 95 percent
of the legal award.
- Things learned in 2006: You can have an incredible
night in Gwangju, Korea, at the Tourist Club, which
seemed to have no tourists until we walked in the door.
An Indonesian taximan will drive 1000-plus miles for
$120. In Mexico City, women drivers are immune from
prosecution for running red lights after 10pm. (Yes,
carjacking there is just that bad.) And the art market
in China is even more insane than I had imagined. Like,
"artists collecting women's phone numbers on $100
bills" insane.
|
|
 |
Featured
article: New York Magazine |
|
|
| |
"Is
Terence Koh’s Sperm Worth $100,000?" |
January 8, 2007 |
Linked
here
With his first New York City
museum solo show about to open at the Whitney, I tracked Terence
Koh's three-year rise from working anonymously as "asianpunkboy"
to being an art-market It Boy - a trajectory made possible
by collaborating with balls-out art dealer Javier Peres. Now
comes the hard part: Keeping the spotlight. |
|
|
|
Featured
article: New York Magazine |
|
|
| |
"The Hunt for Red Collector"
August 21, 2006 |
Link
When an unknown buyer won Picasso's
"Dora Maar au Chat" for
$95 million at Sothebys, it ignited an artworld parlor game.
Trying to track down the mystery man, I talked to sources
on four continents and then laid out my quest as a whodunit
with Russian overtones.
|
| |
|
|
Featured
article: The Art Newspaper |
|
|
| |
"Do
Art Critics Still Matter?" | April
2005 | View
Article
This hard look at the sorry position of today's critics was
rapidly translated into French,
German
and Norwegian,
and launched
many blog comments, emails and discussions. |
|
|
|
Featured
article: Art + Auction |
|
|
| |
"Negative
Charges" |
February 2005 | View
PDF (2.5M)
An investigative piece
detailing the controversy and lawsuit surrounding 921 negatives
from the estate of Mali's Seydou Keita, commonly considered
Africa's greatest photographer. Amid charges and counter-charges
of forged documents, exploited artists and other chicaneries,
truth at times seemed a mirage.
|
|
|
|
Featured
article: Art + Auction |
|
|
| |
"The
Devil and the art detective"
July 2003 |
View
PDF (362 KB)
An extensive profile
of Clemens Toussaint, who at the time ranked among the most
controversial men in the European artworld. In part because
he's a tempestuous maverick in a milieu of complicit discretion.
But also because art restitution is a minefield of ethical
dilemmas and conflicting "realities." Roaming from
1930s Germany to present-day Monte Carlo, this article ranks
among my best ever. |
|
