Mana Contemporary Honors Marina Abramovic
Performance Artist Developing Hudson Based Museum
By: Charles Giuliano - Mar 09, 2013
The performance artist Marina Abramovic is known for extreme, punishing rituals. They entail endurance over long intervals that recall the actions of the post war German artist Joseph Beuys or those of Chris Burden. Her work, with recreations of a number of her classic pieces with living performers were presented in a retrospective at MoMA with additional performances staged at the Guggenheim Museum.
The artist is currently developing a museum for performance art in Hudson, New York which is an arts based community on the last stop of a commuter line to New York City.
What follows is the news release of Mana Contemporary which recently honored the artist.
NEW YORK, NY, March 8, 2013––More than 150 esteemed art collectors, arts professionals and business magnates from all over the world gathered Thursday for Mana Contemporary’s First Annual Collectors Dinner held at Milk Studios in New York.
Broadcast journalist Charlie Rose hosted the elegant evening, which was held to honor iconic performance artist Marina Abramović, whose seminal body of work is best known for pushing physical and mental boundaries. Rose interviewed Abramović on stage before the crowd about her extraordinary career and her ambitious plans for the Marina Abramović Institute for the Preservation of Performing Art, a non-profit organization in Hudson, NY.
Shai Baitel, Vice President of Strategy at Mana Contemporary, presented Abramović with an unusual gift—a custom-made over-sized cabinet for her institute. Abramović said the gift was her “real favorite” out of awards she had received lately, “because an artist needs something that is functional, and that is the most functional cabinet I ever saw.” Abramović said of her recent visit to Mana Contemporary: “I saw the vision that is so similar to my own idea, to educate not just artists but also the public.”
The evening also included a panel discussion on Mana Contemporary’s novel philosophy, which merges an artist community with the business of managing art. Panelists included Eugene Lemay, Founder and Director of Mana Contemporary, Thomas Sokolowski, former director of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Nazy Nazhand, Founder of Art Middle East, and Karole Armitage, Artistic Director of Armitage Gone! Dance.
Notable guests included Saul Dennison, New Museum President; Lisa Dennison, Chairman, Sotheby's North and South America; Broadway producer Darren Bagert; gallerist Sean Kelly; Serge LeBorgne, Director of the Marina Abramović Institute; Milton Esterow, Editor and Publisher of ARTNews; real estate tycoon Michael Shvo and his wife Seren Shvo; David Archibald, President of Rolls-Royce North America; venture capital attorney James Dubin; financier Kevin O'Neill; Jonathan Foster, Director of Lear Corporation; business magnate Poju Zabludowicz and his wife, Anita Zabludowicz, one of Europe's top art patrons; art collector Corice Arman; and Sebastian Cwilich, President of Artsy.
The dinner was held in collaboration with RBC Wealth Management, and included a modern dance performance by Armitage Gone! Dance and music by pianist Dror Baitel and cellist Agnes Nagy. Each year, Mana Contemporary will hold the Collectors Dinner in early March to coincide with the Armory Show art fair. The annual event honors a prominent figure in the arts as selected by Mana’s leadership.
About Mana Contemporary:
Mana Contemporary is a groundbreaking cultural venue just minutes from Manhattan. Based on an integrated philosophy, the center provides services, spaces, and programming for artists, collectors, curators, performers, students and the greater community within a single location. Mana Contemporary is home to the Middle East Center for the Arts, the Carole Feuerman Foundation, the Eileen S. Kaminsky Foundation, Shen Wei Dance Arts, and Armitage Gone! Dance. For more information about Mana Contemporary, visit www.manacontemporary.com
About RBC Wealth Management:
In the United States, RBC Wealth Management operates as a division of RBC Capital Markets, LLC. Founded in 1909, RBC Capital Markets, LLC. is a member of the New York Stock Exchange, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the Securities Investor Protection Corporation, and other major securities exchanges. RBC Wealth Management has more than $235 billion of assets under administration and nearly 2,000 financial advisors operating in 200 locations in 42 states.