Will Joep van Lieshouts Wellness Skull be exhibited at Switzerland’s next Art Basel?
For the record, inside the neck of the skull is a working bathtub. In its head is a sauna and, when it is working, hot steam pours out of the eye sockets. As van Lieshout says, ‘The heavenly power is the big unknown, the death of the hereafter, the skull of physical shell of the mind. The earthly power is an economical power and money plays an important role on our contemporary society’. Joep van Lieshout is based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Back at the 2008 Art Basel event, Brad Pitt bought a Family Lamp by van Lieshout for €35,000 – in all he spent about $1 million on wacky furnishings. Other sizeable sales at the 2008 Art Basel include the ten lots sold by New York’s Gagosian Gallery on the first day, and six works by Yayoi Kusama sold by Victoria Miro for a minimum price of $250,000. Hauser & Wirth, based in London and Zurich, sold a triptych by its recently-signed Indian artist Subodh Gupta for €650,000 and overall Indian art sold really well. Not surprisingly there was enormou
