#Hashtags provides a platform for longer reconsiderations of artworks and art practices outside of the review format and in new contexts. Diogenes, founder of the School of Cynics in ancient Greece, is considered by some to be the first anarchist. Critical of society’s beliefs and structures, which he regarded as oppressive and hypocritical, he espoused a philosophy of being close to nature by living as[.....]

Raul Bussot was 5 years old when his family decided to escape Cuba, so he doesn’t remember the details very well.  He remembers his father and two friends assembling a raft in a mangrove forest under the cover of darkness.  He remembers pushing the raft to the beach while keeping an eye out for the Cuban Coast Guard.  He remembers huddling together for warmth out[.....]

For whatever reason, the Los Angeles art community has dance on the brain. It may or may not have started with artist and choreographer Simone Forti’s inclusion as one of the “Made in L.A.” finalists (the Hammer Museum’s mega-group exhibition-cum-contest from last summer), but the upcoming “Dancing with the Art World” conference (again at the Hammer) clinches the deal—two days of lectures and events with[.....]

Amongst the many trends floating around the contemporary art world, you may have noticed a resurgence in performance art in galleries and museums.  The old guard of artists from the 60’s and 70’s are being recognized in grand retrospectives, such as Marina Abramovic’s critically acclaimed The Artist is Present at MoMA in 2010, as well as the Guggenheim’s current show, Gutai: Splendid Playground, a retrospective of[.....]

Through his refreshing lack of self-seriousness or sanctimony, Ragnar Kjartansson has cut a jagged, joyful figure on the contemporary art scene. Indeed, with solo exhibitions in Boston and New York, the artist has recently been favored with the art world’s fickle attentions and is having something of a well-deserved moment. Ragnar Kjartansson, “The End–Venice,” 2009. Performance view. Venice, June 2009. Courtesy of the artist, Luhring[.....]

There are so many things to look at in a museum–but that doesn’t mean that art doesn’t exist in unplanned and accidental encounters. Today #Hashtags reprints one of our favorite essays from last year, on the topic of uncurated looking. It was miraculous to me, only because I had never seen the space behind the doors. Yet, it was shameful, as if I had seen[.....]

For the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam to choose Mike Kelley for their reopening exhibition was, to say the least, symbolic. The Stedelijk opened its newly refurbished and expanded premises in September last year, after years (and years) of highly controversial, heavily debated and stupendously overpriced refurbishments. The enormous white bath tub that is now hovering in front of the institution’s old facade, (brainchild of Benthem[.....]