The catalog for the Niki in the Garden sculpture exhibition at Chicago’s Garfield Park Conservatory has received an international design award from Graphis, the international journal of visual communication.

Graphis provides a compelling record of the most significant and influential work in design, advertising and photography past and present. Its Gold Award for Design is considered one of the most prestigious in the industry. The catalog, entitled Niki in the Garden: The Extraordinary Scupltures of Niki de Sainte Phalle, was designed by Birkdesign Inc. for the exhibition.

Images of the Niki in the Garden catalog will be featured in the hardcover Graphis Annual.

Last year, the Chicago Office of Tourism’s summer marketing campaign “Niki in the Garden” received two prestigious awards at the 2008 Illinois Governor’s Conference on Tourism. The campaign was named “Best Integrated Marketing Campaign” by a large organization, and received the “Best in Show” award for the overall strongest marketing campaign by any organization in the State of Illinois for 2007. “Niki in the Garden” was chosen from more than 100 applicants to receive this honor.

More than 145,000 people visited the Garfield Park Conservatory to see “Niki in the Garden,” an increase of 300 percent over the previous year’s attendance during the same time period.
 

We pay our respects to an amazing woman, Yoko Masuda, who died on 28 January. Yoko was the director of the Niki Museum, a unique art museum solely devoted to the work of Niki de Saint Phalle. The museum, which opened in Nasu, Japan in 1994, was based on Yoko’s private collection, spanning Niki’s entire career and embodying Yoko’s deep love for Niki and her work.

Yoko was an exceptional woman, a true force of nature. We are happy to have known her. She will be deeply missed.

Photo source: Masuda, Yoko S. “The Tarot Garden. Niki de Saint Phalle.” Nasu: Niki Museum, 2008.
 

For a kid’s-eye view of Niki de Saint Phalle, visit “Les boîtes à secrets de Niki” at La Vallée de la Jeunesse in Lausanne. This unique exhibition, presented in the form of a game, leads children on a playful and educational journey tracing Niki’s life and work in a series of 14 installations. The exhibition, offered in partnership with the Musée en Herbe in Paris, is designed for children as young as four but will captivate kids of all ages.

“Les boîtes à secrets de Niki” will run through 21 June 2009. The price of admission is 6 francs for adults and 4 for children. For more information, visit the web site of La Vallée de la Jeunesse or call 021 315 68 85.

Below are descriptions (in French) of the topics and activities on the journey of “Les boîtes à secrets de Niki”:

1. Niki, la fée des couleurs: Découverte des épisodes les plus marquants de la vie de Niki de Saint Phalle. Jeu : replacer en face des images les étapes de la vie de Niki correspondantes.

2. Meli melo: Dans les années 50 Niki intègre dans ses peintures des objets divers comme des fragments de vaisselle, des grains de café,… Jeu : retrouver les objets que l’artiste a collés sur le tableau.

3. Emplâtrés: Présentation d’un tableau constitué d’éléments collés sur du plâtre. Jeu : créer un tableau en enfonçant des objets dans une surface de pâte à modeler.

4. Mon amour: Pour se remettre d’une rupture amoureuse, Niki crée une œuvre où la tête est constituée par une cible sur laquelle le visiteur peut envoyer des fléchettes. Jeu : lancer des boules velcros sur la cible.

5. Feu: En 1961 elle réalise ses premiers Tirs. Jeu : tirer sur le tableau avec la télécommande pour voir apparaître les couleurs.

6. Magique: Niki et Jean Tinguely créent ensemble en 1982 les sculptures de la fontaine Stravinsky à Paris. Jeu : retrouver quelles sont les sculptures réalisées par Niki et celles réalisées par Tinguely.

7. Le Jardin des Tarots: En 1978 Niki débute la réalisation du Jardin des Tarots en Toscane. Il comporte 22 sculptures monumentales représentant les arcanes du tarot. Jeu : tourner les volets et reconnaître les sculptures.

8. Les Nanas: Les Nanas de Niki représentent l’apothéose de la femme, resplendissante de liberté et de joie. Leurs courbes douces et arrondies évoquent une présence maternelle. Jeu : faire tourner des cylindres et reconstituer 3 nanas différentes.

9. Super Nanas: Niki a réalisé des Nanas de toutes les tailles et toutes les couleurs : petites, grandes, bleues, vertes, noires,… Elles représentent les femmes du monde entier. Jeu : prendre la position des nanas en se regardant dans le miroir.

10. Rhinocéros: Dans les années 90, elle réalise beaucoup de lithographies très colorées. Jeu : retrouver les couleurs du rhinocéros à travers un puzzle.

11. Le Golem: Le Golem est une structure monumentale que Niki a réalisée à Jérusalem. Ses trois langues sont des toboggans sur lesquels les enfants peuvent s’amuser. Ils représentent également la réconciliation entre les 3 religions Juive, Chrétienne et Musulmane. Jeu : faire glisser des personnages sur les toboggans.

12. Miroir, mon beau miroir: Enfant, elle vivait dans une maison pleine de miroirs. Plus tard elle en a orné ses sculptures, comme la tête du Cyclop. Jeu : mettre un chapeau comme Niki et se regarder dans les miroirs.

13. Les maisons de Niki: Elle a crée certaines Nanas qui sont si grandes que l’on peut y pénétrer, voir y habiter. Jeu : réaliser le puzzle pour reconstituer les maisons de Niki puis construire sa propre maison avec un jeu de construction.

14. Reine de légende: Niki a réalisé une immense sculpture entièrement recouverte de mosaïque en l’honneur de la reine Califia, issue d’une légende des Indiens d’Amérique. Elle est capable de dompter tous les animaux. Jeu : décorer la reine Califia avec des morceaux de mosaïque.

15. Suissitude: Niki a réalisé plusieurs œuvres qui sont présentes en Suisse. Jeu : retrouve où sont situées les œuvres photographiées.

In a workshop at the end of the visit, each child will have an opportunity to decorate a card in the style of Niki de Saint Phalle.

School groups visiting the exhibition (as well as teachers planning to present Niki’s work to their students) might also consider these classroom activities:

§ Create a larger-than-life figure in papier mâché, building a framework for it beforehand out of metal wire. Then paint it in bright colors.

§ Have the group create a large mural by gluing mosaic pieces of all colors to a wall or other large surface.

§ Gather old toys and worn-out or cast-off objects, then have the group create an assemblage in plaster.

Niki de Saint Phalle’s first solo exhibition in Portugal opens this Friday at the Fundação Eugénio de Almeida in Évora.

Niki de Saint Phalle: Joie de Vivre – Alegria de Viver is “an unprecedented exposition of sculptures and engravings by one of the Pop Art movement’s most emblematic names,” the museum says, adding:

“The works of Niki de Saint Phalle are living pieces that exalt Love, Liberty and Woman. That speak of internal transformations and the labyrinths of the unconscious. And also of good and evil, of laughter, of tenderness, of fear… The artist’s universe is playful, irreverent; it is made of sinuous lines and forms, illuminated by explosive colors and pregnant with humor.”

The exhibition opens on 23 January and will be on display through 24 May 2009.
 

Work by Niki de Saint Phalle is included in “The Mouse House: Works from the Olga Hirshhorn Collection,” now showing at the Naples Museum of Art in Naples, Florida.

The exhibition opened 1 October 2008 and runs through 28 June 2009.

October 31 is the final day for “Niki in the Garden,” the stunning exhibition of 39 playful, larger-than-life mosaic sculptures now on display at the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis.

The works in the critically acclaimed exhibition include exquisite, brilliantly colored Nanas, animals, heroes, and totems ranging from four to eighteen feet tall, some of them weighing more than a ton. Read the exhibition press release, take an audio-visual tour, or check out a review and a survey of Niki’s life and work by critic David Bonetti — then hustle down to the Missouri Botanical Garden before it’s too late. This is one show you don’t want to miss.
 

You’ll see work by Niki de Saint Phalle and other artistic pioneers in WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution, the first comprehensive, historical exhibition to examine the international foundations and legacy of feminist art.

Organized by The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MoCA), the touring exhibition opens 4 October at the Vancouver Art Gallery in British Columbia, where it will run through 18 January 2009.

The show ran previously at New York City’s internationally renowned P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center. For more detailed information, check out the announcements from MoCA and P.S.1 via our press page.
 

The Tarot Garden, the sculpture garden created by Niki de Saint Phalle in Tuscany between 1978 and 2002, is one of the world’s 50 most beautiful gardens, says Tim Richardson of the Weekly Telegraph:

“Monumental figures, wittily realised in the artist’s trademark bright colours, amorphous shapes and mosaic-work, many of which also serve as pavilions or small buildings, were based on tarot cards. The artist lived inside The Empress for a number of years. The interior has to be seen to be believed. … The integrity of the artist shines out and one can only wonder at the sustained obsessional energy required to make it. One interesting aspect of the garden is that the pieces have been deliberately placed close together — crammed in, almost — so that the whole space can be experienced in one sustained gulp.”