"The philosophy of the UBS Art Collection is collecting the art of our time - stimulating works that reflect where we are now in our culture and in our society."
Mary Rozell, Global Head UBS Art Collection
The UBS Art Collection is recognized as one of the most important corporate collections of its kind. It includes extraordinary works of contemporary art in all media, dating from 1960 onward. Part of our mission is to build and maintain a seminal, thought-provoking and inspirational body of work. Here are a few of our most recent acquisitions, bringing further diversity and richness to the Collection’s ongoing narrative.
Derrick Adams is fascinated by popular culture and how media and society inform the public perception of black identity. 'Heart You', 2017, is from his 'Mood Board 'series of abstract collages. The artist was inspired by the creations of fashion designer Patrick Kelly, the first American designer of color to be accepted in the world of ready-to-wear.
Etel Adnan is an acclaimed poet, and her art takes over where language reaches its limits. She paints with forceful gestures and thick splashes of color. Although her 2017 'Untitled' paintings of Mount Tamalpais in California were drawn from memory, the characteristic features of the subject remain easily identifiable.
Ghada Amer began exploring female and gender stereotypes by appropriating images from magazines and other sources. In her 'Disarray of Emma Bovary', 2017 (created in collaboration with Reza Farkondeh) the acrylic paint functions like thread, partially concealing the figure of Emma Bovary, the protagonist of Flaubert's novel 'Madame Bovary'.
Throughout his long career Sam Gilliam has blurred the traditional boundaries between painting and sculpture. Some of his well-known works consist of acrylic paints poured or dripped onto folded raw canvas, suspended from the wall without stretchers. Gilliam's recent works on paper, such as 'Untitled', 2016, are an extension of these explorations with form and exemplify his lyrical use of color.
Zheng Guogu is a conceptual multimedia artist, who comments on globalization and the "New China," which followed the Cultural Revolution. In 'Computer Controlled by Pig's Brain', 2006, Zheng hints at the growth in commercialization and consumerism by transferring advertisements from Hong Kong, Taiwanese and Guangdong magazines to canvas. The diverse advertisement snippets become an analogy for the effect of the prevalence of branding in today's society, the repetition rendering the images abstract and the messaging nonsensical.
Sarah Morris’s vibrant graphic compositions capture the energy of the modern city and examine systems of control that impact the urban as well as sociopolitical landscape. 'Precious Stone [Sound Graph]', 2018 is from Morris's recent series of paintings in which she translates sound into visual information using a method of decoding and encoding. The jeweled-colored sound bars appear to rise and fall according to volumetric controls This work will also be featured in the UBS lounge at Art Basel Miami.
Haegue Yang is one of the most renowned South Korean artists of her generation. Her large-scale, multidisciplinary installations communicate with the audience in non-verbal and abstract ways. In her 'Sonic Rotating Geometries', spinning plates, when activated, transport the viewer into a multi-sensorial experience of color, sound and touch.
Sue Williams’s paintings, such as 'The Plesiosaurus Couple', 2014, combine abstraction with the exploration of memory and elusive dreams, while also reacting to external forces including politics, the media and cataclysmic world events. Her frenetic compositions are characterized by explosions of colors and a multitude of swirling forms.
November 2018
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