In the past we’ve had impasto-ing elephants and brush wielding monkeys courtesy of Russian duo Komar and Melamid, and now yet again it seems that, in a multitude of media, animals are in the artistic ascendant. A bestial star of the Venice Biennale was undoubtedly Cholla the painting horse, who was selling his gesturally calligraphic watercolours in the Giudecca 795 Art Gallery for €2,000 apiece, and even gained honourable mention in a major Italian watercolour prize when entered incognito by his savvy gallerist Rosalba Giorcelli. In a more sober Swiss environment, however, apart from a touch of animated animalistic frolicking courtesy of Nathalie Djurberg’s rhinos and apes, art history wins the day with the favoured beast of Basel being Giacometti’s magisterial hound over at the Beyeler, even if he is not barking but cast in bronze.
Originally appeared in The Art Newspaper as 'Horse-drawn Basel'