Apparently, the American public can only take one art-focused reality television show at a time. Bravo — the same network behind the new program “Gallery Girls” — is canceling the competition-based “Work of Art: The Next Great Artist,” according to Gallerist NY. Producer Dan Cutforth confirmed that he is shopping the program to other networks, with the hope that it will find a new home.
The show, which ran for two seasons, gave artists the opportunity to compete against one another, “Project Runway”-style, for $100,000 and a solo exhibition at the “world famous” Brooklyn Museum. It also allowed artists to undergo MFA-style crits after each weekly challenge. “I feel like the show had something to say about the art world,” Cutforth told Gallerist. “I feel like there’s a slow upswing right now in interest in art and I think that what we set out to do with the show was make art feel accessible, feel not like it was part of an elitist world or in some unobtainable ivory tower.”
The show managed to assemble a more respectable cast of art world characters than the recent “Gallery Girls.” It featured Phillips de Pury honcho Simon de Pury, dealers Bill Powers and Jeanne Greenberg-Rohatyn, and critic Jerry Saltz as judges. So far, Saltz has yet to react to the news on his popular Facebook page, but we’ll keep you posted.
— Julia Halperin