Yesterday we made the game day decision to hop in the car and head east to Venice, only a 3 hour drive (another great aspect of northern Italy/southern Switzerland – proximity!). The purpose of our last minute excursion was to survey the current Biennale and the periphery exhibitions, such as the Prada Collection. The Prada family has been collecting contemporary art since the ’60s (best exemplified by the above early Donald Judd Conceptual masterpiece) and they’ve installed this temporary show in a magnificent palazzo while they finalize plans for a permanent home in Milan, as designed by Miuccia Prada”s little buddy Rem Koolhaus.

The collection represents a veritable who’s who in contemporary art, and below were some of my favorites.

Louise Bourgeois.

Maurizio Cattelan.

A very unique Charles Ray (Los Angeles represent!)

Damien Hirst (NOT my favorite, but just a reminder that no contemporary art collection is complete without something bad from him!)

I don’t recall this artist but this is a great image of the palazzo.

Carsten Holler “The Double Club”. This installation was a recreation of a London nightclub/party Holler hosted a couple years ago. One wall of the piece was covered in photos of the party patrons.

Is that The Boss Rick Ross?

A couple of Jeff Koons.

An Italian artist whose name I don’t recall.

We then went to see Francois Pinault’s (owner of Gucci, YSL, and husband of Salma Hayek) permanent collection at Punta della Dogana but unfortunately my phone died and I didn’t get any photos. Though it had his own Judds and Cattelan, overall the Prada was much better. Point Italy in the fashion house-collector wars!