Amid the hubbub and bounty of the Getty Foundation's Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA initiative is proyectosLA, a two-month long commercial art fair of remarkable quality, taste, and inspiration, which is housed in a converted downtown warehouse. Near the entry, a collection of small rooms radiating off communal office space serve as booths for 19 galleries from throughout Latin American and the U.S. that present select works by Latin American artists. The remainder of the 20,000 sq. ft. space is occupied by the exhibition Here the border is you, which is comprised of fascinating and distinguished work drawn from the 19 galleries. They are installed so as to elicit dialogues among the established and emerging, multigenerational artists … [Read more...]
Notes on Art Basel Hong Kong 2017
On our way to Seoul to attend a traditional Korean wedding (see photo at the bottom of this post), my husband and I stopped off in Hong Kong, where I attended Art Basel Hong Kong for the first time. I spent two days at the fair and still didn't see it all, but what follows are short notes on a few of the works that struck me and stayed with me. What those who attended the fair only on the Wednesday--the VIP day--may not have realized and what I found remarkable as someone who attended several iterations of Art Basel Miami Beach when it first began, is that when I went to the fair on the Thursday, the first day the fair (which is in its fifth year in Hong Kong) was open to the public, there were thousands of people waiting to get in--and … [Read more...]
Eric Fischl Rift Raft at Skarstedt: The Naked and the Nude
After viewing the exhibition Eric Fischl: Rift Raft at the Skarstedt Gallery in New York a few months ago, I pondered the artist's extensive use of the female nude in this, his most recent series of works. While nudes have been ubiquitous in Fischl's paintings from the early psycho-sexual suburban narratives of the early 1980s to the less overtly allegorical, more formally oriented beach scenes produced in recent years, the new works offer a twist on his exploitation of the female nude as content. These paintings represent a continuation of his Art Fair Series begun in 2013. Having been invited to an art fair to give a talk, he was appalled and fascinated by the attendees and their responses (or lack thereof) to the art on view. He then … [Read more...]
Art Los Angeles Contemporary 2016
Art Los Angeles Contemporary this year had terrific energy and featured a lot of interesting, high quality work. It continues to surprise me, however, given that L.A. now houses one of the world's more dynamic art scenes, being replete with artists of national and international reputation, galleries showing exciting and important work and a growing collector base, that this, the city's preeminent fair focused on current work, which is now in its 7th year, has remained so modest in scale. It is by no means just a local affair, as the galleries indicated below will testify, but I anticipate that in the coming years this fair will greatly expand its scope and become a magnet for collectors worldwide. Soon, the major New York galleries that … [Read more...]