Archive for the ‘Art Basel 2007’ Category

People sold stuff, it was just a little “eh.”

December 11, 2009

Busy in preparation for the last month for this make-or-break last week… happy to finally have time to write about the question on everyone’s mind – How was Miami?  The title quote definitely sums up the week.

Sales were way up from last year (how could they not be). The mood was education and post-fair due diligence, private parties in the evening.  I didn’t expect to see blind spending, but I did miss the enthusiasm, everyone was very restrained. So I guess the title of this post could also be: 2009 – More liquid, just less excitement.

I have been shopping around for a good article about the Top 10 and I finally found one I agree with by Sarah Douglas – Miami Postmortem: A Basel Top 10.

If it were a Miami Top 10, Beg Borrow and Steal at The Rubell Collection would have been #1 – artist list and images for those who couldn’t make the exhibition.

My personal highlight – Chuck Close visiting our Scope booth and spending a lot of time looking at work by Barnaby Whitfield and Shawne Major.

Shawne Major (New Orleans, LA) L'Argent, 2009. Plastic netting, clothing, fabric, plastic toys (including trophies, sheriff badges, coins, flies, rings, tiaras), chains, charms, ornaments, satin ribbon roses, silk flowers, appliques’, pendants, bead, buttons, costume jewelry, circuit boards, feathers, bottle caps, bracelets, braid & trim. 7 x 7 feet.

I’m waiting at the switch

December 18, 2008

for permission to make public all the exciting art events during inauguration week… give me a week because if you’re in DC for the inauguration, I know where you should be (I just can’t tell you yet).

In other news, while some had thought that maybe I’d jumped off the edge of my booth in Miami and that’s why I wasn’t posting, not the case. I almost did though, once I realized about 10% of Europeans from last year came and only about 50% of the New Yorkers.  As you can imagine, the art fair quickly turned into an art war, but special thanks to Belgium, Italy, Laguna Beach, Seattle and the UK for your support.

Also one of my favorite collectors has told me that on one of the forums someone was writing that the Daleks in the my booth were based on some sort of a digital process and not hand-painted. That is completely false.  This:

dalek_untitled1_nov2008

and this

dalek_untitled2_november2008

are 28 x 28 inches of completely hand-painted acrylic on panel and so are the sides:

dalek_untitled2_sideshot

Don’t believe everything you read on the forums, you can only trust blogs!!! (and Wikipedia).

So until I get the OK to spill on the inauguration events, mark January 15th and 19th on your calendars and while you’re waiting, here’s a great excuse to visit the Hirshhorn.

Summer ’07 – The Moons Align in Art Market

June 26, 2007

This summer we had the Venice Biennale (every 2 years), Art Basel (yearly), Documenta (every 5 years) and Sculpture, Munster (every 10 years) and then the well-heeled skip over to London for the big auctions. Maybe its because Basel is the only place out of the 4 exhibitions where works can be bought, but the fair dazzled collectors and critics alike this year, where as the others, and those who curated them, fell short. Have the dealer’s finally gotten the respect they deserve?

Basel used to be a sleepy town, little known next to Zurich (also home to my favorite museum Kunsthaus Zurich). Now, the “Big Fair” is the home, without a doubt, to a selection of the most important art made today. Dealers this year, instead of showing a variety of selections from their gallery’s repertoire, highlighted one artist (usually their blue-chip artist) ensuring high prices and high demand.

Highlights that our DC readers will enjoy included German born artist Katharina Grosse who took traditional Color Field style and twisted it into a 3D installation where stripes on the wall melted into piles of immense weather balloons.

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Katharina Grosse’s Atomimage (2007) in “Art Unlimited”

And my favorite (and crowd pleaser) was undoubtedly Paul McCarthy’s rendition of Santa Claus holding a butt plug that may or may not resemble a Christmas Tree. Some have said that the work, an edition of 3, sold for a mere 800,000, but we are guessing they sold for much more. If you too want to explore the power of the free market (also known as Basel 2007), ArtNet has let you in by offering the fair online: www.artbasel-artnet.com

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Paul McCarthy’s Santa with Butt Plug (2002-07) in front of “Art Unlimited”

My favorite quote from Basel 2007

June 12, 2007

“I see my job as developing resources for artists,” said one dealer at Art Basel, whistling in the wind. “Not providing assets for collectors.”

(Source Walter Robinson – ArtNet)


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