A Mungo Thomson work in Karma Gallery’s booth at Frieze New York. Photo: Casey Kelbaugh/Frieze.
FRIEZE’S LITTLE CARNIVAL SNUCK UP ON US, much like Andrew Yang’s mayoral campaign. Fellow New Yorkers, I implore you, do not space on the primary election (June 22), and do not vote for this jovial empty suit. Perhaps his support for the recent Israeli violence in Palestine will have gotten your attention? The motherfucker will trade affordable housing for the Olympics or an Iron Dome. It will just be Bloomberg 2.0, which resulted in criminal offenses like Hudson Yards.
Hudson Yards, coincidentally, was the site of this year’s Frieze art fair, which abandoned Randall’s Island for the first time since its inaugural New York edition a near-decade ago. One assumes the reason was money (they hold it in a tent, a structure not exactly immune to air circulation). The synergy of desperation between the two behemoths, both harpooned by the pandemic, produced a symbolism around the ev
Frieze Art Fair 2021: The Pieces That Banked Big $$$
Frieze Art Fair 2021: The Pieces That Banked Big $$$
Courtesy of Casey Kelbaugh / Frieze
As the first one-venue art fair to return to the city, there was a lot riding on this year s Frieze New York. One tried-and-tested metric for success is high sales prices and mega-galleries, in particular, have been reporting huge numbers from last week s event.
Blind Man’s Buff (1984) sculpture for an estimated $1 million.
With fewer galleries offering works to fewer collectors, you would expect to have seen less robust sales numbers, but a more local focus seems to have reaped rewards all around. Whereas past editions of Frieze New York have drawn collectors from around the globe, travel restrictions and health concerns made for a distinctly regional turnout. Galleries were similarly focused on American artists.
Agustina Woodgate is selling art via ATM.
May 6, 2021
Agustina Woodgate, Don t Trust, Verify, a project from Barro at Frieze New York. Photo courtesy of Barro, New York and Buenos Aires.
Collectors and dealers alike knew that things wouldn’t be the same when in-person art fairs made their return to New York this week with the opening of Frieze at the Shed. But strict timed entry slots, mandatory face masks, and temperature checks aren’t the only changes at hand: Now, for the first time, you can also buy art directly from an ATM.
Specifically, you can buy one work, part of “Don’t Trust, Verify,” a new project from Argentinian artist Agustina Woodgate. She has installed a working ATM at the fair, loaded with dollars that she’s transformed into art by painstakingly sanding $1 bills to remove the markings on both sides.
Dealers managed to do strong business on opening day at the pared-down Frieze New York.
May 5, 2021
A fairgoer uses her phone in the cafe during the first day of Frieze art fair. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images)
This is not a drill not-online, not-remote, fully inside, honest-to-god art fairs are back.
After 14 months of staring at images of paintings in digitally rendered booths, art-world VIPs lined up Wednesday morning at the Shed in Manhattan’s Hudson Yards district to enter Frieze New York.
This was by no means a foregone conclusion. Frieze, owned by the recently IPOed Endeavor, came close to scrapping its 2021 edition. (Plans for a scaled-back Los Angeles edition were indeed cancelled.) But thanks to rigorous safety protocols that prevent anyone from entering without proof of vaccine or a negative test not to mention a head-scratching requirement for shipped works to be isolated for three days the fair did indeed go off, with everyone wearing masks of co