It was a pretty dismal outcome for the photography included in Phillips' Under the Influence sale in London last week. With a Buy-In rate for photography topping 60% and no positive surprises, it is no surprise that the Total Sale Proceeds for photography missed the low end of the estimate range by a meaningful margin.
The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 41
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: £221000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: £318000
Total Lots Sold: 16
Total Lots Bought In: 25
Buy In %: 60.98%
Total Sale Proceeds: £116063
Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):
Low Total Lots: 11
Low Sold: 4
Low Bought In: 7
Buy In %: 63.64%
Total Low Estimate: £51000
Total Low Sold: £14000
Mid Total Lots: 30
Mid Sold: 12
Mid Bought In: 18
Buy In %: 60.00%
Total Mid Estimate: £267000
Total Mid Sold: £102063
High Total Lots: 0
High Sold: NA
High Bought In: NA
Buy In %: NA
Total High Estimate: £0
Total High Sold: NA
The top photography lot by High estimate was lot 122, Jitish Kallat, Cenotaph (A Deed of Transfer), 2007, at £18000-25000; it was also the top photography outcome of the sale at £20000.
81.25% of the lots that sold had proceeds above or in the estimate range, but that statistic is a little misleading, since only 3 photography lots sold above the range and there were no positive surprises (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate).
Complete lot by lot results can be found here
Phillips
Howick Place
London SW1P 1BB
Monday, April 15, 2013
Chuck Kelton & Eric William Carroll, New Photogenic Drawings @Bosi
JTF (just the facts): A paired show consisting of the work of two photographers, Chuck Kelton and Eric William Carroll, shown against white walls in a large, single room gallery space. There are 11 photographs by Kelton on view, all unique hand toned gelatin silver prints. The works are framed in black and unmatted, sized 19x23, and were made in 2012. A folio of 9 smaller prints (each roughly 8x10) from the same series is shown on a table in the center of the gallery. There are four works by Carroll on view in the back half of the space, each a set of 3 or 4 diazotype prints hung together. The works are unframed and pinned directly to the wall. Each individual panel is sized 72x36, and the works were made in 2010. An artist book from the same series is shown on the table in the center of the gallery. The exhibit was curated by Alison Bradley. (Installation shots at right.)
Comments/Context: This show brings together recent work by Chuck Kelton and Eric William Carroll, playing off a common interest in process-centric photography. The two also share some aesthetic kinship in their use of in-between light that seeps and diffuses, adding enclosed mystery to their carefully constructed compositions.
At first glance, Chuck Kelton's photograms are deceptive and uncertain. From afar, the black craggy areas at the bottom look like mountains or mesas captured as sharp silhouettes. Up close, they reverse into top down topographical maps of unknown shorelines and continental edges, every inlet and bay shown in exacting detail. The "sky" part of each image is decorated with wisps of smoke, murky clouds, or indistinct washes and apparitions (depending on your perspective), and each background is subtly toned in shifting hues, giving the appearance of sunrise or sunset, or some transitional nether time between dark and light. Put together, the works have the style of landscapes, but remain open for imaginative interpretation, full of unspoken foreboding.
Using the diazotype (blueprint) process, Eric William Carroll's images of forest undergrowth are more easily recognizable, capturing filtered light and dark shadows in a haze of soft, royal blue. Tiny up-close leaves are silhouetted against bright spots in the dense woods, while the background recedes into a mottled blur. Standing in their presence (and they have a definite physicality given their size), I saw visual echoes of Robert Adams' recent work, the River Taw photograms of Susan Derges, and even classical nature screens from China and Japan. Their Yves Klein color is rich and tactile, the effect a mixture of bright energy and muted meditation.
This show is a solid reminder that even in this age of ubiquitous digital photography, many contemporary artists are continuing to explore ways of incorporating (or reincorporating) the hand of the artist into the process. Craftsmanship has not gone away, it's just morphing into different forms, using both old and new techniques with increased flexibility.
Collector's POV: The works in this show are priced as follows. Kelton's unique prints are priced at $4800 each, while the 9 print folio is $9500. Carroll's works are $8000 each, regardless of the number of panels; his artist's book is $2000. Neither artist has much secondary market history, so gallery retail likely remains the best/only option for those collectors interested in following up.
Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)
Transit Hub:
Through April 28th
48 Orchard Street
New York, NY 10002
Friday, April 12, 2013
Thomas Ruff: photograms and ma.r.s. @Zwirner: A Review Conversation with Richard B. Woodward
JTF (just the facts): A total of 22 large scale color photographs, framed in black and unmatted, and hung in two pairs of large divided rooms and two smaller transitional spaces. All of the works are chromogenic prints, made between 2010 and 2013. The photograms are sized 95x73 and are available in editions of 4. The images from the ma.r.s. series (including the 3D images) are sized 100x73 and are available in editions of 3. A small selection of vintage work can be found in a side gallery. (Installation shots at right.)
Comments/Context: It is altogether fitting that in the wake of the recent death of film critic Roger Ebert that today’s review of Thomas Ruff’s new show at David Zwirner should take the form of a back and forth exchange between two arts writers. The format Ebert perfected with his longtime partner Gene Siskel offers the freedom to actively (and sometimes aggressively) exchange ideas in a casual, approachable atmosphere, without getting mired in dumbed down platitudes and boring background description. While their face-offs were great for the movies, the direct discussion format is also a terrific match for a lively, open-ended conversation about contemporary art.
Last year, Richard B. Woodward and I talked through Alec Soth’s newest show at Sean Kelly Gallery (here), and when I saw the Ruff show appear on the forward calendar, I knew it wouldn’t fail to give us plenty of fodder for another wide-ranging discussion. As a reminder, Rick contributes regularly to the Wall Street Journal, where he covers major museum shows of photography all over the US. His crisp, well-argued essays can also be found in scores of photobooks and exhibit catalogues going back several decades.
Happily, Rick agreed to join me for a discussion once again, and graciously allowed me the first bite at the apple.
DLK: The work in this show can quite easily be divided into three discrete groups (photograms, Mars images, and 3D Mars images), so I propose that we take each in turn and cover them as individual projects before we jump up and talk about the connections between them. I have to say from the outset that I think Ruff’s photograms are nothing short of revolutionary. They innovate in radical ways on at least three different aesthetic axes: the unprecedented scale/size, the painterly use of color, and the creation of richly nuanced overlapping layers. Add to that the development of the underlying technical mechanisms that made it all possible, and we’ve absolutely traveled somewhere we’ve never been before.
What I think is fascinating is that Ruff has found a way to stay observant of the traditions of the genre while at the same time exploding its previous boundaries. Looking up at his massive works (and you have to look up given their scale), I could still see the remnants of Schad, Moholy-Nagy, and Man Ray, but their foundation ideas have been transformed into something modern and machined. Enlarged to roughly 8 by 6 feet, typical photogram ovals, swirls, and silhouettes take on different characteristics, the intimacy of hand-crafted darkroom experimentation and simple chance traded for bold, expansive gestures and increased compositional complexity. They’re truly immersive in a way utterly different than photograms have ever been before.
RBW: I hadn’t thought about them as revolutionary in terms of scale, but you’re right. All the previous examples by 19th century pioneers William Henry Fox Talbot and Anna Atkins, as well as the modernists you mention, are quite a lot smaller.
About your other claims, though, I’m more dubious. First of all, they’re not photograms in the traditional sense. Those were unique prints created by the laws of chance in a darkroom. These are multiples (limited to editions of 4) created inside a computer. His process allows for a degree of serendipity dictated by the algorithms of his software program. But I’m assuming he knows pretty much how the image will look on the screen before he hits “print.”
Yes, they’re suavely handsome. Their illusory depths are soothing, like watching translucent jellyfish in an aquarium or a giant lava lamp. But they are ultimately decorative and nothing more, the sorts of photographs that would look spectacular at night on the walls of a rotating restaurant high above a city or in a Richard Neutra house.
They’re just abstract photographs, not unlike what a dozen other photographers have done (including the recent work of James Welling, to name another Zwirner artist), and I don’t think he should be allowed to call them photograms when, by our usual definition, they’re not. What's more, they’re only big because digital printers now can handle huge amounts of information that Man Ray’s enlarger couldn’t.
DLK: I think you make a fair definitional point about the word photogram, but to discount their connection to the history of the genre and simply call them abstractions is overly dismissive. I see the works as deeply rooted in the visual vocabulary of the photogram process, but Ruff’s innovative computerized approach has opened up some degrees of freedom that weren’t previously available. We’ve already touched on the scale, but I think there are several more ideas embedded in the pictures that are worth kicking around.
The first is simply the idea of introducing color into these compositions and the quality of the color that Ruff has chosen to employ. The icons of this genre had no ability to use color (except cyanotype), so all the early works, those made between the wars, and even those made in the decades that followed were all constrained by the high contrast white on black palette (or the reversed positive). While some layering and transparency was possible, it wasn’t easy to collapse more than a couple layers without everything turning into a muddle. Fast forward to the present and we find artists like Walead Beshty bringing bold color into the mix. But to my eye, this type of color has a bright, machined saturation that is different than what Ruff has developed here. Ruff’s color billows and diffuses, minutely shifting and washing across his compositions. And the perceived distance between “front” and ”back” seems larger to me, so there is more area to traverse and filter through, more dimensional space for shadows and halos to wander. It’s a soft, hazy, diaphanous color, seemingly mysterious and painterly even though it is entirely digital.
The second point I would make is that I think there is a meaningful conceptual change going on here. Previous photograms draw some of their power from their existence as Duchampian readymades and the immediate physicality of their presence as objects. Ruff has moved away from that tangibility and the direct connection to identifiable forms; those “laws” have been broken now that we are in the digital realm, even though some visual echoes remain. Seeing these huge prints, I’m less focused on the physicality of the original items or worried about trying to identify the jaunty silhouette of a tea strainer, and more interested in how the shapes have been broken down and reconnected. Perhaps, as you say, we are simply talking about abstraction now, but I can’t help looking back to the old way of thinking and seeing just how much Ruff has disrupted our foundation assumptions.
RBW: I’m not dismissing them as photographs--the “billows and diffuses,” to quote from your apt description, are lushly handsome--I just don’t think they are what they claim to be. Unpredictability is part of the charm and risk of a photogram by Schad or Man Ray. They didn’t know what kind of shadows and forms would suggest when they assembled mismatched crap--bits of hair and a comb and thumbtacks and netting--on a piece of photographic paper and exposed it to light. They were making one-offs and, like automatic writing and other surrealist experiments, sometimes the surprise was so much more than anyone could have anticipated that the gamble paid off. And sometimes the results were so clotted or literal that they were thrown out.
Ruff isn’t making one-offs. They’re not unique photographs. His software does the work and when it produces a set of whirling shapes he likes, he stops the process and prints as many as he (or his dealer) wants. He’s using his computer as an optical printer, the way many filmmakers and videographers have done before him. The associations created by the unexpected collisions in a great Man Ray were often funny. Ruff’s “photograms” lack a sense of humor, and the chaos he harnesses is safer for being entirely virtual and situated in the realm of mathematical algorithms, not those of a three-dimensional world of objects acted upon by time and gravity.
I also don’t see his use of color as innovative either. Color was integrated into the abstract photographs of Moholy-Nagy in the 1930s and ‘40s and Henry Holmes Smith in the 1950s. I think what Penelope Umbrico and Marco Breuer have done with abstract color and computers is more interesting that what Ruff is doing with his software program.
Or maybe I'm being too fussy about terminology. Ruff’s photographs aren’t much different from Welling’s recent series Fluid Dynamics, which were also sold by Zwirner as photograms. Or the Gerhard Richters at Marian Goodman last fall, computer samples of his abstract paintings—which were printed on photographic paper and even more outrageously sold as unique “paintings”!
DLK: I absolutely agree with your point about the lack of humor in these Ruff photograms. The whole Dada photogram subgenre (and its randomly clever juxtapositions) has been forgotten here, as has the more general appearance of spontaneity and serendipity. But I think that’s OK. At least in my own mind, I haven’t come to terms with how to think about “algorithmic chance” or the idea that the software is recreating uncertainty. I think this is an area where the technology is likely far ahead of the viewer, and I need to get better educated about how digital photographers are implementing chance and what it looks like in the end product, so that I can identify real innovation more readily.
Let’s move on to the Mars landscapes. I use the word landscape with some hesitation, as I still haven’t exactly come to grips with the fuzzy line between fact and fiction Ruff is walking in these pictures. While he has begun with authentic NASA footage, his cropping, compressing, and coloration move the final results pretty far away from documentation in my mind. It reminds me of a discussion I was having with another writer who was troubled by Michael Benson’s recent space images, mostly because it seemed like they were too close to the scientific “truth” and that his original artistic input was less visible. In this case, I think it is clear that Ruff has used the Mars images as raw material for his own flights of fancy, and that we shouldn’t be confused about being somewhere “real”. That said, the windblown dunes, the tactile crater pocked expanses, and the sandy eroded washes are undeniably texturally seductive.
While space always has the potential to astonish, I have to admit to being a little underwhelmed by many of these photographs, even with their imposing, otherworldly presence. Ultimately, I think the intellectual questions Ruff is raising about the boundaries of the landscape genre and way artists can digitally interpret the land (or space) are much more interesting than the images themselves.
RBW: I much preferred the Mars landscapes so I guess we are fulfilling the tetchy Ebert-Siskel roles you invoked in your introduction. Ruff’s decision to make photographic works of art by rephotographing images of a place that no human being has visited and that we have seen only in photographs struck me as wonderfully perverse—smart and amusing.
Unlike the photograms, there are solid, if ghostly, referents here that his own artistic interpretations can play against. I saw the works as not only commenting on the new worlds we are exploring with cameras attached to wheeled and tractor vehicles and orbiting telescopes but a wry salute to the Internet itself, as a place where objects float around without boundaries and swim into our view without our having much control, like the objects that appear in the night sky.
Taken together, though, the photograms and the Mars landscapes have a lot of geometry in common—and that may be the point he is making and one that I was too grumpy or obtuse to recognize in my earlier posts. The two bodies of work reinforce each other. That said, don’t you think that the “real” images that the Rover has beamed back to us from the Red Planet offer more to ponder and decipher than Ruff’s pictures?
DLK: I like that connection you’re making between space and the Internet. There is a certain poetry to seeing the Internet in that way.
The conceptual connection I see between the two bodies of work is something akin to an ongoing (some might say relentless) investigation of machine seeing, or perhaps another way to think about it is an incremental deconstruction of photography. If you page back through Ruff’s career with the benefit of hindsight, it all starts to fit together as part of a larger pattern, at least to my eyes. The cropped starry skies, the newspaper rephotographs, the green night vision images, the composite face portraits, the pixelated porn nudes, the JPEGs, even the zycles, they’re all exercises in technology mediated vision, or images coming from somewhere else and becoming source material for further experimentation and technical manipulation. I think the new photograms and Mars images fit into that overarching logic as well, and of the two, I personally find the photograms much more daring.
Since we haven’t touched on them yet, I think a few words are in order on the 3D images. For me, these were the weakest works on view, mostly because they seemed the most literal and obvious, even though we haven’t seen many photographers embrace the technology yet. I won’t dispute that there is a gee whiz factor at work when seeing these vertiginous Martian craters and spires (get up close and it feels like you’re really falling in), but I worry that their power to surprise us will be severely diminished in a decade or two. They don’t seem as inherently smart as the others, but I appreciate that Ruff is taking risks with the new tools and trying to figure out what they can and can’t do. The images seem a little more like a work in progress, a necessary intermediate step, or a set of ideas that haven’t yet converged exactly, a little like the first round of candy colored space images (Cassini) that now seem like a preface to the Mars work. And who, by the way, keeps 3D glasses handy for home viewing? Without them, the 3D prints are a headache inducing blur.
RBW: I liked the 3D photographs of craters. They reminded me of flowers blooming on the bottom of the ocean—and hokey, like all 3D. The attempt by media conglomerates to sell us on 3D movies and TV feels like an act of desperation: the best, if panicky, solution they can devise for now to compete with free streaming content from the Internet. As you say, not many collectors are going to keep glasses around for their guests to admire 3D anything on their walls. It’s a losing technology, like stereography in the 19th century. You’re too young to remember but in the 1970s some critics and dealers thought that holograms were going to replace photography as the “next big thing.” We know how that turned out.
You’re right that Ruff’s interest in this technology and computer-generated abstraction is part of a pattern and dovetails with his fascination with other mediated imagery. He is a brainy, wayward artist and I like that about him. A previous show of his is never predictive of his next one. Zwirner has a small room that contains examples of four groups of pictures: a starry night sky, a portrait head, a building, and JPEG porn. They could be the work of four different photographers.
DLK: In general, I think my overall takeaway from this show is more positive than yours. I walked out of the gallery convinced that Ruff continues to be one of the most compelling and challenging artists working in contemporary photography, and one that we ignore at our peril. Even if I might quibble with the durability of some of his end results, the behind–the-scenes thinking that has gone into his projects is consistently smart and perceptive. His view point continues to evolve as he plays through different sourced imagery variations, getting more complex and nuanced as he dives deeper. More than many of his well-known contemporaries, he’s always testing limits, enlarging our understanding of the medium. Yes, he’s brainy, and brilliant, and sometimes inscrutably obtuse, but that’s what makes his work so important.
I think these new photograms continue to blur the line between photography and computer-based art, and I think we’re just at the beginning of that ongoing combination. Ruff is no dummy; he’s going where the largest unexplored white space is in photography, and he’s aggressively starting to map the territory.
RBW: I agree that his willingness to go in new directions and not to stay in a critically proven or popular style is admirable. But I’m not sure what “peril” we risk if we don’t honor everything he does and regard some of these directions as dead ends. His subjects change but the underlying message doesn’t. I don’t see any strong or unforeseen connections between Internet porn and outer space—except that he happened upon these images on the Internet. The JPEG nudes were big and boring and he seemed to think they would be less boring by making them big—a common mistake of our age. Artists who work with found imagery had better tell me something new and provocative about mediation other than the obvious point, reiterated constantly in postmodern theory, that we’re living in a time when pictures and text often originate from an unknown source and arrive on our screens without an author etc. etc. It may be unjust to club one German artist with another, but I find the material Thomas Demand finds on the Internet, and what he does with it, much more unexpected and obsessively crazy—in a good way—than what Ruff does with the stuff he fishes out of the water.
I don’t think Ruff has done anything as finished as those first huge portraits of young good-looking European men and women. They were simple head shots but the quality of detail and light gave them a quivering presence. I wanted to know what might happen to those kids in 10 years. The pictures weren’t about their own construction i.e. not like Chuck Close’s giant heads. Ruff himself seemed engaged by what he was photographing instead of out to prove how alienated we are from the source reality of pictures. He needs to get off his computer for a year or so and go play outdoors.
Incidentally, I first saw those portraits in the late ‘80s, when he was represented by 303. The gallery was then located in Soho and one of my strongest memories of that show was the hilariously snooty attitude of the young woman behind the desk. I asked her where the photographs were taken. Instead of telling me that she didn’t know, she decided to put me in my place and in that blasé voice that New York and L.A. gallery assistants wield to intimidate visitors, she said, “I don’t think it matters.”
Is it any wonder that so many people loathe and fear the art world? Thank goodness, people who work in galleries seem generally friendlier today—at least they are at Zwirner. That’s been one of the few benefits of the recession and the growth of art fairs: galleries need us to stop by and keep them company.
Speaking of company, I’ve enjoyed yours, if only online. We should meet up soon at a bar in Chelsea and resume the conversation in person.
Collector's POV: The prints in this show (both the photograms and the images from the ma.r.s. series) are priced at $95000 each. Ruff's work has become consistently available in the secondary markets in the past decade, with plenty of prints up for sale in any given auction season. Prices have generally ranged from roughly $2000 (lesser known early works or large editions) to $150000.
Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)
Transit Hub:
Thomas Ruff: photograms and ma.r.s
Through April 27th
525 West 19th Street
New York, NY 10011
Thursday, April 11, 2013
2013 Guggenheim Fellows in Photography
Here's the short list of this year's Guggenheim Fellowship winners in Photography, found in a full page ad in this morning's New York Times. The entire list of current fellows can be found on the foundation website (here). Lots of familiar names this year.
CREATIVE ARTS
Photography
Scott Conarroe (here)
Bruce Gilden (here)
Sharon Harper (here)
Michael Kolster (here)
Deana Lawson (here)
Deborah Luster (here)
Christian Patterson (here)
Gary Schneider (here)
Mike Sinclair (here)
Alec Soth (here)
Valerio Spada (here)
HUMANITIES
Photography Studies
Michael Lesy (here)
CREATIVE ARTS
Photography
Scott Conarroe (here)
Bruce Gilden (here)
Sharon Harper (here)
Michael Kolster (here)
Deana Lawson (here)
Deborah Luster (here)
Christian Patterson (here)
Gary Schneider (here)
Mike Sinclair (here)
Alec Soth (here)
Valerio Spada (here)
HUMANITIES
Photography Studies
Michael Lesy (here)
The Checklist: 4/11/13
Current New York Photography Shows
New reviews added this week in red.
(Rating: Artist/Title: Venue: Closing Date: link to review)
Uptown
ONE STAR: After Photoshop: Met: May 27: review
TWO STARS: William Eggleston: Met: July 28: review
Midtown
ONE STAR: Peter Hujar: Pace/MacGill: April 20: review
TWO STARS: The Shaping of New Visions: MoMA: April 21: review
ONE STAR: William Klein: Howard Greenberg: April 27: review
ONE STAR: David (Chim) Seymour: ICP: May 5: review
THREE STARS: Roman Vishniac: ICP: May 5: review
Chelsea
ONE STAR: Nicolai Howalt and Trine Søndergaard: Bruce Silverstein: April 13: review
TWO STARS: Luigi Ghirri: Matthew Marks: April 20: review
THREE STARS: Enrique Metinides: Aperture: April 20: review
ONE STAR: Daido Moriyama: Steven Kasher: May 4: review
SoHo/Lower East Side/Downtown
No reviews at this time.
Elsewhere Nearby
No reviews at this time.
Forward Auction Calendar
New auctions added this week in red.
(Sale Date: Sale Title: Auction House: link to catalog)
March 29-April 12: Photographs of Diane Arbus: Christie's (Online): catalog
April 11: Under the Influence: Phillips (London): catalog
April 18: Fine Photographs & Photobooks: Swann (New York): catalog
May 7: Photographs: Bonhams (New York): catalog
New reviews added this week in red.
(Rating: Artist/Title: Venue: Closing Date: link to review)
Uptown
ONE STAR: After Photoshop: Met: May 27: review
TWO STARS: William Eggleston: Met: July 28: review
Midtown
ONE STAR: Peter Hujar: Pace/MacGill: April 20: review
TWO STARS: The Shaping of New Visions: MoMA: April 21: review
ONE STAR: William Klein: Howard Greenberg: April 27: review
ONE STAR: David (Chim) Seymour: ICP: May 5: review
THREE STARS: Roman Vishniac: ICP: May 5: review
Chelsea
ONE STAR: Nicolai Howalt and Trine Søndergaard: Bruce Silverstein: April 13: review
TWO STARS: Luigi Ghirri: Matthew Marks: April 20: review
THREE STARS: Enrique Metinides: Aperture: April 20: review
ONE STAR: Daido Moriyama: Steven Kasher: May 4: review
SoHo/Lower East Side/Downtown
No reviews at this time.
Elsewhere Nearby
No reviews at this time.
Forward Auction Calendar
New auctions added this week in red.
(Sale Date: Sale Title: Auction House: link to catalog)
March 29-April 12: Photographs of Diane Arbus: Christie's (Online): catalog
April 11: Under the Influence: Phillips (London): catalog
April 18: Fine Photographs & Photobooks: Swann (New York): catalog
May 7: Photographs: Bonhams (New York): catalog
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Auction: Under the Influence, April 11, 2013 @Phillips London
Phillips' Under the Influence sale tomorrow in London has a selection of mid range photographs worth a quick look. Overall, there are a total of 41 lots of photography available in the sale, with a Total High Estimate for photography of £318000.Here's the statistical breakdown:
Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including £5000): 11
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): £51000
Total Mid Lots (high estimate between £5000 and £25000): 30
Total Mid Estimate: £267000
Total High Lots (high estimate above £25000): 0Total High Estimate: NA
The top photography lot by High estimate is lot 122, Jitish Kallat, Cenotaph (A Deed of Transfer), 2007, at £18000-25000. (Image at right, top, via Phillips.)
Here is the short list of the photographers who are represented by three or more lots in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):
Kim Joon (3)
Vik Muniz (3)
Youssef Nabil (3)
The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.
Under the Influence
April 11th
Phillips
Howick Place
London SW1P 1BB
Daido Moriyama: Now and Now @Kasher
JTF (just the facts): A total of 59 black and white and color photographs, variously framed and matted, and hung against white walls in the North and South gallery spaces and the side alcove. The exhibit also includes 7 silkscreen paintings on canvas and a glass case containing a selection of Moriyama's photobooks. Most of the photographs on view are arranged into three contiguous bands of images, hung edge to edge and pinned directly to the wall, unframed but under plexiglas. There are 2 sets of black and white works and 1 set of color works. The black and white images are a mix of gelatin silver and archival pigment prints, all made recently from negatives taken between 1971 and 2011. The color images are all archival pigment prints, made recently from negatives taken in 2010 and 2011. Print sizes for all three sets are either roughly 17x13 or 17x22. The exhibit also includes 4 larger archival pigment prints, ranging in size from 22x33 to 41x55. The alcove holds a selection of earlier Moriyama favorites, all gelatin silver prints made recently from negatives taken between 1969 and 2001. Moriyama doesn't edition his prints, so there is no edition information available for any of the photographic works on view. The silkscreen paintings were made between 2007 and 2012; they range in size from 43x54 to 43x65 and are available in editions of 3 or 5. (Installation shots at right.)
The darkness in Moriyama's images gives the impression that we are traveling through the underbelly of life, so when his eye catches on something and brings it into brightness, it's hard not to be captivated. A tanned back in a shining dress, a blurred baby's face, a feral kitten, a pair of eyes on a TV screen, the edge of a truck tire, they all draw your attention with muscular roughness. Whether its a girl on the side of a bus in Taipei, lingerie in a window in Italy, sunglassed women in LA, or a tangle of overhead wires in Osaka, Moriyama has a knack for sifting cultural signifiers through his own filter, finding the eclectic and the universal in equal measure. There is a noticeable rhythm to these series, with beggars and street sleepers sharing the same space with shining skyscrapers and glorious city lights, a swaying from high to low and back again. His color sequence of Times Square, an alligator, an up-close doll's face, a bloody Christian Louboutin shoe, a nude Japanese stripper, and a bunch of yellow irises mixes seemingly disconnected moments into a surreal summary of modern life, altogether familiar but vaguely unsettling.
The back gallery shows another new body of work - silkscreened Warholian enlargements of some of Moriyama's most famous images. Given their graphic power, the menacing dog, the abstracted tights, and the extra large lips all function effectively in this medium, and the tiny bit of sparkle in the grey paint adds a dose of glamour to Brigitte Bardot posed on a motorcycle. That said, these images are aimed at a different person than a photography collector, and I couldn't help but come away with a bit of a feeling that some of his most iconic images were undergoing a poster shop style dilution.All in, this show does a solid job of presenting Moriyama's newest work while also providing some background and context to help trace his ongoing artistic evolution. It's clear that his eye continues to be restlessly original, turning increasingly broad and varied subject matter into a brash, uneasy meditation on 21st century urban existence.
Collector's POV: While many of the works on view are shown in carefully sequenced series, all of the images are available as individual prints. The photographs in the three series are either $4000 or $5000 each. The handful of larger photographs are either $7500 or $10000, based on size. The gelatin silver prints in the alcove are all $6800 each. And the silkscreen paintings range from $13000 to $25000. Moriyama's work has become more available in the secondary markets in the past year or two. Recent prices have ranged between $2000 and $40000.Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)
Transit Hub:
Through May 4th
Steven Kasher Gallery
521 West 23rd Street
New York, NY 10011
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Auction Results: Photographs, April 6, 2013 @Sotheby's New York
The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 239
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $4546000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $6946000
Total Lots Sold: 182
Total Lots Bought In: 57
Buy In %: 23.85%
Total Sale Proceeds: $5061190
Low Total Lots: 97
Low Sold: 71
Low Bought In: 26
Buy In %: 26.80%
Total Low Estimate: $705000
Total Low Sold: $530315
Mid Total Lots: 117
Mid Sold: 94
Mid Bought In: 23
Buy In %: 19.66%
Total Mid Estimate: $2871000
Total Mid Sold: $2592625
High Total Lots: 25
High Sold: 17
High Bought In: 8
Buy In %: 32.00%
Total High Estimate: $3370000
Total High Sold: $1938250
The top lot by High estimate was lot 165, Man Ray, Calla Lilies, 1931, estimated at $300000-500000; it did not sell. The top outcome of the sale was lot 151, Robert Frank, New Orleans (Trolley), 1955/1972, estimated at $200000-250000, sold at $293000.
84.07% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above the estimate range. There were a total of 9 surprises in the sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):Lot 17, Anonymous American Photographer, Three Men Smoking, 1840s, estimated at $5000-10000, sold at $23750
Lot 36, Paul Strand, Photographs of Mexico, 1932-1933/1940, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $37500
Lot 38, Laura Gilpin, Selected Studies, 1925-1937, estimated at $5000-7000, sold at $16250
Lot 72, Minor White, Selected Images, 1957-1960/1970, estimated at $3000-5000, sold at $10000
Lot 80, Various Photographers, Select Portraits and Landscapes, 1860-1930, estimated at $500-1000, sold at $3125
Lot 121, Robert Frank, Tesuque, NM (Santa Fe), 1955/later, estimated at $25000-35000, sold at $137000 (image at right, top, via Sotheby's)
Lot 173, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Untitled (Positive Photogram), 1925-1928, estimated at $30000-50000, sold at $185000(image at right, middle, via Sotheby's)
Lot 224, Francesca Woodman, Untitled, Self-Portrait, Providence, Rhode Island, 1975-1976, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $68750 (image at right, bottom, via Sotheby's)
Lot 225, Francesca Woodman, Untitled, Providence, Rhode Island, 1975-1976, estimated at $8000-12000, sold at $37500
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Sotheby's
1334 York Avenue
New York, NY 10021
Auction Results: The Modern Image, Photographs from an Important American Collection, April 5, 2013 @Sotheby's New York
The results from this single owner sale at Sotheby's last week are proof that if the overall Buy-In rate can be kept low, even if prices aren't particularly frothy, the Total Sale Proceeds will likely come in in an acceptable range. Roughly 35% of the lots that sold in this auction found buyers below their pre-sale estimates, but with a Buy-In rate of just under 17%, the aggregate proceeds fell right in the middle of the range. The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 59
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $1943000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $2950000
Total Lots Sold: 49
Total Lots Bought In: 10
Buy In %: 16.95%
Total Sale Proceeds: $2544376
Low Total Lots: 21
Low Sold: 16
Low Bought In: 5
Buy In %: 23.81%
Total Low Estimate: $181000
Total Low Sold: $156875
Mid Total Lots: 25
Mid Sold: 21
Mid Bought In: 4
Buy In %: 16.00%
Total Mid Estimate: $598000
Total Mid Sold: $487126
High Total Lots: 13
High Sold: 12
High Bought In: 1
Buy In %: 7.69%
Total High Estimate: $2180000
Total High Sold: $1909375
The top lot by High estimate was lot 18, Edward Weston, Two Shells, 1927, estimated at $600000-900000; it was also the top outcome of the sale at $533000.
Lot 16, Edward Steichen, Anna May Wong, 1930, estimated at $7000-10000, sold at $25000
Lot 17, Edward Steichen, Douglass Lighters (for J. Walter Thompson), 1926, estimated at $40000-60000, sold at $203000 (image at right, top, via Sotheby's)
Lot 28, Walker Evans, Defensa Carniceria, Havana, 1933, estimated at $6000-9000, sold at $20000 (image at right, bottom, via Sotheby's)
Lot 55, Irving Penn, Nude Torso, Soaping, New York, 1978/1992, estimated at $15000-25000, sold at $59375 (image at right, middle, via Sotheby's)
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Sotheby's
1334 York Avenue
New York, NY 10021
Auction Results: Photographs, April 5, 2013 @Christie's New York
Christie's various owner Photographs sale blew past its pre-sale aggregate High estimate, bringing in an extra $700K in proceeds for good measure. To complete the broad-based success, the overall Buy-In rate was low (just over 15%) and there were lots of positive surprises.The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 204
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $4303000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $6512000
Total Lots Sold: 172
Total Lots Bought In: 32
Buy In %: 15.69%
Total Sale Proceeds: $7245375
Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):
Low Total Lots: 43
Low Sold: 35
Low Bought In: 8
Buy In %: 18.60%
Total Low Estimate: $333000
Total Low Sold: $343250
Mid Total Lots: 140
Mid Sold: 119
Mid Bought In: 21
Buy In %: 15.00%
Total Mid Estimate: $3169000
Total Mid Sold: $3094625
High Total Lots: 21
High Sold: 18
High Bought In: 3
Buy In %: 14.29%
Total High Estimate: $3010000
Total High Sold: $3807500
The top lot by High estimate was lot 251, Robert Frank, Trolley-New Orleans, 1955, estimated at $400000-600000; it was also the top outcome of the sale at $663750
Lot 104, Hiroshi Sugimoto, UA Playhouse, Great Neck, NY, 1978, estimated at $20000-30000, sold at $62500
Lot 105, Lewis Baltz, Corona del Mar, 1971, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $30000
Lot 113, Peter Beard, Orphaned Cheetahs, Kenya, from The End of the Game, 1968/later, estimated at $40000-60000, sold at $183750
Lot 114, Irving Penn, Ginko Leaves, New York, 1990/1992, estimated at $80000-120000, sold at $363750 (image at right, middle, via Christie's)
Lot 115, Ansel Adams, Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958/1958-1962, estimated at $100000-150000, sold at $423750 (image at right, top, via Christie's)
Lot 126, William Klein, Atom Bomb Sky, New York, 1955/later, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $20000
Lot 133, Steve McCurry, Afghan Girl, 1984/later, estimated at $4000-6000, sold at $17500
Lot 136, Erwin Blumenfeld, Dictator, Paris, 1937/1940s, estimated at $30000-50000, sold at $111750
Lot 157, Minor White, Two Barns, Dansville, New York, 1955, estimated at $8000-12000, sold at $25000
Lot 165, Edward Weston, Mexico (Tina on the Azotea), 1924, estimated at $100000-150000, sold at $363750
Lot 175, Francesca Woodman, Untitled, Rome, 1977-1978, estimated at $15000-25000, sold at $117750 (image at right, bottom, via Christie's)
Lot 176, Francesca Woodman, Untitled, Providence, RI, 1975-1978, estimated at $20000-30000, sold at $105750
Lot 191, Helmut Newton, Charlotte Rampling, Portrait, Arles, France, 1973/1982, estimated at $20000-30000, sold at $68750
Lot 209, Edward Weston, Charis, 1934, estimated at $8000-12000, sold at $27500
Lot 229, W. Tom Young, Bill with Camera, New Orleans, 1987, estimated at $3000-5000, sold at $12500
Lot 247, William Eggleston, Untitled (Memphis), 1971/1999, estimated at $80000-120000, sold at $279750
Lot 268, Nan Goldin, Cookie at Tin Pan Alley, NYC, 1983, estimated at $4000-6000, sold at $22500
Lot 303, Ansel Adams, Ice on Ellery Lake, Sierra Nevada, California, 1959/1979, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $25000
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Christie's
20 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10020
Auction Results: The Delighted Eye, Modernist Masterworks from a Private Collection @Christie's New York
Led by a new world record price for Man Ray (at $1203750), the proceeds from Christie's single owner Carlos Cruz sale last week easily covered the aggregate High estimate. While the Buy-In rate was likely a bit higher than expected given the quality and rarity of the material on offer, it would be hard not to be satisfied with such a robust overall outcome.The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 71
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $5069000
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $7564000
Total Lots Sold: 54
Total Lots Bought In: 17
Buy In %: 23.94%
Total Sale Proceeds: $7654125
Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):
Low Total Lots: 2
Low Sold: 2
Low Bought In: 0
Buy In %: 0.00%
Total Low Estimate: $16000
Total Low Sold: $18750
Mid Total Lots: 32
Mid Sold: 22
Mid Bought In: 10
Buy In %: 31.25%
Total Mid Estimate: $868000
Total Mid Sold: $723125
High Total Lots: 37
High Sold: 30
High Bought In: 7
Buy In %: 18.92%
Total High Estimate: $6680000
Total High Sold: $6912250
The top lot by High estimate was lot 7, Edward Weston, Nude, 1925, estimated at $400000-600000; it sold for $483750. The top outcome of the sale was lot 17, Man Ray, Untitled Rayograph, 1922, estimated at $250000-350000, sold at $1203750 (image at right, top, via Christie's).
88.89% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above the estimate range. There were a total of 6 surprises in the sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):Lot 17, Man Ray, Untitled Rayograph, 1922, estimated at $250000-350000, sold at $1203750
Lot 35, Man Ray, Untitled, Cannes, 1924, estimated at $80000-120000, sold at $387750 (image at right, bottom, via Christie's)
Lot 36, Fortunato Depero, Message with Self Portraits, 1915, estimated at $50000-70000, sold at $159750
Lot 52, Georg Muche, Reflections in a Sphere, 1924, estimated at $15000-25000, sold at $75000
Lot 54, Paul Strand, Akeley Motion Picture Camera, New York, 1922, estimated at $250000-350000, sold at $783750 (image at right, middle, via Christie's)
Lot 58, Ludwig Hirschfeld-Mack, Reflected Light Composition, 1923, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $46250
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Christie's
20 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10020
Auction Results: Photographs, April 3, 2013 @Phillips New York
Phillips' follow up various owner Photographs sale last week performed nearly as well its earlier single owner sale. The overall Buy-In rate was just over 15% and the Total Sale Proceeds once again came close to the High estimate.The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 141
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $2411500
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $3527500
Total Lots Sold: 118
Total Lots Bought In: 23
Buy In %: 16.31%
Total Sale Proceeds: $3307375
Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):
Low Total Lots: 37
Low Sold: 28
Low Bought In: 9
Buy In %: 24.32%
Total Low Estimate: $244500
Total Low Sold: $230875
Mid Total Lots: 91Mid Sold: 78
Mid Bought In: 13
Buy In %: 14.29%
Total Mid Estimate: $2073000
Total Mid Sold: $1847000
High Total Lots: 13
High Sold: 12
High Bought In: 1
Buy In %: 7.69%
Total High Estimate: $1210000
Total High Sold: $1229500
The top lot by High estimate was lot 177, Edward Steichen, Diagram of Doom - 2, c1922, estimated at $120000-180000; it sold for $122500. The top outcome of the sale was lot 291, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Joe #2134, 2004, estimated at $60000-80000, sold at $170500 (image at right, top, via Phillips).
97.46% of the lots that sold had proceeds in or above the estimate range. There were a total of 6 surprises in the sale (defined as having proceeds of at least double the high estimate):Lot 224, William Eggleston, East Memphis, 1972/1985, estimated at $8000-12000, sold at $30000
Lot 239, Helmut Newton, Shoe, Monte Carlo, 1983, estimated at $8000-12000, sold at $30000
Lot 246, Peter Beard, Cheetah cubs orphaned at Mweiga nr. Nyeri for The End of the Game, 1968/later, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $32500
Lot 291, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Joe #2134, 2004, estimated at $60000-80000, sold at $170500
Lot 297, Gabriel Orozco, Shower Head, 2008, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $25000 (image at right, middle, via Phillips)
Lot 306, Loretta Lux, Study of a Boy, 2002, estimated at $5000-7000, sold at $16250 (image at right, bottom, via Phillips)
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Phillips
450 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10022
Auction Results: Important Photographs from the Collection of Dr. Anthony Terrana, April 2 and 3, 2013 @Phillips New York
Phillips can certainly be pleased with the outcome of the Anthony Terrana single owner photographs sale. Interest was strong across all three price levels, the overall Buy-In rate hovered near 15%, and the Total Sale Proceeds nearly reached the High estimate, powered by a solid number of positive surprises.The summary statistics are below (all results include the buyer’s premium):
Total Lots: 165
Pre Sale Low Total Estimate: $3718500
Pre Sale High Total Estimate: $5400000
Total Lots Sold: 140
Total Lots Bought In: 25
Buy In %: 15.15%
Total Sale Proceeds: $5053750
Here is the breakdown (using the Low, Mid, and High definitions from the preview post, here):
Low Total Lots: 78
Low Sold: 72
Low Bought In: 6
Buy In %: 7.69%
Total Low Estimate: $533000
Total Low Sold: $677625
Mid Total Lots: 64Mid Sold: 50
Mid Bought In: 14
Buy In %: 21.88%
Total Mid Estimate: $1452000
Total Mid Sold: $1348125
High Total Lots: 23
High Sold: 18
High Bought In: 5
Buy In %: 21.74%
Total High Estimate: $3415000
Total High Sold: $3028000
The top lot by High estimate was tied between lot 12, Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, 1919 (image at right, top, via Phillips), and lot 19, Irving Penn, Harlequin Dress (Lisa Fonssagrives-Penn), 1950, both estimated at $300000-500000. The Stieglitz sold for $302500 and the Penn sold for $290500. The top outcome of the sale was lot 28, Diane Arbus, Identical Twins Cathleen and Colleen, Roselle, NJ, 1967, estimated at $180000-220000, sold at $602500 (image at right, top, via Phillips).
Lot 3, Francesca Woodman, Untitled, Providence, Rhode Island, 1975-1978, estimated at $25000-35000, sold at $86500
Lot 7, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Lyon Stadium, 1929. estimated at $90000-120000, sold at $278500
Lot 18, Herb Ritts, Versace Dress, Back View, El Mirage, 1990, estimated at $20000-30000, sold at $68500
Lot 20, Robert Polidori, Galerie Basse, Chateau de Versailles, 1985, estimated at $18000-22000, sold at $45000
Lot 28, Diane Arbus, Identical Twins Cathleen and Colleen, Roselle, NJ, 1967, estimated at $180000-220000, sold at $602500
Lot 29, Angela Strassheim, Untitled (Father & Son), 2004, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $35000
Lot 137, Pieter Hugo, Abdullahi Mohammed with Mainsara, Ogere-Remo, Nigeria, from Gadawan Kura, The Hyena Men II, 2007, estimated at $10000-15000, sold at $40000
Lot 41, Martine Franck, Children's Library Built by the Atelier Montrouge, Clamart, France, 1965/later, estimated at $2000-3000, sold at $6875
Lot 45, Lewis Hine, Tenement Product, Chicago, 1907/1920s, estimated at $6000-8000, sold at $52500 (image at right, middle, via Phillips)
Lot 67, Edward Steichen, The Flatiron Evening, 1905, estimated at $5000-7000, sold at $23750
Lot 98, Masao Yamamoto, Selected images from A Box of Ku and Nakazora, 1990-2002, estimated at $6000-8000, sold at $18750
Lot 101, Lynn Davis, Red Pyramid, Dashur, Cairo, Egypt, 1997, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $20000
Lot 108, Nobuyoshi Araki, Untitled, 1990-2000, estimated at $3000-4000, sold at $11250
Lot 114, Sally Mann, Untitled from Deep South, 1998, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $26250
Lot 130, Ryan McGinley, Whirlwind, 2003, estimated at $5000-7000, sold at $15000
Lot 140, Mickalene Thomas, Afro Goddess Lover's Friend, 2006, estimated at $8000-10000, sold at $23750
Lot 158, Alex Prager, Annie, 2007, estimated at $5000-7000, sold at $30000 (image at right, bottom, via Phillips)
Lot 159, Alex Prager, Wendy from Week-End, 2009, estimated at $7000-9000, sold at $21875
Complete lot by lot results can be found here.
Phillips
450 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10022
Monday, April 8, 2013
Luigi Ghirri, Kodachrome @Marks
JTF (just the facts): A total of 25 color photographs, framed in silver and matted, and hung against white walls in the single room gallery space. All of the works are either vintage c-prints or vintage cibachrome prints, taken between 1971 and 1977. Physical dimensions range from roughly 4x6 to 18x12 (or reverse); no edition information was available. MACK Books published a second edition of Ghirri's 1978 monograph Kodachrome in 2012 (here). The show is sequenced to match the order in the book. (Installation shots at right.)
Comments/Context: In the years that have followed the recent rediscovery of the work of Luigi Ghirri, there has been a strong tendency to try to understand him in the context of Eggleston, Sternfeld, and Shore and 1970s American color. His work was made in color (check), his work was made in the 1970s (check), at first glance, his work has the appearance of a snapshot aesthetic (check), therefore, he's the "Italian Eggleston". But having spent time with this exhibit and the associated reissued monograph, I've come to the conclusion that such a categorization is both overly easy and ultimately misguided. As we see and digest more of his work, his vision seems increasingly innovative and original, with more logical ties to European Surrealism than to anything happening in American photography.
The works in this exhibit come from Ghirri's first self published book, and the photographs are full of visual dislocation and wry disorientation. Compositions are often interrupted, with a vertical board bisecting a beach view, a cross shaped window pane quartering the gardens at Versailles, and a dark shadow falling directly across a framed picture. Other works play with subtle optical illusions and the flattening of perspective, almost with conceptual glee: a perfectly straight contrail in the sky connecting the two sides of a mountain valley, the curve of a man's face echoed by the arc of a souvenir Eiffel Tower, and two men sitting on the corner of a gravel roof, its dark edges receding with mirrored precision. Many images have a constructed, collage-like aesthetic, combining painted murals and found cut outs with tourists walking by and bored couples, creating juxtapositions that are unexpected and often absurd or mysterious. While a few images are inherently about photographic color (the blown pink beach umbrella, the glow of foggy red traffic lights, the wall painted half yellow half blue), most of Ghirri's pictures seem less about color itself and more about a specific way of seeing. Time and again, he confounds your expectations (using his own understated brand of Dada), making photographs of the frames not the paintings, or the postcards not the sunset itself. 
I thoroughly enjoyed Ghirri's sense of visual wit, his images carefully composed to make everyday Italian reality seem altogether more surreal and odd. He never crosses the line into heavy handed trickery, staying instead within the confines of the quietly poetic and the unassumingly puzzling. In the end, his pictures are consistently smart, comforting us with their familiar subject matter and then upending our sense of balance with their deft surprises.
Collector's POV: The works in this show are priced between $12000 and $20000, based on size. Ghirri's prints have only been sporadically available in the secondary markets in recent years, with prices ranging from roughly $1000 to $34000.
Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)
Transit Hub:- Features/Reviews: American Suburb X (here), LPV Magazine (here), New Yorker (here), NY Times (here), Gallerist NY (here)
Through April 20th
526 West 22nd Street
New York, NY 10011
Friday, April 5, 2013
Every Booth at the 2013 AIPAD Photography Show, Part 6 of 6
Start here for Part 1 of this series. It provides some background and explanation for what's going on in these lists.
Andrea Meislin Gallery (here): Angela Strassheim, $12000. Strassheim has recently joined the stable at the gallery. This image of a young girl cocooned in her interior lit blanket fort is wonderfully protected and vulnerable.
Vision Neil Folberg Gallery (here): Georg Kuettinger, $11000. A massive broad landscape of stitched together tire swipes.
Richard Moore Photographs (here): Johan Hagemeyer, $12000. Another lesser known but worthy Modernist, represented by a well crafted image of city buildings.
Keith De Lellis Gallery (here): Margaret Bourke-White, $18000. I think of 1930 as near the beginning of Bourke-White's professional career, so it was exciting to see this early shimmering airplane hangar study from that year.
Joel Soroka Gallery (here): Gyorgy Kepes, $8000. I had no idea Gyorgy Kepes made any works past the late 1940s, so it is was a total shock to see a group of large scale 1980s Polaroid still life constructions (in color no less) in this booth.
Halsted Gallery (here): Julia Margaret Cameron, $11500. Another ethereal Cameron portrait, very reasonably priced given its quality (refreshingly the norm with the friendly Halsteds).
PPOW (here): David Wojnarowicz, $25000. Vintage prints from Wojnarowicz' Arthur Rimbaud in New York series are pretty rare, so this gem is worth seeking out.
Higher Pictures (here): K8 Hardy, $8000. This booth was a solo show of Hardy's Position series, mixing photograms and self-portraits into arresting hybrids. I was able to flip through the full body of work (in a box on the table) and I came away extremely impressed by Hardy's originality and range. This particular image reminded me of Claude Cahun, but in a harsher and distinctly modern guise.
Stephen Daiter Gallery (here): Harry Callahan, $60000. This image just left me shaking my head in awe. What an astounding, astonishing photograph. Stunning is an overused word in art writing, but this one left me slack-jawed and truly stunned by its brilliance.
Nailya Alexander Gallery (here): Pentti Sammallahti, $1100. I liked the gentle, natural balance in this image, the cross of the broken tree limb and the flanking silhouettes of small birds.
Danziger Gallery (here): Susan Derges, $15000. I've always been a fan of Susan Derges' River Taw photograms, so I'm intrigued to see her returning to similar subject matter, albeit now using digital technologies.
Bruce Silverstein Gallery (here): Jaromir Funke, $175000. This was one of the most impressive prints I saw in the entire fair. Cut paper folds intertwined like staircases, a symphony in subtle white.
Hans P. Kraus Jr. Inc. (here): William Henry Fox Talbot, POR. What better way to end this summary than by going back to the beginning with a lovely plant photogram by William Henry Fox Talbot. Even when we bustle and rush to find the next new thing in photography, it's important to be reminded that the very old still has the power to take our breath away.
Andrea Meislin Gallery (here): Angela Strassheim, $12000. Strassheim has recently joined the stable at the gallery. This image of a young girl cocooned in her interior lit blanket fort is wonderfully protected and vulnerable.
Vision Neil Folberg Gallery (here): Georg Kuettinger, $11000. A massive broad landscape of stitched together tire swipes.
Richard Moore Photographs (here): Johan Hagemeyer, $12000. Another lesser known but worthy Modernist, represented by a well crafted image of city buildings.
Keith De Lellis Gallery (here): Margaret Bourke-White, $18000. I think of 1930 as near the beginning of Bourke-White's professional career, so it was exciting to see this early shimmering airplane hangar study from that year.
Joel Soroka Gallery (here): Gyorgy Kepes, $8000. I had no idea Gyorgy Kepes made any works past the late 1940s, so it is was a total shock to see a group of large scale 1980s Polaroid still life constructions (in color no less) in this booth.
Halsted Gallery (here): Julia Margaret Cameron, $11500. Another ethereal Cameron portrait, very reasonably priced given its quality (refreshingly the norm with the friendly Halsteds).
PPOW (here): David Wojnarowicz, $25000. Vintage prints from Wojnarowicz' Arthur Rimbaud in New York series are pretty rare, so this gem is worth seeking out.
Higher Pictures (here): K8 Hardy, $8000. This booth was a solo show of Hardy's Position series, mixing photograms and self-portraits into arresting hybrids. I was able to flip through the full body of work (in a box on the table) and I came away extremely impressed by Hardy's originality and range. This particular image reminded me of Claude Cahun, but in a harsher and distinctly modern guise.
Stephen Daiter Gallery (here): Harry Callahan, $60000. This image just left me shaking my head in awe. What an astounding, astonishing photograph. Stunning is an overused word in art writing, but this one left me slack-jawed and truly stunned by its brilliance.
Nailya Alexander Gallery (here): Pentti Sammallahti, $1100. I liked the gentle, natural balance in this image, the cross of the broken tree limb and the flanking silhouettes of small birds.
Danziger Gallery (here): Susan Derges, $15000. I've always been a fan of Susan Derges' River Taw photograms, so I'm intrigued to see her returning to similar subject matter, albeit now using digital technologies.
Bruce Silverstein Gallery (here): Jaromir Funke, $175000. This was one of the most impressive prints I saw in the entire fair. Cut paper folds intertwined like staircases, a symphony in subtle white.
Hans P. Kraus Jr. Inc. (here): William Henry Fox Talbot, POR. What better way to end this summary than by going back to the beginning with a lovely plant photogram by William Henry Fox Talbot. Even when we bustle and rush to find the next new thing in photography, it's important to be reminded that the very old still has the power to take our breath away.
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