Photography in the 2013 Frieze New York Art Fair, Part 2 of 5

Part 1 of this five-part Frieze report can be found here. Start there for introductory background and explanatory notes.

Miguel Abreu Gallery (here): Eileen Quinlan, $15000. This is a pulsating, attention grabbing color study - the shiny material of the woven rubber yoga mat picks up tiny reflections, dotting the electric yellow green with flecks of textured red.

Andrew Kreps Gallery (here): Roe Ethridge, $16000. There's something unexpectedly off about these red tennis tights (the racquet seems overly big as well). It's an eye-catching example of Ethridge's mix of commercial and fine art aesthetics working together to produce something puzzlingly compelling.

Frith Street Gallery (here): Dayanita Singh, $19400. This work is actually three, housed in a custom wood box with interchangeable slots. The overflowing piles of ledgers are documented in all three images, giving the entire work a richer resonance.

Stuart Shave/Modern Art (here): Linder, £15000. A simple image intervention interrupts this self-portrait, creating a jarring hybrid face..

Maureen Paley (here): Gillian Wearing, £35000. Another in Wearing's ongoing series of self-portraits in the guise of famous photographers, this time peering out from the face of Weegee.

Salon 94 (here): Katy Grannan, $14000. This booth had a powerful wall to wall installation of images from Katy Grannan's new 99 series. Taken along California's Route 99 and set against blistering, eye squinting white backgrounds, the images get close up to a parade of weathered faces and forgotten lives. They recall Dorothea Lange and Richard Avedon's In the American West, mixing unflinching harshness and quiet authenticity.

Cheim & Read (here): Adam Fuss, $60000. While I had seen this same mattress covered with a tangle of writhing black snakes in Fuss' last gallery show, I hadn't seen the snakes replaced by a black female mannequin before; it adds another detail to Fuss' garden/Eve story.

Sean Kelly Gallery (here): James Casebere, $45000. Casebere's picture perfect stage set world given a darker, worn out alter ego, with a moss covered rooftop, a broken fence, and a landscape of barren, lifeless trees.

Galerie Krinzinger (here): Otto Muehl, complete portfolio €150000. This booth was dominated by an edge to edge hanging of images documenting 10 different actions/performances by Muehl - Viennese Actionism captured in raw, transgressive, experimental brashness.

Massimo Minini (here): Luigi Ghirri, $12000. A street scene through an ice cream store window, seen with Ghirri's subtly surreal playfulness.

Continue to Part 3 here.

Auction: Photographs, May 8, 2013 @Phillips London

The spring auction season in London gets going next week, starting with Phillips' various owner Photographs sale Wednesday. It's a broad, primarily mid-range sale, with few major anchor pieces or unexpected treasures. Overall, there are a total of 123 lots of photography available in the sale, with a Total High Estimate of £1676500.

Here's the statistical breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including £5000): 49
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): £182500

Total Mid Lots (high estimate between £5000 and £25000): 59
Total Mid Estimate: £714000

Total High Lots (high estimate above £25000): 15
Total High Estimate: £780000

The top photography lot by High estimate is lot 32, Nobuyoshi Araki, 77 works, n.d., estimated at £100000-120000. (Image at right, top, via Phillips.)

Here is the short list of the photographers who are represented by four or more lots in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):

Robert Mapplethorpe (7)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (4)
Horst P. Horst (4)
David LaChapelle (4)

Other lots of interest include lot 39, Germaine Krull, Selected images, 1923-1927, estimated at £10000-15000 (image at right, middle), and lot 97, Adam Fuss, Untitled, 2006, estimated at £15000-20000 (image at right, bottom, both via Phillips).

The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.

Photographs
May 8th

Phillips
Howick Place
London SW1P 1BB

Photography at the 2012 ADAA Art Show

The more art fairs I go to, the more I am coming around to measuring their "success" on just how many times I see something surprising or unexpected, rather than the usual mind numbing parade of work I've seen elsewhere. My overall impression of this year's ADAA Art Show is that there was more interesting/new photography to see than in past years. As usual, the booths were either solo shows or thematic groups of work, displayed with careful editing and meticulous attention to detail.

My notes from the fair are below, arranged alphabetically by gallery name. For each booth, a list of photographers has been provided, with the number of works on display in parentheses. Additional commentary, prices, and pictures of the installation are also included as appropriate.

Cheim & Read (here): Adam Fuss (4). These brand new works are much larger than Fuss' last series of entrail photograms and the colors are much brighter and more psychedelic (generally pink and purple). They're eye poppingly gestural and swirly. (priced at $65000 each).

James Cohan Gallery (here): Yinka Shonibare (1)

CRG Gallery (here): Ori Gersht (7). These exploding florals are huge and enveloping. Apparently, the bouquets are flash frozen so the petals shatter when they are detonated. There were 4 large prints (97x73) and 3 smaller prints (16x12) on view; the large prints were $50000 and the small ones were $8500.

Crown Point Press (here): Darren Almond (5)

Tibor de Nagy Gallery (here): Rudy Burckhardt (27, plus 3 sets of 4 and 1 video showing 8 films). This was an entire booth of Burckhardt's work. One wall was covered with portraits of painters in their studios (De Kooning, Pollock, Mitchell etc.). I enjoyed these two prints best - the starburst dress ($7000) and the dress with circles echoing the circles on the sidewalk ($6000).

Fraenkel Gallery (here): Lee Friedlander (8), paired with paintings by Mel Bochner. I didn't find this pairing to be particularly compelling.

Marian Goodman Gallery (here): Francesca Woodman (20 gelatin silver prints, 2 diazotypes). The Francesca Woodman frenzy has begun, with the Guggenheim retrospective opening up later this week. I'm fascinated by these large diazotype prints (images printed on blueprint paper) which have started to surface; I think their texture and soft tonality make them something special. This print was priced at $200000, but already sold; the standard gelatin silver prints were $32000 each.

Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery (here): Xaviera Simmons (3). I really liked these bodies covered in pictures, fabrics, and all kinds of thematically arranged collaged items; they were both sculptural and rebus-like. (priced at $12000 each).

Michael Kohn Gallery (here): Bruce Conner (1), Charles Brittin (1)

L&M Arts (here): John Baldessari (1 diptych, 1 set of 10, 1 set of 6, 1 set of 8, 1 set of 22). This entire booth was full of mid 1970s Baldessari conceptual works. In the image below, figures walking in various directions are led by overpainted red arrows indicating which way they are going. I thought it was fantastic. (priced at $725000).

Margo Leavin Gallery (here): William Leavitt (2 triptychs)

Lehmann Maupin (here): Mickalene Thomas (12 collaged photos)

Galerie Lelong (here): Catherine Yass (1), Rosemary Laing (1), Ana Mendieta (1 set of 6)

Jeffrey H. Loria & Co. (no website): Robert Mapplethorpe (1)

Luhring Augustine (here): Elad Lassry (5, plus 1 set of 3 and 1 sculpture)

McKee Gallery (here): Richard Learoyd (1)

Metro Pictures (here): Cindy Sherman (8 sets of 3, 1 set of 4, 2 sets of 6). This booth was entitled Cindy Sherman's Murder Mystery and gathered together a series of early cut-out collaged works. This was the kind of work I wanted to see more of in the MoMA retrospective. The little interconnected vignettes are quirky and melodramatic, with Sherman playing all the parts. (the sets of 3, 4, or 6 prints priced between $200000 and $400000).

Laurence Miller Gallery (here): Ray Metzker (15 composites). This booth was filled with an excellent range of Metzker composites (nudes, city/street scenes, abstractions, in various sizes). The image below is from a recent (2007) photogram series of florals, which I had never seen before, using interlocked strips; it was priced at $35000.

PPOW (here): David Wojnarowicz (1 set of 44, plus 3 on the outer wall)

Pace/MacGill Gallery (here): Robert Adams (1), Richard Misrach (2), Diane Arbus (1), Lee Friedlander (2), Paul Graham (1), William Eggleston (1), Alfred Stieglitz (3), Henry Wessel (2), Harry Callahan (1), Susan Paulsen (1), JoAnn Verburg (1). This booth was an ode to clouds.

Regen Projects (here): Elliott Hundley (8)

Skarstedt Gallery (here): Cindy Sherman (2)

Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects (here): Laurel Nakadate (1), Agnes Denes (1 group of 28 mounted together), Kunie Sugiura (1)

Donald Young Gallery (here): Rodney Graham (1), Moyra Davey (4)

Auction: Photographs, April 6, 2011 @Sotheby's

Sotheby's kicks off the main event spring Photographs auction season in New York next week with a slightly smaller various owner sale (both in number of lots and total estimate) than in the previous few years. It's a well balanced if relatively safe sale, with highlights from a variety of photographic periods, from a Mathew Brady full plate daguerrotype to an Avedon portfolio, with solid vintage prints by plenty of masters (Walker Evans, Timothy O'Sullivan, Man Ray, Edward Weston, Aaron Siskind, Harry Callahan etc.) and the obligatory Ansel Adams and Irving Penn prints thrown in for good measure. All in, there are a total of 174 photographs on offer, with a total High estimate of $4339000.

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Here's the statistical breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including $10000): 64
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): $545000

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Total Mid Lots (high estimate between $10000 and $50000): 97

Total Mid Estimate: $2329000

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Total High Lots (high estimate above $50000): 13
Total High Estimate: $1465000

The top photography lot by High estimate is lot 111, Richard Avedeon, Avedon/Paris (portfolio), 1978, at $150000-250000.

Here's the list of photographers represented by three or more lots in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):

Ansel Adams (17)
Peter Beard (9)
Edward Weston (8)
Irving Penn (7)
Andre Kertesz (6)
Robert Mapplethorpe (6)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (5)

Paul Strand (5)

Harry Callahan (4)
Sally Mann (4)
Helmut Newton (4)
Man Ray (4)
Bernd and Hilla Becher (3)
Adam Fuss (3)

Francesca Woodman (3)

(Lot 96, Jaromir Funke, Composition (from Abstraktni Foto), 1929, at $50000-70000 (image at right, bottom); Lot 112, Irving Penn, Nude 58, 1950/1979, at $30000-50000 (image at right, middle); and Lot 152, Adam Fuss, Untitled (Sunflowers), 1993, at $15000-25000 (image at right, top); all images via Sotheby's.)

The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.

Photographs

April 6th

Sotheby's

1334 York Avenue

New York, NY 10021

Auction: Contemporary Art, March 9, 2011 @Sotheby's

Sotheby's is up second in the lower end Contemporary Art parade in New York later this week. Out of a total of 343 lots on offer, there are 39 photographs interleaved, with a total High estimate for photography of $712000. Overall, I didn't find much of note buried here.

Here's the statistical breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including $10000): 13

Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): $93000

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Total Mid Lots (high estimate between $10000 and $50000): 25

Total Mid Estimate: $559000

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Total High Lots (high estimate above $50000): 1

Total High Estimate: $60000

The top photography lot by High estimate is lot 19, Cindy Sherman, Untitled #109, 1982, at $40000-60000.

Here's the list of photographers represented by two or more lots in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):

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Olafur Eliasson (2)

Candida Hofer (2)

Richard Prince (2)

Andres Serrano (2)

Cindy Sherman (2)

Wang Qingsong (2)

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(Lot 50, Dan Graham, Luxury Housing, Yorkville, New York, N.Y., 1966, at $6000-8000, image at right, middle, lot 159 Adam Fuss, Space, 1988, at $15000-20000, image at right, top, and lot 177, Zhang Dali, Demolition Series, 2000, at $5000-7000, image at right, bottom, all via Sotheby's.)

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The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.
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Contemporary Art

March 9th

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Sotheby's

1334 York Avenue

New York, NY 10021

Auction: Photographs, October 8, 2010 @Phillips

Phillips continues the Fall Photographs season with its massive various owner sale on the 8th. It's a broad mix of material, with special attention paid to Ruth Bernhard and Harry Callahan, and yet another installment of Mapplethorpes from Lisa Lyon. Not too many unexpected standouts in this sale, but plenty of diversity to dig through. Overall, there are a whopping 410 lots on offer, with a total High estimate of $5451700.

Here's the statistical breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including $10000): 260
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): $1669700

Total Mid Lots (high estimate between $10000 and $50000): 138
Total Mid Estimate: $2742000

Total High Lots (high estimate above $50000): 12
Total High Estimate: $1040000

The top lot by High estimate is tied between two lots: lot 47, Robert Frank, Trolley-New Orleans, 1956/1970s, (image at right, top, via Phillips), and lot 64, Richard Avedon, Brigitte Bardot, Hair by Alexandre, Paris Studio, 1959, both at $100000-150000.

The following is the list of the photographers represented by five or more lots in this sale (with the number of lots on offer in parentheses):

Ruth Bernhard (26)

Harry Callahan (20)

Robert Mapplethorpe (12)

Horst P. Horst (9)

Andre Kertesz (9)

Irving Penn (9)

Herb Ritts (8)

Peter Beard (6)

Henri Cartier-Bresson (6)

Sally Mann (6)

Vik Muniz (6)

Arnold Newman (6)

Ansel Adams (5)

Walker Evans (5)

Robert Frank (5)

Lee Friedlander (5)

Helmut Newton (5)

Erwin Olaf (5)

A few images that caught my eye for our own collection include:

Lot 78, Harry Callahan, Eleanor, Chicago, 1949

Lot 159, Edward Steichen, Foxgloves, France, 1926

Lot 299, Adam Fuss, Untitled, 1995 (image at right, bottom, via Phillips)

The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.

Photographs

October 8th

Phillips De Pury & Company
450 West 15th Street
New York, NY 10011

Adam Fuss, Home and the World @Cheim & Read

JTF (just the facts): A total of 13 works, displayed in the small front room and the larger main gallery (divided by a single wall). The front gallery contains three full plate daguerreotypes framed in black and hung against grey walls. Two of the works are each 28x42 and are unique; the third is 28x24 and is available in an edition of 9. While the larger images are hung on opposing side walls, the smaller image is displayed on the floor in the middle of the room. All of the works in the main gallery space are unique gelatin silver print photograms mounted on canvas, framed in white (without mats) and hung against white walls. Five of the images are 103x60, two are 58x54, two are 62x104, and one is 76x63. All of the works in the show were made in 2010. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: In the past twenty years or so, Adam Fuss has taken the seemingly simple process of the photogram and created a radical, innovative and original body of contemporary art. He has alternately experimented with water droplets and smoke, rabbit guts and sunflowers, lacy baptism dresses and babies in puddles, creating large scale organic silhouettes and patterns in a spectrum of saturated colors, adding layers of symbolism and spiritual meaning to everyday objects.
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While Fuss has previously explored the imagery of snakes (swimming through water or skittering through powder), his new works dive deeper into this subject matter via a pared-down monochrome palette. Inky black forms tangle and swirl in intertwined and overlapping bunches, creating graceful gestural movements that echo the elegance of Chinese calligraphy or the kinetic energy of Jackson Pollock's abstractions. Blurs in the process make it clear that these are not static frozen forms, but active living beings, bringing an element of chance and a sense of motion into the compositions.

The resulting jumble of slithering black lines and curves is then superimposed on several different backgrounds: a grid of newspapers, a vertical shaft, or pure expansive white. The alternate contexts pile on symbolic connections to the game Snakes and Ladders, the myth of Tiresias and the caduceus, and the alternately positive and negative views of snakes throughout history. I found the simplest images with white backgrounds to be the most powerful and refined, the arrangement of lines uncluttered by competing ideas. When the knot of snakes coalesces into just the right graphic design, something magical happens.
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In the smaller front room, the uncertainty of motion found in the photograms is exchanged for the precision detail of the daguerreotype process. In matching large scale plates, an empty mattress sits alone, or is adorned with a coil of black snakes; in this case however, the process picks up every reptilian scale and highlight, making the snakes look all too real. Nearby, a close-up view of a vagina sits on the concrete, like a fleshy opening in the floor. For me, the symbolism here was a little too heavy-handed, and as such, I found the abstract arabesques in the other room much more compelling and beautiful.

Overall, Fuss' high contrast black and white photograms are both jolting and harmonious, finding a polished balance between the literal and figurative, the threatening and the lyrical. It's an impressive and mature display of the continuing evolution of his craft and ideas. Most importantly, the images themselves are wholly original and memorable, tied back to any number of traditions, but at the same time, exciting and expressively new.

Collector's POV: The works in this show are priced between $40000 and $65000. Fuss' images have become more consistently available in the secondary markets in the past five years or so, with prices ranging from $2000 to $90000, depending both on size and subject matter. The artist is also represented by Fraenkel Gallery in San Francisco (here) and Xavier Hufkens in Brussels (here).

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• Reviews: NY Times, 1999 (here), NY Times, 2002 (here)
• Features: NY Times, 1999 (here)
• Exhibition: MFA Boston, 2002 (here)

Adam Fuss, Home and the World

Through October 23rd

Cheim & Read
547 West 25th Street
New York, NY 10001