Reinstallation of the Permanent Collection of Photography, 2011 @MoMA

JTF (just the facts): A group show consisting of a total of 214 black and white and color photographs from 141 different photographers, variously framed and matted, and hung against grey and white walls in a series of 6 connecting rooms on the third floor of the museum. The works on view span the entire history of the medium, ranging from 1841 to the present, and are arranged roughly chronologically. This reinstallation of the permanent collection of photography was curated by Sarah Meister.

The following photographers are included in the show, with the number of works and dates in parentheses. The names have been listed in their order of appearance around the galleries.

Room 1

David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson (1, 1841-1848)
John B. Greene (1, 1855-1856)
William Henry Fox Talbot (1, 1844)
Bisson Freres (1, 1841-1846)
Felice Beato (1, 1860)
Samuel Bourne (1, 1864)
Robert Hewlett (1, 1857)
Carleton Watkins (1, 1889)
Gertrude Kasebier (1, 1907)
Robert Demachy (1, 1910)
Frederick Evans (1, 1903)
Edward Steichen (1, 1900)
Jules Janssen (2, 1885)
Adam Clark Vroman (1, 1902)
Jacob Riis (1, 1890)
Radio Corporation of America (1, 1926)
E.J. Bellocq (1, 1912)
Eugene Atget (1, 1899)
Unknown (2, 1923 and 1933)
Underwood and Underwood (1, 1910)
Automatic Camera/Photomaton (1, 1928)
Arthur Bedou (1, 1915)
Dornac (1, 1892)
Lewis Hine (1, 1908)
Seeberger Freres (1, 1912)
Jacques-Henri Lartigue (1, 1917)

Room 2
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Alfred Stieglitz (1, 1922)
Jospeh Cornell (1, 1933)
Imogen Cunningham (1, 1931)
Hugo Erfurth (1, 1926)
Edward Weston (1, 1925)
Alexander Rodchenko (2, 1924 and 1932)
Stanislaw Witkiewicz (1, 1911)
Edmund Kesting (1, 1928)
Man Ray (1, 1930)
Laszlo Mohloy-Nagy (1, 1923)
Tina Modotti (1, 1924)
Umbo (1, 1930)
Walker Evans (2, 1935 and 1936)
Ben Shahn (1, 1935)
Dorothea Lange (1, 1937)
Jack Delano (1, 1940)
Marian Post Wolcott (1, 1938)
John Vachon (1, 1938)
August Sander (2, 1927 and 1929)
Eugene Atget (2, 1921 and 1925)
Brassai (1, 1932)
Ilse Bing (1, 1932)
Bill Brandt (1, 1936)
Helen Levitt (1, 1941)
Antonio Reynoso (1, 1944)
Manuel Alvarez Bravo (1, 1934)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1, 1934)
Paul Strand (1, 1920)
Ralph Steiner (1, 1929)
Berenice Abbott (1, 1936)
Lewis Hine (1, 1930)
Arkadii Shaikhet (1, 1930)

Room 3
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Barbara Morgan (1, 1943)
Weegee (2, 1942 and 1950)
Emmy Andriesse (1, 1945)
Ernst Haas (1, 1947)
US Army Signal Corps (4, 1944 and 1945)
Dmitri Baltermans (1, 1942)
Times World Wide Photos (1, 1941)
Unknown (1, 1953)
Neal Boenzi/New York Times (1, 1956)
Meyer Liebowitz/New York Times (1, 1957)
Unknown (14 panels of vernacular families)
Robert Rauschenberg (1, 1949)
Geraldo de Barros (1, 1949)
Aaron Siskind (1, 1949)
Minor White (1, 1964)
Frederick Sommer (1, 1961)
Guy Bourdin (1, 1956)
Clarence John Laughlin (1, 1941)
Josef Sudek (1, 1954)
Ansel Adams (1, 1932)
Eugen Wiskovsky (1, 1946)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1, 1952)
Robert Doisneau (1, 1956)
Leonard Freed (1, 1954)
Lisette Model (1, 1942)
Roy DeCarava (1, 1952)

Room 4
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Rudy Burckhardt (4, 1940)
Philip Elliott (3, 1950)
Lola Alvarez Bravo (1, 1958)
Louis Faurer (1, 1949)
Leon Levinstein (1, 1952)
Robert Frank (1, 1956)
Garry Winogrand (1, 1962)
Christian Stromholm (1, 1959)
Paolo Gasparini (1, 1968)
Diane Arbus (1, 1965)
Unknown (1, 1957)
Lee Friedlander (1, 1970)
Jerry Schatzberg (1, 1964)
Arnold Newman (1, 1955)
Richard Avedon (1, 1965)
Irving Penn (1, 1979)
Harry Callahan (2, 1957)
Zeke Berman (1, 1979)
Kenneth Josephson (1, 1967)
Martus Granirer (1, 1964)
Otto Piene (1, 1964)
Shomei Tomatsu (1, 1960)
Daido Moriyama (1, 1970)
Miyako Ishiuchi (1, 1977)
Kohei Yoshiyuki (1, 1973)

Room 5
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Joseph Dankowski (20, 1970)
David Goldblatt (1, 1967)
Ernest Cole (1, 1960-1963)
Jeane Moutoussamy-Ashe (1, 1977)
Frank Stewart (1, 1981)
Geoff Winningham (1, 1971)
Candice Lenney (1, 1977)
William Gedney (1, 1975)
Martine Barrat (1, 1984)
Stephen Shore (1, 1973)
Frank Gohlke (1, 1973-1974)
Robert Adams (1, 1974)
Lewis Baltz (1, 1974)
Joel Sternfeld (1, 1979)
Nicholas Nixon (1, 1973)
Bill Owens (1, 1972)
Tod Papageorge (1, 1969)
Henry Wessell (1, 1972)
William Eggleston (1, 1980)
Sheron Rupp (1, 1984)

Room 6
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Jan Groover (1, 2006)
Michael Spano (1, 2003)
Bernd and Hilla Becher (18, 1959-1973)
Hai Bo (2, 1999)
Philip-Lorca diCorcia (1, 1981)
Vik Muniz (1, 2003)
Tina Barney (1, 1998)
William Christenberry (1, 2004)
Brian Rose (1, 2006)
Nicholas Faure (1, 1997)
Guy Tillim (2, 2008)
Leandro Katz (6 panels, 1978-1979)
Jiro Takamatsu (1, 1973)

Comments/Context: In between the special exhibitions and annual features like the New Photography series that usually populate the photography calendar at the MoMA, the curatorial team reinstalls the permanent collection of photography in the main series of galleries on the third floor. While this isn't a press release type event (or one that generally gets written about at all), it does offer an opportunity to peer into the minds of the organizers, mostly to see how new acquisitions are filling holes and to consider how the implied narrative arc of the history of photography is slowly evolving.

This is now my fourth year of covering the rehanging of the collection, and it's instructive to go back and remember what has been done in recent years (all the reviews are linked below). Three years ago, a grouping mechanism was used, where half a dozen images or so by a single photographer (from a related series) were chosen and hung in clusters, allowing a deeper dive into a smaller number of master photographers. Two years ago, the show was dominated by recent acquisitions (particularly 19th century) and peppered with lesser known works and artists, making the story more diffuse and harder to follow. Last year, the history of photography was seen through the prism of female photographers (known and unknown), providing a surprisingly different set of anchor points and references.

In prior years, these rehangings were "unsigned", in that they were tacitly meant to represent an institutional point of view rather than an individual one; therefore we could arguably read them as a monolithic perspective, an orthodoxy as to the "right" (or at least most recent) history of photography. What's different now is that MoMA has moved away from this approach and has begun to "sign" the reinstallations; this one was curated by Sarah Meister, and presumably the task (or opportunity) will rotate to someone else in the future. But make no mistake, this is now a new world, where a large number of alternate histories of photography are suddenly both acceptable and encouraged, and the process of identifying any one individual slice through the central mass of the collection could produce an unexpected and insightful outcome.

This selection of works sprinkles in a few more recognizable icons than the effort two years ago, and as a result, feels a bit more comfortably tied to a known line of thinking. The first room does a whirlwind tour of the 19th century (travel, scientific experimentation etc.), starting with the early masters and crossing over into Pictorialism, mixing artful images and vernacular shots with equal aplomb. The recently acquired Watkins still life of a box of peaches is the single best work in the entire exhibit; it is mind blowingly modern and lusciously crisp. It's the kind of picture that forces you to reevaluate everything you think you know about 19th century photography. (Carleton Watkins, Late George Cling Peaches, 1889, at right, top.)

The second room is the standard "between the wars" room, with bunches of European avant-garde and Surrealism, North American modernism, and FSA documentary reportage. To my eye, this group felt a little like "one of each", since there's one Brandt, one Brassai, one Weston, one Strand, one Man Ray etc., although never one of the better known images of the master identified on the wall label, presumably to keep things fresh. (Man Ray, Untitled, 1930, and Edward Weston, Nude, Mexico, 1926, at right, second and third from top.)

The next room follows chronologically into the 1940s and 1950s, bringing together a selection of professional press and vernacular photography with images from those working in a more fine art context where introspection, expressionism, and abstraction were taking hold(Siskind, Sommer, Sudek, Minor White et al.). The styles and approaches could hardly be more different, but their juxtaposition offers the first glimpses of multiple paths forward, of combination, dialogue, and confrontation. (Barbara Morgan, Use Litter Basket, 1943 and Aaron Siskind, Palm Springs, 1949, at right, fourth and fifth from the top.)

The fourth room continues a broad expansion of photographic paths forward, with 1950s hand held camera work (Frank, Winogrand, Levinstein, Faurer etc.), large format portraiture (Penn, Avedon, Newman), various forms of conceptual photography, and the arrival of the Japanese avant-garde (Tomatsu, Moriyama) in the 1970s. (Paolo Gasparini, Bello Monte, Caracas, 1968, and Zeke Berman, Still Life with Necker Cube, 1979, at right, sixth and seventh from top.)

Continuing into the other half of the divided space (which I have named the fifth room), the South Africans are added to the mix, along with the New Topographics photographers and the arrival of 1970s color. Again, many of the names will be familiar, but the specific image choices will keep you guessing. (Joel Sternfeld, Solar Pool Petals, Tuscon, Arizona, 1979, and William Eggleston, Untitled from Troubled Waters portfolio, 1980, at right, eight and ninth from top.)

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The last room in the show runs from roughly 1980 to the present, and it's here where I think the exhibit loses momentum a bit. Maybe a different way to say the same thing is that I was looking for a more definitive point of view on the current state of the world, and felt like I didn't get as sharp an opinion as I might have liked. The challenge is of course to make sense of the chaos, to follow both "contemporary art" and purely "photographic" progressions and to bushwhack a path through the thicket of competing aesthetics and mind sets, which is tough to do in a single room filled with a relatively small number of large pictures. That said, I did enjoy the Barney, the Tillim diptych, the Christenberry mess of kudzu and the multi-layered diCorcia. Perhaps a better way to look at this last room is to see it as simply a collection of new acquisitions that can tell us something about what the museum is interested in and continuing to follow closely, even if the thematic patterns are hard to discern. (William Christenberry, Kudzu Devouring Building, Near Greensboro, Alabama, 2004, and Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Catherine, 1981, at right, tenth and eleventh from top.)

In the end, I think this reinstallation of the permanent collection of photography makes a case for three distinct periods: the early period, from inception to roughly 1950, where the influence of vernacular photography and "history" is more pronounced and instructive, the middle period, from roughly Frank to Eggleston, where there is a flowering of bold experimentation in multiple directions, but mostly still connected to the existing photographic traditions, and the current period, where photography is stretching beyond its usual borders, crossing over into the context of contemporary art. In this realm, we're opening a dialogue beyond the confines of looking inward at photographic history and instead playing on a grander stage. While I'm sure this is an oversimplification of the nuanced ideas of the curators, I think this general framework has merit, especially if it can help to make the underlying forces tugging at contemporary photography more legible.

Collector's POV: Since this is a permanent collection exhibition, it seems only fitting to forego the prices and secondary market discussion that usually fills this section.

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

• Previous installations of the permanent collection of photography: 2010 (here), 2009 (here), 2008 (here)

Permanent Collection of Photography
Through March 2012
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Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd Street
New York, NY 10019

2011 AIPAD Review, Part 2 of 2

The 2nd and final portion of our 2011 AIPAD Review is below. Part 1 of the summary (which includes an explanation of the format) can be found here.

Galerie Priska Pasquer (here): Lieko Shiga (3), August Sander (4), Shomei Tomatsu (4), Shin Yanagisawa (2), Daido Moriyama (1), Issei Suda (2), Rinko Kawauchi (5), Nobuyoshi Araki (2), Yutaka Takanashi (6). The Pasquer booth was one of the best edited displays at AIPAD, with a strong mix of vintage and contemporary Japanese photography (with a few vintage Sanders on an inside wall). Takanashi (one of the founders of Provoke) was a discovery for me; the modern prints below were priced at $4900 each. There were also some excellent early prints by Kawauchi and a superb Araki portrait.

M+B (here): Matthew Porter (4), Anthony Lepore (4), Hugh Holland (3), Mike Brodie (6), Alex Prager (1).

L. Parker Stephenson Photographs (here): Jan Yoors (3), Louis Faurer (1), Harold Roth (2), Lisette Model (1), Edward Steichen (1), Irving Penn (1), Erwin Blumenfeld (1), Umbo (2), Charlotte Rudolph (1), Zdenek Tmej (1), Raphael Dallaporta (6). I was intrigued by the scale and ornate detail of these Dallaporta pipe organ images. The large print was reminiscent of Candida Höfer for me, although the level of detail up close was even more meticulously precise; the smaller images were almost like post cards, yet with an astounding level of visual depth and granular accuracy. Prices were $15000 for the large print, $3500 for the smaller ones.

Stephen Daiter Gallery (here): Joseph Sterling (6), Aaron Siskind (5), Ken Josephson (2), Andre Kertesz (3), Berenice Abbott (1), Walter Peterhans (1), Herbert Bayer (1), Stanley Kubrick (1), Eliott Erwitt (3), Weegee (4), John Gossage (3), Lynne Cohen (4), Danny Lyon (2), Ruth Orkin (1), Dawoud Bey (1), Yasuhiro Ishimoto (1), Robert Frank (3), Alex Webb (2).

Michael Shapiro Photographs (here): Irving Penn (1), Helen Levitt (1), Robert Frank (3), Harry Callahan (1), Manuel Alvarez Bravo (8), Eugen Wiskovsky (1), Jaromir Funke (1), Josef Sudek (6), Pierre Dubreuil (1), Charles Sheeler (1), Man Ray (1), Robert Imandt (1), Fletcher Gould (1), Elmer Blew (1), R. Owen Shrader (1), Pirkle Jones (1), Lewis Baltz (6), Ansel Adams, (1), Brett Weston (1), Imogen Cunningham (1), Anonymous (8), Jefferson Hayman (group on outside wall). Shapiro's booth had two of my favorite vintage prints at the fair, hanging right next to each other. The Dubreuil study of spectacles and shadows was simply masterful, full stop. And I don't think I've seen more than a handful of River Rouge Sheelers out in the market since we started collecting, so it was terrific to look at this one up close. The amounts weren't labeled and the booth was crowded, so I didn't get prices for these two gems.

Yossi Milo Gallery (here): Pieter Hugo (2), Alison Rossiter (12), Sze Tsung Leong (2), Ezra Stoller (2), Simen Johan (1), Loretta Lux (2), Yuki Onodera (14).

Higher Pictures (here): Yvon (6), Sam Falls (1), Claire Pentecost (4), Jill Freedman (64), LaToya Ruby Frazier (1). Fall's image disregards all the distinctions that we normally make about the where the edges of the photographic process lie. He starts with photographic imagery, adds a layer of painterly Photoshop effects, and then overlays the resulting print with even more layers of acrylic and pastel. The mixed media result is an abstract hybrid, jolted by splashes of color; it's priced at $4500.

Eric Franck Fine Art (here): Robert Bergman (5), Richard Avedon (1), Antanas Sutkus (2), Rimaldis Vikstraitis (2), Marketa Luskacova (2), Martine Franck (2), Charlotte Bracegirdle (4), Josef Koudelka (1), Geraldo de Barros (4), Erwin Blumenfeld (2), Henri Cartier-Bresson (1), Graham Smith (4), Chris Killip (4), Layla Love (2), Karen Knorr (2), Katarzyna Mirczak (16), Norman Parkinson (6), Lottie Davies (2). Mirczak's grid of Polish prisoner tattoos on preserved skin fragments is an unsettling mix of the memorably grisy and the surprisingly symbolic. The set is priced at $15000.

Bonni Benrubi Gallery (here): Massimo Vitali (1), Georges Dambier (4), Abelardo Morell (7), Matthew Pillsbury (3), Andreas Feininger (12), Paolo Pellegrin (3).

Bruce Silverstein Gallery (here): Shinichi Maruyama (2), Michael Wolf (3), Andre Kertesz (12), Man Ray (2), Irving Penn (1), Marie Cosindas (1), Trine Sondergaard (4), Frederick Sommer (4, collage, drawing, painting), Aaron Siskind (3), John Wood (1), Arthur Siegel (1), Henry Moore (1), Nathan Lyons (5 diptychs), Todd Hido (1), Edward Weston (2). I though this early Siegel light drawing was fantastic, with its abstract waves of rhythmic saturated color; this is the kind of image that should have been in the photography room of MoMA's AbEx show, but wasn't. It was priced at $25000.

Scheinbaum & Russek (here): Luis Gonzalez-Palma (2), Eliot Porter (4), Harry Callahan (2), Edward Weston (4), Ruth Bernhard (2), Andre Kertesz (1), Walter Chappell (1), Manuel Alvarez Bravo (3), Edward Curtis (2), Ansel Adams (4), Paul Caponigro (3), Aaron Siskind (1), Minor White (1), William Garnett (1), Lee Friedlander (2), Diane Arbus (1), Henri Cartier-Bresson (1), plus two bins.

Laurence Miller Gallery (here): Simone Rosenbauer (2), Daido Moriyama (1), Toshio Shibata (1), Fan Ho (1), Fred Herzog (1), Ray Metzker (4), Denis Darzacq (2), Lee Friedlander (2), Stephane Couturier (1), Bruce Wrighton (15), Michael Spano (3), Jessica Backhaus (10). This is a 2010 image from Darzacq's Hyper series; this time his young subject is floating through what appears to be a carpet store; it was priced at $7500.

Robert Morat Galerie (here): Christian Patterson (5), Richard Renaldi (2), Richard Rothman (5).

William L. Schaeffer Photographs (no website): Edouard Loydreau (1), Carleton Watkins (1), Eugene Cuvelier (2), Minor White (1), Harry Callahan (1), Clarence White (1), Heinrich Kuhn (1), Walker Evans (1), Margaret Bourke-White (2), Robert Frank (1), NW Gibbons (2), plus three bins and one case of daguerrotypes. This is the kind of 19th century print that makes you rethink everything you think you know about 19th century photography; the massive Watkins tree is seen in crisp dark detail, almost with a modernist sensibility; it was priced at $75000, with a lifetime's worth of enjoyment thrown in for good measure.

Howard Greenberg Gallery (here): Ilse Bing (1), Martin Munkacsi (3), Edward Steichen (1), Charles Sheeler (1), Albert Renger-Patzsch (1), Arnold Newman (1), Minor White (2), Ansel Adams (1), Bruce Davidson (4), Saul Leiter (2), Peter Sekaer (5), David Goldblatt (5), William Klein (1).

James Hyman Photography (here): William Henry Fox Talbot (1), Horatio Ross (3), Roger Fenton (2), Hill & Adamson (3), Julia Margaret Cameron (1), Paul Reas (4), Ken Grant (2), Jem Southam (2), Anna Fox (4), Karen Knorr (4), Thomas Annan (2), Bert Hardy (1), Caroline Coon (2), Cecil Beaton (2), Roger Mayne (2), Lucien Clergue (1), JH Lartigue (1), Eugene Atget (1), Brassai (1), Andre Kertesz (1), Bill Brandt (1), Edward Weston (1), plus four bins. As flower collectors, this rich, dark Fox Talbot study is near the apex of the genre for us; no wonder it was $450000 (the shadow is from the velvet cover being pulled back).

Robert Mann Gallery (here): Kevin Kay (9), Jeff Brouws (33), Holly Andres (1), Julie Blackmon (2), John Mack (2), O. Winston Link (1), Fred Stein (2), Ansel Adams (1), David Vestal (2), Aaron Siskind (2), Joe Deal (2), Chip Hooper (2), Michael Kenna (4), Mario Giacomelli (3).

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ADMINISTRATIVE NOTE: For the rest of this week, we'll be on spring break. We'll be back next Monday with a backlog of gallery show reviews and auction previews for the upcoming New York photographs season.

Photography at the 2011 ADAA Art Show

As always, this year's ADAA Art Show was characterized by its consistent quality from booth to booth and its extraordinarily high production values. Even though there is a wide spread of work on display in this show, the ratio of wheat to chaff is generally much higher than the other fairs. Once again, many of the exhibitors opted for solo shows or tightly edited groups of work, meticulously hung against colored walls or linen wallpaper. It's a thoroughly sophisticated approach to an art fair; the challenge is that without a few jolts of roughness or energy, this hushed environment can lull you to sleep.

This post is organized by my path through the fair, starting to the left from the entrance, and winding back and forth before returning to the front to exit. Like our Armory posts, 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 where specific images stood out.

Marian Goodman Gallery (here): Gabriel Orozco (2)

McKee Gallery (here): Richard Learoyd (1). Learoyd's portraits are growing on me as I see them more. This one was priced at $35000.

Robert Miller Gallery (here): Diane Arbus (11)

Jill Newhouse (here): Anonymous (13). This booth was filled with Rodin sculptures and drawings, as well as quite a few photographs of his sculptures. It wasn't clear who the photographer of record was for these images, as many were signed by Rodin himself. I particularly liked this set of three variant images. In general, the prints were reasonably priced, between $800 and $4500 each.

Zabriskie Gallery (here): Paul Strand (16). This booth was devoted to Strand, and aside from one industrial image and one Taos church, all of the works were from his garden in Orgeval, France. I very much enjoyed these two florals (look for the bees in the second one), both of which were priced at $24000.

Cheim & Read (here): Diane Arbus (1), William Eggleston (2), Walker Evans (1). The contrasts in this Evans were spectacular; however, it wasn't for sale.

CRG Gallery (here): Lyle Ashton Harris (1), Joel-Peter Witkin (1)

Hans P. Kraus Jr. Fine Photographs (here): Bisson Freres (1), Jean Laurent (2), Felix Teynard (1), Auguste Salzmann (1), Louis-Remy Robert (2), Louis-Emile Durandelle (2), William Henry Fox Talbot (7), James Nasmyth (2), Anna Atkins (2), Louis Pierre Rousseau (1), Dr. Alfred Donne (1), Unknown (2), Edward Steichen (1), JB Greene (2), Andre Adolphe Eugene Disderi (2), James Ross and John Thomson (1), Nevil Story-Maskelyne (1), Duchenne de Boulogne and Adrien Tournachon (1), Circle of Charles Simart (1), Julia Margaret Cameron (1), Charles Marville (2). As usual, Kraus' booth was a smorgasbord of 19th century photographic treasures. I had seen the two Atkins cyanotypes previously, so I was more intrigued by the Robert negative image, with its intersecting lines made by the cart and tools. It was priced at $60000.

Skarstedt Gallery (here): Cindy Sherman (2), Richard Prince (group of 4)

Fraenkel Gallery (here): Carleton Watkins (7), Robert Adams (10). This booth featured a smart pairing of Watkins and Adams, where echoes of land forms (rivers, masses of boulders, horizon lines, etc.) were matched together. I liked the Adams on the top left below, with its jagged shadow contrast and the hidden train track running below. The Adams images were priced between $12000 and $18000; the Watkins images were between $45000 and $190000.

Donald Young Gallery (here): Jeanne Dunning (2), James Welling (5), Rodney Graham (1 + 1 diptych), Mark Wallinger (stills on video screen)

Howard Greenberg Gallery (here): William Klein (20 + 1 video + 4 books). A brash booth full of Klein photographs was a bit of a surprise from Greenberg, which has often opted for a selection of iconic highlights in this kind of fair setting. I thought it was fresh and fantastic.

James Cohan Gallery (here): Katie Patterson (4)

Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects (here): Laurel Nakadate (12)

Pace/MacGill Gallery (here): Irving Penn (20). This booth contained a selection of Penn's innovative corner portraits, where his famous subjects have been pushed into a narrow confining space. I enjoyed the two portraits of Georgia O'Keeffe on the inside wall of the booth, but perhaps my favorite was the Truman Capote on the front wall; I liked the way the space is taken up by the chair and Capote's large coat, and I think the introduction of the vertical line of the wall opens up the strict formula of the composition. The Capote portrait was priced at $95000.

Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery (here): Mika Rottenberg (2), Barney Kulok (1). I liked the jumble of spaces and volumes in this large Kulok image; it was priced at $6000.

Regen Projects (here): Catherine Opie (3). There is certainly an echo of Hiroshi Sugimoto or Renate Aller in these Opie seascapes and sunsets, but there's no denying the serene lushness of the pure blue images. These were priced at $30000 each.