NY ART FAIR DIARIES THU March 27

Thu March 27, 2008    Thursday proved to be an action-packed art-fair-event-hopping bonanza. I started at Scope, located in Lincoln Center’s Damrosch Park at 62nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue. The tent’s interior was arid and warm, and the quaint selection of 50 galleries was obviously much more digestible than the vast ocean of booths at the Armory.

Thu March 27, 2008

Painters of interest included Kristin Moran, a recent Hunter College MFA student, located at DEAN PROJECTS of Long Island City (booth 21), Thomas Zitzwitz, a mid-career German painter located at Galerie Rupert Pfab of Dusseldorf (booth 28), and Brooklyn-based Beau Chamberlain, located at D.C.’s Project 4 Gallery (booth 9).

 

Of the galleries, only two in particular stood out. NETTIE HORN (booth 40), is an innovative London-based gallery that first opened its doors in September. Representing an eclectic variety of emerging, mainly conceptual contemporary British and International artists, the gallery aims to showcase a broad selection of works with emphasis on experimental techniques and materials. On view at Scope was the photographic documentation of the exciting performative work of Finnish artist, Antti Laitinen, who most notably built an island in the sea replete with a single tree on which he attempted to live for one week. Also of note, and also focused on conceptually-driven and performative work, was the Amsterdam-based 2x2projects (booth 42) where performance artist Linda Molnaar physically inhabited a hand-crafted horse head placed on the floor, out of which her own arm emerged holding a brush with which she combed the horse’s mane.

 

After Scope, it was off to the launch event of the Hans Ulrich Obrist book project The Conversation Series, his celebrated series of conversations with a range of artists and thinkers as diverse as Robert Crumb, Nancy Spero, Olafur Eliasson, and Rem Koolhaas.

 

The night was still young, and so it was thus that we ended up the White Box and Diva Fair-sponsored 26th Street Block Party in which all the galleries on this Chelsea street stayed open until 10, creating a veritable party in the streets, complete with kebab and hot dog vendors. Diva’s claim to fame this year is their scattering of shipping containter-cum-video-installation-rooms littering a few street corners in Chelsea. The video installations at White Box were blocked mainly by the gaggles of hipsters cueing for the free beer, and the hideous Joseph La Piana paintings on view at Robert Miller Gallery across the street were thankfully equally as obstructed by the crowds and the blinding flashes of the paparazzi camera bulbs. The whole scene was more pomp and circumstance than anything else.

 

Two delicious empanadas later, we decided to change venues once more, opting for the more “underground” vibe of the legendary Chelsea hot spot and artist hang out “Passerby” instead of the Bridge Fair after party at the decidedly cheesy “Glass Lounge”. Passerby is slated to close Saturday night after years of serving the spawn and hangers-on of the belly button of the art world. On Sunday Gavin Brown and Rirkrit Tiravanija will host its final fete. Dancing on the Saturday Night Fever-esque blinking tiled floors to the jolly tunes of Justice, we realized it was the dawn of the end of an era. There was some talk of Passerby changing venues, perhaps to the Lower East Side because of the neighborhood’s influx of hip new galleries. But in the meantime, all we are left with is the occasional MK Olsen sighting at Sweet Paradise and sub-par DJs at overcrowded White Box events.

 

Gillian Sneed