For a while now, VoCA hasn’t been trotting off to art fairs the way we used to. This year, the New York Amory almost went unnoticed to us. But then we noticed that some people, curators, dealers…are choosing to remain home this year, too.

New York’s Armory Show. Image: thearmoryshow.com

Is it the end of the art fair?

A new non-fair, called the Independent, is on from March 4 - 7 at the Dia building in New York, and is billed as a “hybrid model and temporary exhibition forum.” It is the subject of THIS fascinating article in the Observer.

The article states that “New York is going through a moment right now—that the glitzy, frivolous culture of the boom years is giving way to a new era of intellectual engagement and open-minded community among art lovers.”

Johan Lundh’s evening of critical discussion at Fillip’s offices. Image: firtheaglandlundh.net

That same “new seriousness” can be found, here and there, in Canada, though our market wasn’t as deflated as that of the U.S. in the recent economic downturn. Nonetheless, upstart journals such as the excellent Fillip Review from Vancouver and Toronto’s publication Hunter and Cook, run by artists Tony Romano and Jay Isaac, show us that the art world wants to talk. Also, galleries around town are working discussion into their programming. The Toronto Free Gallery is a not-for-profit space that has long been doing this with events that express their mandate to provide a forum for social, cultural, urban and environmental issues.

The Toronto Free Gallery’s executive director, Heather Haynes. Image: photojunkie.ca

New festivals, like the Flash Forward photography festival (coming next fall to Liberty Village in Toronto) aim to blend exhibition opportunities with lectures, workshops and public art - in short, to provide a place for artists and the public to learn, and engage with art in a new, real, hands-on way.

This is also echoed by the Young Patrons groups sprouting up in this city. At various price levels and interest points, they range from the AGO’s NEXT, to the ROM’s Young Patrons Circle to the Canadian Art Foundation’s New Contemporaries (which - disclaimer - I help organize), all of which aim to generate interest, engagement, education and discussion about arts and culture.

Finally, the recent interest in art criticism that is blossoming in Toronto, particularly, in both serious and less serious ways, (and that took off with THIS VoCA post) is heartening.

Tomorrow, Sunday, February 28, in Toronto, the Canadian Art Reel Artists Film Festival will host the first tribute to the legendary Swiss art dealer and founder of Art Basel, Ernst Beyeler, who died Thursday at his home, aged 88.

Ernst Beyeler in his gallery office, 22 May 1982. Image: beyeler.com

Continue reading →

…In London:

Sales were up at Frieze art fair in London apparently, but collectors are bargain-hunting. Artists continue apace, and you’ve got to hand it to Swiss artist Christoph Buchel for bravely exhibiting a pair of his old, worn socks on the floor of Hauser & Wirth, for sale at €20,000. Not sure if they sold.

Christoph Büchel Socks, 2009. Image: artfagcity.com

Editions are big news. White cube gallery in London exhibited as White Cube Editions at the Zoo art fair, offering affordable but highly branded prints and multiples by artists.

One of Damien Hirst’s Blue Paintings that are being slammed by critics in London.
Image: slamxhype.com

The latest trend seems to be blatant piss-taking (Hirst on Francis Bacon, Elmgreen Dragsett on Giacometti, the Korean artist Gimhongsok on Jeff Koons, or one of Stephanie Syjuco’s artists who have copied Gimhongsok’s copy of Koons.) This seems to point to a lack of creative inspiration among artists, perhaps a fatigue of having to create new, inspiring artwork. It’s as if they are creating lesser, imitation editions of great work and it’s an interesting trend to keep watching.

In related news, in THIS op-ed in the NYT last week argued that today’s conceptual art will go the way of the dodo bird. It’s craftsmanship and technical skill that will serve art in the long term, not “witty” conceptual ideas. VoCA thinks the writer certainly has a point.

…and in Canada:

Continue reading →

“An art gallery is like a single-cell organism: it is the crudest but also the most essential life form in the art-world food chain. It is among the easiest of public forums to start up…

Luanne Martineau, Gobbler, 2005. Image: trepanierbaer.com

…At the same time keeping a gallery going is usually fairly hard, and can seem impossibly daunting when sales slump. As small operations, galleries are…canaries in the coal mine, as they have often been called. So it made sense, as the bottom fell out of the art market last winter, that many people predicted galleries would start closing fast and furiously.”

This is from an article by Roberta Smith from the New York Times. Check it out HERE.

Graham Gillmore, Turns You On, 2005. Image: monteclarkgallery.com

Because Canada’s contemporary art market pales in comparison to that in the U.S., we don’t, perhaps give it much thought. But now’s a good time to set aside a budget to buy some art. $2000 would do nicely, and there’s the Toronto International Art Fair coming up, as well as excellent exhibitions opening this month. Here are some of our picks:

Continue reading →

Check out my article on the Art Expo, Toronto’s “kinder, gentler art fair for tough times” in today’s Globe and Mail - click thumbnail after the jump.

It’s a good place to discover work by artists who may not have gallery representation. Many are from abroad - expect to see work from India, Japan, Israel, Germany and Korea.

A mixed-media work by artist In Hyuck Song. Image: art-zurich.com

To read my article, click the thumbnail twice to enlarge:

Continue reading →

Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE, Ruler of Dubai with John Martin, Director of Art Dubai.

The report, Globalisation and the Art Market, Emerging Economies and the Art Trade in 2008 takes a detailed look at the growing importance of China, Russia, India and the Middle East in the art market in recent years. It also examines the past and possible future effects of the current world economic climate on international art buying.

Read the full article from Art Daily, right HERE

Following on from our recent question of whether artist flea markets are the new art fairs, Winnipeg artist/dealer Paul Butler has launched a website, which is “a collectively determined, autonomous art economy where economic value is determined through the consensus of peers.

It exists to facilitate connections and to create a network through which artists can trade their art.”

Work from theuppertradingpost.com

Originally invitational, now it’s gone public.

Continue reading →

ARTISTS’ FLEA MARKET
Saturday, January 17th and Saturday, January 24th, 10 am - 6 pm.
Board of Directors, Toronto

A ‘real’ flea market in Amsterdam. Image: z.about.com

At a time when everyone - surely - is tiring of the never ending art fairs popping up around the globe, and there is an excess of mediocre contemporary art being produced, it seems the timing is right for galleries to address the situation - and what more perfect way than with a flea market?

This community-based project will involve 10 ‘vendors’ at a time will set up selling art, collectibles, craft, second-hand goods and food items.

Just like a real flea market, you never know what you might find.

Incidentally, “In Relational Art, the audience is envisaged as a community. Rather than the artwork being an encounter between a viewer and an object, relational art produces intersubjective encounters. Through these encounters, meaning is elaborated collectively, rather than in the space of individual consumption.”

More on the concept of Relational Aesthetics HERE.

It reminds us of Martha Rosler’s fantastic piece, Garage Sale, which was staged in 1973, and which we saw at its re-installation at the ICA London in 2005.

Continue reading →

Dealer Angela Westwater offers her thoughts at Art Basel Miami Beach. From a recent issue of the Art Newspaper:

“The art market is only part of the art world. The turmoil in the global economy distracts us from where the true value of art really resides – its sustaining benefits as spiritual sustenancy and cultural legacy.”
– Angela Westwater, Sperone Westwater Gallery, New York

VoCA’s favorite retail design guru Murray Moss speaks to the New York Times as Design Miami opens in tandem with Art Basel Miami Beach et al, which the Times appropriately calls “a cultural caviar-stuffed buffet.”

Studio Job, Bavaria Screen, 2008, (Courtesy of Moss Gallery, New York). Image: nytimes.com

Read the full article HERE.

Incidentally, Studio Job, the cutting-edge Dutch designers who designed the screen above, will speak in Toronto on February 6, 2009 as part of the Azure Trade Talks. Please click HERE.

Continue reading →