Julie Novakoff
Los Angeles is not slowing down its effort to make known its growth as a global capital for contemporary art. On the contrary, with Pacific Standard Time programming in full swing, four art fairs: Photo L.A., the L.A. Art Show, Art Los Angeles Contemporary, and the Affordable Art Fair Los Angeles graced our city during the month of January.
Photo L.A.
The twenty-first edition of Photo L.A., a photo-based art fair at Santa Monica Civic Auditorium opened its doors on January 12. The longest running art fair in California hosted dealers from Berlin to Australia who exhibited works spanning the history of the photographic medium from the 19th century to the present. The opening night of the fair, featuring special host Moby and DJ Aaron Byrd, served as a benefit for the Wallis Annenberg Department of Photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Drinks and hors d’oeuvres floated through the crowds who stopped to take candids in the Smashbox-sponsored photo lounge.
Maria Luisa Morando, Silver V, chromogenic print, 12×12″. Courtesy Photo-Eye Gallery.
As an aficionada of vintage photography, I was pleased to have the opportunity to view works typically found in museums and art collections. I found photojournalist Robert Capa’s Normandy, a 1945 action shot of a U.S. soldier and European soldier sharing a cup of apple cider, to be a glimpse of humanity amidst the violence of war. This photograph was exhibited by Argentic, a group of Paris-based photo enthusiasts whose participation in Photo L.A. was their first in the U.S. Another highlight of the show was the installation of ’30s and ’40s vintage silver gelatin prints depicting urban American landscapes by European artists who immigrated to the United States during the war. Artists included Lloyd Ulberg, Josef Breitenbach, Sasha and Cami Stone and Lyonel Feininger. The fair was not short of stellar contemporary works; artists Suzanne Opton and Maria Luisa Morando were my 21st century top picks.
Suzanne Opton, Soldier: Kimball – 287 Days in Afghanistan. Courtesy Stephen Cohen Gallery.
LA Art Show & The Affordable Art Fair, Los Angeles
The 17th edition of The LA Art Show and the very first edition of the Affordable Art Fair, Los Angeles, both on view January 18-22 in downtown Los Angeles, next took the stage.
Although close in proximity location-wise, the offerings of the two shows were distinctly different. The LA Art Show located at the Los Angeles Convention Center was run by the well-respected Fine Art Dealers Association (FADA). It featured works from the last five centuries that were divided into three sections: Historic and Traditional, Modern and Contemporary and Fine Art Prints. With more than 130 galleries, the LA Art Show was the blockbuster of the four fairs. Naturally, I gravitated toward the Modern and Contemporary section of the fair. Most striking from this category were the surreal, still-life photographs by Agniet Snoep at the Amstel Gallery based in Amsterdam and the small collection of Julian Stanczak abstract op color paintings from the New Mexico-based gallery David Richard Contemporary. Also of note was the petite anamorphic sculpture by Stephanie Bachiero at the Peter Blake Gallery, a local gallery based in Laguna Beach that I have yet to discover due to my ineptness with LA traffic.
Agniet Snoep, Still Life Series, Prawn Photo, 2011. Courtesy Amstel Gallery.
Just steps away from the LA Art Show, The Affordable Art Fair, Los Angeles (AAF) exhibited strictly contemporary art and primarily featured emerging artists from around the world. AAF utilized the L.A. Live Event Deck, the former home to PULSE Contemporary Art Fair in Fall 2011. This space is quite unconventional in itself as it is actually the top level of a parking lot that has been converted into a fully wired and carpeted art haven closed in by pristine white tent bays.
The Affordable Art Fair has traveled from city to city since 1999 only to make its Los Angeles debut this winter. After Los Angeles, the Affordable Art Fair will travel to Milan, Brussels, London, New York, Bristol, Melbourne, Stockholm, Mexico City, Amsterdam, Rome and Singapore to brand itself as a showcase for original contemporary works of art priced from $100 to $10,000. In addition to the $10,000 price ceiling, galleries must agree to price at least half of the works in their booth under $5,000. To further the approachability of the fair, the galleries must display price tags in plain view and be willing to help visitors learn more about the art. Founder Will Ramsay mandates these practices to “democratize the sometimes intimidating art world.”
As with all four January fairs, The Affordable Art Fair also provided a variety of programming free with the price of admission. I was very pleased to be featured on a panel discussion titled “Expert Advice on How To Grow Your Collection.” Here, first time buyers had the opportunity to learn the basics of collecting and to find out answers to questions such as, “Is negotiating common practice when buying art?” Hint: The answer is YES!
Three gems I discovered at the fair for the first time were artists Zhou Hongbin at the Living With Art Gallery, New York, NY; Matt Nighswander at the Pictura Gallery, Bloomington, MI; and Richard Heeps at the Bleach Box, Cambridge, England.
Zhou Hongbin, Aquarium 04, 79×27.5″. Courtesy Living with Art Gallery.
Art Los Angeles Contemporary (ALAC)
Art Los Angeles Contemporary (ALAC) presented its third edition at the Barker Hangar in Santa Monica from January 19-22. The opening night of the fair was filled with drama and suspense as crowds gathered to watch artist Judy Chicago and participants from Materials & Applications transform twenty-five tons of dry ice into an environment of fog illuminated at dusk by road flares. This installation unveiled Sublime Environments, a recreation of the public art installation Disappearing Environments originally performed by Judy Chicago, Lloyd Hamrol, and Eric Orr in 1968. It also kicked off the eleven-day Performance and Public Art Festival sponsored by the Pacific Standard Time initiative.
Like AAF, ALAC exclusively highlighted contemporary galleries from the US and abroad. Among more than seventy galleries were many established LA mainstays, including but not limited to ACE Gallery, ACME, Angles Gallery, Cherry and Martin, China Art Objects Galleries, Honor Fraser, David Kordansky Gallery, M + B and Susan Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects.
Judy Chicago and Materials & Applications, Sublime Environment, 2012. Photo: Donald Woodman. Courtesy Pacific Standard Time.
