ASome describe it as “intimate”, as a pleasant contrast to the biggest art fairs: the TEFAF, actually at home in Maastricht, opens its doors in Manhattan for the eighth time this weekend. Big old gates: The Park Avenue Armory, a 142-year-old former armory, takes up an entire block on the Upper East Side. The stands in the hall can be seen from a gallery on the first floor. The hallway is a little cramped up here, but the pink carpeting, drop ceilings, and flower arrangements seem to absorb any rush. Collectors stand in front of the bars like at the cocktail reception, you take your time at the “Collectors Preview” on the day before the opening.
Down in the hall, the stands are only half the size of TEFAF Maastricht, around thirty square meters. That should not detract from the importance of the New York branch: 91 exhibitors show art and design from 7000 years – and some see an advantage in the modest size of the fair. The New York Times quoted the gallery owner Thaddaeus Ropac as saying that it was like a “jewel box”. Here the exhibitors are forced to choose very carefully what they present.
Exclusive to affordable
The White Cube gallery in London is coming up with an oil painting by Georg Baselitz: “Hanoversche faithfulness” – named after an iron ore mine in Salzgitter – shows a wing abstraction on a blue background over which black paint has flowed. The gallery states that the purchase price for the 2010 picture was $1.75 million before taxes. If you’re looking for something more affordable, you might also want to check out White Cube: a 1971 black-and-white photograph by filmmaker Larry Clark costs $10,000. It shows a man sitting in front of a US flag aiming a pistol into space.
A small traffic jam forms in front of Gustav Klimt’s study of a gorgon for the Beethoven Frieze of 1901. A dozen visitors want to take a closer look at the standing nude at the stand of Vienna’s Wienerroither & Kohlbacher gallery, whose black hair covers her face and whose hands cover her breasts. The Donald Ellis gallery in New York is presenting drawings that are regarded as unique testimonies to indigenous American history. The works by the artists Nokkoist and Ohettoint cost between 40,000 and 200,000 dollars. Between 1870 and 1880, imprisoned in Fort St. Marion, Florida, they drew columns of soldiers, steamboats, and reminiscences of the cultural life of their Cheyenne and Kiowa communities of origin.
A happy coincidence
Design and jewelery are also widely represented in the former armory. In addition to historical pieces, a massive piece of furniture by the Swedish-French sculptor Ingrid Donat catches the eye – the gallery Carpenters Workshop has set a purchase price of 850,000 dollars for “Commode Skarabée”. New York’s Bernard Goldberg Gallery is selling two $120,000 wooden chairs that once graced a “medieval room” in a Manhattan hotel. They were made by Winold Reiss, who had emigrated from Germany before the First World War. Two other works by Reiss caused a stir at the opening of TEFAF: His oval murals, which depict female nudes in a paradisiacal setting with snakes or leopards, were thought to have been lost. They once adorned the Longchamps restaurant in the Empire State Building. Historians assume that they were destroyed during renovations in the 1960s. The fact that the pieces are now hanging at the Goldberg booth is thanks to a happy coincidence: three years ago they fetched less than $3,000 each at an auction in New York, then someone offered them for sale online. Goldberg’s director Ken Sims noticed, historians rated the find as significant, and the gallery eventually bought the works for a “low five-figure sum.” Now they are said to bring in a “low seven-figure sum” together. Gallery founder Bernard Goldberg told local media he hopes the remaining six Reiss works from the restaurant, which has been replaced today by a “Starbucks” branch, will still show up – perhaps also through the attention at TEFAF.
This publicity can only help the trade fair, which has just been reduced from two to one event per year. New Yorkers who want to collect or view art can choose from a number of events in May: Frieze is undoubtedly the best-known, but Focus, Nada and Volta also advertise for customers. The district of Chelsea offers the most trade fairs. Not far from there, in Hudson Yards, Frieze is starting in a few days. The cultural center, The Shed, offers a more modern setting than the armory on Park Avenue – but many locals feel the setting lacks any character. Nan Goldin, who has just joined Gagosian from Galerie Marion Goodman, is not deterred. Her works are already being treated as a main attraction at Frieze: Nine of the photographer’s works will be on display at the fair.
TEFAF New York, Park Avenue Armory, through May 16, admission $55
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