I'm now rushing to check out of my hotel and head back to New York so I'm forced to be somewhat brief. And the weather is now the best ever. Too bad.
As promised I went to the big fair yesterday and as soon as I pulled out my camera a fair-goer said to me, "How did you get that in? They took mine away." Turns out they were confiscating all cameras, but my trusty Lumix was in my back pocket and so what you are seeing are truly contraband pictures. But I had to be circumspect, hence a somewhat abbreviated selection. What I do for this blog ...
As you'll see, however, there's an altogether different aesthetic as far as photography at Miami Basel is concerned. More conceptual, slicker, and certainly more expensive. We can get into the reasons behind all this at a later date. With the down economy, fair-going was actually extremely pleasant. And one encounter which I'll write about later could have some important future implications. But now for a highly edited selection of the pictures that caught my eye.
Kind of a cool Slater Bradley.
A new Gursky (longshot & detail).
A new Sam Taylor-Wood.
Richard Prince.
Andres Serrano's piss pictures still seem powerful and religious.
Vik Muniz takes on Cindy Sherman.
Barbara Kruger looked powerful.
Then Dash Snow had to go and ruin things by being supercool and making this picture of throw-up. (Grow up, I say!)
At Fraenkel, who always have the best booth, this new Misrach - a preview of his new body of work to be shown next year.
Two Diane Arbus photographs from an Elizabeth Taylor lookalike contest!
A gorgeous Adam Fuss.
The ubiquitous prize goes to these Richard Prince nurse collages which were simply everywhere.
And that's my big fair report.
My last stop was AQUA, one of the fairs held in a hotel with dealers displaying their wares in their rooms. It's loose, fun, and often worthwhile. These three photographs which look somewhat Sugimoto-esque were created out of a video game, but beautifully printed and presented. The artist is Oliver Warden showing at Boston's O.H+T gallery.
And last, but certainly not least, one from a set of barnyard photographs that look like the animal cast of a nativity play taking a bow! Rob Macinnis at Katharine Mulherin Contemporary.
