Artists and art fairs

If you are a visual artist or art dealer/gallerist in today’s ever changing visual art world, and you’re not aware or know about the Miami art fairs that take place each year-end and are clustered around Miami and Miami Beach, then you have a problem that needs urgent attention.

Almost a decade ago, the founders and organizers of a European art fair called Art Basel (which of course, takes place in Basel, Switzerland), decided to try an American version of their successful European model and started an art fair in the Miami Beach Convention Center and they called it Art Basel Miami Beach or ABMB for short.

This was nothing new in the American art fair scene, as even in Miami art fairs such as Art Miami had been going on for years. But whatever right timing and combination of European flavoring added to Miami's Cubanized international art scene did was spectacular and ABMB took off like Meat Loaf's second album's title.

In the halcyon days of the healthy economy of those days, the art fair proved to be a spectacular success, with millions of dollars of artwork by the blue chip names of the art world exchanging hands at ABMB as collectors from all over the world congregated in Miami’s balmy December to be seen at the sharp point of the spear of the contemporary art world.

ABMB’s success soon spawned other art fairs, which are called “satellite fairs”, since they all revolve around ABMB’s dates and presence on America’s coolest and most international beach city. The evolution of these satellite fairs was fed by the fact that ABMB focused almost exclusively on European galleries and a handful of the top tier American New York galleries.

In those days, even if you were the best gallery in Chicago, or LA or Miami itself, you had zero chance to be invited to ABMB.

And thus satellite art fairs with names like Scope, Red Dot, Bridge, Pulse, NADA and others began to appear around Miami at the same time as ABMB. Soon, someone came up with the novel idea that these art fairs could also take place in hotel rooms, and the “hotel fair” was born. Many of these also began to appear, none better than the Aqua Art Fair, now called “the best hotel art fair in the world.” Having just done Aqua, I can testify brother, that the Aqua organizers have it down, and in my limited opinion, this is indeed the best hotel art fair in the world.

Back to my story... by 2010, even with the economy in the doldrums that refuse to go away, there were 25 art fairs going on around Miami starting roughly around November 28 through the first Sunday of December.

Yes dear readers, 25 art fairs at once! Some developed a tight focus, such as for Asian art or photography, others tried to establish an artist-oriented focus, but in general, all recognized that something special happens each December in Miami.

By now the figures are mind blowing: I am told by Miami journalists from Rumor Control that during that week of the ABMB art fairs, roughly 20% of all the art work sold in the world exchanges hands in Miami.

Furthermore, as the magnitude of the event grew, so did the attendance by both the “need to be seen” crowd and by even more worldwide collectors and, just as importantly, the press.

Thus now the news media not only discusses what’s new or who’s hot in the art world, but also they let us know who Sly Stallone or other Hollywood stars of all magnitude are acquiring. It has become cool for Hollywood stars and wannabes to collect art, which in most Einsteinian dimensions is a good thing.

The concentrated press reporting has also made celebrities out of mega collectors, such as the Miami based Rubell or DeLaCruz families.

Most of the art fairs are gallery-focused; that means that it is art galleries, as opposed to individual artists, who exhibit artwork. The prices for the booths are spectacularly expensive, and generally, a small 200 sq. ft. booth can start at $10,000 or more, and a large booth can run as high as $100,000. And this is before a gallery adds other associated costs such as shipping costs of the artwork, transportation to/from Miami, customs, food, car rental, hotel and salaries.

For most galleries around the world it is a daunting economic investment, which can turn into a financial disaster if sales fail to materialize.

Around the DMV, only a handful of local area galleries took the risk over the last few years. Spaces such as Conner Contemporary, Civilian Art Projects, Hamiltonian Gallery, Fraser Gallery, Irvine Contemporary, and a precious few others, took the venture out to Miami. One local dealer, Art Whino, began its own model and sets up its own ABMB space in Miami during that week.

“I meet more art collectors that week in Miami than the entire year in DC,” related one local art dealer.

“Over the years,” added another, “about 80% of my sales take place at, or because of art fairs in Miami, New York, LA, etc.”

The opportunity to actually sell art is a powerful magnet to tempt art dealers to take the economic plunge. “My openings in Norfolk are always packed, and the shows get good press coverage here,” notes Norfolk’s Mayer Fine Art’s director Sheila Giolitti, who has been also going to Miami for the last few years (disclosure: she represents my work), “And yet, the Norfolk area has a very limited market for contemporary art. If it wasn’t for the art fairs, keeping a gallery in this area would not be a viable option.”

Read: "Because of Miami and other art fairs, I wouldn't be able to have a gallery in Norfolk." Norfolk should be grateful to Miami...

Individual artists have also begun to use the Miami opportunity to showcase their own approaches. None of these have been as cool or successful as Calder Brannock’s Camper Contemporary.

Camper Contemporary is a mobile gallery created and curated by Calder Brannock. According to the artist, “It is a fully functional art gallery set up inside an altered 1967 Yellowstone camper. Camper Contemporary gallery poses a solution for many problems a gallery faces in the modern art market. It allows the gallerist to showcase work in a clean controlled gallery environment without being tethered to rents or a geographic location. The mobile gallery model allows the gallerist to maintain a physical space where work can be displayed with all the benefits and gravitas of a traditional gallery while easily reaching collectors at art fairs and other large art markets.”

So how does an artist get to Miami if he/she is not represented by a gallery, or their gallery doesn’t do art fairs or chooses not to bring your work to the party?

Some ideas next later...

Opportunity for Collage Artists

Deadline: December 31, 11.

2012 marks the centennial of the inception of collage in the field of painting. Strange Glue - Collage is 100 is a three-part exhibition series that will open in September of 2012 and run through June of 2013. Collage is ubiquitous in contemporary culture and it is arguably the most democratic of artistic processes. The exhibition series aims to explore the current status of collage methodology within contemporary art practices as much as it endeavors to examine the conceptual and political manifestations of this evolving artistic strategy. To apply, please visit the Thompson Gallery website for a prospectus and/or follow this link.

Opportunity for Artists of the Nude

Deadline: January 27, 2012

CIAO Gallery of Jackson, Wyoming is pleased to offer the opportunity to participate in their 5th annual "Naturally Nude", an exhibition of exceptional nudes. This show is open to all artists in any medium, traditional renderings as well as unique interpretations. Work must be original and ready to be displayed, clearly labeled with the artists name and contact information. No substitutions of accepted work. Art work must be for sale. This exhibition opening takes place on Valentine's Day evening and has become one of our most popular events for the gallery. $45 entry fee. Visit website for prospectus, or send a SASE to:

PO Box 1274
Jackson WY 83001

Questions? Contact Michele Walters at ciaogallery@yahoo.com or call (307) 733-7833.

Hand woes

Yesterday I was packing some Xmas presents and when I was taping up the shipping box, somehow my right hand slipped while I was cutting the tape and as a result I embedded the entire blade of the Exacto knife into the meaty portion of my left palm.

Sis in law drove me to emergency, where after a few lost hours I exited with a wounded hand hopefully on the way to recovery and one really gross image (taken while I was bored waiting for the doc in one of the emergency room cubicles) of what a very deep entry wound looks like.

New Xmas Song

Keep buying!!

Campello Pinot Grigio is available practically everywhere, most notably at Trader Joe's in those non fascist states where supermarkets can sell wine.

Reviews and comments here. For around six or seven bucks it has been getting rave reviews!

Keep buying!

Statement by the President on the Legacy of Laura Pollán

Today, as the National Endowment for Democracy awards the Democracy Service Medal posthumously to Laura Pollán, the founder of Las Damas de Blanco, we honor and celebrate her life by recognizing her significant contributions to the struggle to defend human rights in Cuba.

Laura Pollán and the quiet dignity of the Ladies in White have courageously voiced the core desire of the Cuban people and of people everywhere to live in liberty. Taking to the streets in peaceful protest to draw attention to the plight of those unjustly held in Cuba’s prisons, Laura Pollán and the Ladies in White have stood bravely against Cuban authorities who unleash mobs, and resort to house arrest, and temporary detention in a failed attempt to silence them. Through Laura Pollán’s and the Damas’ brave actions, the world bore witness to the repressive actions of Cuban authorities, eventually leading to the release of political prisoners wrongly jailed in the Spring of 2003.

Though Laura is not with us today, her bravery in the face of repression and her selfless commitment to democracy and human rights in Cuba, offer a living legacy that inspires us to keep moving forward. To Las Damas de Blanco who will watch or listen to today’s ceremony, you have our utmost respect for your efforts to stand up for the rights of the Cuban people even in the face of this weekend’s crackdown directed at you and we honor each of you as well.

The United States is steadfast in supporting the simple desire of the Cuban people to freely determine their future and to enjoy the rights and freedoms that define the Americas, and that should be universal to all human beings. I remain committed to supporting civil society in Cuba, including by protecting the ability of Cuban Americans to support their families in Cuba through unrestricted family visits and remittances.

The Castro brothers' criminal dictatorship will come to an end one day soon, and justice will touch the Castros and their fellow criminals who have brutalized the Cuban people for so many years.

It is a lesson in human will to see these brutal dictators throw the entire power of their 53-year-old repressive state machine at a bunch of valiant old women and have the Ladies in White show the Cuban police state what human will power and love for freedom is all about.

Laura Pollán, you will not be forgotten.

You won't believe this...

Hardworking Norfolk art dealer Sheila Giolitti is the owner of Norfolk-based gallery Mayer Fine Art.

MFA is not only Norfolk's best art gallery (in my biased opinion since they represent me), but also the only Norfolk-based gallery and one of 2-3 Virginia art galleries that does art fairs around the US and overseas.

This morning Giolitti woke up to the news that her gallery website had been hacked into by an extremist Muslim group who filled her website with anti Jewish, hate-filled slogans, causing her account to be suspended.

Who knows why the website was targeted, unless some idiot thought that the "Mayer" in Mayer Fine Art means that it is a Jewish-owned gallery, which it isn't.

I don't know if there's a relationship, but I am also aware of the fact that several artists' email accounts around the Tidewater area have been recently hacked into and hate-filled emails sent out, and this morning my own personal account had been shut down (for unknown reasons so far) and I had to go through a laborious process to restore it and hope that it was all a precautionary step from MS.

One word to those whose heart and actions are filled with hate: you reap what you sow.

Hizzoner's Weird Xmas Pic

"Mayor Jorge Santini of San Juan landed himself a spot in the famed Awkward Family Photo blog with his 2011 Christmas picture which depicts his family huddling around a taxidermied killing scene. As a leopard sinks its teeth into a poor creature’s throat, a little girl strikes a very sassy pose."

Read the whole thing online here.

Hockney Atop The Brits

A recent poll conducted by 'The Other Art Fair' asked thousands of artists of all ages who they thought was the most influential artist in the UK. The winner was David Hockney, leading many to ask: "really?" Hockney, known for his modern-pop appropriations of the traditional landscape, won a surprising victory over such giants as J.M.W. Turner, Francis Bacon and Thomas Gainsborough. Banksy made the shortlist, but influential Young British Artists (YBAs) Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin didn't even even make the top 10.

Read it online here.

Another loss to the DMV visual arts community

(Via)

Nicole Puzan
1983-2011
Studio Coordinator, Glass Artist, Friend

I am sorry to report that the Washington Glass School's much loved glass studio coordinator passed away yesterday morning. Only 28 years old, Nicole succumbed to a very aggressive ovarian cancer. Our Nicole was a trooper to the end, and we understand that she seemed comfortable as she passed.

Nicole was integral to the Prince George's County Courthouse public artwork sculpture.

Nicole coordinated many art projects while working in the Washington Glass Studio. Here, Nicole is cleaning a just annealed glass casting that was part of the Vanderbilt University Critical Care Tower.

Nicole celebrating the arrival of Margaret Boozer's baby in 2009 with the Dutch sweet "beschuit met muisies".

Nicole shown here plugged through the messy part of studio work.

Nicole was an instructor of classes at the Washington Glass School. Nicole is hown here with artists Cheryl Derricotte and Dave Cook.

A mural based on Nicole's tattoo was painted at the Fridge Gallery in Washington, DC. in 2010.

Services will be held Saturday at 11 am at the Oakton Unitarian Universalist.

Vintage Che

To the left is the most reproduced photograph in human history. It's an image taken by Cuban photographer Korda (1928-2001) of Argentine mass-murdering guerrilla icon Ernesto Guevara de La Serna Lynch, known to most of the world as Che and to many Cubans as "El Chacal de La Cabana."

Che's photo has been reproduced in billions of T-Shirts, posters, postcards, cigar labels, vodka labels, etc. as the West's all-powerful ad machinery, driven mostly by an mystic love of all things Che by Italians and the French, has iconized this image beyond's Korda's wildest expectations (and until the very end of his life, he didn't get a penny for it, as in Castro's workers' paradise, the state, not Korda, had ownership of the image).

Would you be surprised to learn that the very first vintage photo of Che; the very first one; Korda's own personal print; the mother of all subsequent images of Che, has found a home in the DMV?

It does, living alongside 17 other vintage Korda photographs acquired directly from Korda's daughter soon after the legendary Cuban photographer died.

Artists 62 and older...

The Research Center for Arts and Culture at the National Center for Creative Aging
(NYC & DC Metro Area ) --- ART CART: SAVING THE LEGACY (www.creativeaging.org/artcart) will select professional visual artists from the NYC and Washington DC Metro areas for a 9-month project (September 2012-May 2013) run by the Research Center for Arts and Culture at the National Center for Creative Aging to help organize and document the artists' work.

Artists receive honoraria for public forums. To receive more information please send your contact information to rcac@creativeaging.org or leave it at 202-895-9489. Info materials will be sent in January for a February deadline.

Website: http://www.creativeaging.org/artcart

Graduate Arts Award

Deadline: 9 February 2012

The Graduate Arts Award - The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Graduate Arts Award recognizes and rewards America's promising up-and-coming artists from lower-income backgrounds with the nation's leading graduate scholarships in the visual arts, performing arts, and creative writing.

The Graduate Arts Award enables students or recent alumni with exceptional artistic or creative promise and significant financial need to pursue up to three years of study at an accredited graduate institution in the US or abroad. Awards can be as much as $50,000 annually. In 2012, the Foundation will select up to 15 recipients for this award.

The award provides funding for tuition, room and board, required fees, and books. Scholarship amounts vary based on several factors, including cost at the institution each recipient attends and other grants and scholarships the student receives.

Students interested in the program must be nominated by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Faculty Representative at their school, and may not apply directly to the Foundation. Each college or university may nominate two students to be considered for this award.

SELECTION CRITERIA
A review panel of distinguished artists, arts faculty, and university administrators select Scholars using criteria including artistic or creative merit, academic achievement, financial need, will to succeed, and a breadth of interest and activities.

The online application is available now and the deadline for submission is February 9, 2012. For more information please visit the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation website.

Another Experiment: Frida After Frida

As I've discussed and reflected on this site many times, over the last year or so I have been experimenting with the marriage of technology and drawing. In the first trials, I have begun to embed a video player into drawings and use that technology to expand my interest in narrative art.

In preparation for the recent Aqua Art Fair in Miami during Art Basel Week, I also began to experiment with tiny LCD screens and software that would allow a Powerpoint-like presentation.


Here we see a shot of my studio with the first stage of a drawing of Frida Kahlo. I envisioned a Kahlo portrait that (like the Kahlo portrait with a small portrait of Diego Rivera on her forehead) that would amplify her obsession (and mine) with her own image.


And thus, here is the drawing - prior to the addition of the electronic component.


And here is the 1.5 inch LCD screen and the motherboard with rechargeable lithium battery.


Here is the drawing with the window cut into her forehead.


And here's a detail showing the embedded electronic component playing a continuous loop of all of Kahlo's self portraits.

This piece is now in the De La Torre Collection in Miami Beach. The Aqua Art Fair was a spectacular success for these new pieces.

What's next?

About a decade ago I did a huge drawing entitled "Last Supper for Dictators." The piece was exhibited at one of my solos at the old Fraser Gallery in Georgetown, and subsequently sold to a New York collector via Sotheby's auction. It depicted a last supper scene with the principals being Latin American dictators. Che Guevara was The Christ, Fidel Castro was Judas Iscariot, Evita Peron was The Magdalene, etc.

I am going to revisit that theme again, and this time the video or Powerpoint component will amplify the presence of the dictators.

The WPA 2012 Auction Jurors are...

Seth Adelsberger - Artist & Co-Founder, Nudashank (Baltimore, MD)

Molly Donovan - Associate Curator, National Gallery of Art

Sarah Newman - Curator, Corcoran Gallery of Art

Dennis O’Neil - Chair, Fine Arts Dept at Corcoran College of Art+Design, Director at Hand Print Workshop International

Stephen Phillips - Fine Arts Program Director, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System

Katy Murnane Reis - Curatorial Assistant, Wexner Art Center

Judy Sherman - Independent Curator, J Fine Art

Paul Thulin - Interim Chair, Dept. of Photography and Film at VCU

Tomorrow: Kahn & Goldberg at Addison Ripley


Wolf Kahn: paintings & pastels and Carol Brown Goldberg: sculptures

December 9, 2011 - January 21, 2012

Opening reception for the artists: Friday, December 9th, 6-8pm.

New Xmas Song

WGS Open House

The Washington Glass School will have its 10th annual Winter Sculpture Show and Holiday Open House, featuring works by artists and instructors of the Washington Glass School.

Some of the region’s leading mixed media sculptors and artists work from the studios on the edge of DC, and artwork both large and small will be on sale.

This event is more than an art open house – its an experience! I get a lot of Xmas presents there each year.

The adjacent artist studios - FluxStudios and Ellyn Weiss Studio will also be open on the day.

Washington Glass School Winter Sculpture Show
1pm – 5 pm
Saturday, Dec 10, 2011
Free and open to the public

Washington Glass School
3700 Otis Street
Mount Rainier, MD 20712
phone: 202.744.8222
website: www.washglass.com
email: washglassschool@aol.com

December 7

This story has been a perfect guiding example for me most of my life: seeing the silver lining in every possible aspect of life:

Sunday, December 7th, 1941--Admiral Chester Nimitz was attending a concert in Washington D.C. He was paged and told there was a phone call for him.

When he answered the phone, it was President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He told Admiral Nimitz that he (Nimitz) would now be the Commander of the Pacific Fleet.

Admiral Nimitz flew to Hawaii to assume command of the Pacific Fleet. He landed at Pearl Harbor on Christmas Eve, 1941. There was such a spirit of despair, dejection and defeat—you would have thought the Japanese had already won the war.

On Christmas Day, 1941, Adm. Nimitz was given a boat tour of the destruction wrought on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese. Big sunken battleships and navy vessels cluttered the waters every where you looked. As the tour boat returned to dock, the young helmsman of the boat asked, "Well Admiral, what do you think after seeing all this destruction?"

Admiral Nimitz's reply shocked everyone within the sound of his voice.

Admiral Nimitz said, "The Japanese made three of the biggest mistakes an attack force could ever make, or God was taking care of America. Which do you think it was?"

Shocked and surprised, the young helmsman asked, "What do mean by saying the Japanese made the three biggest mistakes an attack force ever made?"

Nimitz explained: Mistake number one: the Japanese attacked on Sunday morning. Nine out of every ten crewmen of those ships were ashore on leave. If those same ships had been lured to sea and been sunk--we would have lost 38,000 men instead of 3,800.

Mistake number two: when the Japanese saw all those battleships lined in a row, they got so carried away sinking those battleships, they never once bombed our dry docks opposite those ships. If they had destroyed our dry docks, we would have had to tow everyone of those ships to America to be repaired. As it is now, the ships are in shallow water and can be raised. One tug can pull them over to the dry docks, and we can have them repaired and at sea by the time we could have towed them to America. And I already have crews ashore anxious to man those ships.

Mistake number three: Every drop of fuel in the Pacific theater of war is on top of the ground in storage tanks five miles away over that hill. One attack plane could have strafed those tanks and destroyed our fuel supply.

That's why I say the Japanese made three of the biggest mistakes an attack force could make, or God was taking care of America.

-- "Reflections on Pearl Harbor" by Admiral Chester Nimitz