HFAF 2014: The Good Stuff

Robert Boyd

OK, I was pretty harsh on the Houston Fine Art Fair here and here. These things are always a mixture. You have the good and the bad and a lot in between. The problem with HFAF was that the bad was so bad, and there was so much of it, one wonders if good galleries like Shoshana Wayne Gallery and Mark Borghi Fine Art will want to continue their association with the fair. Art fairs need to be curated to an extent, and there was little sense that HFAF was particularly selective.

But even if their inclusion criterion was nothing more than a gallery's willingness to pay the booth fee, some good art sneaked in. Here's some of my favorites.


James Surls at Wade Wilson Gallery


James Surls at Wade Wilson Gallery

I love James Surls and was struck by how nice these large sculptures look inside (I think they are meant to be outdoors sculptures). I was a bit surprised to see Surls associated with Wade Wilson (I though Barbara Davis was his local gallery when he bothered--but a look at the artists page on their website suggests that is no longer true.Wade Wilson Gallery closed their Houston location after opening a Santa Fe gallery. I was a little surprised to see them in Houston--at least one Houston artist had to sue Wade Wilson to get paid in recent years.


Michal Rovner, Yaar (Laila), 2014, LCD screens, paper and video, 46 1/2 x 40 1/2 x 2 3/8 inches at Shoshana Wayne Gallery

Not surprisingly, there wasn't much video art at HFAF. I think there were literally more lenticular artworks than video artworks. But one video piece I liked was this eerie one by Michal Rovner, featuring two lines of people endlessly marching on what looks like the face of a cliff. A group of cypress is in silhouette in the foreground. The latter feature seemed slightly unnecessary--the point of the work was the endless line of marchers. But as I looked closely, I realized that the center tree covered a seam between two video monitors. I guess you have to work with monitors that are actually manufactured, and if you want to have a nearly square image like this, connecting two monitors is the only way to do it. It detracts from the main idea, unfortunately. But I still found Yaar (Laila) to be a rather haunting piece.


Sabrina Gschwandtner, Hearts and Hands Brown and Blue, 2014, 16 mm polyester film, polyester thread, 23 5/8 x 23 1/2 inches at Shoshana Wayne Gallery

I saw Sabrina Gschwandtner's work earlier this year at Pulse. Aside from creating very interesting collages with old bits of 16 mm film, her surname has the highest consonant to vowel ratio of any other artist that I know of. Her pieces require a lightbox to be seen properly. Because the strips of film are sewn together, there is a rather quilt-like quality to her pieces. I find the patterning quite hypnotic.


Sabrina Gschwandtner, Hearts and Hands Brown and Blue (detail), 2014, 16 mm polyester film, polyester thread, 23 5/8 x 23 1/2 inches at Shoshana Wayne Gallery


John Chamberlain, Flywheelsonata, 2007, painted and chromed steel at Mark Borghi Fine Art

This rather antic piece by John Chamberlain exudes a happy feeling not always present in his work, which can be a little anxious in part because the association one may draw from it with car accidents. I know he always claimed to be a formalist, but still his work is from the high tide of the automobile (and thus the auto accident). It's nearly impossible not to think about that. But here, by using narrow strips of brightly painted sheet metal, I get an entirely different feeling.


John Chamberlain prints for sale to benefit the Asia Society

In addition to the John Chamberlain sculpture, HFAF was auctioning off two John Chamberlain prints (and some other artwork) to benefit the Asia Society.


Larry Poons, Untitled #13, 1973, acrylic on canvas, 55 1/2 x 29 inches at Mark Borghi Fine Art

This alarming snot avalanche by Larry Poons was perversely fascinating. 


Luis Jimenez, El Buen Pastor, colored lithograph, 1999 at Redbud Gallery

Redbud Gallery had several Luis Jimenez prints, including this powerful portrait of Esequiel Hernández, Jr., the goat herder killed by U.S. Marines in 1997.


Jim Dine, Double Iron Man, woodcut, 68 x 98 inches at Adamar Fine Arts

When I saw these antic woodcuts, I immediately thought, "Wow!" I would have never guessed that they were by Jim Dine. There is something about these two faces that really grabs me--a combination of the crude cartoonish rendering, the intense and unexpected colors and the restless texture.


Donald Sultan, Screen Aug 25, 1987, aquatint with relief print on reverse, 63 x 144 inches flat at Parkerson Gallery

I wish they had displayed this Donald Sultan on the floor so that we could see both sides of the screen. The image on this side is simple, but I love the smudginess.



Bert Long, Search, 1987, mixed media, 26 x 44 1/2 inches at Deborah Colton Gallery

Great colors on this Bert Long at Deborah Colton Gallery, which had one of the more interesting booths at HFAF.


Suzanne Anker, Carbon Collision in the Diamond Mind 33-40, 2013 metallic glazed porcelain at Deborah Colton Gallery

Suzanne Anker's little porcelain statuettes look decidedly dangerous.


Ferhat Özgür, Corps of Honour, 2011, watercolor on paper, 15.75 x 23.62 inches at Deborah Colton Gallery

Ferhat Özgür had a whole series of bizarre, slightly martial watercolors, including this tender moment between two Turkish soldiers.

The Houston Artists Hall of Fame

Jackie Harris, The Fruitmobile, 1967 Ford station wagon modified 1984

The fair devoted a considerable amount of space to the Houston Artists Hall of Fame, an exhibit of artists chosen by Patricia Covo Johnson. The idea is that there will be new artists added each year. In a way, it might have been a bad idea for HFAF to host this because it showed how weak most of the exhibitors were in comparison. It was nice that Johnson included an art car (one of the very first art cars, in fact) , recognizing the importance of this oddball vernacular art form to Houston.


Jesse Lott, Ascension of the Fire God, ca. 1974, wire and other found materials


two Jim Love sculptures


Manual (Ed Hill and Suzanne Bloom), Louis Corinth in Vermont, gelatin silver


Mel Chin, Cross for the Unforgiven, n.d., AK47s and steel


Alabama Song's booth

As they did last year, HFAF comped Alabama Song a booth. Work was hung salon-style and was for sale at all different price points (good idea!). They also had some participatory art happening. Rocky Wang played ping pong with all challengers.


Rocky Wang taking all comers with a shoe

Despite the fact that he handicapped himself by playing with his shoe instead of a paddle, Wang eviscerated every challenger.


Rocky Wang's hat with a tiny ping pong paddle


Rabéa Ballin at Alabama Song


Miguel Amat at Alabama Song

Miguel Amat will be having a show at the Blaffer Gallery later this fall--I'm looking forward to it and so should you.

Fotofest also had a booth which featured an intriguing selection of Arab photographers.


Ahmed Mater, from the series Illumination (Ottoman Waqf), 2014, gold leaf, tea, pomegranate, Dupont prints at Fotofest


Ahmed Mater, from the series Illumination (Ottoman Waqf), 2014, gold leaf, tea, pomegranate, Dupont prints at Fotofest


Hassan Hajjaj, Odd 1 Out, 2000/1421 from the series Kesh Angels, 2009-2012, c-print, walnut wood frame, tomato cans at Fotofest




Lalla Essaydi, Harem #29, 2012, chromogenic print at Fotofest

So it wasn't all bad. But HFAF still has to improve a lot, and their trajectory over the past couple of years has not been in the right direction.

In New York for the Fairs day 1: Cutlog, Pulse and Select (possibly NSFW)

Robert Boyd

For the past three years, I've been checking out the art fairs in New York that happen in early May. It's a little birthday gift for myself. I like it, but it's exhausting--both physically (my dogs are barking by the end) and mentally. Your eyes get tired of looking at art for a while. But it's a lot of fun walking through the fairs with my friends LM and DC. On Thursday, I went to Cutlog alone and then met up with DC at Pulse.

I forgot my camera at Cutlog so I didn't take too many photos--just a few phone pictures. (If you want to see an excellent selection of photos from Cutlog as well as a nice write-up, real Alison Meier's report.)



Yes, I was wearing a tie that day.



This is what the entrance looked like at night. As you can see, it looks like it's on fire! But that is actually a brilliantly lit ball of fake fur, Hairdoo for a Hallway by Shoplifter. The neon phrasing is by Robert Montgomery.


Hrafnhildur Arnardottir aka Shoplifter, Hairdoo for a Hallway

It was really dramatic. I think it makes sense for an art fair to have something eye-popping in the entrance way, even if it's a kind of empty calories artwork like this. It gives you a nice feeling of "wow."


Clara Feder, Break In Case of Emergency, mixed media, 13.7 x 17.7 inches

Clara Feder's Break in Case of Emergency made me laugh. It was part of a larger project called the Wall of Temptation. Now the thing about art like this is that it is literally a joke--a one-liner, a New Yorker cartoon. And it's a good joke! But once you've gotten a joke, do you want it on your wall forever? Some of my favorite art at the art fairs are jokes--I see them and enjoy them for a moment, but feel that they have a shelf life of just as long as the laugh they get.

Borges wrote a story called "The Analytical Language of John Wilkins" that includes within it a description of a Chinese Encyclopedia called "Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge." In it, all animals are categorized as belonging to one of the following categories:

a) belonging to the emperor, (b) embalmed, (c) tame, (d) sucking pigs, (e) sirens, (f) fabulous, (g) stray dogs, (h) included in the present classification, (i) frenzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, (l) et cetera, (m) having just broken the water pitcher, (n) that from a long way off look like flies.

DC and I started a similar classification of art you will find at an art fair. These would include (but not be limited to) (a) jokes, (b) art that seems good for 10 seconds, (c) art you are glad you saw but never want to see again, (d) visual overload art, (e) Anish Kapoor wall bowls, (f) abstract painting, (g) art that if you owned it, it would require you build a special room for it, (g) art that if you owned it, it would require some kind of continuous special maintenance, (h) art so quiet and unassuming, you almost miss it, (i) art so quiet and unassuming that you do miss it, (i) big photos, (j) small photos, (k) sexy art, (l) new casualism, (m) etc., (n) art that from up close looks like money.

Hairdoo for a Hallway was a (d) and Break in Case of Emergency was an (a).


Garcia Sinclair, Weapons of Mass Distraction, 2013, maple, cotton rope, plaster casts

Gabriel Sinclair's Weapons of Mass Distraction at Yellow Peril Gallery was also an (a).

There was art that was more about some visual quality or which had a sophisticated conceptual basis at Cutlog--I just didn't take any pictures. I think Cutlog is a good art fair--the art's eclectic, it's in a funky space and it brings over non-blue chip European galleries. Not to mention one from Malaysia--Fuman Art. I mention them because I was shocked as I rounded the corner into their both and saw this:


Stéphane Blanquet, Blue Ocean, 2014, mixed media on paper, 11.8 x 15.75 inches

Blue Ocean is by artwork Stéphane Blanquet, a French artist best known (to me at least) for his comics. An alternative comics artist, his work falls into the more transgressive, underground sphere of French alternative comics (as opposed to the somewhat more intellectual, twee side represented by L'Association). A small number of his stories have been published in English and one book, Toys in the Basement. Many of his comics are drawn in silhouette form (such as La Vénéneuse aux deux éperons). And the work that Fuman Art had was all done in silhouette.

Obviously one thinks of Kara Walker (or I should say that Kara Walker reminded me of Blanquet--I saw his silhouette work before I saw hers). But even more so, this work reminds me of Andrea Dezsö, an artist whose work was shown at the Rice University Art Gallery in 2010.

I have always liked Blanquet's work, and his paintings were reasonably priced. So I bought one.


Stéphane Blanquet

It's a pretty simple piece. It is painted on stained unprimed linen. But it shows a familiar creepy situation--a bug landing in your hair. It tickles me to think that an artist produced this in France presumably, it was shipped to Kuala Lampur in Malaysia, but then shipped to Manhattan for this art fair, bought by me and carried home in my suitcase to Houston. It would be amusing to draw a map of its travels.

My next stop was Pulse where I met my friend DC. The first year I went to Pulse in New York, I was bowled over by the sheer crassness of the art. Lots of loud, stupid art. Tons of pin-up derived art. I won't say that is entirely gone this year. For example, there is Fall by Jessica Lichtenstein at gallery nine5.


Jessica Lichtenstein, Fall (Four Seasons Series), c-print on acrylic, 48 inches in diameter.

An oversaturated nature scene. But look closer.


Jessica Lichtenstein, Fall (Four Seasons Series) detail, c-print on acrylic, 48 inches in diameter.

The tree is constructed of sexy naked cartoon girls.

 Gallery nine5 also has a classic example of a (g).


Katherine Mann, Fallow, acrylic, sumi ink, collage on paper and felt

Pulse over all seems to have mellowed and matured a bit. Here is some other work that was on display.



Two pieces by Jim Condron at Adah Rose Gallery.



Two pieces by Brian Dupont at Adah Rose gallery. The text is derived from depositions in the Richard Prince/Patrick Cariou case.



And here's Brian Dupont himself

There was a lot of interesting photography at Pulse.


Penelope Umbrico, Mountains Moving: of Aperture Masters of Photography (4 Westons), 2013, c-print at Aperture

Penelope Umbrico also did the amazing Suns from the Internet.


Ellen Carey, Dings and Shadows (Suite of 5, Panels A through D), 2013, color photograms, 24 x 20 inches each at JHB Gallery



Here's DC looking at some Ellen Carey photos at JHB Gallery, with Jayne Baum on the left.



Stephen Mallon captured the sinking of a subway car (at Front Room Gallery).

Among the non-photographic works I liked were these calligraphic pieces by Retna at Coburn Projects.


Retna


Retna

And I loved Loren Munk's history of minimalism (portrayed, ironically, in his trademarked visually dense, super-colorful style) at the Freight + Volume booth. Interestingly, Munk and Retna are two artists I have seen before, but only at art fairs. Sometimes art is described as "art fair art"--that's always seemed rather vague, but one possible definition would be an artist whose work you only ever see at art fairs (assuming that artist is not represented by a gallery in your city).

Loren Munk also has an alter-ego named James Kalm who does videos of various current art shows, which allow him to comment on the art scene--which will presumably inform future Loren Munk paintings.


Loren Munk, Colliding Timelines of Minimalism, 2012, oil on linen, 60 x 72 inches


Loren Munk, Colliding Timelines of Minimalism (detail), 2012, oil on linen, 60 x 72 inches

Munk's painting combine two things I recoil from in visual art--a self-referential art history content and tons of text. For this reason, I've resisted liking them even though in my gut, they appeal to me. My gut wins. I like Colliding Timelines of Minimalism and his work in general. It's wacky fun.


Dan Gluibizzi, Our Season, 2013 (left) and Story Sisters, 2014 (right)


Dan Gluibizzi, Between Friends, 2014


Dan Gluibizzi, Girls Girls Girls 1, 2014

These Dan Gluibizzi watercolors at Kopeikin Gallery also had a wacky quality to them. Both Munk and Gluibizzi want to dazzle you with intense color, and they both succeed. You might ask, why do I condemn Jessica Lichtenstein's Fall, with its naked girls, but like Dan Gluibizzi's Girls Girls Girls 1. Good question. I think it's because the girls in Fall are so fake and plastic. Something about the watercolor in Girls Girls Girls 1 gives them a much more real presence. Not real in the sense of realistic, but real in the sense of human, flesh-and-blood as opposed to just pixels.

Keith Allyn Spencer, Post-Walmart Moral Hangover, filthy disgusting dusty plywood panel found in the outskirts of Hell, student purchased acrylic paint, 1 nail only God Bless It. Dimensions vary (24″ tall -+), 2014

"New Casualism" was represented at Pulse with a booth full of the work of Keith Allyn Spencer. (Jim Condron might fall into that category as well.) I liked these ramshackle abstractions quite a lot. Spencer wears his casualism on his sleeve. The materials for Post-Walmart Moral Hangover are described as "filthy disgusting dusty plywood panel found in the outskirts of Hell, student purchased acrylic paint, 1 nail only." (Spencer was included in the Pan Art Fair in Dallas as part of the Oliver Francis Gallery's line-up.)


Keith Allyn Spencer, The Department, plywood, paint, paint, plywood, staples, canvas, canvas, staples, pain in the pain in the, 12.21″ tall -+, 2013

The booth was run by Phalanx Gallery and it was a solo show by Spencer. I wonder about the strategy of devoting your booth to one artist versus multiple artists. With the former, you can be more dramatic and less cluttered. You are also sending a message that you consider this artist very important. But you may be simultaneously sending a message to the other artists in your stable that you consider this one guy to be the star and all you other artists to be spear carriers.

On the other hand, showing multiple artists can look a bit cluttered and cheap--like a flea market stall. It makes it harder for the viewer to really see the work--individual pieces get lots in the crowd. But at the same time, you hedge your bets. If artist A doesn't sell anything, artist B might.


Sabrina Gschwandtner, Hoorah! For the home spun Dresses, 2014, 16 mm polyester film and thread, 17 13/16 x 16 3/4 inches at LMAKprojects


Sabrina Gschwandtner, Hoorah! For the home spun Dresses (detail), 2014, 16 mm polyester film and thread, 17 13/16 x 16 3/4 inches at LMAKprojects

Sabrina Gschwandtner takes old 16 mm film--in this case, some that was deaccessioned by the FIT--and makes quilt-like patterns out of them. (She also is the only person I've ever encountered who has five consonants in a row in her name, as well as another set of four consecutive consonants as well.) Her beautiful work was shown at LMAKprojects.

Station Independent Projects had a large variety of work by Conrad Bakker, pictured below.


Conrad Bakker at Station Independent Projects

All the stuff on the desk is Bakker's work. So is the desk. So is the trash can. So is the post-it note. And it's all carved from wood and hand-painted. 


Conrad Bakker at Station Independent Projects

So yeah, that piece of paper is carved from wood.


Conrad Bakker at Station Independent Projects

These books are all carved from wood, as is the Amazon box. The concept here is that Bakker is taking high art objects (the Donald Judd-designed desk) and mundane objects (a plastic trash can) and equalizing them, forcing us to contend with our ideas of "high" and "low," art-as-commodity, and blah blah blah. Conceptually, this seems like pretty weak tea. But the objects themselves are amazing! Obviously Bakker demonstrates a lot of skill as a wood-carver, and I respect that, but what really appeals to me is the slightly crude, obviously hand-made paint job he gives each object. Instead of making perfect replicas, he's made ones that is slightly off in a very appealing way.


Conrad Bakker at Station Independent Projects

This sculpture--a painted wood replica of a paperback copy of Thorstein Veblen's The Theory of the Leisure, is the perfect art fair artwork. It takes something cheap and mass-produced (but wonderful for the ideas it contains) and turns it into a valuable unique artwork for a member of the "leisure class" to buy--without any implied obligation that said leisure class member needs to read the words the original contained!

DC had to head home after Pulse, but I went next door to check out Select Art Fair. The main thing Select Art Fair had going for it was its immediate proximity to Pulse. Otherwise, it seems to have taken the old Pulse's worst sensationalist tendencies and run with them. The selection of galleries was truly odd. I knew two of the galleries represented, Zoya Tommy Contemporary and Unit, run by Arianne Roesch. Both told me that they had been approached by Select while exhibiting at other regional art fairs. (They were, by the way, the only two Houston galleries in New York at any of the fairs as far as I could tell.) My friend DC texted me that "Select was 100% missable, if you haven't already been." By the time I got his text, I had been.


People lined up to check out Select

The fair went more for spectacle than for depth. And spectacle can be entertaining. That's the main reason I go to an art fair, anyway--to be entertained.  The problem is that when you are repeatedly hit in the face with such art, it makes it hard to see other art. Art that is quiet or contemplative or subtle.

Allie Pohl, Hot Seat series at Black Book Gallery

So we have work like Allie Pohl's Hot Seat series at Black Book Gallery, self-portraits (presumably) of the artist peeing in various bathrooms. It feels like it desperately wants to be outrageous.

Pills at DNA Gallery

I don't know who did these pills/bombs at DNA Gallery--their website is unhelpful to the point of being extremely irritating--but the facile juxtaposition of pharmaceuticals with aerial bombardment, the huge size of the objects, and their shiny plastic quality make them masterpieces of glibness.


Pills at DNA Gallery


Daniel Henderson, Premo, 2011, Fossil black marble, cast glass, glass lenses, brass-plated bronze, cast bronze with patina, nickel-plated steel, powder-coated steel, nickel-plated brass, enamel paint. 79 x 38 x 68 in., 5600 lbs. Powder-coated steel base
 
When is doubt, make giant-sized versions of small things. That's what Daniel Henderson did.

One sweaty fellow told me, seemingly at random, that I should make sure I don't miss the goings on in the back room. Naturally I was intrigued and went to check it out. When I saw what he was talking about, it made me wonder if he wasn't a professional tout, like you'd see outside a strip joint in Soho.
The piece he was pointing me to turned out to be a living tableau/art-making exercise sponsored by Lambert Fine Art. It was described as a collaboration between Terrenceo Hammond and Tony Margerrison.


fruit girl at Lambert Fine Art

You were beckoned into a room by this young woman, who also gave you fruit.


Terrenceo Hammond and Tony Margerrison's naked tableau
 
In the back room, there was this scene of naked folks lounging around on cushions and couches. The woman in the center seemed to be posing the other models and taking pictures of them with the camera in the foreground on the left. Maybe this had a point beyond, "Hey look! Naked people!" But I couldn't figure it out.

Not everything was cranked up to 10. I liked this collection of detritus by Brett Day Windham. Sure, Tony Cragg did it first, but Windham's version still looked lovely.


Brett Day Windham's project


Meow Wolf installation

And I liked the casually thrown-together installation by Meow Wolf, a Santa Fe, New Mexico collective. On one side was this collection of artfully arrange junk (I liked the altered traffic cone), and on another was this large painting of a flower-sasquatch by Meow Wolf member Caity Kennedy. 


Caity Kennedy of Meow Wolf
 
So if you are a gallery that shows relatively quiet work, how do you get seen in a fair characterized by visual cacophony? My friend Zoya Tommy's gallery showed art that was kind of unassuming compared to the pulsating productions that dominated Select Art Fair.


Zoya Tommy standing in front of Mark Perry's Koi Pond 2, 2014, oil on canvas, 66"x49"

But she announced on Facebook that she had sold Mark Perry's large painting Koi Pond. So even with all the distractions, if fair goers saw a quieter work that they wanted, they went for it.


Arianne Roesch at the UNIT booth

And Select Fair was probably smart to include a lot of printers of and dealers of editioned artwork, like UNIT. Out of the 42 exhibitors, at least five were presses. The result was that work was accessible to younger, poorer collectors.


Magsamen+ Hillerbrand oven mitts

You could get these playful Magsamen+Hillerbrand oven mitts from UNIT. 

All in all, I'd say Pulse was the best fair I saw Thursday, followed by Cutlog and then Select. Friday was devoted to Frieze, which is the subject of my next post.