Photo: Courtesy Art Basel
This year’s Art Basel entrants have been a noteworthy bunch, and sales on Day One and Day Two have been fast and furious as a result. It seems everyone is talking about the large-scale works and grand gestures at Unlimited, and Design Miami/Basel has had its share of whimsical delights as well.
Below, artnet News has chosen our favorites from the approximately 300 galleries who made the trip to Switzerland’s third largest city this year. From Pawel Althamer’s scatological ode to Rodin to Andrea Bowers’s chilling text installation, the following booths are worth a visit.
Franz West at Galerie Eva Presenhuber.
Photo: artnet News.
1. Galerie Eva Presenhuber
Zurich-based gallery Eva Presenhuber displayed perhaps the most impressive of the colorful sculptures by Austrian artist Franz West seen around the fair. Presenhuber’s relationship with West began 20 years ago in Zurich, and in May the gallery had its first show of his work since his death in 2012.
His large lumpy, varnished, papier mache objects, for which the tables on which they rest become elements of the work, are not to be missed. Also in the gallery are works by Swiss artist Valentin Carron and an array of wonderful ceramics by Josh Smith.
Ugo Rondinone at Sadie Coles.
Photo: artnet News.
2. Sadie Coles
Sadie Coles had several colorful small works by Ugo Rondinone. The three works, small colorful sculptures composed of delicately arranged rock, were already sold out on the first day.
“They’re maquettes for large-scale works he’s making in the Nevada Desert,” said a young staffer at Sadie Coles. “These are brand, brand new.” Also in the booth were works by Sarah Lucas, Jordan Wolfson, and Jim Lambie.
Sarah Crowner at Casey Kaplan.
Photo: Casey Kaplan.
3. Casey Kaplan Gallery
“I’m excited to be showing three women I’ve never shown before at Basel,” said Casey Kaplan when we entered the booth of his eponymous gallery. Those artists are Berlin-based Haris Epaminonda (represented by a piece of antique statuette), the paintings by N. Dash, who joined the gallery this past January, and a large black-and-white geometric abstraction by Sarah Crowner hanging on the exterior wall, which echoed work Crowner presented at Kaplan earlier this year (above).
Six gorgeously colored resin-cast works by Kevin Beasley that looked like medium-sized plastic crates, which had been peppered around the gallery, were sold as one work; it had already been placed in an important European collection. When asked about a recent New York Times article, which highlighted the difficulty of galleries to get into Basel, Kaplan, who has been coming to Basel for years, said that his mother took note. “After 20 years in the business,” said Kaplan, “it takes that article for my mother to say she’s proud of me.”
Jose Davila at OMR Gallery.
Photo: artnet News.
4. Galería OMR
Large plates of glass were balanced precariously with brown stones and colorful nylon straps at Mexico City’s OMR gallery. The glass works were part of the gallery’s stunning solo presentation of the new painting and sculpture of Jose Dávila. With work recently acquired by the Tate and the Centre Pompidou, Dávila is on the up-and-up.
“He’s one of our most interesting emerging artists right now,” said gallery founder Jaime Riestra about the “small but comprehensive” display of work exploring “tension, fragility, and force.” He continued, “Europe will get a more complete idea of what he’s doing.”
Liza Lou at Goodman Gallery.
Photo: artnet News.
5. Goodman Gallery
A large spool of white woven rope at South Africa’s Goodman Gallery is actually a work made of glass beads by the artist Liza Lou, who is in the formidable collection of art collectors Norman and Irma Braman in Miami. The work, titled, Continuous Mile, took 50 local women one year to make in Durban, South Africa. The glimmering white rope was installed in the booth one layer at a time for six hours because the labor is all part of the practice.
Lou has become known for transforming everyday objects and whole rooms into sparkling beaded sculptures and environments, like the full-scale reproduction of a kitchen she completed in 1995, replete with beaded table, chairs, and potato chip bags.
In 2005, Lou founded a studio collective in South Africa where she works with Zulu craftswomen to bring her vision to life. Also in the gallery are works by Alfredo Jaar and William Kentridge.
Galerie Gmurzynska.
Photo: artnet News.
6. Galerie Gmurzynska
At Galerie Gmurzynska, Mathias Rastorfer completed an on-camera interview with a Swiss television station before turning to chat with us about the “very substantial sale” that had just happened at the gallery but about which he could divulge no details. Gmurzynska—which was showing works by Yves Klein, Wifredo Lam, and Joan Miro—keeps up the old world style that feels most fitting at this fair.
The booth of the Cologne gallery, which has been dealing in Russian Avant-Garde and Classical Modern art for forty years, and has outposts in Zurich and St. Moritz, was abuzz with activity during the VIP preview. Rastorfer noted that the change in the fair to allow for First Choice collectors to get first dibs, before the regular VIP collectors, has had a noted effect on business.
“We’ve experienced steady sales over two to three days,” he said. He also noted that this tiered system allows those who want to instantly seal the deal on an artwork to get the very first crack, while those who “don’t want to be part of that rush,” and prefer to have a day or two to consider something before they make the deal, come in the next wave.
Robert Rauschenberg at Pace Gallery.
Photo: artnet News.
7. Pace Gallery
With a booth that’s a bit bigger than last year’s, Pace went all out with a section devoted to work by Robert Rauschenberg that has never before been seen or offered at auction.
All of the 7 Rauschenbergs on display sold during the VIP preview. The works, ranging from $450,000 to $1 million—“prices are reasonable for what he was,” according to a staffer in the booth—sold to mainly Russian and American collectors, and each one went to a different collector.
Paweł Althamer: The Neighbors,” (2014) at the New Museum.
Photo: Benoit Pailley.
8. Foksal Gallery Foundation
Joining the ranks of artists who have worked with excrement before him (channeling Chris Ofili and Piero Manzoni among others), Pawel Althamer’s self-portrait at Warsaw’s Foksal Gallery Foundation is a sculpture that gets your attention. In the pose of Rodin’s The Thinker, the work is composed of cow dung, straw, and little wooden totems. Made by his Malian friend Joseph Dada, the totems are an emblem of Althamer’s interest in shamanism and his extensive travels throughout Africa.
The past couple of years have been big for Althamer, who was featured at the 55th Venice Biennale and had his first US solo show at the New Museum in 2014. Also in the booth are works by Wilhelm Sasnal and Edward Krasniski.
Tobias Rehberger at Neuger-Riemschneider.
Photo: artnet News.
9. Neuger-Riemschneider
Berlin’s Neuger-Riemschneider had a nifty work by Tobias Rehberger. Oki Nami Ura Hokusai 1832 and Manga Girls III (2015) is a mural composed of a tiled pattern that resemble pixels of a photograph. Sculptures placed in front of and affixed to the papered wall reflect the wall with a similar tiled pattern. When seen from afar, the mural starts to take on the forms of Hokusai’s famous wave as well as manga characters in risqué poses.
Purchase one sculpture, or more, and you get an image file from which Rehberger will work with you to configure the wallpaper to a specific site. Making this booth particularly resonant with Art Basel is that if you head to the Fondation Beyeler, you’ll see how Rehberger transformed the basement space in similar fashion.
Daniel Buren’s striped floor at Galleria Continua.
Photo: artnet News.
10. Galeria Continua
Bringing the sculpture of Mona Hatoum and Cameroonian artist Pascale Marthine Tayou together with a custom silver-and-white striped floor by Daniel Buren, Galeria Continua has a striking eclectic and energetic presence that’s felt the moment you enter the space. Hatoum’s string of pots and pans is connected by electrical cord and energy running through the objects lights a single bulb hanging from the bottom of the work.
Andrea Bowers installation at Pomona College Museum of Art, 2014.
Photo: artnet News.
11. Susanne Vielmetter
Susanne Vielmetter put on a striking show of the work of Andrea Bowers, which was previously installed at Pomona College Museum of Art last year. Enter the gallery and you’ll see a tranquil setting of blue with white writing. But start reading the text and you’ll soon get chills running down your spine.
The text is snippets of celebratory text messages and Twitter messages that several high school students in Steubenville, Ohio sent each other after having raped a 16-year-old girl. It’s a chilling examination that you’ll find yourself getting unwittingly immersed in.
For more Art Basel coverage, see:
Naked Selfie Artist Milo Moiré Strikes Again at Art Basel With Unauthorized Performance
Helly Nahmad Returns to Art Basel with Judge’s Permission Bringing $50 Million Rothko
Unlimited Is The Most Talked-About Highlight at Art Basel in Basel