The Fine Art Print Fair, run by the International Fine Print Dealers Association, returns this weekend for its 27th edition. As always, the fair is an eclectic mix, with Old Masters, religious manuscripts, Japanese prints, Modern art, and new works by some of the top names in the contemporary art scene all on offer, from prices ranging from just hundreds of dollars to upwards of one million.
New York’s David Tunick, Inc., may have seen its Andy Warhol screenprint of The Scream (1984), heavily featured in the fair’s promotional materials, snapped up before the VIP preview even began for a price in the high six figures, but there are still plenty of good buys on offer. (Tunick also has an original Edvard Munch’s The Scream lithograph, with a seven-figure price tag.)
After perusing the fair’s offerings at New York’s Javits Center, we compiled a list of eight pieces we’d love to own. Some are by artists you know who aren’t known for their prints; others are by print veterans. All are priced under $50,000.
1. Saul Steinberg, “Masks” series at Senior & Shopmaker Gallery, New York
$16,000 each
Saul Steinberg, Untitled (1959–62). Photo courtesy of Senior & Shopmaker Gallery.
Senior & Shopmaker is offering a preview of their upcoming exhibition “Eyes Wide Open: Saul Steinberg & Philip Guston, Prints, Drawings, Objects” (November 2–December 22, 2018) with a two-person presentation of the artists at the Print Fair.
Don’t miss Steinberg’s quirky paper bag masks, decorated with crayons, colored pencils, and markers, which were documented in an incredibly amusing photo series by Inge Morath.
“He made these masks and gave them out at parties,” Laurence Shopmaker told artnet News. “They became a a kind of metaphor about hiding one’s identity,” he added, noting that Steinberg was known to don the paper bag disguises when talking to the press.
Each one is priced at $16,000.
2. Huma Bhabha, “Leochicospeedy” series at Niels Borch Jensen Gallery
$2,200 each
Huma Bhabha, Leochicospeedy (2016). Photo courtesy of Niels Borch Jensen Gallery.
If you can’t afford—or don’t have the space for—Tacita Dean’s massive seven-panel photogravure Quarantania, priced at $130,000, Niels Borch Jensen Gallery is also offering work from Huma Bhabha at a more affordable price point. (The Dean piece debuted during Berlin Gallery Weekend in April, and more than half of the set of 12 have already sold.)
The series is called “Leochicospeedy,” after the names of the artist’s brother’s dogs—if you look closely, you can make out the friendly canines, photographs of the animals at play obscured by Bhabha’s drawings of scull-like faces. Those are priced at $2,000 each; a second, smaller series, “The Unsubs,” are just $900.
“When we were in the print shop proofing ‘Leochocspeedy,’ she had some time and we gave her some plates and she started etching,” Niels Borch Jensen told artnet News.
3. Chitra Ganesh, “Sultana’s Dream” portfolio at Durham Press, Pennsylvania
$850 ($18,000 full set)
Chitra Ganesh, a print from “Sultana’s Dream.” Courtesy of Durham Press, Pennsylvania.
Fresh off her show at New York’s the Kitchen, Chitra Ganesh is offering the full set of her “Sultana’s Dream” linocuts, which illustrate a feminist, sci-fi, Utopian text of the same name, published in India’s Ladies’ Journal in 1905.
“The main character wakes up and finds herself in a beautiful world led by women,” the gallery’s Ann Marshall told artnet News of the narrative-based work, which shows a world at peace, men living quietly behind closed doors.
The series is calling out to be published in some kind of book or graphic novel form, but you can snap up the full suite of images, in a boxed portfolio, for $18,000. There are 25 sets currently in production, one of which has been reserved for sales of the 27 individual prints, at $850 each.
4. Margarita Cabrera, Time Does Not Forgive (New Landscape) at Ruiz-Healy Art, San Antonio and New York
$3,500
Margarita Cabrera, Time Does Not Forgive (New Landscape). Photo courtesy of Ruiz-Healy Art.
Born in Mexico and raised in El Paso, Texas, San Antonio-based artist Margarita Cabrera’s work is deeply tied to Spanish-speaking immigrant communities in the US and issues of labor, migration, and violence.
At the Print Fair, the artist’s Time Does Not Forgive (New Landscape) combines printmaking, painting, and collage. A fabric cactus is overlaid atop a grid of imprints of a butterfly-shaped copper plate decorated with US pennies, printed in light brown ink. The composition immediately suggests the desert region between the US and Mexico.
“She works a lot with border patrol fabric,” Patricia Ruiz-Healy told artnet News, noting that the butterfly penny motif represents “commerce and freedom.”
In addition to stitching the cloth to the prints, which are $3,500 each, Cabrera has added hand painted accents, making each one slightly unique.
5. Sebastian Burdon (Whatshisname), Popek at Stoney Road Press, Dublin
$395
Sebastian Burdon, POPek. Courtesy of Stoney Road Press.
Who can resist poking fun at Jeff Koons and his ubiquitous Balloon Dog? Sebastian Burdon, also known as Whatshisname, has created the perfect response to Koons’s shiny canine sculptures with a tiny, mounted version caught taking an adorable, balloon-shaped dump.
“I think he does appreciate Jeff Koons, in a sort of humorous way,” said the gallery’s David O’Donoghue. At $395, it’s more than some other Balloon Dog knockoffs. But maybe the Kardashians might want one anyway?
6. Cecily Brown, new series of untitled monotypes at Two Palms, New York
$32,000–38,000
Cecily Brown, Untitled (2018). Courtesy of Two Palms.
You can basically snatch a print off the walls of the world-class museum at Two Palms, which is selling prints Cecily Brown made in preparation for her upcoming retrospective, “Cecily Brown: Where, When, How Often and With Whom,” at the Louisiana in Denmark (November 11, 2018–March 10, 2019).
“Cecily wanted to create a whole room of monotypes,” the gallery’s Alexandra Slattery told artnet News. The artist got to work at the Two Palms studio, producing 30 prints. Twenty will be included in the show, but the other 10 are for sale at the fair for $32,000–38,000.
“She’s revisiting all these themes and images she’s used throughout her career, so as a whole they’re like a little mini-retrospective,” said Slattery.
7. Grayson Perry, “Six Snapshots of Julie” at Paragon Press, London
$18,000
Grayson Perry, one a the prints in “Six Snapshots of Julie” (2015). Courtesy of Paragon Press, London.
In 2015, Grayson Perry built A House for Essex, an art installation and real-life home inspired by Julie Cope, a character he developed. “She’s an everyday Essex woman. Her second husband loved her so much that when she died he created a shrine to her,” Paragon Press’s
Florence Batchelor explained to artnet News.
Among the home’s decor is wallpaper based on a set of six woodcut prints Perry developed based on imagined snapshots of Julie’s life, from childhood to teenage rebellion, the joys of motherhood and vacations to the Taj Mahal. Each print is priced at $18,000.
8. Toko Shinoda, Rapture at the Tolman Collection of Tokyo
$4,500
Toko Shinoda, Rapture (1988). Courtesy of the Tolman Collection of Tokyo.
At the ripe old age of 105, Toko Shinoda, whose long career includes commissioned work for the emperor of Japan, is still painting every day.
“She started out as a calligrapher… she still has this simple way of putting down shapes on paper,” Allison Tolman told artnet News. She runs the gallery, which specializes in contemporary Japanese artists, with her parents, who moved to Japan to work at the US Embassy but soon fell in love with the art scene and decided to become dealers.
In addition to Shinoda’s more recent paintings, the gallery is also offering a 1988 print, Rapture, for $4,500.
The IFPDA’s Fine Art Print Fair is on view at the River Pavilion Javits Center, 11th Avenue at West 35th Street, October 25–28, 2018.