The Independent, Armory and ADAA Art fairs offer collectors, at least those with the time and stamina to view them all, a survey of one brief moment in time for contemporary art. Each fair specializes in a different area of the art market, with The Independent predominantly showing work by young and emerging artists, Armory being the largest with over 200 exhibitors and the ADAA having a smaller selection of exhibitors who often, though not always, show works available on the secondary market. These three fairs and the exhibitions that open during the busy week allow one to consider the current mood of the art market. While the hype that many will remember from a few short years ago remains largely absent, top quality art works continue to be in demand. The biggest change in relation to Art Fairs has come about by the amount of information available prior to the fairs as to what each gallery intends to show. PDFs of all the works that will be available at the fairs are often sent to gallery mailing lists, or anyone who asks, weeks in advance. Many art fairs are collaborating with online platforms to similarly preview works, as The Armory did with Paddle8 this year.

TWAAS participated at The Independent for the third-time, sharing a booth with Three Star Press from Paris. Presenting two new publications, one from Blake Rayne on which Three Star Press also collaborated, and the other with James Beckett. Blake Rayne’s publication extended his ‘a’ motif into a limited edition book. In a happy coincidence, Blake’s European dealers Campoli Presti were exhibiting two of Blake’s “a” paintings at their booth on the same floor of The Independent, helping interested viewers to understand the backstory to this book. A stool was also on view, again an “a” form that has been produced by Westreich Wagner Publications. James Beckett showed a series of unique works featuring canaries that received much attention. Beckett produced this series to coincide with the launch of his new book ‘Works of James Beckett with constant interjection by Frank Key.’ Again, it was fortuitous that James Beckett’s gallerist Wilfred Lentz was showing related works by Beckett at his booth also on the same floor of The Independent. Details of each of these publications and limited editions can be found in the publications section of the website.
Recent visits to art fairs and other exhibitions were an important reminder of the incredible amount of knowledge and expertise that exists amongst the leading members of the gallery, curatorial and critical communities. Many galleries time the opening of their exhibitions with the art fairs to take advantage of the many collectors and art world professionals who travel to the city for these events. Some of the highlights of these exhibitions included an exhibition of early paintings by Helen Frankenthaler at Gagosian Gallery, the young British artist Georgie Nettell at Reena Spaulings Fine Art, Rirkrit Tiravanija beautifully installed and highly seductive mirror ping pong tables at Gavin Brown’s Enterprise and Danh Vo’s display at the Guggenheim of paintings and personal artifacts from the collection of Martin Wong.