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ART BASEL

ART BASEL

Swiss art fair sells high culture to the cashed-up

Hundreds of suitcases hang eerily from the ceiling, old publications depict colonial scenes of dark "savages" committing horrific acts of violence, and an anti-protester gun blasts into life... with rounds of birdsong.

Published: 16 June 2016 11:49 CEST
Swiss art fair sells high culture to the cashed-up
Paul McCarthy's "Tomato Head" installation sold for $4.75 million. Photo: Hauser & Wirth

A common theme — of angst at a world in political turmoil, beset by a migration crisis and dread of terrorism — unites many of the works at this year's Art Basel, the world's biggest contemporary art fair.

“As anyone knows who reads the papers, these are very dynamic times,” Art Basel director Marc Spiegler told the AFP news agency ahead of the show's public opening on Thursday.

“We have major political elections coming up, we have major referenda coming up, we have mass migration in Europe, we have economic uncertainties,” he said, pointing out that “from an artistic standpoint (this) creates a lot of material for artists to work with.”

“Interesting times make for interesting art,” he insisted.

Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota's 120-square-metre (1,300-square-feet) installation “Accumulation: Searching for Destination”, for instance appears to speak to the large numbers of people on the move.

Suspended from the ceiling by red yarn, the vintage suitcases slope gently towards the floor, some bobbing and twitching in the air, perhaps uncertain of where their journey will lead them.

Elsewhere, Hong Kong artist Samson Young has mounted a sound cannon usually used to violently disperse crowds of protesters to shoot melodic birdsongs across the vast hall.

And French artist Kader Attia's installation “The Culture of Fear: An invention of Evil”, with its 19th and early 20th century newspaper and book covers displaying horrific images of “wild men” murdering and raping whites, examines the conceptual construction of Western fears of “harmful Otherness” that continues to colour our anxieties in an age of terrorism.

Spectacular sales

The angst infusing politics and economies around the world does not meanwhile appear to have rubbed off on the deep-pocketed collectors amassing at Art Basel.

Elegantly dressed art enthusiasts braved the rain to throng to the advance VIP opening of the show on Tuesday to check out what the 286 galleries on site had to offer.

“I think we've sold about half the things in the booth so far… I'm ready to go to bed,” Marc Glimcher, president of Pace Gallery, told AFP with a laugh just a few hours after the doors opened.

In the show's Unlimited section, dedicated to 88 large-scale installations including Shiota, Young and Attia's works, the Hauser & Wirth gallery sold a Paul McCarthy installation called “Tomato Head” for $4.75 million.

Sean Kelly, founder and owner of the gallery bearing his name, said in fact, the art “market is as strong as I have ever seen it.”

He explained that while the world is clearly “a complicated place at the moment, the art world … is somewhere that you go to escape those everyday pressures.”

Addressing the one percent

“There's a lot of money in the world, there's a lot of people interested in art, and this is where a lot of that money is concentrated and being spent,” he said, acknowledging: “We're really addressing the one percent.”

Joseph Kosuth, the 71-year-old legendary US conceptual artist, despaired at the growing sway the super wealthy hold over the art world.

“The problem is that a busy billionaire doesn't have time to study art,” he told AFP at the show, pointing out that many rich collectors determine which pieces are important by the price being paid for them rather than the ideas behind them.

“But the thing is that you can't compare art to a handbag,” he said.

Art Basel meanwhile also has much to offer to art enthusiasts with less padded wallets.

As part of the Parcours section, 19 installations have been sprinkled through the centre of Basel, in public squares, museums, but also in usually closed-off public buildings, where visitors can see them for free.

Among the works on display is a week-long performance by South African artist Tracey Rose.

On the first night on Monday, she sat on the steps of Basel's Civil Registry in a bridal dress, laughing in the rain, as her partner Dan Gunn, wearing a skin-coloured body suit, ran screaming into the gate separating him from a handfull of spectators.

Taking shelter from the downpour at a nearby installation, Corinne Erni, 54, said she loved the idea of Parcours.

“It's a nice way to introduce both art and the city,” she said.

PAINTING

How women artists are bringing #MeToo reckoning to Basel fair

Mannequins display inflatable, white airbag dresses created to protect women from workplace harassment, while nearby details of the alleged sexual misdeeds of 170 public figures cover four long walls, splashed in red.

Published: 13 June 2019 15:04 CEST
How women artists are bringing #MeToo reckoning to Basel fair
A visitor looks at Anne Collier's "Woman Crying (Comic) #7" at Art Basel. Photo: AFP

The #MeToo movement that exploded on the global stage in late 2017 has inspired several works exhibited at this year's Art Basel, the world's biggest contemporary art fair, which opens to the public on Thursday.

Women artists have taken centre stage at the show's 50th edition, with in-your-face installations expressing disgust and exasperation at persisting gender inequalities and culturally condoned abuse and harassment of women.

Spanish artist Alicia Framis has filled a room with delicate, white mannequins wearing different styles of dresses made from airbag material, which inflate to protect different parts of the female body.

The piece called “Life Dress” consists of dresses “to protect women in all work situations where there is some kind of abuse,” Framis told AFP.

The 52-year-old artist said she had spoken with victims of harassment and abuse and allowed their stories to inspire the dress designs, using “fashion to demonstrate against violence.”

Where Framis uses humour to spotlight abuse, Los Angeles-based artist Andrea Bowers's massive archival project “Open Secrets” radiates rage.

Andrea Bower's “Open Secrets” has already caused controversy. Photo: AFP

It consists of reams of photographic prints on red backgrounds, each listing the name and occupation of a public figure accused of sexual harassment or abuse, their public response to the accusations and details of the case.

'Rape culture'

Disgraced film mogul Harvey Weinstein, whose misconduct first sparked the #MeToo movement, has two full panels dedicated to his long list of alleged misdeeds.

US President Donald Trump also figures in the piece, as do his predecessors Bill Clinton and George Bush Senior, two Supreme Court justices, as well as actors, journalists, musicians and other public figures. 

“I just felt like the #MeToo movement is perhaps one of the most important feminist movements of my lifetime,” Bowers told AFP, explaining her inspiration for the piece.

The 54-year-old self-described feminist activist artist said she had been shocked to realise “what it was like for me growing up, that it was rape culture, where … young men were given permission to sexually violate me and my friends.”

With the #MeToo movement, such behaviour is finally “being acknowledged,” she said. “I hope that it's a historic shift.” 

During a preview earlier this week, men in particular lingered in front of the piece which covers two long walls, back and front, in the middle of the fair's Unlimited exhibition space.

“You can see a lot of men standing here and being a bit unsure how to react,” said Vanja Oberhoff, a young German art investor standing among some dozen men gazing at the articles.

“It's a very strong piece,” he told AFP. 

Not all reactions have been positive.

Helen Donahue, who in 2017 tweeted out photographs of herself bearing the marks of alleged abuse by freelance columnist Michael Hafford, voiced outrage that Bowers had used one of the pictures.

“Cool that my fucking photos and trauma are heading art basel thx for exploiting us for 'art' ANDREA BOWERS,” she tweeted on Tuesday.

Bowers, who insists on the importance of trusting survivors, quickly issued an apology for not seeking Donahue's consent before using the picture and removed the panel from the exhibit.

'Equalisation'?

The artist also told AFP that showing her piece at Art Basel had been more challenging than she had expected.

The VIP opening of the show drew “some of the richest people in the world, and they actually know many of the people on the walls, because these are also some of the most powerful people in the world,” Bowers said.

“This is an emotional piece for a lot of people here because it is very personal.”

The piece shows “we have to change our thinking, and not everybody is ready to do that… There is still a lot more work to be done.”

This year's Art Basel is also abuzz with discussion about disparities between the prices raked in for pieces made by male and female artists, as well as access to gallery representation.

Clare McAndrew, a cultural economist who writes the annual Art Market Report released each year ahead of Art Basel, told AFP that women still face “stark under-representation” in the art world.

“Only five percent of the work sold last year at auction were by female artists, and the higher up the price point you go, the worse that gets,” she said, adding that even at galleries only showing contemporary art, women account for about a third of the represented artists.

Marc Glimcher, who heads Pace Gallery, a global leader in contemporary art, acknowledged that the most talented women artists have long made only about a 10th of the amount made by contemporary male artists, if they were lucky.

But he told AFP that “an equalisation is taking place”.

“The market recognises that there was an arbitrary depression of value, and a possible opportunity.” 

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