THE IRRESISTIBLE PULL OF THE ART FAIR

As a part-time student at Penn with newfound .free time, I flew myself to Frieze Los Angeles on a Thursday night. I bought the pre-sale ticket months ago out of sheer excitement. I didn’t even have a friend with me – I was going to LA not for the sunshine, but for some aesthetic recharge. Friday morning, I got up to wear my best and most intellectual-looking outfit and headed to the Santa Monica airport where the fair occurred. And no, you did not misunderstand that – while it was apparently selected for its “additional space and flexibility,” the single lane to the fair site greeted me with tons of traffic. I followed the crowd to eventually arrive at the fair in the corner of the airfield.

When I tell my friends that I am going to an art fair, they tend to romanticize it – they conceive of it as a museum-going experience reserved for art fanatics. However, being a party of one and an undergraduate college student, I have to admit that art fairs are stressful. For those unfamiliar with the concept, an art fair is a booth-style convention show intended for collectors and institutions to purchase. Obviously, all the renowned galleries and curators attend every major art fair, such as Frieze, Art Basel, and the Armory Show. Since the big money is always supporting the art world in its major events, no art fair looks drastically different from any other. From a critical eye, we might have reached a point of stagnation in art fairs where nothing is so groundbreaking – there is a lack of inclusion, awareness and nuanced knowledge of people and places beyond established art circles and recognized art centers.

The art fairs remind me of French anthropologist Marc Augé’s concept of “non-places,” a “place” so transient that it does not hold significance. In other words, the excess of information and excess of space makes the space lose its locality. This theory implies the anonymity of humans and objects inside “non-places.” Examples of nonplaces are hotel rooms, airports, stations, and of course, art fairs. An art fair’s booth is designed to minimize distraction, hence a white-cube – it is the epitome of supermodernity. Whether it is an art fair in LA, London, or New York, once I step into these spaces they make me forget where I am. The ideal white cube subtracts from the artwork all cues that interfere with the fact that it is “art.” However, in reality, art fairs exhibit hundreds of works in a packed space – which ironically is no different than a bazaar, except the works being sold are often 5- or 6-figures –the pieces serve as distractions from each other. Though there are so many works of renowned artists, the chaotic and distracting atmosphere prevents me from spending fruitful time in front of a singular painting.

Before the opening of Frieze LA, the art-world’s meme maker Jerry Gogosian posted on instagram, “The Art World preparing to kick off the festivities in Los Angeles, regreeting all their best friends whose surnames they don’t actually know, flitting from event to even making sure to be seen (doing nothing in particular), and air-kissing hundreds of people – 10 of whom they’ll be in litigation with by the next auction cycle in 2 weeks.” Art fairs are the ugly side of the art world, where superficial networking interactions happen between galleries and dealers, and rather than leading with their best or most challenging works, galleries display what they know will sell. Peter Schjeldahl of New York times said, “The events are schmoozefests for the über-rich and assorted influencers, granted V.I.P. privileges.” And for that reason, as a college student with little knowledge and even less money, I am invisible at an art fair.

Despite stressful red flags of superficial people scanning each other and visually bombarding art, I would never want to miss out on art fairs. It is a living report of what sells, who is popular, and where the art market is heading.