Frieze London Art Fair
2022 was my first visit to a Frieze Art Fair, which are held annually in London, Los Angeles and New York. Upwards of 250 international galleries are respresented in temporary structures on London’s Regent Park.
In the Southeast corner you’ll find Frieze London, though well concealed from the street itself. Another tent pitched at the Northeast corner houses Frieze Masters. Along the path between the two tents, you will find the Frieze Sculpture Exhibits.
Frieze London focuses on contemporary art from living artists, works created since the year 2000. There were some interesting works… life’s what you make it and art is well…. also something that you make.
Frieze Masters features essentially anything before that time, ranging literally from a triceratops skull to Lichtenstein paintings. As expected, there were more works up my aesthetic alley in the Masters fair. Scroll to the bottom of the post to see the one piece that truly made my jaw drop. My mouth actually hung all the way open for probably a minute while I looked around trying to figure out if what I was seeing was real!
Would I go again? Probably. The tickets were a bit steep, but to be fair I bought mine one day ahead of the event. Better planning for better economics I sometimes say but always feel! Would I wear different shoes? Yes!
Here are a selection of the works which stood out to me at each fair
Frieze London
Rayan Yasmineh Cyrus et l’odeur du lys devant les murs de Jerusalem - the artist is 26 years old!
cropped view of a painting from OMR Gallery, Mexico City
cropped view Copperfield Gallery
Frieze Masters
a cropped view of WILLEM VAN MIERIS’s A Young Lady at her Toilet (remainder of the pic highlighted in the gallery of images below)
crop from Johann Rottenhammer and Jan Brueghel “Feast of the Gods”- the marriage of Peleus and Thetis
crop of a German School Painting of an Open Manuscript
grand finale!
This was truly SUCH a delight to discover.
The title translates to “The Lives Of The Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, And Architects” Written By M. Giorgio Vasari, painter and rrchitect from Arezzo.
Vasari's Vite were first published in 1550. This second edition is much expanded, and is the first to include illustrations (portraits), per London’s Royal Academy of Art. The copy below was the first illustrated and first complete second edition. SO OLD. SO SPECIAL!
I own a copy of the modern translation which I purchased at the National Gallery in my last visit. Haven’t yet read it as it sits on my “to be read” shelf which is now actually 2 shelves and over 30 books.
Here is a 23 min podcast on Vasari from “The Renaissance” podcast, if you’d like to learn more. I listened to the entirely of this podcast, which I quite enjoyed, on long morning walks in with Ellie in Dripping Springs in the early days of the pandemic.
