This content was published on May 05, 2022 – 21:46
Nora Quintanilla
New York, May 5 (EFE) .- Art dealers and collectors arrived in New York this Thursday wanting to meet again after the stoppage of the pandemic at the TEFAF fair, the most exclusive in the market and which heads the convention season this year. Big Apple sector.
The young New York edition of TEFAF thus precedes the veteran of Maastricht (Netherlands), postponed by the coronavirus, and welcomes until next Tuesday more than 91 galleries from around the world loaded with thousands of valuable pieces that reach millions of dollars.
The historic Park Avenue Armory building was filling up fast on this day before the official opening, only accessible by invitation and for media, and soon there were huddles greeting each other by name and hugging in the booths arranged throughout the ground floor and the upstairs.
Every detail was designed to captivate the senses, from the flower arrangements to the champagne, the “filet mignon” canapés and the oysters distributed by the waiters, or the works of Anselm Kiefer and Carmen Herrera that decorated resting spaces in a bar or a hallway.
The Colombian León Tovar, one of the most recognized promoters of Latin American art and who has his gallery in New York, assured Efe that during the pandemic there was no choice but to “learn to sell online, but people want to touch and look,” and today the desire was noted.
Tovar, who has presented at TEFAF New York since its inception in 2016 and also for several years in Maastricht, highlighted the “demanding” process to be an exhibitor -“not suitable for beginners”-, in which a committee of 200 experts evaluates the selection offered before giving the green light.
In this case, the gallery owner proposes a series of works related “to the land” and the constructivist legacy of the Uruguayan Joaquín Torres García, with pieces by this artist and others such as Gonzalo Fonseca, Arnaldo Pomodoro or Lygia Clark, whose “Bicho” (sculpture pattern that mimics a paper bow tie) is for sale for $2 million.
The only Spanish gallery, Mayoral, brought pieces by the most important post-war artists such as Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí and Manolo Millares, with a range between 35,000 dollars for a textile sculpture by Aurelia Muñoz and 2 million dollars for a painting. Joan Miró’s “povera” style.
“We have passed the hard stage of the pandemic, but now the art continues, the auctions are going well and the fairs are starting up again,” Eduard Mayoral, who belongs to the second generation of this Barcelona family business, founded by his parents 30 years ago.
In a tour of the fair’s treasures, whose price is only known by asking the vendors directly, two paintings by exponents of “pop art” stood out: “Figure with Banner”, by Roy Lichtenstein (5.5 million), and “Piglet Goes Shopping” by Keith Haring ($5.5 million).
“Collectors are more excited than ever to get together, keep talking,” reiterated Katherina Neudeck of Galeria Karsten Greve, who is offering two recently rediscovered vertical sculptures with small cushions by Louise Bourgeois for $2.6 million and $2.7 million each. a.
Although they were not the most expensive, the first sculptures of classical African art presented at TEFAF also stood out for their interest, the most expensive of 700,000 dollars, and whose dealer, the Frenchman Bernard Dulon, was encouraged to find “new collectors” after the pandemic impasse.
As evidence of the movement of the market, François-Xavier Lalanne’s “Gorilles de pièrre” sculptures, highlighted by the fair in a list, were already “reserved” an hour after opening, according to a representative of Galerie Lefebvre, who He refused to reveal his price.
TEFAF headlines the first “Art Week” in New York, which concentrates a score of events this month, with other fairs such as Frieze, VOLTA and Future Fair; auctions at Christie’s, Sotheby’s and Phillips and extensive exhibitions in museums such as the Whitney, which has its Biennale. EFE
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