Non-Armory Day 1

One of my favorite New York weekends is here: The Armory Show. In keeping with tradition, I will not be visiting the actual event on the piers, but I do love checking out the more affordable satellite shows that pop up all over town at the same time. (By "affordable," btw, I'm referring not to the art, which is of course all unaffordable, but to the entrance fee: a hefty $30 for The Armory Show.)

Today, I went to the (free) Independent show in Chelsea. I suppose I could go on & on about the lowest-common-denominator aspect of art fairs & the way they cram unrelated pieces right on top of one another (I actually kind of like that latter part), but I'll settle for one word for this one: ugh. I optimistically pulled out my trusty pad right at the start to write down all the wonderful new artists I was about to be introduced to. With dozens of international vendors showing hundreds of artists, I felt compelled to write down exactly 2 names. The rest of it was like a visit to The New Museum: poorly conceived, lazily executed silliness. Not really worth the walk all the way out to West Side Highway.

Anyway, I try not to let this blog become about bad art (because there's sooo much of it), so on to the winners:

1) Ricci Albenda (from Andrew Kreps Gallery, just down the street):


Sculpture mounted seamlessly into the wall. More info about this piece here.

2) Alex Brown (also here):


"Hummingbird" 2010

Next I'll be visiting Red Dot. Wish me luck.