December 2009

ARTICLES | ART FAIRS | AUCTIONS | EXHIBITIONS

Museum of Everything
One of London’s newer, and very unusual, museums is the Museum of Everything in Primrose Hill. The space was converted by James Brett, the eclectic collector of naive, folk and outsider art. You really do feel as if you have stumbled across something rather wonderful as you move between the cavernous rooms, each one exhibiting work by untrained artists whose fascinating paintings, drawings and sculptures you would normally not come across.

Ed Ruscha
Ed Ruscha – pronounced Roo-shay – is showing ‘Fifty Years of Painting’ at the Hayward Gallery until 10 January – the highly influential Los Angeles artist’s work depicts language as a visual experience. He draws inspiration from graphic design, advertising, cinema and photography, and possibly his most successful works are the ones where there is a smooth slippage between word and image, such as Scream, and End where ‘End’ painted at the bottom of the canvas in Gothic script conjures up memories of old romantic films. In other paintings he refers to classic American imagery such as ‘Hollywood’ seen in the work below.

The Sacred made Real
‘The Sacred made Real’ is the National Gallery’s extraordinary exhibition of Spain’s 17th century sculptors. A show of the forgotten tradition of exquisitely carved and painted effigies, created to make the inanimate seem as real and immediate as possible.

Kitsch and gore, our first encounter is the severed head of John the Baptist, slowly giving way to awe and emotion as we are confronted by the deposed body of Christ lain out on a carved crumpled cloth, with the wounds of crucifixion delineated in all their harrowing detail. The walls are hung with masterworks by Velazquez and Zurbaran showing their indebtedness to the overlooked powerful sculpture below. This show is a revelation and one not to miss. Runs till 24th January.

In The World, But Don’t Know the World?
On show at the October gallery, London is In The World, But Don’t Know the World? by the Nigerian based artist, El Anatsui. This is one of his newer works which was first seen in the 3rd Moscow Biennale this September. This sculptural ‘cloth’ is made up of thousands of flattened liquor bottle tops, stitched together with copper wire, creating something so beautiful and sumptuous it is hard to believe that it is made from a metal we normally discard.

Frieze Fair 2009
At this year’s Frieze Fair, a new and subsequently highly praised space was created - the Frame was added to the more established format creating a fresh look. Historically, Frieze has hosted top galleries displaying works for sale by many artists assigned to them. In the Frame, younger galleries (established in the last six years) were invited to show solo artists. In Seventeen Gallery’s space artist Susan Collis showed new work, again confidently challenging the viewer to almost dismiss and move on. But, on closer inspection and with the will to look at seemingly everyday objects such as a discarded off-cut floor board are in fact created by Collis from rare woods such as cedar of Lebanon, “haphazard” nails and paint splodges are made from precious metals, Brazilian agate, smoky topaz, garnet and citrine and “careless” splashes of paint on an overall and dust sheet were in fact meticulously stitched. Susan Collis is one to continue to watch with her attention to detail and playful toying with the audience to look beyond the surface. Next stop: she will exhibit at The Armory Show in 2010.

The Price of Everything
It is often said that our society knows the price of everything and the value of nothing and I think this becomes more prenounced as we get older and tarnished by the world! Bear with me... This month (Dec 2009) has brought us the sale of a £29m Raphael drawing (see image) in a highly successful Christies Old Master sale in London. Bearing in mind where the world is at present I feel this is a fairly remarkable result. Not quite up there with the US$28.3m Eileen Gray Dragons armchair but close! Raphael is undoubtedly an important artistic figure and deserves to be, despite Vasari’s attempts to almost have him “deified”. But I have spoken to perhaps 25 or 30 knowledgeable colleagues in the rtworld and not one has spoken of the work itself – all they have commented on is the price.

Is it just me making assumptions therefore or is it possible that the quality of the work was perhaps not £29m worth? I have seen a fair number of Old Master drawings in my 25 years studying or working in the Art world and this work is lovely ... but I have seen a number of works that are superior both objectively and subjectively. This is nothing new – we all know that Art can be and often is treated as a trophy and less successful works by big names can fetch more money than anyone imagines. What does upset me though is that not one colleague commented on the work itself. I mean Raphael is a big name I know but e primary reason he is a big name (other than the fact that Vasari worshipped him) is that he he was an exceptional draftsman. The price and the name has obsured the essential quality of the work. The price seems disproportionate to the value of this drawing. It’s value lies in a wonderful draftsman’s craft who was hugely influential as a result of the Renaissance’s cultural influence over the last 500 years At the same time, I was recently given a excellent “loo” book entitled “Einstein’s Watch – an unofficial record a year’s most ownable things” – it lists unusual items that have sold in the last year including a Lotus Esprit from “The film the Spy who Loved Me” in 1976, James Brown’s Zippo lighter and Del Boy’s van from “Only Fools and Horses”.

However I asked my wife and family what they would most like in the book

• Me: rather boringly and predictably was Lucien Freud’s portrait of Francis Bacon £5.4m
• Wife: a Knights Templar chateau in France - £5.5m
• Daughter aged 10: a C19th minature of the Real Mr Darcy by George Engleheart (!!!) - £150,000
• Son aged 7: Luke Skywalker’s lightsabre from Star Wars – circa £90,000
• Son aged 5: a puppy dog called “Jackson” from Battersea Dog’s Home - £nil – free!

You see, without being too precious about it all, the value of each item to myself and each member of amily was the same but the older we get the more the price kicks in! I hope and believe that at Seymours we are as concerned with the true value of works of Art as much as we are concerned with obtaining the “right” price.