Kate Taylor takes another turn through the piers, this time she’s checking in with folks at Pier 92:
Things are definitely calmer over at the Pier 92 today (in the Modern section of the fair) than they were around the bar last night.
Marlborough reported that they had sold three small paintings by Steven Charles. “I think the Modern part of the fair was slower yesterday, because the entrances were over there [at Pier 94],” said gallery director Tara Reddi.
Ricco-Maresca was doing well with its solo show of Martin Ramirez drawings, part of a newly discovered cache of 144 drawings by the self-taught artist that the gallery won the right to represent last year. Frank Maresca said that they had sold one drawing yesterday, for $110,000, and he expected to sell two more today, to collectors who came by yesterday.
One person who has recently fallen in love with Ramirez’s work is the artist Maurizio Cattelan. He stopped by Ricco-Maresca’s booth to discuss a catalogue essay he may write for an upcoming Ramirez exhibition, but he couldn’t keep his eyes from wandering to the works on display in the neighboring booths.
Cattelan has become known as a voracious collector. On a walk through the aisles, as he admired a sculpture by the artist Nancy Hoffman and a tiny drawing by Lucio Fontana, Cattelan explained how he got into collecting, in an attempt to turn envy of his colleagues and their great work into something positive. Buying young artists’ work was also a way “to give back,” he said. He lives with only a few works at a time; then, when they have been “metabolized,” he rotates them out and brings others in.
