Art Market Monitor

Global Coverage ~ Unique Analysis

Succinct Guide to LA's Art Fairs

by

Los Angeles is in the midst of a rush of art fairs. So the Los Angeles Times’s Jori Finkel has put together a handy guide to making sense of the fairs:

Fair: Los Angeles Art Show
A.k.a.: the Fine Art Dealers Assn. fair
Place: Los Angeles Convention Center, downtown
Opening night: Wednesday, Jan. 19, tickets start at $125, benefiting the Art of Elysium               Regular show dates: Jan. 20-23
Strength: Paintings and prints with historical range
Talks of note: “Sisterhood City”: a panel on feminist art in L.A. with Meg Linton, Cheri Gaulke, Rachel Rosenthal and Linda Vallejo
Nice touch: A new iPhone app lets visitors point a phone at artwork of interest to get key info on it

Fair: Art Los Angeles Contemporary
A.k.a.: The fair that took place in the PDC last year
Place: The Barker Hangar, Santa Monica
Opening night: Thursday, Jan. 27, tickets $40 (no beneficiary)
Regular show dates: Jan. 28-30
Strength: Fresh-from-the-studio contemporary art
Talks of note: Raymond Pettibon on “the importance of one’s artistic practice, peers, dogs, music, politics and baseball”
Nice touch: The nomadic nonprofit West of Rome is organizing the opening-night performance

The ABCs of LA’s January Art Fairs (Los Angeles Times)

LACMA Rides New Wing to Attendance Jump

by

The Los Angeles Times reports that enthusiasm for the new Resnick Pavilion helped the museum increase its attendance in 2010 by 9% in 2010:

LACMA said attendance for the calendar year 2010 was 914,396, a 9.6% increase over 2009 attendance of 834,143. The museum reported a strong surge in attendance during the three days after Christmas — with 12,083 admissions versus 6,956 from the same period last year.

The most-attended exhibitions of 2010 were “Eye for the Sensual: Selections from the Resnick Collection,” one of the inaugural shows at the Resnick Pavilion, which had approximately 134,000 admissions; “Renoir in the 20th Century,” with approximately 130,000 admissions; and “American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915,” with approximately 65,000 admissions.

LACMA Reports Increase in Attendanc for 2010 (Los Angeles Times)

LA Picasso Fraud's Other Side

by

If you remember the case of Tatiana Khan, the Los Angeles dealer who admitted having a Picasso drawing faked so she could sell it for $2 million, you might be interested to read about the follow up case. In this one, the buyer, Victor Sands, is suing Jack and Leslie Kavanaugh. Sands foolishly relied on Kavanaugh’s advice to buy the fake Picasso and several other real paintings for $6 million. But Kavanaugh was getting kickbacks from Khan.

Here are quotes from the complaint cited by the Courthouse News Service:

“While the Kavanaughs continue to live a life of ostentatious opulence, complete with a multi-million dollar Brentwood home filled with their collection of fine art, fine wine and a Ferrari in the driveway, a portion of which has been undoubtedly underwritten by Sands, himself, Sands has been left to seek redress from the court,” according to the complaint.

[…] Khan paid the Kavanaughs an $800,000 kickback disguised as a “loan,” according to the complaint. […] Continue Reading

"Welcome to LA, Deitch; now leave the streets to the artists."

by

William Poundstone has an excellent post on LA MoCA’s misstep this weekend with a mural by street artist Blu that backfired and is leaving everyone unhappy. Poundstone assembles all the relevant information on the work that upset neighbors including a link to this video of the mural being whitewashed shortly after it was finished.

What remains unexplained is whether Deitch and LA MoCA gave the artist a free hand without asking to see what he would produce on the site. Though it isn’t clear either answer would be anything less than embarrassing.

Worse, the event can only add to the controversy surrounding the Smithsonian’s choice to remove a work that also provoked complaints.

twitterfacebooksoundcloud
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
California Privacy Rights
Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Advertise on Art Market Monitor