It’s Frieze week, which means you can take your pick of the world’s best contemporary art, from the international galleries that fill the art fair’s Hyde Park home, to the many big name exhibitions and satellite events happening across town. Here,
It’s Frieze week, which means you can take your pick of the world’s best contemporary art, from the international galleries that fill the art fair’s Hyde Park home, to the many big name exhibitions and satellite events happening across town. Here, AnOther's art writer Skye Sherwin recommends her top 5 picks...
Kiki Smith
Kiki Smith is one of the most distinctive artists working today. With her fearless confrontations of the macabre and a love of fairy tale creatures, not to mention her famous head of wild, white hair, she seems a sort of sorceress of sculpture. Her latest show at Timothy Taylor Gallery sees her taking inspiration from medieval tapestries and 1920s Hollywood and includes bronze reliefs, which have turned a wintry, oxidised turquoise, white porcelain figures and new drawings. Runs until October 14.
Frame at Frieze supported by COS
If Frieze were a city, its Frame section would be downtown. This is where the new kids on the block hang out: young, innovative galleries showcasing fledgling talents, future art stars and left-field projects. Of the London crew, look out for Anna Barham’s anagram poetry at Arcade.
The Em-Dash Award
If you find you suddenly get brain freeze looking at the art, fear not. Cecile B. Evans, this year’s winner of the Em-Dash Award for a proposal by an emerging artist, has something to help. Commissioned as part of the fair’s Special Projects, she’s created an audio guide to the fair, where famous names from beyond the artworld, including model-turned-chef Sophie Dahl and musician Arto Lindsay, give their own personal, emotional response to what’s on show.
Rita Ackermann
Galleries across town bust out their most glittering art stars this month for shows timed to lure the international collectors away from the fair. Blue chip titan Hauser & Wirth has Rita Ackermann whose highly sexed paintings of cat-eyed Lolitas made her the coveted bad girl of 1990s New York. Now she’s breaking into yet more abstract territory, with biomorphic figures in hot, gauzy washes of reds and blues. Runs until November 3.
The Sunday Art Fair
A bar, an art pub quiz and a ‘no walls’ policy between gallery stands make this up and coming alternative art fair for galleries no older than three years, a more chilled out alternative to Frieze, where it’s genuinely a pleasure to kick back and hang out. This year’s edition boasts work by feted young British artists like Alice Channer, Ruth Ewan and Stephen Sutcliffe. In spite of the name, it opens its doors on Thursday for a four-day run.
Frieze takes place in Regent's Park, and across London, from 11-14 October.
Text by Skye Sherwin
