After an incredibly brief trip to Art Basel 41 in the middle of putting this issue together, INTRODUCING’s editor William West has breakfast with Jeffrey Boloten, the Co-founder & Managing Director of ArtInsight, to reflect on the current scene and atmosphere at one of the years most ‘important’ moments in contemporary art, at least as far as the market is concerned. ArtInsight is the art market education partner of leading art market analysts, ArtTactic, and is run independently of any institution or business, ensuring clear and unbiased market information and education. Jeffrey Boloten is as well a frequent lecturer and speaker on the global art market at a number of international fairs, conferences and institutions.  

Joseph Cornell, Karen Kilimnik, installation view, Spruth Magers London, June 2010
Courtesy of Spruth Magers, London

INTRODUCING: Having had only enough time between meetings to go around the first floor of the fair (skipping the secondary market on the ground floor with the exception of Spruth Magers, Marian Goodman and Gladstone), Art Statements (the younger side of the fair), and half of a conversation about collecting between Josh Baer, Adam Lindemann ‘Who Has it and who doesn’t’. The day was tight but certainly full and left me with a lot of questions, admittedly it may seem that it is exactly this which causes the problems we are discussing in this current issue but as we see more and more ‘curated’ exhibitions in commercial settings, from commercial galleries to auction houses and art fair stands, which used to be exclusive to not-for-profit institutions, maybe we need to re-evaluate our attitude towards the fair as the line between the fair and the biennial blurs ever more is it the case that? What do you think is the reason for this? Am I cynical in thinking it is a marketing device?

Jeffrey Boloten: I think that you have to look at the history of the art fair and how they began, and I think that this issue is an organic progression of the role and format of the art fair. Originally art fairs acted as wholesale events where galleries & dealers would sell to other galleries & dealers. At that time it wasn’t a ‘public event’, but then when the public became more engaged, the fairs began adapting and tailoring the composition of the fair as a whole to ensure as much participation from the interested public as possible. This made a huge difference in the art market; of course the fair was never meant to be a curated event, but the fact that this aspect of some of the major fairs are developing in this way, is a very positive result of a huge level of engagement from the public. Art fairs need to respond to what they have become, this change is an organic process of relating to their audience, I wouldn’t say that it is cynical practice. If you look at London, which didn’t really have any major international contemporary art fairs and then all of a sudden we have Frieze, which has only been in existence since  2003, and now sees 60-70,000 people through their doors, that is a huge number of new people engaging with contemporary art who would have never have done that before. The Art Fair has become an amazing facilitator for engaging new people, in view of that, what has become the natural next step is for it to become something more than just a commercial venture. That said, I don’t know that gallerists in their booths have the prime aim of making the most crowd-pleasing stand that they can, but as their ultimate goal is to promote their artists in the most effective way possible, having to be conscious of the context and manner in which they are doing that will inevitably involve curatorial skills & expertise.

(left) Billy Childish, Flags (in June's Pot), 2009, Courtesy the artist and L-13, London; (right) Pierre Bismuth, Flip Side of the Same, Art Basel, Courtesy of Team Gallery, NY

INTRODUCING: Historically, it seems to me that the market has always managed to adapt to the art that is being made. I always feel that what is deemed ‘valuable’ art-commodity should be more in line with what is progressive or challenging on the creative side of the coin. However, in recent years, I couldn’t help at noticing that this coin has flipped and it seems that the art that’s being made is under the overwhelming influence of art market in order to obtain any sense of authority in the art world.

Neugerriemschneider Berlin, presented a solo show of new work by Billy Childish and did very well off of it on the opening day, there was a buzz about this stall and I was surprised, Childish is a name I have not heard in ages, the work was even more surprising (tongue in cheek replicas of impressionists masters). Although I agree that this was one of the most exciting booths at the fair. I want to compare it with the work of Pierre Bismuth of Team Gallery New York in the Art Unlimited section of the Fair where the artist crated a photocopy replica of the galleries booth upstairs. While both artists are directly commenting on the world and the environment that they are placed, it seems that Bismuth’s work managed to invigorate question the dialogue where Childish’s appears to surrender to realization that he is a commodity.

Jeffrey Boloten: I don’t know that I am the most likely candidate in terms of commenting on the artistic practice side of things, but can just add my humble observation that artists have always reacted to market aspect of the art world. Look at Marcel Duchamp’s urinal - when you are questioning ‘what is art’ you are in turn commenting on the commerciality of art and the potential ‘impurity’ of art. It seems to me that what is happening in the art market is what is happening in the economy which is what is happening in peoples lives, and that is what artists are hopefully reacting to - mirroring the times that we live in to some degree.

It was often a criticism of the contemporary art that was coming out of China that the artists were creating work to fit the western market and that it didn’t represent Chinese art or Chinese culture. This  sort of sentiment is not exclusive to China, but has been seen as a key issue with most ‘emerging markets’. It is a tough issue - artists don’t work in isolated little boxes and inevitably are going to become influenced by what is happening in the international marketplace. Art is becoming more globalised, which is again very likely a reflection of what is happening in our world, and which to some degree is what artists are making comments about. Especially within the newer, ‘emerging markets’, you notice that artists are increasingly reluctant to be seen within a certain classification, they just want to be ‘artists’, they react against the idea of regional labeling.

Just to go back to the topic of art fairs; I think that they are going through a fascinating transition at the moment. It seems to be becoming quite clear that neither the keen international collector, nor the galleries can sustain the present + ever-expanding level of art fair activity. I think that the global market simply cannot absorb that many more global international fairs, and what is likely to happen is that a number of fairs are going to transform into more ‘regional fairs’, which will be a really positive development in terms of promoting and showcasing the art from a particular Region, with more depth and vigour.  It is an interesting time now to watch the art fairs, as they have become such an integral aspect of the market, but the way that the art fair model has grown has put a lot of pressure on both galleries and artists in terms of energy and focus. The artists have this pressure to make work for all these fairs, which means that their artistic practice may have to take a back seat in order for them to produce what the market is responding to. That said, I would imagine that there has always been pressure on artists to make particular things, and in a way that might also have its own way of actually stimulating creativity. Sometimes when creative things have constraints they become more interesting. To look on the bright side of all the present economic doom & gloom, it has historically been seen that new artistic movements follow periods of economic downturn, look at the YBA’s for example, so we may well be in for some interesting new times.

Yue Minjun, Untitled, 2005 , at The Revolution Continues: New Art From China, Saatchi gallery, London, Photograph: David Levene

INTRODUCING: With all of the international art fairs, biennales and touring blockbuster art shows being held in different parts of the world, we can’t see the contemporary art world purely locally anymore. It now has a global stage and global audience who speak different language, live in different cultures, and use different currencies. What do you think is the ramification of this phenomenon? Currently Europe and America are still the players who call the shots, but will that remain the case in the foreseeable future? How do you see the Western art world adapt to the new power game?  

Jeffrey Boloten: If you look at China, it is amazing what is going on. China has now overtaken France as the third largest global art market, after the US and the UK. In a recent conference we help on the topic, virtually all of the speakers posed the question ‘will we see a point were China becomes number two, or even number one’ and the answer was ‘absolutely’. It is the tip of the iceberg right now, especially if you look at the fact that they are already number three, and the wealth has still really not percolated into the art market as yet. In 2009, the state-owned Poly Auction house became the biggest player in the Chinese contemporary art market, surpassing both Sotheby’s and Christie’s. Emerging economies and their art markets are growing at an amazing pace - India, Russia, Brazil, Latin America….the global power bases are clearly shifting, and we will absolutely be seeing some very interesting new developments at every level in the global art market of the future.