NEW YORK— To our mind, there is no better time to be in New York than the fall, when the autumnal colors and crisp air can perk up even the most world-weary of urbanites. And this fall, the air seems to be filled with buzz about photography (indeed, many of the gallerists interviewed for our Fall Preview predicted that the medium would be a hot buy for collectors).

At the Met, Robert Polidori's series of post-Katrina photographs of New Orleans are attracting rave reviews, and MoMA just unveiled its annual exhibition of New Photography, with images created by three European artists.

Meanwhile, the UBS Art Gallery is turning Wall Street heads with a large-format display of work from Walker Evans, and last week, the Rubin Museum of Art opened a new show of photos by Frederic Roberts that were created during his travels through Asia.

With all the furor over photos, we feel compelled to ask: Could there be a better time for a photography art fair?

Stephen Cohen of ArtFairs Inc., which produces the annual Photo NY fair, doesn’t think so—although the timing for the fair last year brought some unforeseen problems. “On opening night of the [2005] fair, Homeland Security issued a warning and Mayor Bloomberg shut down Penn Station temporarily,” he recalled. “And then there were those torrential rains that flooded the entire city.”

Yet in spite of those natural and man-made obstacles, the contemporary photography fair still attracted at least 3,000 visitors—even more than in the previous year.

For its upcoming event, to be held Oct. 5-8 at the Metropolitan Pavilion on West 18th Street, Cohen is hoping for clear weather and clear security reports. He also is anticipating an even greater turnout from the art world—as many as 5,000 visitors—due in large part to heightened interest from the art market. "People are very interested in photography this year," he said.

And those hitting the stalls this weekend should expect to see some of the most current work available, he added. The Photo NY fair places a strong emphasis on ultra-contemporary photo work and includes the latest in video and digital imagery. “There might be some conceptual work from the 1980s and 1990s, but for the most part, we don’t show 20th-century artwork.”

There will also be more galleries and artists from across the pond, Cohen said. Of the fair's almost 40 exhibitors, at least five are based in Europe and several more specialize in European artists. Among the out-of-towners: [DAM] and Galerie Caprice Horn from Berlin; Federico Luger Gallery and Galleria d'Arte Pack from Milan; and Galleria PaciArte Contemporary from Brescia, Italy.

Several U.S. galleries are joining the fair for the first time as well, including the German-influenced OMC Gallery for Contemporary Art, which recently relocated from Germany to Huntington Beach, Calif.; and gallerist Daneyal Mahmood, who is opening the doors on his own space in New York this fall after spending several years at Kashya Hildebrand. Ch'i: Contemporary Fine Art, from Brooklyn, N.Y., is also new to the aisles, as are Chelsea's ClampArt, Foley Gallery and Brenda Taylor Gallery.

"I think we've really improved the fair, the quality of the dealers and the range of work. There will be a lot of work that has not been exposed in a public way in New York before," Cohen said.

Among the work he's most interested in viewing are Nancy Burson's digital composite portraits at ClampArt; Douglas Busch's wave series at Galerie Caprice Horn; David Levinthal's large-Polaroid baseball series, on special display at the fair; and Rachelle Mozman's staged photography of children in South American gated communities, being shown by Metaphor Contemporary Art from Brooklyn.

Collectors can also get a fresh look at new student talent, presented by the School of Visual Arts and the School of the International Center of Photography, which will be showing off its MFA collaboration with Bard College.

And while they are far from being students, Magnum Photo's lensmen are getting a special exhibition at the fair. "[Magnum is] picking some very contemporary artists to show," Cohen said. "It's not just photojournalism anymore—photojournalists are producing work of such exquisite quality that it's about more than information—they've raised it to a great art."