Basel Best & Wurst

By Robert Ayers

Published: June 16, 2007

Robert Gober, "Untitled" (1992). Installation view at Schaulager, 2007

Photo by Robert Ayers

A group of Tyrolean-topped dwarves used to promote the Midget Gallery

Paul Klee History’s Limits Santa's Little Helper Martín Ramírez Weimar Celebrating 90th Anniversary of Bauhaus Oranges and Sardines Art Meets Music at the Louvre Uwe Kowski in Berlin

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With Art 38 Basel coming to an end, ARTINFO's Robert Ayers selects his highlights and lowlights of the week.

Best

The ride up Mattenstrasse on a SCOPE pedal rickshaw. And SCOPE itself: the best one yet.

Robert Gober’s show at the Schaulager. Sublime.

The Helly Nahmad Gallery’s show of late Picassos. Their booth had a lovely pale cream carpet, but that was nothing compared to the comfort that I took from those fantastic paintings.

Hans Op der Beeck’s Art Unlimited installation. Quite magical.

The retro Girl Scout outfits worn by the Art Basel security women.

The exquisite little group of Paul Klee paintings in the Basel Kunstmuseum’s permanent collection.

Dealers so excited by the art that they went out of their way to share their enthusiasm with visitors to their booths—and made sure their staffs did the same.

Wurst

Too many visitors and not enough hotel rooms. Far worse than in previous years. Some people, like me, were forced to stay in hotels in France. My two- to three-hour commute involved a taxi, a train, and a tram, plus a change of currency, a change of language, and a passport control. Twice a day.

The fact that in 2007 someone thought it would be amusing to promote the Midget Gallery by bringing along a group of Tyrolean-topped dwarves for people to gawk at.

The Toblerone that appeared right at the front of my minibar every day. “Eat me,” it murmured. Naturally, I obeyed. Every day.

The fact that any temptation to describe Art Basel as “a zoo” was discouraged by the proximity—there it was, right across the Messeplatz—of an actual zoo. A traveling one, with a circus, and sad animals in smelly trailers.

Dealers and their staff who thought they were so bloody special they didn’t need to bother to be civil to visitors to their booths.

The exchange rate. And the Swiss cost of living. I lost my sunglasses, which I bought on 14th Street in Manhattan for $5. It cost me 50 Swiss Francs ($40!) to replace them.

The weight of the Art 38 Basel catalogue. No doubt it will cost me excess baggage charges.

How everyone seemed to get hungry at the same time, and then suddenly the lines at all the Art Basel cafes would be yards long.

And—oh yes—the ubiquitous bratwurst.