June 2008 In Brief

Fit for a King

A Dickens Tale

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On the 27th, Zach Feuer gallery debuted new video art by the Israel-born, New York–based artist Tamy Ben-Tor. During Armory week alone, Feuer sold out two of the four videos, which were produced in limited editions of five, each priced between $6,000 to $7,500. In them, Ben-Tor assumes various personae, including a self-satisfied artist and a cynical critic.

Then, on the 28th, PaceWildenstein handed over its West 22nd Street space to the abstract painter James Siena. Thanks to an extensive waiting list, all 78 of the featured works—intricately patterned paintings and oversized ink drawings—priced from around $5,000 to $50,000, sold by week’s end. Also on the 28th, Leo Koenig, Inc. gallery unveiled Alexis Rockman’s seven-panel Antarctic seascape, South, among other pieces by the artist. The painting, above, was put on reserve during Armory week and sold shortly thereafter for $130,000. 

On March 29, the nearby Bortolami gallery launched a show of figurative paintings by the New Yorker Hope Atherton. Within a few days, nearly all the canvases—several of which had been claimed months before—sold, at prices ranging from $10,000 to $28,000. All in all, not a bad week for the New York art world, which has lately been rocked by recession jitters.

"Show Time" originally appeared in the June 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's June 2008 Table of Contents.