NEW YORK— Some people have spent the last few weeks lying by the side of a pool somewhere or tramping the tourist trail in Paris or Palau, but most of us at ARTINFO have hardly strayed from Chelsea, where the languor of late summer has gradually given way to a growing sense of impatience. In our eagerness to get the new season underway, we've been asking friends and acquaintances in the art world a few simple questions about their expectations for the year ahead:

1. What are you looking forward to in the coming season?

2. What do you predict will be the year’s big trend?

3. Who will be the new directors of the Guggenheim and the Met?

The people we've spoken to include Helen Allen, Melissa Chiu, Leigh Conner, Katelijne de Backer, Renato Danese, Zach Feuer, RoseLee Goldberg, Alexis Hubshman, Olga Korper, Marilyn Minter, Sundaram Tagore, and Ray Waterhouse. It's a diverse group, and so are their answers.

Click on the photo gallery at left for images and excerpts from our interviews, or continue reading below.
Marilyn Minter, painter

Looking forward to: I am really looking forward to the Mary Heilmann show at the New Museum.

Big trend: The future of the art world? Ha! More of the same, only less money.

New directors: Matthew Higgs is phenomenal at White Columns. I'm sure he’s not interested, but he would kick ass at the Guggenheim.

Melissa Chiu, director, Asia Society Museum

Looking forward to: The grand tour of Asia: For the first time nearly all the biennials and triennials in Asia have coalesced at the same time: the Guangzhou Triennial and Shanghai Biennale in China, the Taipei Biennial in Taiwan, the Gwangju Biennale in Korea, the Yokohama Triennale in Japan, and the Singapore Biennale. It’s a unique chance to catch a lot of international art!

Big trend: Not surprisingly, there is an intense interest in the Islamic world, from historical sites of Babylon to contemporary art from Pakistan. We are planning a major exhibition of this work for next summer.

New directors: Both are prize positions, so they can have their pick of candidates. I think the Met director will be a European.

Olga Korper, gallerist, Toronto

Looking forward to: The fall season in the art world is like spring for gardeners. I get swept up in a renewed energy of art events, openings, and clients returning from vacations. And I am delighted to see the end of flip-flops.

Big trend: I can only suggest the trend I see in Canada, where we are happily looking at works with staying power rather than the seduction of a “big new trend.” There is very serious interest in historical work, which is not my specialty, but I appreciate the respect we pay established, older artists and the renewed interest in works created 20, 30, and 50 years ago.

New directors: I am a huge fan of Glenn Lowry at MoMA and Matthew Teitelbaum at the Art Gallery of Ontario but would be horrified if either of them left their current director position.

Katelijne de Backer, director, the Armory Show

Looking forward to: One of the things I’m most looking forward to is our party in September celebrating Ewan Gibbs, who we commissioned to create the visual identity for the Armory Show 2009. For one thing, it will be great to see Ewan again, and secondly, we’ve finally recovered from the madness of this year’s fair, so we’re ready for another party! On a related note, I’m also excited about Mary Heilmann’s retrospective at the New Museum. She was one of our two commissioned artists last year, along with John Waters, and she’s the nicest person. Judging from all the raves the show got when it opened at the Orange County Museum, it should be very good.

Big trend: For a while now there has been a move toward less flashy, more earnest work and away from high-production “blockbuster” pieces, so I expect that we will be seeing art that doesn’t look like it was made by a team of assistants. Then again, no sooner do you make a prediction than you’re proven wrong — I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that Jeff Koons is casting the Empire State Building in stainless steel.

New directors: I don’t really know, but I like what Jerry Saltz said last year: The next director of the Guggenheim should be a woman!

Ray Waterhouse, dealer, London

Looking forward to: Our two shows of Middle Eastern and Arab art, which will be the most extensive selling shows ever held in London. We are promoting them widely in western Europe and the United States; I'm really looking forward to seeing how they are received.

The other thing, with perhaps more trepidation, is seeing how the market reacts after the summer break. I hate the summer season when there are no shows or auctions, and there is so little to buy. I love doing deals!

Big trend: Less speculative buying.

New directors: Dunno.

Renato Danese, gallerist, New York

Looking forward to: I’m looking forward to a more temperate market. There’s too much art in the world, too many auctions, and far too many art fairs. If there’s a benefit to a downturn in the economy, it will be the curtailment of the rashest excesses of the art world.

Big trend: I won’t make any predictions in aesthetic terms, because things are so polycentric and pluralistic. That’s a positive trend in itself: New doors will open to reflect the global market that exists outside of the art world, and the U.S. will become hospitable not only to art from China, but to hidden treasures from places like Japan, India, and Israel.

New directors: Were Anne d'Harnoncourt still alive, she’d have made a great candidate for the Met post, though I doubt very much that she’d have left Philadelphia. As it is, I could see Michael Govan — who I don’t think would mind being called a protégé of Thomas Krens — at the Guggenheim. He’s much more suited to the Guggenheim than the Met. For the Met, there’s Rusty Powell, but Peter Marzio or James Wood would be my first choices.

Leigh Conner, gallerist, Washington, D.C.

Looking forward to: There are two museum shows that I am very excited to see: Mark Rothko at Tate Modern and “The Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden: The Birth of Modern Painting” at the Staedel Museum in Frankfurt. These two exhibitions bookend my interests in abstraction and realism in painting.

Of course the biggest thing I am looking forward to is the opening of our new gallery building. This project has been four years in the making, and the building will feature two galleries for solo presentations, a dedicated media room for digital work, and an outdoor courtyard space. Another aspect of the building is its location in northeast Washington, D.C. This area has long been ignored, and we look forward to being a part of the revitalization.

Big trend: I believe the big new trend this season will be a movement toward purism. With a more discerning art market and audience, I think we will see a curatorial pullback from exhibitions that present a synthesis between art and rock music, fashion, film, etc. Fine artists will get back to their roots, do what they do best, and make significant contributions to current culture and, hopefully, art history. With that, gallerists will scramble to become sincere about art again.

New directors: The Guggenheim? Hilary Clinton! The Met, I’m not so sure. Here’s my question: Who will be named director of the Hirshhorn?

Alexis Hubshman, founder and director, SCOPE

Looking forward to: Seeing which Asian art fairs can attract a strong exhibitor base and collector following will be of major interest to us as we prepare the launch of ArtAsia ’08 in Miami this December. Also, SCOPE London 2008 at the Lord's Cricket Ground is a big one for me.     

Big trend: The big trend this year is foreign money and foreign markets. With America’s weak dollar and more billionaires coming online everyday from India, Russia, China, the UAE, et al, what better place to speculate than the inefficient and mostly unregulated economy that is the art world.

New directors: I predict eastern interests will acquire both institutions, creating “MegaHeim,” which will be shepherded by a towheaded hero from the West.

Zach Feuer, gallerist, New York

Looking forward to: Marc Handelman at Sikkema Jenkins, Dana Frankfort at Bellwether. At my gallery, Phoebe Washburn, Anton Henning, Nathalie Djurberg, and Justin Lieberman (in order of exhibition schedule).

Big trend: I expect that the frenzy of trophy hunting or finding the next big thing will fade, and we’ll see a return to connoisseurship and interesting collections that don’t mimic each other. I guess the trend will be no more trends.

New directors: Jerry Saltz for the Guggenheim, Mayor Bloomberg for the Met.

RoseLee Goldberg, director, Performa

Looking forward to: Fall weather in New York. The light is gorgeous and the temperature perfect. I’m very excited about our special gala that we produce each November, and this one, the Metal Ball, will be very special indeed! In 2006, the evening was all white, and for ’08, it will be silver and gold. The Metal Ball is inspired by Oskar Schlemmer’s event at the Bauhaus, and ours will be an entirely new take on metallic! We’re planning a great evening of nonstop surprises. Stay posted!

Big trend: Performance is everywhere! Even when it’s not live, it’s implied. I am really looking forward to Nancy Spector’s “theanyspacewhatever” at the Guggenheim, which brings wonderful artists who know each other well and who’ve worked together in the past (Angela Bulloch, Maurizio Cattelan, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Douglas Gordon, Liam Gillick, Pierre Huyghe ....) in a show that will surely make terrific use of that dramatic space. I am also looking forward to Jerome Bel’s lecture at the French Institute. Anything by Jerome is worth the trip.

New directors: I certainly have my own wish list of directors for these two important positions, but for now, let’s congratulate Dia on filling their directorship with the terrific Philippe Vergne. I can’t wait to hear about his plans.

Sundaram Tagore, gallerist, New York/Beverly Hills/Hong Kong

Looking forward to: I think this fall season is going to be a little unpredictable, because everyone is going to be glued to their televisions watching the elections. I think everyone is waiting for a new chapter to begin. I’m going to be spending the entire fall in Hong Kong. It’s one of the largest art auction markets in the world and a great place to see what’s happening with contemporary Asian art. We're traveling to Taipei, Seoul, and Singapore between September and November to attend art fairs, so I expect to see some exciting new work. Back in New York, we’re opening a show at the gallery called "New Walls from Europe," which has been curated by a Berlin artist, Fré Ilgen. It's a collection of work from young artists all over Germany. This will be followed by an exhibition of new work by the renowned Mexican artist Ricardo Mazal. It’s jointly organized by our gallery and the Mexican Cultural Institute in Washington, D.C. So, I’m pretty much scanning the globe this fall.

Big trend: I've said it before and I'll say it again, the trend is globalism. We've been at the forefront since we opened in 2000, and now, everyone is catching up. There are exciting things happening around the world. Who would have thought that Damien Hirst’s work would be previewed in New Delhi? My favorite show in recent memory is the Nandalal Bose exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. He was a great Indian modernist. One must look beyond conventional Western art.

New directors: Who can follow Philippe de Montebello? He has an all-embracing cultural viewpoint and a certain refinement that will be very difficult to replace. I don’t know who can fill either role, but I do hope in both cases it will be an individual with exceptional art-historical knowledge and an international mindset. A lot of people claim to have a global view, but very few actually possess it.

Helen Allen, founder and director, Pulse

Looking forward to: I’m really excited about Calder at the Whitney and the Van Gogh and Miro exhibitions at MoMA. There also seem to be a dozen fairs happening in Asia this September, so I’ll be following what is happening in that market. Most of all I’m looking forward to autumn in the city and seeing my daughter start preschool.

Big trend: We’re seeing a lot of artists working in a variety of different media and experimenting with new methods in things like moving sculptures and three-dimensional animation — and young collectors seem to actually be stepping out of their comfort zones and buying those pieces. Indian, Russian, and Eastern European art will continue to grow, and of course we’ll still see plenty of interest in east Asia.

New directors: When I was little, my dream was to be director of the Metropolitan Museum, so maybe they should hire me! As for the Guggenheim, that'll take some thought. Ask me again in a year.