ARCO Expands to Survive Recession

Man Ray Bill Viola Francis Bacon Ilya Kabakov Emilia Kabakov Balthus Louise Bourgeois Alicia Framis

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The first part of the answer is about size. Surprisingly, in this time of global crisis, ARCO didn't shrink but instead became bigger than in previous years. Around 250 galleries (25 more than last year) from 31 countries are spread out over three halls in the enormous exhibition space, Feria de Madrid, which also hosts jewelry and fur fairs, among other events. ARCO also made sure to present a wide range of art, thanks in part to the ARCO 40 program, which allows galleries to purchase 40 square meters of space (431 square feet) for a reasonable price. Variety is an important consideration for art fairs in Europe, which can tend to get very local, with the country's artists flooding the booths.

Then comes the second part: lowering overhead. Floor Wullems, director of the Anita Gelink Gallery from Amsterdam, said that her gallery cancelled its Armory Show booth and decided to attend ARCO instead because of location (it hadn’t participated in ARCO since 2005 because of the more important London and Basel fairs). “I think a lot of the European galleries cannot afford the Armory Show this year,” she said.

And finally a third factor: offering works in a wide range of prices. Many galleries were presenting less costly artists this year, like Peres Projects of Los Angeles and Berlin, whose Margherite Beliaeff said that bringing a star like gallery artist Terence Koh was out of the question. Instead Peres was showcasing Spanish-born Antonio Ballester Moreno, who makes faux-naif paintings and drawings. This was the right move: A number of his €18,000 ($23,160) paintings and a €4,500 drawing sold on the first day of the fair.

Madrid's Pilar Parra & Romero riffed on the idea of price flexibility with the exhibition “I Spend II” by Amaya Gonzalez Reyes in the Solo Projects part of the fair. The artist made prints on canvas of receipts and checks she received at shops and restaurants, and each print was selling for the exact price on the document. Works ran from €39 (for a pair of shoes) to €1,000 (for a laptop computer). The project was so popular that at times the booth resembled an outdoor market in an Eastern city, with a swarm of visitor interest and works disappearing quickly.

But some bigger players stressed that they had not adjusted their pricing or assortment. A representative of Thaddaeus Ropac gallery said: “We specialize in the kind of artists whose work has a stable price. We are not part of the economic bubble, and the prices are not going to be decreased.” Thaddaeus Ropac’s booth had, among other works, an Ilya and Emilia Kabakov painting for $800,000, a huge Georg Baselitz for €425,000, and an Antony Gormley sculpture for £220,000 ($316,380). The gallery sold “one major work and some smaller ones” on the first day, according to an assistant.

One big-name British gallery, Lisson, chose not attend the fair this year, but another one, the stalwart Haunch of Venison, was present and on the first day sold a 2008 video by Bill Viola to a European collector for €190,000. Other galleries presenting costly works weren't as lucky, at least at the time of this writing; Galerie Karsten Greve of Cologne, Paris, and St. Moritz, Switzerland hadn’t sold its Piero Manzoni blank paintings from 1961, priced at €1.1 million, or its Louise Bourgeois sculptures priced at around €125,000. A gallery representative told ARTINFO that reservations had been made and contacts established, however, which, he said, “is no less important than selling.”

Haunch of Venison also had probably the most photographed work at the fair: a €290,000 installation, Aquasaurus, by Indian artist Jitish Kallat, which consists of a water tanker made what appears to be dinosaur bones (the artist used polyester resin to create the illusion). It is fitting that the artist is from India, since the Asian county was the focus of ARCO’s Panorama section this year, in which 13 galleries from different Indian cities showed around 50 artists. There were also special events outside the fair, including three exhibitions of contemporary Indian art and one showing pop culture ephemera such as Bollywood posters at different venues around Madrid. However, this presence, although picturesque and exotic, was not to everyone's liking: one Indian journalist was disappointed, complaining off the record that galleries were not showing the best work of the artists involved.