Whether presenting a cocaine buffet as an artwork or turning an art fair booth into a flea market, artist Rob Pruitt has always seemed to want us to laugh with him. To his credit, his latest performance, the First Annual Art Awards, a Golden Globes-style awards ceremony doubling as a benefit for the Guggenheim (in whose rotunda it took place last week), the alternative space White Columns, and the Studio in a School program, maintained the ludic spirit that characterizes the rest of his production.

The event started out with a tongue-in-cheek red-carpet extravaganza, complete with blinding flashbulbs and paparazzi and hosted by the Art Production Funds Yvonne Force Villareal, Doreen Remen, and Casey Fremont, who greeted both art-world celebrities — dealer and tastemaker Jeffrey Deitch with, on his arm, artist Kembra Pfahler decked out in full Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black regalia (nude and painted powder blue, hair a voluminous rats nest) — and actual celebrities like Kylie Minogue, Julianne Moore, and James Franco, all of whom served as presenters.

Pruitt, dapper in a slick black suit and Converse All-Stars, served as master of ceremonies, with a good amount of help from his co-hosts, the Delusional Downtown Divas, whose sitcom-like Web TV show for Index magazine sends up the art world by chronicling the desperate efforts of three hapless young women (the Divas, played by Joana Avillez, Lena Dunham, and Isabel Halley) to make a name for themselves in it. The Art Awards opened with a video in which the Divas read an email from Pruitt, asking them to take part in the ceremony. (In the first of the night’s many in-jokes, one of them is wearing a T-shirt that reads “The Days of This Society Are Numbered,” a reference to a painting by Rirkrit Tiravanija recently shown at the Frieze Art Fair by Tiravanija’s dealer, Gavin Brown, who also represents Pruitt.) The Divas think Pruitt is offering them an award; when they find out he is instead asking them to co-host, they’re initially dismayed, but quickly perk up. “It’s important for us to get exposure,” one of them observes. Does Pruitt’s offer indicate that he trusts them? No, they decide: “It shows desperation...that’s really sweet.”

Taking the stage with the Divas to greet his guests (who’d paid $1,000 a seat, or $10,000 a table for the privilege), Pruitt poked fun at his role as impresario (“Why should I wield this kind of power?”) and pointed out that while some took his Art Awards “seriously, others [see it] as cheeky performance. Couldn’t we use cheeky performance now?” (Maybe so; after all, Pruitt launched these awards, according to the night’s printed program, in part to rouse the art world from a gloomy mood brought on by the recession.) The awards were meant to be something “that toasts the art world,” he went on, at which point one of the Divas interjected, “and roasts it a little bit, too.”

And roast it did. The first award, for writer of the year, went to New York magazine’s Jerry Saltz, who began his acceptance speech by cheekily thanking Pruitt for “the lamp” — the trophies take the form of a champagne bottle jutting from a bucket of ice, and indeed double as kitschy lamps. “First of all, I’d like to thank the academy,” Saltz continued. “Just kidding.” He gave props to one of the other contenders, Walter Robinson, founding editor of Artnet magazine — “he should be given a MacArthur” — and ended by quipping, “I love the art world. I love all of you. I hate you and I love you too. We sing the art world electric.”

The rest of the awards alternated between moments of gravity — a memorial video honored the recently deceased, including art historian Robert Rosenblum (who actually died in 2006) and artist Robert Rauschenberg — and antic humor — as dealer Tony Shafrazi rose to accept his award for best group show of the year (for “Who’s Afraid of Jasper Johns?” which was favored to win, curated as it was by Gavin Brown and Urs Fischer) an audience member called out “Kill lies all!” the phrase Shafrazi infamously spray painted on Picassos Guernica in 1974. Shafrazi, for his part, seemed genuinely appreciative of the honor. “I think the art world is as glamorous and exciting as filmmaking and theater,” he observed. “It’s high time this should be happening. Good job, Rob.” And then, as though in a jibe at his heckler, “I think I’ve been great for quite a few years, once in a while.”

Other recipients were just as sincere in their acceptances. Kaspar König and Joan Jonas both garnered lifetime achievement awards, and Jonas took the opportunity to quote a bit of Dante: “The more we know, the more we hate time’s waste.” Mary Heilmann, who won artist of the year, remarked of being an artist, “I did this a long time ago because I wanted to be weird.” And now? “I own this place, right? Back when I started painting it was to be a loner up in a garret. You’d go out and get drunk, and then come back and work, alone. The title of the show I did [last year’s traveling mid-career retrospective] was ‘To Be Someone.’ And it worked out. So, thank you.” Ryan Trecartin, who won best new artist of the year, gave props to the many collaborators on his movies, thanked his parents, and thanked his dealer, Elizabeth Dee. “You have to be with a great gallery, and I love her.”

But for all the earnest moments, it was a sort of schticky humor that ruled the evening. Klaus Biesenbach, recently appointed director of P.S.1, presented together with pop star Kylie Minogue the award for best exhibition outside the United States. After damning the Guggenheim with faint praise — “here we are in the second most beautiful museum in the city” — he veered away from the teleprompter’s commands to remark that “when Tony Shafrazi got a prize, I thought [this] was a hoax. Then, when Joan Jonas and Kaspar König got awards, I knew it wasn’t a hoax.” The lamp went to Jeff Koons for his show at Versailles, and Koons was characteristically blasé in the video he sent in to serve as his acceptance speech. “It was a lot of fun, it was effortless to do...I’m honored.”

In the end, Pruitt and the Divas stole the show. The “Rob Pruitt award” went to Cynthia Plaster Caster, so-called because she has made a career out of casting men’s penises, mainly members of the punk rock pantheon, like Wayne Kramer of the MC5, who, along with a few other of her subjects, sung her praises in a video. Before handing over the lamp, Pruitt offered, “I don’t know if you were going to ask me to pose, but tonight my penis is bigger than ever.” Plaster Caster beamed. “I really love trophies. It’ll look beautiful on my mantel, with my others. I’m a show-off. That’s what groupies are known for. This here is Jimi Hendrix and with that she displayed a sizable plaster cast. “He’s one of my biggest conquests.”

As for the Divas, their videos, which served as interstitial entertainment, lampooned the art world from any number of angles. In one, they’d pitched a tent in the Guggenheim’s rotunda — surely a dig on Carsten Höllers project for the museum’s recent show “theanyspacewhatever,” which allowed visitors to spend the night in the museum — inside which they read E.L. Konigsbergs classic children’s book From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, which chronicles a girl’s adventures in the Met. Emerging from their tent, they irreverently washed their panties and shaved their legs in the rotunda’s fountain. In another video, they work up the courage to call Jeffrey Deitch on his cell phone, only to be hung up on. And in yet another, they corner writer Linda Yablonsky in Chelsea. “We’re huge fans of yours!” they gush, and confide, “We’re trying to get a leg up in the art world.” This serves as an occasion for a bit of bawdiness, as Yablonsky wryly responds, “Easy. Put both legs up.” Then, perhaps taking pity on them, she advises, “You should focus on the work and how you define it for your audience,” then offers, “would you like your picture taken for [Artforum’s] Scene and Herd?” The attention-seeking Divas are thrilled but — oh, too bad. Alas, Yablonsky’s camera battery had run out.