Trending at the Print Fair: Chris Ofili, Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, and More
Love Richard Serra’s sculptures at Gagosian in London, or the Chris Ofili paintings drawing crowds to the New Museum? Tomorrow, when the IFPDA Print Fair opens to New York, thousands of prints will be on view—among them, works by contemporary art’s biggest names. So if you’re keeping up with the headlines in the art world, this list of trending artists shouldn’t surprise you. From Pablo Picasso, with two newly opened, major exhibitions in New York (at Pace and Gagosian), to Chris Ofili, who is leaving jaws agape with his stunning mid-career survey at the New Museum, to Jeff Koons, on the heels of his five-floor retrospective at the Whitney Museum, this list is the perfect primer for the fair—and cheat sheet for some of the most exciting happenings this fall.
10. Roy Lichtenstein
Next week, a new exhibition at Mitchell-Innes & Nash’s uptown New York space will show over 60 of Roy Lichtenstein’s works, and tomorrow, at least three galleries will bring the American Pop artist’s prints to the IFPDA fair, all bearing his signature Ben-Day dots. Among them is a work from his “Water Lilies” series, inspired by Claude Monet’s “Nympheas.” (And if you’re still wanting more, head downtown to Chelsea to see 14 of his sculptures at FLAG Art Foundation.)
Following his October openings in London at Gagosian (large-scale steel sculptures on Britannia Street and an over 16-foot work on paper on Davies Street), Richard Serra will open a solo show next week at David Zwirner Gallery in New York. Though he’s better known for his sculptures, at the IFPDA fair, you’ll find his prints at Barbara Krakow Gallery and Gemini G.E.L at Joni Moisant Weyl.
Jeff Koons, who just helped New Yorkers bid adieu to the Whitney Museum’s iconic Breuer building with his career retrospective—the museum’s last show in the space before passing the keys to the Met—and who recently installed a colossal, 37-foot flower-covered sculpture at New York’s Rockefeller Center for a Public Art Fund project, will show works from his “Luxury and Degradation” series at the IFPDA fair. The series, to be presented by Carolina Nitsch Contemporary Art, is a commentary on luxury, advertising, and alcohol consumption.
7. Donald Judd
Works spanning three decades of Donald Judd’s career are currently on view in “Local History,” a show featuring Judd, Enrico Castellani, and Frank Stella, held concurrently at Dominique Lévy Gallery in London and New York. At the print fair, look for Judd’s cadmium red rectangle print at Barbara Krakow Gallery and his parallelogram at Susan Sheehan Gallery. The latter is part of a series of 38 woodcuts made between 1961 and ’73 that mark an important shift in Judd’s work—when the image fled the square and rectangular forms and became a parallelogram, an abstracted shape that recurs in his work.
6. Chris Ofili
Manchester-born YBA Chris Ofili is finally having the New York moment he deserves. Last week, the artist opened his first solo museum exhibition in the United States at the New Museum, spanning two decades of his career—from his early ’90s paintings, incorporating glitter and elephant dung, to his more recent “Blue Rider” series, partially inspired by the landscape of his home in Trinidad. At the fair, don’t miss Ofili’s watercolor monotypes shown by Two Palms, his aquatints at Crown Point Press, or his hand-colored dry point etchings with The Paragon Press.
Just last month, Marlborough Fine Art’s solo booth honoring Francis Bacon was a highlight of Frieze Masters, the centerpiece being Study for Bullfight no. 1, a work shown in Bacon’s seminal retrospective at Le Grand Palais, Paris, in the early 1970s.And just last week—on the late British painter’s birthday—the Francis Bacon MB Art Foundation opened in Monte Carlo. For more of Bacon, head to Marlborough Graphics’ booth at the print fair, which will feature the artist’s 1984 study for a self-portrait.
4. Damien Hirst
Look for Damien Hirst’s butterfly etchings at The Paragon Press and silkscreen pills at Paul Stolper Gallery, the latter which are part of his “Schizophrenogenesis” series that debuted in London in October (read about the exhibition here). At Paul Stolper Gallery’s booth, you’ll find a selection of prints from The Cure—screenprints depicting vibrant, two-colored colored pills—as well as sculptural works.
Last month, during Frieze Week, London’s Fine Art Society mounted an exhibition featuring the work of 50 artists in celebration of Marcel Duchamp—often named one of the most influential artists of the 20th century. Currently, you can see his work in an exhibition titled “Marcel Duchamp: La Peinture, Même” atthe Centre Pompidou in Paris, and at the print fair, including one of the artist’s playfully counterfeit “Monte Carlo Bonds.” Works from this series were also recently on view in the Swiss Institute New York’s “St. Petersburg Paradox” exhibition.
With two newly opened major exhibitions in New York, “Picasso and the Camera” at Gagosian and “Picasso & Jacqueline: The Evolution of Style” at Pace—not to mention the grand reopening of the Picasso Museum in Paris in October—the Spanish painter’s name is (still) everywhere. At the fair, look for the print of his 1930s mistress, Marie-Thérèse Walter.
1. Andy Warhol
It’s no surprise to find Pop-art-pioneer Andy Warhol, maker of some of the world’s most iconic and ubiquitous prints—the Campbell’s soup cans, the Marilyns, the dollar signs, to name just a few—as the most popular artist at the print fair. Susan Sheehan Gallery will show works from Warhol’s flowers series, which began with the artist’s first solo show at Leo Castelli Gallery in 1964 and consisted entirely of flowers—all made from the same source image, clipped from Modern Photography magazine. The flower motif continued throughout Warhol’s career, across all mediums.
