It’s a glamorous circus of buyers, collectors, curators, and self-proclaimed connoisseurs. Two events that overlap: Frieze London, showcasing the best emerging talent of today, and Frieze Masters, which allows us to rediscover masterpieces by artists like Man Ray and Lucio Fontana. But London hosts numerous art exhibitions beyond the main fairs, so much so that these Frieze moments feel like just a smattering of what London’s art world has to offer.
I am in my last year of studying Art History at The Courtauld, and I got into art through studying the subject at school. Growing up in London, I always wanted to go into town and make a day out of going to museums and galleries with friends. Now, when I travel somewhere new, that’s the first thought on my mind. I get the Frieze hype: My first experience going there was with my best friend when I was 17, and I quickly realised how overwhelming it was, as well as how underdressed it makes you feel.
So with that in mind I decided to spend my chaotic London Art Week going a little off-piste, checking out contemporary activations, 19th and 20th century painters, furniture, and perfume. And a house party, of course.
THE WARM-UP
On October 9, before things officially kick off, I go to Carpenters Workshop Gallery for a party celebrating Rick Owens’ Furniture exhibition, RUST NEVER SLEEPS, created by Michèle Lamy. It’s the first time I’ve been to the gallery. Its high ceilings, sexy exterior space. and the foggy dance floor pairs glamorously with the crocodile leather chaise longue and antler bed on display. The other works similarly explore primal materiality in an architectural form. Fabulous foreplay for the week ahead.
MONDAY
We’re at LOEWE’s Frieze pop up to celebrate their Crafted Collection debut: three bold and expressive scents (Roasted Vanilla, Iris Root and Bittersweet Oud). They are exactly what you’d hope and expect from Loewe: a lively and artisanal representation of iconic perfumery notes. The second floor has been transformed into an elegant perfumer’s laboratory, embellished with floral arrangements by Hamish Powell. With weak intention, I put my foot down and demand that I need an early night. But I need little to no convincing to keep the party going and end the night quite tipsy dancing to ‘80s music at The Maine.
TUESDAY
A couple of weeks ago, Saatchi Yates threw a brilliantly chaotic rave celebrating their exhibition with Marina Abramović at their gallery on Bury Street. Although her appearance is brief, my favorite artist showing face even just for a second is special. Shortly after, the sweaty, dancing crowd took over until the early morning. On Tuesday, Saatchi Yates host a breakfast tour of Abramović’s 1200 unique and signed prints from her 1998 performance videos, Red Period and Blue Period—600 of each color. Red Period shows Abramović bathed in red light, her face showing emotions from shy to contention, both powerfully feminine and seductive. Blue Period, in contrast, evokes an emotional coldness and tension. Saatchi Yates is also exhibiting vintage prints from the artist’s personal archive that document some of her most iconic and influential performances.
WEDNESDAY
Thaddaeus Ropac hosts an activation party for Tom Sachs’ exhibition A Good Shelf, easily the busiest event of the week, surrounded by friends, new work colleagues, old work colleagues and prestigious collectors enamoured with Sachs’ creations. The New York based artist’s ceramics are inspired by East Asian tea bowls (chawans), these vessels can be used as mezcal copitas or cortado cups, cereal or soup bowls. The party came with an actual Mezcaleria, a working espresso and mezcal bar. Tom Sachs NASA Mezcal bottles, editions of 100, are exclusively available at the gallery. As part of the activation, the mezcal is being bottled, sealed, bagged, and presented by Tom Sachs’ himself and his studio staff. The bottles are then presented to their buyers who gather around recording the process.
THURSDAY
I go to Alon Zakaim Fine Art to see Cig Harvey: I Want You To Remember This Forever. The exhibition centres around luminosity, and Harvey’s works—moody and beautiful photography —are aptly paired with vital painters of the 19th and 20th century. My favorite pairing is Harvey’s “Three Apricots” (2023) and Avigdor Arikha’s “Composition in orange and black” (1968). By recontextualising painters like Marc Chagall and Le Corbusier next to Harvey’s work, we are invited to see how main artistic concerns, like light and composition, have evolved or remained constant over time. The exhibition’s title and its content are perfectly in sync.
“I was only born yesterday so I don’t know how ‘back’ I can personally say London Art Week is.”
FRIDAY
I rush over to Christie’s London around midday to watch the Impressionist and Modern Art Day and Works on Paper Sale. It’s a revered setting of specialists and bidders, heads turning left and right at the sound of the auctioneer’s voice, seeing which phone bidder is able to successfully win a work for their client. The headline of the sale is a Berthe Morisot painting of a delicate interior world of women, which sold for $18.45m.
My night ends, naturally, in Elephant and Castle at a house party with friends who had all made time for the arts this week, whether it be the main fairs, running into the U-Haul Gallery (a nomadic art-gallery that rents box trucks as exhibition space, which has a reputation for parking up outside the good parties), or just prioritising their personal projects. We were all exhausted. Let’s call it a content kind of fatigue.
I was only born yesterday so I don’t know how ‘back’ I can personally say London Art Week is. But I’ve learnt that this year, fresher eyes have brought fresher things to London’s art scene. It felt like we were seeing something new.
