Frieze Art Fair: The Culture Takeover You Don’t Want to Miss

Located in London’s Regent’s Park, Frieze Art Fair is the annual highlight of the international art world’s Autumn season, showcasing today’s most significant artists across its main and curated sections. This year, the fair brings together over 160 of the world’s leading art galleries in a bespoke structure designed by award-winning architecture and interior design company Universal Design Studios.

Visitors can view and buy art from over 1,000 of today’s leading artists, and experience the fair’s critically acclaimed Frieze Projects and Talks programmes. The Sculpture Park and Frieze Film, which includes work by Rachel Maclean, who at the end of the month will present her first major solo show of new work entitled Wot U :-) About here with us at HOME, are other popular event strands. Alongside these fantastic displays, Frieze Masters offers a series of top-notch projects, films and talks.

Elisa Ruff, our Media & Comms Manager, shares her experience…

The VIP Preview

There was anticipation in the air as soon as we got to Regents Park. There were eager art collectors, artists, and other movers and shakers all keen to embark upon the hottest art event of the Autumn. The pure size of the fair is pretty overwhelming. Wherever you look, there’s something amazing to see, and at times you don’t know what’s performance and what’s not. It was also lovely to experience the premiere of Rachel’s film – there was a special screening in the Frieze auditorium and it went down a treat with the audience.

The 2016 Fair

Frieze Sculpture Park is one of my absolute favourite things at the fair this year. It features 19 major artists, including Goshka Macuga, Lynn Chadwick, Ed Herring and Conrad Shawcross, dramatising the landscape of Regent’s Park with large-scale sculptures and installations. It’s one of the largest free outdoor art programmes in London, and it’s fantastic to see contemporary sculpture set against the backdrop of the beautiful park. Frieze Projects is really cool, too, with many random performances that make you think of what art is and how all of us, on a daily basis, engage with art in one way or another.

London

During Frieze Art Fair, the contemporary art scene in London explodes, with all galleries peacocking the very best they have to offer to attract international collectors, artists, curators and industry bods.

Simon Fujiwara (Photographer’s Gallery)

A beautiful new film commission, Joanne is a portrait of Joanna Salley, who taught Fujiwara art at Harrow School for Boys and a few years later found herself at the mercy of the tabloids when her students found and distributed nude photos of her. The project is a statement and an attempt to review the representation of women in mainstream media – I really recommend popping by if you are in London.

Scott Campbell (Lazarides)

Lazarides Rathbone exhibits many of the most significant artists thriving outside the conventional contemporary art market, the market leader in urban art. During Frieze week, they kicked off their new season with the launch of Whole Glory London, an off-site exhibition by renowned artist and tattoo artist Scott Campbell in Covent Garden. It features a new series of nine works, tattooed pig skin encased in stainless steel frames in liquid preservative – and the best bit: randomly selected participants can place their arm through a hole in the wall, giving brave candidates the chance to be inked by the same hand that tattooed Courtney Love, Orlando Bloom and Heath Ledger. Only on until Sunday!

There are so many fantastic exhibitions, performances and events to experience, I only wish I had time to do it all. If you are planning to go to Frieze next year, be sure to do your online research to pinpoint your favourites, as I can promise you now that you won’t be able to do it all.

Frieze Art Fair runs until Sun 9 Oct. Keep an eye on @HOME_mcr on Twitter for our #FriezeWeek #AwayFromHOME updates from London. Rachel Maclean’s solo exhibition Wot u :-) about? opens here on Sat 29 Oct.

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