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Dog Days at the Affordable Art Fair (Whitehot Magazine of Contemporary Art); featuring KITTY BLANDY
Apr 2009
whitehot | March 2009, Review: The Affordable Art Fair
The Affordable Art Fair
Battersea Evolution
Battersea Park
London
SW11 4NJ
March 12 through March 15, 2009
Dog Days at the Affordable Art Fair
A large scale event dedicated to affordable art? Now there's a novel
concept - and the raison d'etre behind the decade old Affordable Art
Fair. Held this year at Battersea Park along the southern banks of the
River Thames during the second full weekend of March, the fair was
launched originally in London in 1999 and now takes place biannually in
London as well as annually in Brussels, Bristol, Amsterdam, Paris and
New York, with affiliate fairs in Sydney and Melbourne. This self
proclaimed “important and popular step on the art-buying ladder” is a
showcase for contemporary art priced at £3000 (roughly $4250) or under.
For the most part, this year’s AAF was a hit or miss affair. Lots of
over-priced kitsch (dogs were an especially popular theme for much of
the art on show) and last minute purchase possibilities for the next
weekend’s UK Mothers Day (March 22nd) were on display with plenty of
landscape paintings and portrait photography rounding out the bulk of
what was represented. Of course, with the mission to exhibit thousands
of paintings, sculpture, photography and original prints with price
tags between £50 and £3,000, perhaps such run of the mill works were to
be expected. Despite the same-old-same-old aspect of many of the works,
enough diamonds in the rough, undiscovered marvels and memorable
up-and-comers were exhibited to make AFF a worthwhile visit, if not a
mandatory shopping excursion, for both seasoned and wannabe collectors.
Indeed, this year’s AAF offered an excellent opportunity to gauge the
state of contemporary art, not to mention the tastes and buying habits
of art buyers. A focus on Asian art (particularly Chinese and
Vietnamese) served to refresh western palettes with a decidedly brash
take on contemporary painting. One gloriously rich example from Kings
Road Galleries, Chinese artist Liao Man’s Breeze from Caribbean, No. 11
stopped attendees dead in their tracks as they rounded the corner to
see this 160x110cm oil on canvas of a Mickey and Minnie bikini-clad
bubble butt poised for a cheeky portrait. Other winning attempts at
the affordably unforgettable seized the notion of accessible art,
hijacking it to outlandish extremes. One such work was Robert
Bradford’s Soft Dog, exhibited by the Parisian gallery Envie
D’Art. This life-sized sculpture comprised of “cuddly toys on wood”
amped up the charm to the point of distortion, resulting a big,
huggable piece of mildly subversive and wildly fun art.
The £3000 ceiling still may have been a bit beyond the means of many
art fans, especially with the fair’s £12 fee for general public entry.
However, plenty of works were priced around the £50 mark. Besides, if
the quality of the art didn’t do the trick, the vast numbers of works
in the AAF’s airy and pleasant facilities made for a gawk-worthy stroll
at the very least.
