Review: AIPAD Photography Show - New York CIty, April 10-13, 2008
Text and Phtographs by Naveed Nour | April 11, 2008
From the 10th to the 13th of April, the Park Avenue Armory in New York City was host to the 28th annual AIPAD Photography Show. This was my first visit to the event and I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by the quality and presentation of the show. Seventy seven of the leading international galleries that sell fine art photography had set up shop, and overall the selection was vast and interesting for the untrained viewer. The United States was represented by 65 galleries, of which, not surprisingly, 28 were from New York and 8 from California. The rest of the world was represented by two galleries from England, three galleries from Germany, one gallery each from Italy, Canada, Japan and Switzerland, and three from France. It was important for me to see who and where the players are, but by no means would I discount those who were absent. I guess in order to see the rest I can always go to Paris in the fall and visit Paris Photo, of whose 90-plus galleries only a small percentage will be from America.
David Gallery, Culver City, CA
Overall, the good news is that the business of fine art photography is on the rise. Experts talk about how the market really started to build over the past 25 years, with an accelerated surge in the last 10 years that shows no sign of stopping. Michael Hoppen, founder of the Michael Hoppen Gallery Inc. of London, England, says, “Despite the show being slow this year, I see a major change. A new generation of collectors is joining the market and taking advantage of the affordable prices. These collectors who are now in their 20’s to 30’s will be huge in the future. Right now we are just waiting for this financial mess to pass, but after that things will pick up again.” Hoppen should know, as he owns a three segmented gallery: One for vintage photography, another for contemporary photography, and one that sells affordable art. This means that there is room for everybody to own or to sell fine art photography. Recently we witnessed the record-breaking sale of a photograph by Richard Prince for $3.4 million, which surpassed the previous mark of $3.34 million set by German photographer Andreas Gursky just a week earlier. These prices may seem unreal, but they will surely legitimize the price tags of any photograph that is sold under $50K. I know photographers who will be happy to fetch just a $1000 for their work. So let’s be happy for what is going on in the market.
Visitor passing by Lalla Essaydi's photographs at Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, NY
When I interviewed some exhibitors and visitors, the overall opinion was that this year’s show was very conservative and the number of contemporary work was very low. Maybe with all the expenses related to participating at a show like this, gallery owners thought to have a better selling percentage with their vintage collection. But this will eventually change. In order to ensure myself that contemporary photography will soon replace traditional or classic photography, I was on the hunt for galleries that courageously showed and sold digital prints (oops, sorry for the blasphemy. How dare I say the word). To some folks photographs that were not produced in the traditional way should not be marketed, or if they are, these people will distance themselves from it as far as possible. Oh well, someone has to tell these people that pretty soon companies like Kodak and Fuji will stop making film, and without film there won’t be any traditional printing. Who ever thought that Polaroid will go out of business? Very soon there will be young photographers out there who have never touched a negative, and this will be the way of life just in a few years. Those dealers who still believe in vintage photographs can stay with what is left from the past and just become commodity dealers. By doing so, they will just miss a tremendous opportunity to become part of the next wave.
A Gallery for Fine Photography, New Orleans, LA
One of my favorite exhibitors at this show was A Gallery for Fine Photography, from New Orleans. Founder Joshua Mann Pailet mostly deals with photography-based art. His collection at AIPAD was free of any restrictions and his artists used anything from pipe cleaners (Sandy Skoglund’s “Fresh Hybrid”, 2008) to gold leaves sandwiched between layers of black and white transparencies. Josh has been in this business since 1973, but his outlook on the photography market is as fresh as it can be. I came to realize that photographers need more Josh’s in the field, as he will allow them to have a voice. Other galleries that I also liked were the Yancey Richardson Gallery from NYC, for their boldness in showing non-traditional work, and also the Hemphill Gallery from Washington D.C., whose collection was entirely made up of archival inkjet prints. It is sad that I even have to distinguish the work like this, or argue about the relationship between the price of photographs and their ephemeral nature. Recently I saw an installation piece in London that was made entirely of cardboards and plastic tubing, and was probably held together with Elmer’s Glue. Nobody questions the longevity of that piece, yet the price tag of the sold work was over $20K. So why do we even question how an image is photographed, prepared and printed? I am sure that any photograph will outlive the aforementioned installation.
Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York, NY
In the end, however, I can only conclude that despite whatever I may have said above, in the world of fine art photography anything goes. If a gallery finds a piece that has been professionally produced and they like it, they will find a way to market and sell it. Therefore you photographers out there mustn’t sit still. Get out and work on your ideas. Make sure they are perfected and polished, and look for a gallery that matches your style. The rest will work itself out. NN
Robert Klein Gallery, Boston MA
