Few members of today's art world embody the tensions between glamour and artistic integrity as surely as British-born, New York-based critic and curator Neville Wakefield. Which is why Wakefield was a natural choice to curate the fifth Frieze Projects (which, along with the rest of the Frieze, gets underway tomorrow), and why his goal is to remind us that art fairs aren't only about sales and high-profile buyers; the art is also worth paying attention to. He practices a souped-up form of scholarship, combining mass and high culture, uptown and downtown style, art and fashion. He has been a contributing editor to such varied publications as Another Magazine and the academic journal Open City, and is the author of scholarly books on fashion photography and postmodern theory and a contributing photo editor at Visionaire.Why do you think the relationship between fashion and art is consistently so interesting to critics and curators?
The art/fashion duet is always fascinating, and I think critics and curators are attentive to it in part to see who's taking the lead. The art calendar has come to resemble the fashion calendar, with major destination events taking place almost according to seasons. Now you are just as likely to see Stefano Pilati or Marc Jacobs at a fair or biennial as you are to see Elizabeth Peyton or Rachel Feinstein at a fashion show. But essentially it's not about either fashion or art. It's simply that the lamp of wealth and commerce attracts moths of all colors and what's interesting is the nature of the dance.
Do you believe in a high/ low hierarchy between art and fashion?
I don't know whether I believe in a hierarchy, but I do know that generally I'm not interested in art that is worn as fashion or fashion that is fetishized as art. To me they are different entities with very different roles. Even couture, which is perhaps closest to art in its intent, is ultimately about design and not, as I believe art to be, about transcendence.
How did you select the works you'll show in Frieze Projects?
I was interested in commissioning work that in one way or another engaged with the conditions of the fair itself and what it means to show work in such intense hothouse conditions. The responses ranged from the spectacular—Richard Prince's take on the fair as a yard sale for rich people—to the beautifully elusive work of Mario Garcia Torres, who is this year's recipient of the Cartier Award.
How is curating for Frieze different than selecting work for a more conventional exhibition space?
It's an entirely different process from putting on something in a white cube. Not only does the work have to be able to survive and be seen in an environment that is continually vying for your attention, it also has to meet the health and safety requirements of an event that attracts over 60,000 people. For instance, one proposal that we took seriously was a cattle grid installed across the entranceway. It was meant to be a riff on the stampede to collect, its underlying herd mentality, and the demarcation of the English countryside but in the end just couldn't be done.
How is Frieze different from other fairs?
What distinguishes Frieze from other art fairs is that it was founded on a critical rather than commercial culture. This feeds into nearly every aspect of the Fair, from the pavilion designed by architect Jamie Fobert in Regent's Park to the fiercely independent curatorial program. The FAF is greater than the sum of its commercial parts—it's both bellwether and overview of what's going on in the international art world.
—Ana Finel Honigman
Photo: David Velasco/Artforum.com
Wednesday, October 10, 2007 03:02 PM
