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And then in came all the sales figures and the self-congratulating reports and as someone else said, “the function of art now is to avoid frightening or shocking or, God forbid, exciting anyone” and I’m reading far more about the business of art rather then the art itself. Apparently 85,000 people attended Frieze London or Frieze Masters over the five days both fairs were on. Those sales reports are eye watering, they’d be depressing if, as artists, we gave a shit about the prices. And here come the press releases for the next stops on the never-ending circus ride, all off to Paris, “Paris Internationale 2023 Opens Tuesday 17 October”, this Frieze coverage is already today’s chip paer and off they all fly, “see you at Art Basel”, people at galleries are asking in all seriousness if we are going like we naturally would be, have they no clue how the other 99% live? Climate change crisis? What climate change crisis? And anyway didn’t they all have those nice little logos that no one could see up there in the air in the corner of their gallery signs? No one could see them, there was nothing to explain any of it at the fair,  but hey, they looked good in the Instagram film that showed how much they care and they’ve done their bit of offsetting or whatever the the hell the tokenism so let’s all fly to Paris and see you at Art Basel.  And of course all those cum covered flower cop-outs that Gagosian and Hirst thrust at us in the big dog spot were, well they were all “placed” (rather than sold, careful wording there), they probably were forced on to some tasteless collector who wants to eave his willy in the air, got to keep those values up now, can’t have the market collapsing, got to play the game and who cares about him or that a Tracey Emin sold for over a million almost as soon as the fair opened and clearly I in some way do or I wouldn’t be mentioning it (I certainly care about Tracey as an artist, wouldn’t piss on Hirst if he was on fire). Does it matter that that Leon Kossoff piece I was admiring last Sunday afternoon went for quite a few arms and legs? 

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We made a point of avoiding  all the press reviews until today, until it was all over, until (nearly) all our pieces from the week were up, not that anyone cares that much about what we have to say and who cares what anyone says, we’re gonna do it anyway (hey, we’ve got tens of thousands of readers dropping by from all over the world, we don’t need to be quoting Girlschool lines here), we care a lot about the garbage pale kids that no one loves, we like to think we live in the real world, no a world where there are no wars, no climate change problems, no cost of living crisis, some of these people parading around Frieze are sickening….  

So the fair packed up, the money was counted, the 85,000 who mostly never dream of going to anything other than these big art events all went home, the “international art community” if there is such a thing, THE participating galleries hailing from 46 countries (so we’re told), they all moved on to the next one, Stephen Friedman Gallery shared the news that a 2023 piece by Leilah Babirye had sold for $250,000, actually she was one of the standout artists from what was, beside our day spent at Frieze Masters, a rather underwhelming somewhat disappointing Frieze week and well, never mind the money shot (it certainly wasn’t the jizz all over Hirst’s flowers), lets pick out our traditional ten highlights from London Frieze Week 2023 and then scuttle back to where ever we’re supposed to be, it certainly isn’t here.

The biggest disappointment I take from the week was the lack of any attempt at an alternative, the lack of any kind of artist-led let do our own thing during the week. Those car park shows of ten or so years ago, for all their faults and the egos of the organisers, were at least something, that Factory Project show over in Docklands during 2021’a Frieze Week really threatened to go somewhere more than it ever really did. There really is a lack of joined up thinking now, a lack of conversation, communication, a lack of any coming together and the new breed of galleries in their new sets of emperor’s clothing, seem to want to do nothing more than conform to the model, like they’ve all done the same tedious degree in curating at Chelsea or St.Martins, like they all aspire to nothing more than a booth at Frieze next year and a “properly” written statement because that’s the way you do things. Where’s the danger? Where’s the proper guts? I know things are way tougher now then they were back there even ten years ago but surely there has to be something more that this?  

But this is about the art, the best things we saw during, in and around the week, this is about the positives not the price tags or the politics and I don’t see the so called art press actually writing that much about the actual art, nowhere near as much as they write about the business of art anyway, I find reading Artlyst depressing these days. And no, we can’t claim to have been everywhere or seen everything during the week, of course we can’t. We did see a lot that we just chose not to cover and unlike previous years, we really didn’t find too much to really excite at sone of the galleries that have provided something during the week in previous years, no Gina Birch at Gallery 46 this year or Lee Mazler at D.Contemporary or Kate Bickmore at Annka Kultys (where this year they’ve opted for some nonsense about a robot painting something or other instead). We really didn’t see that much outside of the two Frieze Fairs themselves that we really felt like shouting that loudly about this year… Enough of this, cut to the chaise, the Top Ten

In no particular order, the top ten things we saw during Frieze Week 2023

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1: Leilah Babirye – I know we said this list is in no particular order but we d oreally have to start here with Leilah. Stephen Freedman Gallery’s richly red presentation of Ugandan lesbian artist Leilah Babirye is a powerful highlight (Stephen Freedman provided the highlight last year with Jeffrey Gibson and wasn’t it the same gallery who brought us the brilliant Deborah Roberts pieces in 2021?). “Babirye’s multidisciplinary practice transforms everyday materials into objects that address issues surrounding identity, sexuality and human rights. In this body of work, the artist imagines creating a community of queer Ugandans”.  

2: Fabian Knecht‘s Laughing is suspicious installation at the main Frieze Fair presented by Berlin’s Alexander Levy Gallery was certainly a highlight. The German artist’s work often appears unexpectedly in public spaces, apparently he likes to break out of the exhibition context and into everyday life. “He changes patterns of perception and action, transgresses art concepts and power structures, and questions social relations and norms by countering them with strong and provocative images”. The piece(s) at Frieze were strong, exciting, tactile, big, bold, they were rather beautiful  Fabian Knecht, born 1980 in Magdeburg, has been building a reputation for a while now, it was good to get to see his work in the flesh even if it was in the rather cold-hearted setting of a corporate monster of an art fair like this. I guess it could be viewed in as an intervention in the middle of it all, a good a conversation is anyone wanted to engage, the problem for an artists at an event like this is that most people are just walking past and not really looking, if anyone had stopped for just five minutes they would have found some exciting structure, some beautiful texture, engaging forms, provocative indeed, natural, questioning, one of the highlights of a week where we almost encountered too much art.  Fabian Knecht

3: Sterling Ruby – alaways good to see a Sterling Ruby painting in the flesh, this 2023 piece certainly stood out as it almost mocked Hirst’s Gagosian big dog spot presentation, the same spot Sterling had occupied a couple of years or more back with those stil exciting yellow paintings –

Previously on these pages – ORGAN THING: A John Zorn and Bill Laswell session in front of Sterling Ruby’s paintings that happened at Gagosian over in New York… and in 2019 – ORGAN: FRIEZE WEEK Part 5 – The fair itself, why was it so damn conservative? Did Sterling Ruby and the Gagosian save it all with the help of Joyce Pensato’s giant Mickey?

4; Yasmin Grant‘s boot – And there was that spot of red paint on Yasmin Grant’s boot and that visit to her studio at the start of the week, if these ten slections were in an order it would probably be at the top of list – “We’re into Frieze Week now, that doesn’t mean we’re just going to focus on artists showing at the fair, far from it, you know that Organ has always been about the alternatives, the new blood, the ones to watch out for. I do like a studio visit, I do like to look behind the curtain of an artist, an artist’s studio is a very private very personal space, a studio is where the proper sense of an artist is really found – the commitment, the reality, the sense of an artist’s movement, the drips of paint, the flights, the flaws, the blood sweat and tears.   I like that there’s an attention-demanding spec of red paint on one of Yasmin Grant’s boots, she’s probably unaware of it, it is things like the paint on an artist’s boot that you see when you’re allowed inside a space like this. I love the details, the smells, that intoxicating smell of oil paint… read on

5: Josèfa Ntjam’s challenge at NıCOLETTı’s East London space, the last gallery left on Vyner Street is genuinely engaging, the same artist presented by the same gallery at Frieze itself felt a little muted, date we say polite? A little lost in all the noise? We really didn’t see that much outside of the Fair this year that excited us, Josèfa Ntjam’s exhbition certainly did – Frieze Week – Josèfa Ntjam’s challenge at NıCOLETTı’s East London (cave-like) space. Film, installation, colour, darkness, questions , she has a lot for you… We’re on the cusp of Frieze week, the weekend before the whole circus really kicks in, we’re basking in the outrageous mid-Summer heat of an October weekend here in London, it isn’t right, it is a delight, surely this is not right? This is surely global warming, a warning, another one. This heat is… read on

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6: There was that Ibis at Frieze Masters, and that painting by the unknown artist of the Amarican sxhool…. “There’s an Egyptian gilded wood and bronze Ibis on original base, it dates from the late dynastic period, 25th – 31st Dynasty, 715-332BC, It stands at 41cm including the base, It had a red dot on it which means it has probably sold to a private collector and probably won’t be seen again. You see so many amazing things at Frieze Masters And yes, the curated spaces we bemoaned the lack of back at the main event, well we find that curated combination of spaces  alive and well in here, Modern Women, curated by Camille Morineau and Aware dedicate t oart created by women between 1880 and 1980…. that beautiful portrait of that young artist painting a landscape, painted in 1831 by Amelie Legrand De Saint-Aubin, that amazing painting by an unknown artist of the American School painted around 1825  (presented by Phillip Mould Gallery), the red beads they’re both wearing, what is the story, what are the stories who are they? It is a wonderful painting, the two of them looking right at you, just you and the two of them meeting for a few minutes, a painting that had to be returned to three or four times during the day… and there was a wonderfully bright Cederic Morris still life from 1952 and…. and those Louyse Moillon peaches and… ORGAN: Frieze Week – Did Frieze Masters and a painting by an unknown artist from the American School circca 1925 or a Cederic Morris still life from 1952 save the whole week?

7: Artist and occasional Organ contributor (as well as Cultivate partner in crime) Emma Harvey mostly got excited by the Joan Semmel paintings and when asked about her stand out pieces Emma said “The only things that really stood out were from artists I already knew about, Barbara Kruger, Joan Semmel, Lindsey Mendick, Martin Eder… Actually Emma got more excited about Sissyfit‘s version of Cherry Bomb than she did about anything else during Frieze week… The absolutely brilliant Californian punks Sissyfit have now covered Cherry Bomb! “This is great!” said artist Emma Harvey…

8: Tenant of Culture – There was Tenant of Culture at East London’s Soft Opening, disassembling the warp, looking through the weft… – This show has pulled us back a number of times now, a busy opening night back in mid September, it goes on until October 21st so you still have time. A new body of work from the strangely named artist known as Tenant of Culture… read on

9: Michael Seri – And there was Michael and his models who somehow got away with having his models walking around Frieze and Frieze masters for a couple of days (we have know artists like Amy Kingsmill get thrown out of previous Frieze events for being art rather than just being a parson attending the fair). Michael walked around the fair with a different model everyday – always very beautiful models, might have been nice if they hadn’t all been so “perfect” and they hadn’t all been female but hey picking at straws, it was good at least to see someone saying something about climate change during the week and the piece of art/design/fashion did look good. it was good to chat to Michael and the girls who’s names I did;nt catch (sorry, rude of me). Michael lives and works in New York – “My idiosyncratic objects reflect my life experiences, Dada philosophy, and individual aesthetic. My de-constructed found objects that I re-interpret represent the cycle of death and re-birth. It reveals the history of the original object yet places it in a cultural content that is both vernacular and 21st century. My art creates a distinct but unresolved dialogue that is ironic and open to interpretation”. — Michael Seri    

10: Okay, we admit, the Cork Street Party last Thursday was a bit of an event, It kind of felt like a much missed Vyner Street First Thursday on extra steroids and with better free drink, although the art was a little safer. All the major galleries of the born again street were open for the evening, there was (tens of) thousands of people out on the street and filling every gallery, there was music, gin, whisky, sin, wine, it was all very wrong. Yeah it was fun and yes there was some good art, we need to sort through it all, we haven’t had time yet. We need to go back…. The street party, if we were to park our cynical smiles for a moment, was kind of fun. Art is good for you… 

And that was that for another year….

ORGAN: Frieze Week, what of the Fair itself? Was it even more conservative than last time? Did everyone really have to play it that safe? Did Gagosian’s Hirst cop out just about sum it all up this year?

ORGAN: Frieze Week – Did Frieze Masters and a painting by an unknown artist from the American School circca 1925 or a Cederic Morris still life from 1952 save the whole week?