Top Picks from Frieze Library in Collaboration with Tate
Sam Gordon of Gordon Robichaux Gallery makes his selection of the art books submitted by galleries at the fairs this year
Sam Gordon of Gordon Robichaux Gallery makes his selection of the art books submitted by galleries at the fairs this year
Conceived by the New York gallery Gordon Robichaux and originating at Frieze New York in 2019, the Frieze Library offers an archive of the fair and a snapshot of the artworld at a particular moment. It invites each exhibitor to submit one art publication to a collection of books on display at Frieze London and Frieze Masters. At the close of the fairs, the collection is donated to Tate Library, forming part of its permanent collection.
Sam Gordon (co-founder, Gordon Robichaux Gallery) shares his highlights from the 2024 London edition of Frieze Library.
Lotus L. Kang: In Cascades (Hurtwood Press, 2023). Submitted by Franz Kaka
The first book by New York based Lotus L. Kang contains essays around her photographic material processes alongside poetry by CAConrad. Kang’s first solo exhibition at Commonwealth and Council in Los Angeles – on view until October – comes on the heels of a knockout installation at the Whitney Biennial. Edited by Zoé Whitley and Amy Jones as part of the Chisenhale Gallery’s commission and book series, the volume centres on ideas of ritual, family and migration.
Carol Bove: Collage Sculptures (Lisa Le Feuvre, Nasher Sculpture Center, 2022). Submitted by Gagosian
From her early 2000s delicate bookshelf assemblages to the recently commissioned façade for the Metropolitan Museum, Carol Bove’s sculptural language continues to investigate and expand the histories of the medium, treating modernism as a muse. This publication, released in conjunction with an exhibition at the Nasher, includes more than 50 sculptures dated 2015 to 2021, juxtaposed with selected works from the museum’s collection chosen in dialogue with the artist.
Jane Dickson (Karma, 2024). Submitted by Karma
The first comprehensive monograph of Jane Dickson’s oeuvre is an essential tome exploring her ‘psychogeography of American culture’, which the artist has mined from New York’s Times Square to the vast stretches of highway across the country. As a participant in collectives such as Fashion Moda, Collaborative Projects Inc., and Group Material, Dickson has been a cultural worker engaged with her community of artists. Newly commissioned essays include writing by Lucy Sante, whose own viewpoint as a New Yorker runs in parallel. Look closely too – using paint on canvas and atypical surfaces such as vinyl, felt, astroturf and sandpaper – these iconic images are tactile creatures.
Fiona Connor: KIT (lo, 2023). Submitted by Maureen Paley
Born in Auckland, New Zealand, and based in Los Angeles, California, Connor uses photography as a tool for sculptures that explore ideas around reproduction. A very special contribution to the library, KIT is a series of 49 unique artist’s books, each comprising a different group of 100 photographs on sheets of recycled paper. The photographs record architectural details, materials and specific objects, while the images, in turn, are laser-printed single-sided in black and white, replicating the way these photographs exist within the artist’s studio. A stream of consciousness made into a paper trail of process, bound into a book.
Derek Boshier: Strange Lands (Night Gallery, 2024). Submitted by Night Gallery
Long live the art of Derek Boshier (1937–2024). A significant figure in 1960s British pop art, Boshier was a subversive cultural force, who received commissions from David Bowie and The Clash, and engaged in a decades-long dialogue around the absurdities of modern life. Known primarily as a painter, he also explored drawing, collage and sculpture, and for a period expanded into photography, film, video, assemblage and installations. ‘Most important is life itself,’ Boshier stated. ‘My sources tend to be current events, personal events, social and political situations, and a sense of place and places.’
Hal Fischer: The Gay Seventies (Gallery 16, 2019). Submitted by Project Native Informant
Hal Fischer has been an artist, art critic, and museum professional for over four decades. The Gay Seventies is Fischer’s first monograph to feature his complete set of photo-text works produced between 1977 and 1979 in San Francisco’s Haight and Castro neighbourhoods. A recipient of NEA fellowships in both photography and criticism, Fischer combines image and text in ways as witty and insightful as a Cole Porter lyric. In addition to his now classic Gay Semiotics, this essential monograph includes 18th Near Castro Street x 24 (originally published as an artist’s book), Boy-Friends, A Salesman, Civic Center and Cheap Chic Homo.
Barkley L. Hendricks: Solid!, ed. Zoé Whitley (Skira, 2023). Submitted by Jack Shainman Gallery
This comprehensive monograph follows the life and work of Barkley L. Hendricks (1945–2017), an essential American artist who painted and photographed his world for six decades. Inspired by Walker Evans, one of his mentors at Yale, Hendricks took a lens to life close at hand; his attention to the evolution of fashion and style alone, captured in so many moments, will prove to be an important cultural archive for generations to come.
Cynthia Hawkins: Art Notes, Art (Center for Art, Research and Alliances, 2024). Submitted by STARS
From 1979 to 1981 abstract painter Cynthia Hawkins kept a journal which could be described as a record of routine and the everyday. This included work sketches, notes for new and in-progress works, and responses to contemporary art and criticism. This publication offers an intimate insight into her process-oriented practice through photographs and ephemera, and provides context around exhibiting at Linda Goode Bryant’s Just Above Midtown, where artists like Hawkins, David Hammons, Janet Oliva Henry, and many others had the freedom and encouragement to experiment.
Dean Sameshima: being alone (Soft Opening, 2024). Submitted by Soft Opening
You still have time to catch this Anonymous Homosexual at the Venice Biennale, and don’t miss this striking new publication of 25 black-and-white photographs that comprise Dean Sameshima’s recent series ‘being alone’ exhibited in its entirety for the first time at Soft Opening this year. The outline of a single viewer sits bathed in light from a glowing theatre screen. Featuring a newly commissioned text by American critic, writer and poet Bruce Hainley, this volume outlines Sameshima’s ongoing archiving of queer culture in relation to his own personal experience.
Jef Verheyen: Window on Infinity (ed. Annelien de Troij and Adriaan Gonnissen, Hannibal Books, 2024). Submitted by Axel Vervoordt
Belgian painter Jef Verheyen (1932–1984) was an avant-garde master of modernism at the center of an international network of artists. Verheyen’s paintings evolved from gestural abstractions into translucent glazes that concealed the marks of the artist altogether. While his ‘experimental quest for the void’ brings him into conversation with contemporaries such as Yves Klein and Lucio Fontana, this publication expands the context to contemporary voices such as Kimsooja and Ann Veronica Janssens. “My life has been a permanent dialogue with light; actually a rather nice title for a book,” he wryly remarked.
About Frieze Library
Initially conceived by the New York gallery Gordon Robichaux, the Frieze Library is ‘a curatorial collaboration between a fair, a magazine, a museum and a gallery’ (Sam Gordon, Gordon Robichaux). It invites each exhibitor to submit one art publication, togther forming a collection of works on display at the fairs. At the close of the fairs, the collection will be donated to Tate Library forming part of its permanent collection. Galleries are encouraged to submit a title that they feel both echoes their fair presentation and speaks to the present moment. The collection of volumes will function as a kind of archive of the fair, offering a reflection of the present day as seen through the eyes of artists, writers and art world professionals.
Frieze Library is on show at Frieze London and Frieze Masters.
Further Information
Frieze London and Frieze Masters, 9 – 13 October 2024, The Regent’s Park.
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Main image: Linda Nylind. Courtesy Linda Nylind / Frieze
