Frieze Projects 2013

The second edition of the Frieze Art Fair’s New York edition recently took over Randall’s Island, an insular retreat up Manhattan’s East River that until two years ago not many New Yorkers paid much attention to. In and around the main sinuous tent designed by Brooklyn-based architecture studio SO-IL — and the myriad galleries inside — emerging interdisciplinary art practices punctuated the public spaces amidst the galleries and over the island. These integrated the Frieze Projects, a series of commissioned art projects curated by Cecilia Alemani. Her work as director and curator of The High Line arts program demonstrates her sensitivity to exterior spaces, allowing art fair goers to walk away with a widened perspective on the shared social spaces we inhabit.

Distinct from other works displayed at the fair, the Frieze Projects respond specifically to the geography and place of the site. They are more specific and interactive than the works one traditionally encounters at an art fair. “Last year’s Frieze Projects were inspired by the history, geography, and social position of Randall’s Island,” says Alemani, in her second year as the curator of the initiative. “This year the projects are linked together by creating communal and gathering spaces that infiltrate the grid of the fair.”

Beyond mere visuals, this year’s Frieze Projects required collaboration from the audience and site to make them possible. The curatorial framework sought “to provide an alternative experience of art in the fair,” states Alemani, “whilst creating spaces where our visitors can gather.” Installations materialised in contemporary sculpture, food, sound, scent, and performance by artists who don’t rely on white walls as the backdrop of their work, but rather place and participation.

This was notable in Liz Glynn’s Vault, a hidden speakeasy. Behind an unmarked white door, a dark room emerged with wood and cardboard sculptures based on fictional references to ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire. Visitors received a cocktail while listening to a story and were then encouraged to convene at communal tables behind the bar in an intimate yet lively space.

Some of the projects found their spaces amidst the five “wedges” of SO-IL’s tent, spaces “that function as temporary squares,” according to Alemani. These open spaces for intervention and social space enabled larger scale works such as Marianne Vitale’s Cockpit, which brought vernacular rural architecture to the interior of the gallery spaces. Elsewhere, Mateo Tannatt’s The Smile Goes Round, used sculpture, performance, and text as mediums to create a public theatre space for fair goers. Seven social sitting pieces were located outside and inside the tent structure, creating temporary landmarks with monochromatic industrial colours, providing the audience with reference points to assist in the promenade of the space. “One stumbles upon them in different locations around the fair, as if you are in an art journey which is always repeating itself,” states Alemani.

Meanwhile, Gordon-Matta Clark and Carol Goodden’s FOOD 1971/2013 acted as a historical homage to the role food and gathering spaces played in the burgeoning art community of Soho in the early 1970’s. Food can be curated and is more than a simple view about choosing the food itself; it can encapsulate experience, references, and produce gathering spaces. Similarly, Frieze Story continued this year for writers to share in contemporary art making. Novelist Ben Marcus employed his fictional writing skills to explore another layer of context to the island with a free downloadable text entitled Notes from the Hospital to be experienced by anyone with access to the Internet.

Despite the project’s different forms, Alemani points out all projects “share an interest in building spaces where people can get together. Some of the projects are participatory, like Liz Glynn’s Vault, or FOOD 1971/2013. Others help one navigate the fair and its surroundings.”

Punctuating the space, and “providing unexpected encounters in unusual spaces,” in the words of Alemani, the Frieze Projects demonstrated the collaborative nature of art practices and the importance of the participant. These were interactive experiences that encouraged the audience to react and interact with the artist's work and with each other. Justin Allen