Frieze: Opening Day

The London fog — thick as pea soup this morning — lifted just in time for Frieze to pull back its curtain in Regent's Park. When the crowds started moving in at 11 A.M., some galleries were still fussing over their exhibition spaces — hanging paintings or, in one case, mopping the floor. You could still move about easily in the first hour or so, but by the time I came out of the "auditorium" — International Herald Tribune design critic Alice Rawsthorn was moderating a panel that included none other than the limited edition darling Marc Newson (more on this a little later) — Frieze was not unlike MoMA on a Saturday afternoon.

As far as individual works of art go, here's what caught my eye: a good number of large format, incredibly lucid photographs (Thomas Struth, Andreas Gursky, Jeff Wall, Isaac Julien, and Catherine Opie); two nice Beatriz Milhazes paintings; and two pieces by Cristoph Büchel — much smaller in scale and not nearly as contentious as his aborted Mass MoCA installation.

What got the most attention? Without a doubt, Gianni Motti's Pre-emptive Act, a sort of performance piece for which he has enlisted the help of the police patrolling the fair. Every so often, one of them comes and sits down in the middle of a main fair thoroughfare to practice yoga. There's no announcement, no explanation, which makes for stares and even gawks. It entertained one small child for a good 5 minutes. What's it mean? The official party line: "In our times of proliferating terrorism and great national and personal insecurity, Motti presents a humanist response to these circumstances with an image of calm." Mostly, though, it seemed people saw it as mix of the amusing and the absurd.

The best of the fair, though, I'm saving for the next post. (Photographs to come soon, too.)

A Thomas Struth photograph

Cristoph Büchel's beer can Christmas tree

Yoga cop

Another yoga cop