TEFAF and Independent Art Fair: Advisory Selections

Jiang Cheng, Downs & Ross, Independent Art Fair

Downs & Ross will stage a solo presentation of Beijing-based Jiang Cheng, introducing his most recent series of oil on canvas works.

Each executed in a single sitting, Cheng's fluid and fragmented portraits blend Eastern and Western influences, while his cropped and somewhat kaleidoscopic colour palette shrewdly obstructs the reading of his faces from any legible race or gender.

Since receiving his MFA in Painting from Berlin University of Arts, Cheng has had solo shows at Shanghai galleries A+ Contemporary and AIKE, and more recently, Downs & Ross towards the end of last year. His work can be found in the permanent collection of ICA Miami.

Isamu Noguchi, White Cube, TEFAF

Isamu Noguchi's practice has been in the spotlight over the last 18 months, with his work presented in a major travelling retrospective that started at the Barbican (now on view at Museum Ludwig, Köln) alongside a solo at White Cube in Bermondsey.

For TEFAF, the gallery brings The Seed to New York audiences: an exquisite polished bronze sculpture conceived from three interlocking shapes—a design that forms part of a series of interlocking sculptures that he embarked upon in the 1940s.

A concept initially formed from marble, this sculpture continues his exploration of biomorphic sculpture with each element held together in palpable tension.

Pam Evelyn, The Approach, Independent Art Fair

Still enrolled in an MA in Painting at London's Royal College of Art, Pam Evelyn's solo presentation with The Approach for TEFAF runs alongside her debut exhibition with the gallery in London.

Conjuring expressive layers, involving pigments, forms, and strokes being built up and transformed during the course of painting, Evelyn's practice has garnered much attention, with her London show selling out prior to a packed opening night.

'I have always used oil paint. While I'm working on paintings, the pigments slowly gather up and develop into more interesting colours. I try to store it all and keep it. I like it when the paintings then become a bit more muted and interesting', Evelyn explains to Ocula Advisor, Rory Mitchell.

Thornton Dial, Blum & Poe, TEFAF

A solo presentation of Thornton Dial debuts Blum and Poe's presence at TEFAF, following their signing of the gallery's estate.

Born and raised in rural Emelle, Alabama, Dial rose to fame in the 1980s with his monumental assemblages—a practice that in time incorporated drawings, sculptures and installations.

Dial is heralded for his expressions of African-American experience during the civil rights movement in the 1960s throughout America.

The artist's work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at top U.S. institutions, including New Orleans Museum of Art, New York Museum of Art, New York, and Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

Quac Insik, Gallery Hyundai, TEFAF

Born in Daegu, South Korea, Quac Insik moved to Japan in 1937 where he attended the prestigious Tokyo University of the Arts.

Insik was to remain in the country for the entirety of his career—a decision influenced by Tokyo's burgeoning art scene, as well as the declining political situation in Korea after the eruption of the Korean War in 1950. Experimenting with materiality was the crux of Insik's artistry.

Recalling Lucio Fontana's experimentation with spacial aesthetics, Insik's work explores the relationship between materials and surrounding space.

An artistic mentor to Lee Ufan, Insik has been celebrated in Korea with a major retrospective at their National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in 1985 and 2019.

Joan Nelson, Adams and Ollman, Independent Art Fair

New York-based Joan Nelson imagines fantastical, dystopian landscapes free from human presence, artfully weaving memory and her own mediated experience into these scenes.

Her reimagined landscapes are bursting with foaming volcanoes, glowing rainbows, and jutting rock formations that recall China's mountainous landscapes depicted in Yuan dynasty scholar paintings.

Nelson's work can be found in major U.S. collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington D.C.; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, among others.

Kwon Young-Woo, Tina Kim Gallery, TEFAF

Tina Kim Gallery played an instrumental role in pushing the Dansaekhwa movement into the forefront of the global art market.

For TEFAF, the gallery brings this beautiful 1980s work by Kwon Young-Woo, who used paper as his primary medium, transforming the material into a three-dimensional form through processes of puncturing, tearing, and scratching.

This approach, which he began experimenting with in the 1960s, culminated in his debut solo show in 1966 in Seoul, garnering attention both at home and abroad.

Kwon's works are in a number of important global collections including the British Museum, London; M+, Hong Kong; and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul.

Peter Hujar, Maureen Paley, Independent Art Fair

Throughout his 30 year career, Peter Hujar photographed those at the creative margins of New York society.

Showing with Maureen Paley, David Wojnarowicz Reclining (II) depicts the American artist Wojnarowicz, with whom Hujar was in a relationship at the time.

Lying in an unmade bed, Wojnarowicz is captured in one of Hujar's distinctive black and white, intimately staged frames, with his clasped hand across his naked torso.

'Hujar was a darkroom master. Known for consistently using the same square format firm, his intention to take 'uncomplicated direct photographs of complicated and difficult subjects' extended from pastoral landscapes to erotic nudes', Ocula Magazine explains.