MELBOURNE
After a four-year hiatus, the biennial Melbourne Art Fair (MAF) (February 17–20) returned to the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, luring 14,500 visitors and achieving USD 7.8 million in artwork sales from 63 galleries. For this edition, MAF launched an Indigenous Art Centre Program, which supported the participation of five First Nations art spaces and a new section, “Beyond,” curated by Emily Cormack and featuring six large-scale installations. With the spotlight on local and Indigenous artists, many galleries reported sold-out booths in the fair’s first three hours.
Melbourne-based galleries offered new works by local artists. This Is No Fantasy presented the latest paintings series by Vincent Namatjira, the winner of the Archibald (2021) features figurative portraits of celebrity and historical figures such as Queen Elizabeth, and musicians Chuck Berry and Angus Young. Station gallery reported selling at least five of nine paintings of blossoming or withering flower paired with Chinese quotes by emerging artist Jason Phu for USD 5,800 each, and had similar success with Nadia Hernández’s canvases featuring flowers and abstract objects, going for between USD 2,400 and USD 8,200. At Neon Parc, Nabilah Nordin’s bombastic multimedia sculptures evoking futuristic bonsai, at USD 3,300 apiece, and Dale Frank’s vibrantly hued resin paintings on Perspex, ranging from USD 37,200 to USD 65,500, were popular among collectors. Anna Schwartz Gallery showcased Emily Floyd’s sculpture series (2022), which comprises a “family of philosophical owls” initially created for a children’s reading pavilion, with individual works priced at USD 14,900 to USD 41,000.
