This week: Continental European Bureau Czar Mark Staff Brandl roams the Basel Art Fair
2009 with guest co-host Peter Noser, gallerist, curator and artist. They
comment primarily on the "main fair," but also cursorily on Scope,
Volta, the Solos Show, die Liste (and look forward to a Bridge addition next
year). Additional walk-on voices include Maya LaLive d'Epinay, Martin Kraft,
Alex Meszmer, many others, and a few seconds of Olga Stefan. Mark managed
to wipe-out some excellent comments, or record them so poorly that they were
unusable. Ce la technologie. A quick but comprehensive look at the
"real" Basel, the most important international art fair, the Queen
yet also Great Whore of Babylon. I made some multiples especially for the fair
including pins and my T-shirt. They all bore the Latin phrase "Abite in
Malam crucem, artis nundinae!", signed Marcus Scipio Incendiolus. Or,
roughly in English, "Screw Art Fairs!" In German, as appropriate for
Basel, that's "Zum Teufel mit Kunstmessen!"