For any modern American city that hopes to call itself a visual arts center— at least according to the tastemakers who decide these sorts of things—a couple of prerequisites have lately become necessary.
The first is the “biennial,” which Western New York proved it could accomplish in stunning fashion with Beyond/ In Western New York, the epic regionwide exhibition that wrapped up early this year.
The second is the art fair—a more concentrated, typically glitzy commercial phenomenon aimed at creating buzz and bolstering the market for regional painting, sculpture and media art.
On Saturday in Buffalo’s Central Terminal, Buffalo will make its first foray into the collective mass marketing of its fine artists with a daylong event called “echo: Art Fair.” The fair was the brainchild of Frits Abell, founder of the Buffalo Expat Network, which seeks to engage current and former Buffalonians in the revitalization of their hometown.
Think of “echo” as a sort of antidote to the sprawling Allentown Art Festival. That goes for its size and scope, which are comparatively small and focused; its purported quality, which Abell enlisted a slate of high-profile jurors to ensure; but also its higher prices, which float up to the $3,000 range and beyond.
The jury, comprised of the same people who made Beyond/In Western New York such a success, including Albright- Knox Art Gallery Director Louis Grachos and Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center’s John Massier, bodes well for the potential of “echo.” The fair includes more than 40 artists and six galleries showing a range of painting, sculpture, video and other new media art.
Abell modeled the fair after a similar event held in London and also took cues from New York City’s Affordable Art Fair. He sees it as an opportunity to bolster Buffalo’s growing reputation as a significant arts city.
“I love the arts and just believe in the power of the arts in Buffalo’s renaissance,” Abell said. “I also wanted to provide artists with another avenue to sell their work. I’d like to see more art flowing into the local artists’ market.”
At their best, events like “echo,”— which ends with a gargantuan dance party featuring a slate of DJs and performances from The Albrights and Free Henry, among others—serve somehow to make the idea of art collecting sexier and also less intimidating.
That’s important, as engaged and active collectors are vital to any healthy art scene. And however icky you might feel about the corrupting potential of mixing fine art and commerce too closely, Buffalo could certainly use a few more.
The importance of the informed, community-minded collector is tough to overestimate. Take the late Giuseppe Panza, many of whose canvases now reside in the collection of the Albright- Knox Art Gallery. The late Lockport collector Charles Rand Penney, whose affinity for the watercolors of Charles Burchfield helped to form the Burchfield Penney Art Center as we know it and whose other collections will be on offer during a September estate sale, is an excellent local example of the collector’s importance to the community.
But “echo” juror Gerald Mead, the discerning local art-gatherer whose collection’s highlights are now on view in the Castellani Art Museum’s “Public/Private” exhibition, might be the ideal model that the creators of “echo” are out to duplicate. Most of the works in Mead’s collection were had for far less than what we think of as “fine art” prices.
If all goes well, “echo” may help to christen a new generation of mini- Meads, thus fostering a healthier marketplace for local artists and, in turn, more and better art. It seems like the next logical step in Buffalo’s artistic evolution.
cdabkowski@buffnews.comnull
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