Tefaf makes New York debut

You might have guessed that the first edition of The European Fine Art Fair (Tefaf), which opens to VIPs in New York today, would be no ordinary affair. 

“Tefaf New York is __more than just a fair; it’s a cultural event, a cultural happening,” says Michael Plummer, who is organising the two US editions—in autumn (22-26 October) and spring (4-9 May 2017)—with his Artvest partner Jeff Rabin. They are working with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Frick Collection and the Morgan Library to align their programming with what is being billed as “Tefaf Week”. A group of Upper East Side dealers, including Otto Naumann and Richard Feigen, are capitalising on the presence of the Old Master fair at the nearby Park Avenue Armory by staging a new event, October Art Week.

Chinese jeweller Wallace Chan is bringing this pair of brooches titled A Tale of Two Dragons

Previous fairs at the Armory have been restricted to the Drill Hall, but Tefaf New York “will __more or less take over the whole building”, Plummer says. It will fill rooms on the first and second floors, where an exhibition of pieces from Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum will be shown, and a dozen of the 94 participating galleries will exhibit within the historic fin de siècle rooms. Plummer sees this select group as “a good microcosm of the fair”. The Kunstkammer Georg Laue, Blumka Gallery and Kunsthandlung Julius Böhler are collaborating on a special display. Downstairs, the Chinese jeweller Wallace Chan, whose stand in Maastricht in March wowed the crowds, will be exhibiting in the US for the very first time.

Tom Postma, the designer of Tefaf Maastricht, is re-creating the immersive experience for which the Maastricht fair is known. The Armory, which is known for its dark 19th-century interior, will be transformed with floor-to-ceiling white scrims and new carpeting. 

Gainsborough's portrait of Admiral Thomas Graves can be found on Lowell Libson's stand

The London dealer Lowell Libson, who does around 60% of his business in the US, admits that initially he had mixed feelings about Tefaf’s expansion to New York as he had always been “an enthusiastic supporter of the Maastricht fair”, but that he quickly realised its potential. “I had always thought the Tefaf brand was not used or valued enough in a way,” he says, adding that, while he is a fan of the Winter Antiques Show, New York has long needed “a highly-focused, high quality fair” that does not look at the 20th century. Among the works to be found on Libson’s stand is a watercolour by Turner, several works by Constable and a Gainsborough portrait of Thomas Graves, the British admiral whose loss of a fleet led to the decisive British surrender at Yorktown in the US War of Independence.

Tefaf New York is making its debut in an already packed autumn fair calendar: the Biennale des Antiquaire was held at the Grand Palais in Paris from 10 to 18 September; Frieze Masters wrapped up in London on 9 October—just two weeks before Tefaf’s launch; and Paris’s Fiac (the Foire Internationale d’Art Contemporain) overlaps with Tefaf (20-23 October). The quick succession of fairs has left dealers having to choose between them. Tomasso Brothers, which shared a brilliant stand with dealer Karsten Schubert at Frieze Masters last year that mixed Bridget Riley drawings with Neo-Classical busts, opted to do the biennial in Paris and Tefaf New York. Sculpture dealer Dino Tomasso says that after 20 years of admiring the biennial they decided the time was right to participate and that they “considered carefully” about where their specialist inventory was best suited to the market. “There are only a handful of elite fairs attracting the right clientele to benefit our business; the Paris Biennale is one of them, and Tefaf—Maastricht and now New York—is another.” He adds: “Being part of the first ever Tefaf New York is important to us and for logistical reasons it’s impossible for us to do both New York and Frieze Masters in London.” 

Long-time Tefaf Maastricht exhibitor Mark Weiss of London’s Weiss Gallery decided not to go to New York as he had already signed on to do Frieze Masters. “I was unsure of our capacity to commit to two fairs in one month,” he says. The gallery plans to exhibit at Tefaf Maastricht in March 2017. 

Others, including the Swiss rare books dealer Jörn Gunther, have opted to show at both Frieze Masters and Tefaf New York. “It is very important for us to have face to face contact with our clients in both the US and UK markets and we value the fairs as a chance to do that,” says Gunther, who will be bringing an unpublished 15th-century manuscript of educational texts made for Juan II (1405-54), the King of Castile and Leon (priced at €2.4m).     

Lowell Libson agrees that that the overlapping and back-to-back fair schedule is a problem, but that it is inevitable that something will be going on every fortnight of the year. “There is no perfect time, you just have to get on with it,” he says. “Besides, the pending US presidential election is probably more of an issue this year than other fairs.”    


• Tefaf New York Fall, Park Avenue Armory, New York: VIP preview, 21 October; public days, 22-26 October