Phillips Sale of Contemporary Native Art Raises Interest – ARTnews.com

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Following several major Indigenous art exhibitions last year and the selection of Jeffrey Gibson as the first Indigenous artist to represent the United States at the Venice Biennale, Phillips Auction House has opened an exhibition selling Indigenous and contemporary Indigenous art at its New York Times. York headquarters on Park Avenue. The show, which runs through January 23, is just the latest sign that the art market is increasingly interested in the works of such artists, while also serving as a reminder of how many Native and Indigenous artists have been undervalued, marginalized and misunderstood. decades

“They’ve been doing good work for a long time, showing their work, sometimes with galleries, sometimes not, but in other situations, doing their work consistently, for a long time,” said Mary Sabbatino, vice president and partner at Galerie Lelong. ARTnews.

The works on display in “New Terrains” span seven decades, a wide range of media and more than 60 artists, including Kent Monkman (Cree), Jaune Quick-to-See Smith (Citizen of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Nation), and Fritz Schholder (Louiseño). Although Phillips’ website lists each work as “price upon request,” a spokesman said ARTnews works range from $5,000 to nearly a million dollars.

ARTnews spoke to a dozen gallerists, artists, art advisors and curators about the key signals behind this apparent shift, why traditional data points don’t apply, and what still needs to change to ensure interest in Indigenous and Native artists continues growing up

Scott Nussbaum, Phillips vice president for the Americas and leading international specialist in contemporary and 20th-century art. ARTnews that the auction house had no in-house expertise to organize the show and very little sales data outside of a few artists like Smith, prompting him to bring in a trio of curators after he visited the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas to beginning of last year. and met with Bruce Hartman, former executive director and chief curator of that museum. The Phillips show was curated by Hartman, along with artist Tony Abeyta (Navajo) and gallerist and curator James Trotta-Bono.

“It was so important that this wasn’t Phillips’ interpretation of what Native American art looks like, that we were more or less the vehicle for the real experts to tell the story,” Nussbaum said at the exhibit’s opening reception Saturday.

Nussbaum was also aware of the potential optics of a sale exhibition dedicated to Native and Indigenous artists at Phillips, which, like other major auction houses, rarely featured works by them in its marquee sales.

“We didn’t want to go and set up something that was just perceived as some sort of commercial exploitation company,” he said.

Several people, including Abeyta, cited the importance of Gibson being selected to represent the United States at the Venice Biennale, and the response to Smith’s retrospective at the Whitney Museum, “The Land Carries Our Ancestors,” at the National Gallery of Art, as well such as “Indian Theater” at the Bard College Hessel Museum of Art as strong signs that native and indigenous art was becoming more mainstream.

Filmmaker Dana Claxton (Wood Mountain Lakota First Nation) also highlighted the work of Candice Hopkins (Carcross/Tagish First Nation), the curator of “Indian Theater,” as crucial to increasing the visibility of Native and Indigenous artists in the United States. “As an Indigenous curator, she provided and shared and opened space for Indigenous contemporary art,” Claxton said.

Hopkins’ influential curatorial practice includes the first two editions of the Toronto Art Biennale, Documenta 14, several editions of the SITElines biennial at SITE Santa Fe in New York, the Canadian Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale, directing the Forge Project, the Focus section. from the Armory Show last year and several other groundbreaking group exhibitions focusing on Indigenous artists.

This wave of visibility has helped increase interest among museums and collectors. In a price-sensitive market, many buyers are also noticing the lower entry point for high-quality, historically significant work by many Native and Indigenous artists.

“The reality is there are tons of people making great work, whose work hasn’t been collected en masse,” said gallerist Garth Greenan, who represents a significant number of indigenous and native artists at his eponymous New York gallery. ARTnews.

While auction records are one way to gauge the market’s growing interest, there are several factors behind the fact that no living Indigenous or Native artist has broken the $1 million mark.

Monkman said ARTnews that, in his case, this was in part due to his self-representation, which allowed him to sell pieces directly to museums and private collectors focused on long-term ownership, as well as the availability of many indigenous artists to lend their works for exhibitions .

“I like working with collectors who have museum relationships, because you know the work is probably going to be a promised gift or it’s going to end up in a museum,” Monkman said. ARTnews from his study at the National Arts Club last October.

A Phillips spokesman described museum interest in works in “New Terrains” as “significant”, with numerous works already acquired by institutions.

Abeyta, meanwhile, said he knew of private sales that topped nine figures, but it was also important to note how many artists were breaking the $100,000 mark, as well as the rapid sales momentum of artists like TC Cannon (Kiowa-Caddo ). “I’ve seen things at auction that sold for $20,000 or $30,000, then sold for $250,000 two or three years later,” he said.

There are also production limitations for artists like fourth-generation weaver Melissa Cody (Navajo), whose tapestries will be shown in a solo show of her work at MoMA PS1 in April. “She will never work enough for the market to do what [it] has to do to set those crazy auction records,” said Zach Feuer, co-founder of the Forge Project and director of the Gochman Family Collection. ARTnews.

Another challenge is how many Western art collectors and professionals don’t see the textile works of indigenous artists as great art or good investments, according to art advisor and gallerist Thomas Stauffer of Zurich-based Gerber & Stauffer Fine Arts. “And people are willing to pay a lot more for an artwork by a Western artist who does the same technique in some way,” he added.

When Greenan attended Art Basel Miami Beach in December, he noted how many young Native artists had been picked up to be represented by galleries. “I’ve said it a million times, and this year seemed to be the tipping point,” he said.

Several people counted ARTnews that a true sign of success would be when native and indigenous artists—especially elders like Smith, James Luna (Luiseño, Ipai), and Edgar Heap of Birds (Cheyenne, Arapaho)—are shown, collected, and sold in more integrated contexts that do not focus in their native or indigenous identities. As it happens when exhibitions like “New Terrain” are no longer held and artists do not have to wait until they are 70 years old to get an individual show in New York.

“Sometimes people go their whole lives without getting their flowers while they’re here,” said artist Nicholas Galanin (Tlingít/Unangax̂), whose work is in “New Terrains” and currently has a solo show at SITE Santa Fe . ARTnews.