Modern, mid-career and new discoveries among increasingly international stands, but the sensational pieces still remain mostly reserved for other fairs and markets
All loaded and ready, the director Nicola Ricciardi and the 169 Miart galleries, when the doors for the 2023 edition opened. Visitors crowded the stands in large numbers in an inauguration that lasted an entire day. This twenty-seventh edition presents itself as the first consolidated “after”: after the Covid and after the changes that are now settling into a new order.
The galleries have grown, twenty more than the last edition, many of which are foreign; there were also many returns, a sign of the interest in Milan, which is increasingly attractive internationally. At the entrance you are greeted by the birthday cake created by Maurizio Cattelan for the twentieth anniversary of the Trussardi Foundation, yesterday complete with a band in tow. The Foundation, a nomad by choice, has led to the discovery and re-evaluation of unknown or forgotten places in the city with first-rate artists and exhibitions that are certainly always of great impact and relevance, even when controversial.
The stand of Kaufmann Repetto captures the attention of impact and substance, a large sky on which the butterflies of Anthea Hamilton, the sculptures of Simone Fattal, and then the works of Katherine Bradford, Pierpaolo Campanini and Latifa Echakhch among others.
Tommaso Corvi-Mora, from London, has chosen to participate in only two fairs a year, Frieze and Miart, and as always presents an almost monographic stand, in which one can well understand the work of the artists: in this case Des Ferris and John Lindell, consolidated and complex mid-career artists, one a painter and the other a sculptor. Winner of the last edition of the Herno Prize for the best staging, it maintains contained prices between 5 thousand and 12 thousand euros.
Vistamare, in addition to a gigantic and ironic sculpture, fortunately in polystyrene, by Scotto di Luzio, offers a classic diptych by Ettore Spalletti and an interesting kinetic wall sculpture by Rosa Barba, carefully observed also by Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo. The collector was present right from the opening and already an hour later she had found interesting buying ideas: «Especially among young peoplehe said. I come to fairs for this very reason, and to always learn something new».
In the stand opposite Luisa Delle Piane, queen of design, awaits the collectors in total black Comme de Garçon. In the corridors among the many enthusiasts you can also see Laura Calissoni Colnaghi, Jacopo Etro, Nina zu Fürtenberg, Emanuela Galtrucco, Costantino della Gherardesca, Gilberto and Rosa Sandretto and Carlo Clavarino, president of Aon Group Europe, Middle East and Africa.
Always effervescent Francesco Pantaleone celebrates twenty years in the gallery with a pitch black installation by Per Barclay that occupies the entire floor of the stand. To the walls “Twenty artists for twenty yearsHe says, all in the picture gallery, to name a few: Italo Zuffi, Loredana Longo, Letizia Battaglia, Flavio Favelli, Liliana Moro, Alessandro Bazan and Mangano & van Rooy».
Emanuelle Orenga de Gaffory, senior director of Perrotin, says here for the first time: «We have many Italian collectors and many artists in Italian collections, it seemed right to us to come to their country. We propose a mix of artists including some, such as Xavier Veilhan, already known by the Italian public, then Jean-Michel Othoniel, who works with glass in Murano, and Aya Akatano, who will soon have a retrospective at the Lyon Museum. Prices range from $9,900 for Akatano to €130,000 for Hans Hartung. Tomorrow, however, we will change the setup and propose other artists».
At Alessandra Bonomo they preferred to work on fragility and light, offering Murano glass sculptures by Tristano di Robilant and José Angelino (ideal continuation of the exhibition in the gallery in Rome) and Calixto Ramirez, all between 3,000 and 10,000 euros.
Giò Marconi hosts three generations, Trisha Baga, Will Benedict and John Bock, with a new series of collages. “For now there is a lot of interest in Baga which will have a retrospective in Geneva,” says the gallery owner, prices from 10,000 to 150,000 euros.
Benjamin Trigano of M+B, Los Angeles, is happy to be back here, so much so that he has just opened a space in a period Milanese apartment: «We are thrilled by this new project, which is bringing our collectors to the city. Miart is the fair where my artists always want to come, here we offer European artists such as Eva Beresin, already very popular».
Monica Bottani, Ribot Gallery, proposes Bénédicte Peyrat, French, and Andrei Pokrovski, Russian, «both use classical techniques with contemporary readingstells, our figures are always contained, 3 thousand-5 thousand euros, Miart must be a good opportunity for attentive collectors, but also for the curious who want to buy a work with serenity».
Then there is the power of the modern of the Cardi gallery: «We relied on the identity from the galleries, says Nicolò Cardi, then American Minimalism and Arte Povera, Spatialism and Conceptual Art. Let’s think yes to the Milanese public, but this morning characters who are usually seen only in Basel and the forty most important Italian collectors passed by: we have many negotiations in progress; you can see the effort made by the fair, so good”. For sale a Kounellis museum, an important Merz, plus Paladino and others, requests up to two million euros.
The modern has always been the strong point of Milan, but this year the feeling is that many galleries have chosen the path of good proposals and classic names, however leaving in stock the sensational pieces reserved for more tempting fairs. Crowded corridors with a climax around 19.00, when the map of the fair, first prize for being almost illegible in the cool graphics, was no longer needed: everyone looked and greeted everyone, but it’s always like this, this is also part of the success