Well that was some kinda cool trip! first stop San Francisco for the Wondercon. last year it was possibly the shittiest big show (sales wise) i've EVER done. but hey, it's San Fran and they have some great food there, several awesome museums and my good buddy art legend SPAIN RODRIGUEZ...whom i spent good time with. after the show i did some good trading and buying so i was hopeful about a return trip. and i visited my brother in L.A. so i had more excuses to come back to wondercon. aiiiiiiiight, fast forward to this year!-:
Packed a crazy cool selection of art and with a few last minute adjustments at the check in counter i was able to skirt the xtra fees regarding overweight baggage. yeah, i zig and zag when i have to. Got to San Fran with a day to spare and spent a great chunk of it with a walk to the Embarcadero, where i had lunch at the Ferry Building's Farmers market. OMG this place rocks...think the chelsea market and then magnify 2-3x. after i had a nice mexican lunch (tortilla soup, 2 fish tacos) i headed over to san fran MOMA. i must say this might have been the single most perfect museum visit i've ever had! how? i know, i mean think about it: i'm a museum HOUND!!! i love museums and i've been to many of the best in the world (Prado, Moma NYC, Louvre, Vatican, Alte pinacotec munich, Rijks Museum, etc... BUT, what makes this museum is it's size (small-mid) which enables you to see everything without completely blowing your senses and wearing yourself out, and of course the incredible quality to the collection and shows of this particular day i went. there were 2 great shows going on.
-first was the Belgian painter LUC TUYMANS. i wasn't very familiar with him prior to this show. i knew a little about him, but after this show i was blown away and regard him as a giant in the world of figurative painting. there are often motivations and explanations behind good works of art (and bad), but i found what was going on behind the paintings really poignant and significant, adding tremendous weight to works of art that stood by themselves without explanation.
-2nd was the great 75 years of loooking forward show. celebrating the 75th anniversary. Entirely from their collection. As you'd expect there were phenomenal pieces of art, but one of the most interesting and charming parts of the show revolved around the first Jackson Pollack painting they purchased. This was early in Jackson's career and way before the drip art success. he was largely unknown outside the New York area, and completely unknown in California. The fledgling museum had to scrape together the money and ask J's dealer Peggy Guggenheim for a discount!!! and then they still needed the purchase to be approved. i know this because the documents and letters were there and i really got a kick out of it. the asking price of this Pollack masterpiece was $750!!!! and they haggled it down to $500. wow. u gotta love it.
-3rd was the great photography show The View From Here with work from the 1840's and on.
a perfect museum day.
Now on the Wondercon. first 2 days totally uneventful. crapola sales...but that wasn't unexpected, however saturday nite i went out with Mark Bode and his wife Molly. had a great Mexican dinner and then over to their house to hang and do some art deals. Mark is the Son of art legend VAUGHN BODE
and visiting his home enshrined with great art by Mark and his Dad was truely a great experience! and we did some great deals...picked up awesome art by Cobalt 60 (by mark) and a few nice pieces by his dad!
Sunday, the show started off well with a coupla good sales (totaling more than fri/sat combined), and then it just got better and better with some significant trading, more sales, and a coupla great purchases (wally wood art!@!!!!! from early Mad Magazine). AWESOME!!!!
so all in all it was a great show.
flew down to L.A. and spent some super quality time with my brother EVAN (a musician and sound guru). well, we ate like nobody's biz, cuz he lives one block away from Sawtelle the home to a gazillion cool Asian eateries. and we did 3 big hikes in Malibu Canyon, so i just had a great time every minute.
also paid a visit to a well known collector and made a nice purchase, and had a great time hangin out.
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