Christies Contemporary Art Sale 2002 big tent near Hoxton London
Reviews

From: j
Category: Exhibitions
Date: 10 February 2002

Review

A lot of paintings, installations, and photographs shabbily sitting around in a basement with price tags by them. Graveyard and junkyard spring to mind. A Chris Offili is chained to the wall to prevent it falling off its dung balls. A Tomoko Takahashi installation will need careful transporting to the lucky buyer. Red and white walls and dark carpets and salon style hanging mean that each work must fight for itself unsupported by pristine clarity.

Doig, Peyton, and Offili are expensive painters. Photographs estimate high, 100,000 pounds for a Rineke Djistra of which six were made. 30, 000 pounds for a copy of sam taylor woods video cassette and an out of date projection system. 20, 000 for a big Fiona Rae, they're laughing at her now.Prices seem to have been assigned by playful gods. 20 of one, six and a half dozen for another. It feels like the party is over, read all about it in the art press, this is where it gets nasty kids. Well groomed collectors in gray living in Switzerland will have to enjoy less leisure and shopping for a while. Tightening their snake-skin belts and dumping some of their junky art in the cellar 'til the shit falls from the fan. The artists will starve and default on their mortgages.

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