ADAA Fair 2011
Date: March 2–6, 2011
Place: Park Avenue Armory, New York
Amid the ADAA fair’s old-world refinement and mighty blue-chip merchandise, Jessica Stockholder’s solo booth with Mitchell-Innes & Nash may be the most touchingly fragile, and alive. Wholly designed by the influential sculptor — who seems to be getting a second reputational wind these days after her star turn in the 1990s — the broad stand, at the end of one aisle, is organized around a sharp spike of black fabric that runs down one wall to the booth’s center, where a brightly colored chandelier lies crashed.
The walls are hung with enormously engaging assemblages, whose parts only slowly reveal themselves to be humble household items (a shower mat, a towel dowel) upon close inspection. The one pictured is a perceptual delight, and a captivating update of Jesús Rafael Soto’s 3-D compositions. Stockholder doesn’t believe in titles and finds the “untitled” formulation inelegant, so she names her works by their ingredients. This one is “Wood, glass, chicken wire, hardware, hanger, broken plastic, rubberized fabric, plastic sheets, bamboo beads, aluminum hanger, umbrella sleeve, oil paint.” All are between $20,000-$40,000.