The New York AIPAD Photography Show 2009 was challenging but in the end rewarding. Surprisingly, the show remained very busy throughout its run.  I think many expected much worse given the dire straights of the economy. It is always a pleasure to meet new collectors and reconnect with our faithful supporters. AIPAD, in general, is a celebration of photography for participants and attendants alike, offering a great opportunity to see a broad range of the medium. The Innovation program this year was especially successful. Many galleries sold their featured photographs, including us (we featured Alexey Titarenko’s Three Women Selling Cigarettes, 1992 from the City of Shadows series).

Work by our other featured artists was also wonderfully received. Pentti Sammallahti (Helsinki, Finland) has always been popular. He is a master of composition and possesses an incredibly wry sense of humor. Reflecting an obvious love for animals, his work tends to explore the relationship between nature, animals and human beings. His panorama images of Solovki by the White Sea in Russia (1992) have been in particular demand. For the first time I showed work by Raymond Meeks (Portland, Oregon), who is famous for his limited edition artist books. We sold a few copies of his new book Likeness of Reality. One of these is going to the collection of George Eastman House in Rochester, NY.  We actually received special attention from the George Eastman House this year with Chief Curator Alison Nordstrom holding a collector’s preview in our booth. She likes the work by Alexey Titarenko (they already have some five prints in the collection). In addition, we sold Untitled #17 by Nicholas Hughes (England) from his In Darkness Visible series. Igor Savchenko’s (Minsk, Belarus) unique paper prints (all made in 2008) attracted collectors looking for quiet and poignant work on a small-scale.

Christian Klinger from Amadelio film visited the show on Saturday. He continues his documentary about Evgeny Mokhorev, and the film release is scheduled for the fall of 2009. Christian interviewed Joseph Baio, a prominent photography collector, who supported Evgeny’s work from early on.

 (Joseph Baio and Nailya)

Among other news, work by Alexey Titarenko is featured in the spring/summer issue of French revue de modes #14. Alexey is going to Venice this month to continue photographing his “Venice” series. Michele C. Cone (a New York based art critic) mentions Evgeny Mokhorev in her recent article "Lolitos in Fag Limbo" for artnet.com.

To learn more about our artists please email nailyaalexander@gmail.com. 

After five years it was wonderful to be back at photo l.a., reconnecting with the West Coast collectors as well as enjoying the fair's many improvements and, of course, it was great to escape low temperatures of NYC. In spite of the poor economy the show was very crowded, with 10,000 or more visitors--at times during the weekend it was impossible to enter my booth. All the artists I featured - Alexey Titarenko, Pentti Sammallahti, Raymond Meeks, Evgeny Mokhorev and Nicholas Hughes - were very well received. This was the first time that works by Mokhorev and Hughes had been seen in L.A., and we were especially pleased when a photograph by Raymond Meeks was acquired by the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.

Amadelio, a United Kingdom based film company, is coming to St. Petersburg this month to start a documentary about Evgeny Mokhorev set for release later this year. Also this month, Nicholas Hughes will be shown at the "British Landscape Photography" show at the Photographers' Gallery; in addition, his #17 from the "In Darkness Visible" series was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and will be shown in their exhibition of recent acquisitions this summer. Currently Raymond Meeks has an exhibition at Camera Obscura Gallery in Paris. And also at this time, work by Titarenko can be seen in "Water Currents" (December 13, 2008-March 25, 2009) at the Thessaloniki Museum of Photography in Greece. This show is a part of the museum's "The Four Elements of Nature and Man" series. Igor Savchenko is preparing for a major show in Berlin dedicated to the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the exhibition is scheduled for July.

I will be showing all these artists next month, at the upcoming AIPAD Photography Show at the Park Avenue Armory in New York (March 26-29).
More news about the fair will be posted soon.