While Mark Grotjahn Angles for a Megadeal, Kenny Schachter Is Dying to Make His Own Retrospective a Success
Death be not proud (it's bound to happen sooner or later). Video still courtesy of Kenny Schachter.In the waning days of summer, just when you might expect the art world to be napping beachside in the Mediterranean, guess what? There’s no rest for the weary, because...
Putting Art in the Back Seat, Kenny Schachter Goes to Venerate the Old Masters of the Racetrack at the Festival of Speed
Seventeen-time Le Mans entrant, and driver of my car, Nic Minassian. Photo courtesy of Kenny Schachter.As an isolated, overweight child growing up in Long Island with zero exposure to culture, cars were my gateway drug to art. It was the industrial design that...
Summer Shocker: Kenny Schachter Hits the Art-Gossip Goldmine… and Keeps It to Himself
You’re only as good as your last sale. Amy was on top this time, but don’t count out Loïc for long.... Illustration courtesy of Kenny Schachter.I have noticed a surge in the level of homelessness in London, which was confirmed by a recent article in the Guardian that...
Kim Jong-who? At Art Basel, $165 Million Sales and Other Dizzying Disclosures Made the Rest of the World Disappear
See you at Art Basel Pyongyang 2019. Photo illustration courtesy of Kenny Schachter.Switzerland is the land of three-cheek kisses (along with Slovenia, Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, the Netherlands, and Egypt), seven presidents (a collective of co-equally powered...
Wynn Some, Lose Some: Kenny Schachter on the Parade of Art and Depravity at New York’s May Auctions
It's time for someone to bone up on art-handling. Photo illustration by Kenny Schachter. The latest spate of New York auctions that transpired over the past two weeks saw nearly $3 billion worth of art trading hands, a mind-boggling sum. But beware: Springtime in...
What Do David Blaine, John Currin, and a Super-Sneaker Have in Common? Kenny Schachter Reports From TEFAF New York
The TEFAF Fast Art Shoe. Illustration courtesy of Kenny Schachter.If Frieze New York were more conveniently located—with all the Ubers in New York, you still couldn’t get a car out of Randall’s Island during last week’s fair—with better, broader art in a (way) more...
Kenny Schachter Gets Hot and Bothered at the Ironically Titled Frieze New York
The art world loves spontaneity... but spontaneous combustion? Video still courtesy of Kenny Schachter. While I was checking into my hotel for Frieze New York, a fellow guest made a comment about how much she liked my writing—at the precise moment my credit card got...
Get Off the High Horse, Jerry Saltz! Kenny Schachter Mounts a Last-Ditch Defense of Art Fairs
Who knew? Everyone who wins a Pulitzer gets a free horse. Photo illustration by Kenny Schachter. Like Paul Revere riding into town in the dead of night to warn the colonials of the impending British invasion, Jerry Saltz rolled into the art world’s inboxes and social...
Kenny Schachter Takes a Cut-Throat Art Quiz Before Hitting Art Cologne (With a Hangover)
Did someone say "open bar"? Kenny Schachter gets rambunctious at London's annual Art Quiz. Photo by Luke Fullalove. In the brief respite between miart and Art Cologne, I was invited to join some art-world-style extracurricular activities closer to home: a charity quiz...
Kenny Schachter on miart, the Milan Art Fair So Eccentric He Might Just Want to Move In
It's not easy getting out of bed during an art-fair week. An artwork by Eva Kot'atkova at the 2018 opening of miart in Milan. (Photo by Pier Marco Tacca/Getty Images) I’m like a sacrificial lamb trudging across the world to art fairs so you don’t have to. Yes, I can...
Kenny Schachter Gets Overwhelmed at Art Basel Hong Kong—and Almost Gets Punched in the Face, Too
The death of an art collector. Photo illustration by Kenny Schachter. Wandering around Art Basel Hong Kong last week, I wondered what Andy would make of all this—fairs, Instagram, and the unstoppable beast the art market has become. For some perspective, his lifetime...
Kenny Schachter Tries (and Fails) to Keep His Mouth Shut at Gallery Weekend Beijing
Protect me… from the art world. Photo illustration by Kenny Schachter. A few months ago, I got a direct message from an Instagram account entitled Frenchiepickles that appeared to be dedicated to a French Bulldog. Odder still than receiving a missive from a...
Has the Great Depression Struck Galleries? Kenny Schachter Ventures Among the Art Hobos at Armory Week
A hobo encamped at a Lower East Side gallery, surely a casualty of the Great Depression. Photo collage by Kenny Schachter. Just before coming to New York for last week’s art fairs, someone tried to sell me a Louise Lawler that had been marked “Lost Property” by an...
Want to Get Rich Quick? Fresh From the London Auctions, Kenny Schachter Explains How to Game the System
Be sure and catch Kenny's new instructional YouTube video. Photo illustration courtesy of Kenny Schachter. Where in the world have I been? It’s been a while since my last dispatch—I hope you enjoyed the break. My absence was largely down to the fact I avoided the...
Snow, Schlag, and Schnabel: Kenny Schachter’s Dispatch From St. Moritz (and Predictions for 2018)
The architect Norman Foster surveys the town of St. Moritz. Photo courtesy of Kenny Schachter. I’m no fan of Christmas, New Year’s is even worse—all the contrived peace, love, and joy is frankly too much, not to mention the practice of holiday emails that amount to...
Miami After Dark: Kenny Schachter on Disaster, Death Threats, and Killer Deals at Art Basel Miami Beach
The gang's all here—again—in Miami. Artwork by Kenny Schachter.Before heading off to Miami Beach for the sixteenth edition of the Art Basel there, I bumped into a prominent art-world public-relations exec who exaggeratedly fist-pumped in exaltation at not having to go...
Kenny Schachter Solves the Mystery of the $450 Million da Vinci Buyer—or Does He?
A tortoise and the hare for our age. All images courtesy of Kenny Schachter.What does $450,312,500, the sum paid at Christie’s last week for Leonardo da Vinci’s circa-1500 painting Salvator Mundi (the “Savior of the World”), look like? How about 55,000 Bitcoins at...
Kenny Schachter Found the Future at a Shanghai Art Fair (Even If His Kids Got Censored)
A work by Ilona Rich being installed by Adrian, Kai, and Kenny at the Art021 fair in Shanghai. Photo courtesy of Kenny Schachter.Last week there were two simultaneous international art fairs in Shanghai, one being Art021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair—the...
Kenny Schachter on Bad Behavior at FIAC and the Swindle Behind da Vinci’s ‘Salvator Mundi’
,h3> A very special episode of "Antiques Roadshow." Image courtesy of Kenny Schachter.Having just returned from Paris and the 44th edition of the Foire internationale d’art contemporain, otherwise known as FIAC, I’m left with two distinct impressions. The first is...
Sculduggery, Weak Bladders, and the Wrath of the Schnabel: Kenny Schachter on Frieze London 2017
Step right up. Image courtesy of Kenny Schachter. When I began my career, art fairs were still in the Paleolithic Age. The marquee events were Chicago (really), Cologne (really), and Basel (can you recall when there was but one?). That’s it. In a given year, attending...
In a Post-Truth Art World, Kenny Schachter Holes Up in Trump Tower, Spills the Beans on Mark Grotjahn, and Gets Arrested
An anonymous auction-dominating art dynasty. Image courtesy of Kenny Schachter. It doesn’t take much to get me out of the house, but what choice have I? Opportunities in the art world are scarce, and these days you need to chase them more than ever. The especially...
Kenny Schachter Goes for a Swim in the Summertime Art Market and Gets Stung
Kenny Schachter discovers the hard way that jellyfish and art dealers are of the same genus. Video still by Kenny Schachter. As much as global warming has disrupted the traditional cycling of the seasons, the 24/7 maelstrom that is the art market has also had an...
Kenny Schachter on Learning to Love the LA Art Scene (Except Those Wacky Private Museums)
Kenny Schachter Plank III (pace Charle Ray Plank II). Image courtesy of Kenny Schachter. I am all but Los Angeles illiterate—I have only been to the city twice, for a handful of days. I don’t go to movies, or even watch them on laptops or planes. As an...
Has London’s Auction Market Lost Its Mojo? Kenny Schachter Finds the Onetime Art Capital Down on Its Luck
Basquiat is the latest wild card in the high-stakes art casino. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. London is known for gin and tonic, Bacon and Freud, Gilbert and George, and Damien and Tracey. When I moved to the UK in 2004, London also boasted a burgeoning auction market,...
Nothing Fishy Here! Kenny Schachter Squeezes His Way Into the Thick of Things at Yet Another Art Basel
Art Sardines: The close quarters of Basel hotel living. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter.Two years ago, when I was driving home from Art Basel, I suffered facial injuries in a car accident. This year, I rolled back into the art-industry town with an automotive vengeance:...
Scandal! Innuendo! Flipping! Kenny Schachter’s Inside Scoop on the May Art Auctions
Kenny Schachter flipping his two artist sons, Kai and Adrian, for love and profit. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. I probably shouldn’t give it away, but New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport is by far the easiest point of ingress and egress for New York...
To Escape the Numbing Art World, Kenny Schachter Hits the Road (and Drives Everyone Crazy)
On the road in Sicily in a 1970 Fiat Abarth Rally car. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. After Damien Hirst’s undersea extravaganza in Venice left me feeling like a splashed-on tourist at SeaWorld (albeit one with much nicer aquariums, and a different kind of whales),...
Is This Show Worth a Billion Dollars? A Few Thoughts on Damien Hirst’s New Venture in Venice
Damien and his figurehead. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. Buckets of (digital) ink have already been spilled on the subject, but I’ll add more. I have pretty much seen every artwork that Damien Hirst has made, read his book On the Way to...
Poisoned Tongues and Chicken Feet: My Sojourn to China’s Rising Kingdom of Contemporary Art
The Poison Pen of Kenny Schachter (Courtesy Kenny Schachter, with Adrian Schachter) As an art lifer, I’ve begun to measure the remainder of my days by how many Art Basel fairs I’ve left to attend. The fifth iteration of Art Basel Hong Kong (or 10th if you...
The $14 Million Flip, and What the London Day Sales Foretell for the Near Future
Art musical chairs. Courtesy Kenny Schachter Imagine Janet Yellin—or the head of your respective Federal Reserve—calling to say that you’ve been granted free rein of a currency-printing press, with the lone caveat that it be enjoyed at your discretion. That has...
Kenny Schachter Gets Roasted During Armory Week… and Lives to Tell the Tale
Image courtesy Kenny Schachter Roving the art world for business and pleasure, I was en route to New York for the Armory Show and its attendant fairs and goings-on when I had a near miss with a sneering Tracey Emin, and struck a possible deal with Harry...
How I Found Sigmar Polke Alive and Well in a German Spa Town
At the Kurhaus Casino Baden-Baden with Anne Polke (second from left). Courtesy of Kenny Schachter The Museum Frieder Burda was opened by the eponymous publisher in 2004 in a Richard Meier building in the German spa town of Baden-Baden (literally “Bath-Bath”) known for...
Kenny Schachter Says It’s the End of the World and Everybody Wants Classic Contemporary
Image courtesy of Kenny Schachter. The Unquenchable Appetite for Classic Contemporary I’ve never lived through such a tumultuous period, one that compels us to tune into the news 24/7 to stay abreast of the rapidly changing global condition; the USA is giving the...
Why Jerry Saltz is the provocative art critic you need to follow
A bat's private parts, naked Ancient Greek girls and boys, enemas being administered, sex from every entry point imaginable, tits, penises, balls, vaginas and arses in every shape and form. Let's not forget gorilla sex, too. And this is just a one month recap of Jerry...
Kenny Schachter on Richard Prince and the Magic of Art Market Metaphysics
Illustration by Kenny Schachter. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. Prince v. Trump Without getting too much into the minutiae of Immanuel Kant’s concept of the “thing-in-itself,” as posited in his “Critique of Pure Reason” (1781), in which he wrestles with the differences...
Kenny Schachter on the Fire That Ravaged His Home and Art
My bedroom with Joe Bradley and Mel Bochner paintings. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. Thursday evening, January 5, two bottles into a business dinner, my wife Ilona phoned to say that our London house was on fire. She assured me that everyone was fine (our four sons,...
Kenny Schachter on Art and Horse-Racing in St. Moritz
The Sky Over Nine Columns by Heinz Mack, with illustration by Kenny Schachter. Writing in St. Moritz, Switzerland lands me on a slippery slope in more ways than one, besides accidentally smashing onto the pavement on occasion. After an article I wrote last year, I was...
Jerry Saltz and the Future of the Critic-Artist
Collage by Kenny Schachter. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. This story first appeared in the January 2017 issue of British GQ. The world has changed in the last five months since I wrote this. Much of Jerry Saltz’s medieval (over sexualized) mischievousness has been...
Kenny Schachter on Celebritism and ‘Arting’ at Art Basel in Miami Beach
Collage by Kenny Schachter. Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. Loving and Learning Like starlings changing course mid-flight in a well-ordered flock, many trudged to Art Basel Miami, season fifteen (there should be a boxed set). Come to think of it I’ve been to every fair,...
Kenny Schachter Sees the Art Market Shimmy Along in a City Shaken by Protest
Collage by Kenny Schachter. Courtesy Kenny Schachter. THE ART MARKET PLAYS ITS TRUMP CARD New York is a city enveloped in an otherworldly atmosphere lined by an endless horizon of police cordons and seemingly spontaneous, raucous, pop-up protests that resemble school...
Kenny Schachter’s Dealer’s Diary: Shanghai’s West Bund Art Fair and ART021
Collage of Mao beside artwork by Joe Bradley a Gagosian's booth at Art021. Courtesy Kenny Schachter This may be the craziest, most pathetic thing I’ve written but consider this an appeal to action—or inaction—in light of recent political events, the relevance and...
Kenny Schachter Hunts Big Game Basquiat in Bentonville
Courtesy of Kenny Schachter. This is an interim report between the West Bund and Art 021 art fairs in Shanghai next week, followed by the pivotal New York November auctions kicking off on the 14th, and the final Basel iteration before year end in Miami. The 11th...
Kenny Schachter Goes Running With the Bull-Headed Bulls at FIAC
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter Comes Out to Play at Frieze London
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter’s Dealer Diary: Of Art & Cars, Part II
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter’s Dealer Diary: Of Art & Cars, Part I
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter Gets Kicked Off Facebook and Looks for Good News in Ibiza
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter on the London Auctions, Brexit, and the New Nihilists
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter Declares Basel the New Art Hajj
“Dark Shadows” was an epic American gothic soap opera involving a bloodsucking vampire. Though it aired weekdays from 1966–71 (I’m dating myself), it’s what the art market has come to resemble.
Kenny Schachter on how to survive an art fair
I enjoy many art fairs, especially the Art Basels (Basel, Miami and Hong Kong) and, considering its owners, MCH Group, announced a major expansion into the market for regional fairs [the group is to buy stakes in existing fairs], there are soon to be plenty more. In...