THIS WEEK'S HOT TOPIC
It’s mid-October, which means London is set to take center stage for the international art world. The 2026 editions of Frieze London and Frieze Masters launch this Wednesday at Regent’s Park, while roughly 30 minutes and two neighborhoods to the south, Sotheby’s and Christie’s kick off their fall sales the same day.
Frieze week arrives at an interesting moment for the city’s art scene. The summer was headlined by news of well-established dealers like Stephen Friedman and Sid Motion shuttering their businesses due to rising rent costs and broader financial downturns, leading many to speculate about the viability of the gallery model in a post-Brexit London. Was this a bump in the road or a sign of a new reality amid the great wealth transfer?
We devoted our monthly newsletter to the topic in September, and came away feeling optimistic. While some galleries are closing, others are popping up every day, many with new ideas and novel models. What we are seeing is a scene shedding a layer of skin as a new crop of galleries ascends into maturity.
It’s a good reminder that what seems like a downward trend is often just the byproduct of generational turnover—the lag period when one runner hands the baton to the next. Now, let’s hope we’re on to the sprint.
3…THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT FRIEZE LONDON 2026
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Each year as the leaves change in The Big Smoke, big tents rise in Regent’s Park for Frieze and Frieze Masters. Though recent chatter among European fairgoers suggests that Paris’s art week has stolen its thunder, London still has plenty to differentiate itself. The most prominent of which is the sweeping experience of visiting Frieze Masters, which, this year, sees an expansion of its Spotlight section highlighting overlooked artists from the 20th century. The city is also getting a new satellite fair, the London Invitational, an offshoot of the Dallas Invitational that will feature a small but punchy lineup of 12 galleries, including James Cope (who runs the fair), New York's LOMEX, and London’s Vardaxoglou.
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Beyond the fair booths, there are various, critically important exhibitions taking place during Frieze week at some of London’s world-class institutions. An expansive retrospective of Robert Ryman’s works recently opened at the brutalist Barbican Centre to much conversation. (It is among the latest exhibitions to receive major support from Ken Griffin’s civic engagement initiative, Griffin Catalyst.) Another exciting institutional highlight is Whitechapel Gallery's benefit show by Cecilia Vicuña, called “Foraging Quipu,” which is created from donated materials sourced by the local community. Since it’s a benefit show, most of the works are for sale; buy something and show your support for an excellent art space!
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There are several can't-miss gallery shows as well. In Mayfair, the blue-chippers are staging exhibitions with some tried-and-true greats: Hauser & Wirth has a show of Cindy Sherman’s new “Fabric Matrons” photo series, and Thaddaeus Ropac has brought together paintings from the late Georg Baselitz’s impactful Hero suite, completed in the mid-1960s. Meanwhile, Victoria Miro is bringing some new talent from New York to Islington: Khalif Tahir Thompson, whose paintings combine various materials and collage to depict familiar NYC scenes.
A NUMBER TO KNOW
80%
The share of British Columbia’s artist population currently at risk of being economically displaced, according to research by the Vancouver-based arts nonprofit 221a. The financial pressure has motivated the city council to form a Cultural Land Trust (CLT), a creative solution gaining momentum across a growing number of arts cities, according to reporting by The Art Newspaper.
Although CLTs can take multiple forms, Vancouver’s will be what 221a executive director Brian McBay called “a permanent capital platform” that partners with the city and philanthropic donors to gain leasing or ownership rights to local buildings. The CLT can then use these spaces to house artists or host cultural programming at affordable rates, while representatives of the land trust handle fundraising, maintenance, strategic planning, and the rest of the extremely non-artistic work needed to maximize the value of a real estate portfolio.
Vancouver is iterating on land trusts formed in London, Helsinki, and California’s Bay Area in recent decades. Its version is already off and running thanks to the donation of its first property, a 1920s house from the estate of the maritime anthropologist and University of British Columbia professor Evelyn Pinkerton.
Once renovated, the property won’t just provide housing and studio space; it will also be used as collateral to finance more real estate moves by the CLT, said McBay. If all goes well, the initiative will make Pinkerton’s former house a home for many more Canadian artists in need—and maybe inspire other high-rent cities to follow the Vancouver CLT’s path, too.
—Tim Schneider / The Gray Market
ASK: ACCESS SOPHISTICATED KNOWLEDGE
ASK: While the big fall auctions in London, Paris, and New York have become globalized, it's clear that some sales—like the David Hockney sale at Sotheby's and the Peter Simon Collection sale at Christie's in London this week—are geared for local audiences. What role does regionalism play in marquee sales like this? Are there any artists whose markets are defined by certain cities?
NoReserve: It's tough being told your work is provincial, which is to say it has more meaning locally than globally. The strongest markets are "universal." In the case of upcoming sales, David Hockney is global; Leon Kosoff not so much.
Who is interested in English landscape paintings outside the UK? For years at the famous old art fair in Paris, FIAC, there were dozens of French booths selling French art for a lot of money that no one outside of France gave a rat's about. The same often goes for music—so it's a cultural phenomenon, I guess.
Terminology shifts over time. What is “modern” or “contemporary art” anymore? Terms like "Post War" art have referred to WW2, but if you live in other regions you might wonder, "Which war"? Or “American Art: What does that mean? That said, when you see regional art, you just know it.
Have your own question for the NoReserve team? Reply to this email or reach out to us on Instagram, @no.reserve. Readers whose submissions we choose get a special prize—six free months of our paid newsletter, The Baer Faxt.
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