The new art market season has opened with an exciting programme of new exhibitions and the arrival of new galleries in London. Stephen Lacey, formerly a member of the British paintings department at Sotheby's and for some years a trader of modern British art, has completed the development of an impressive space on the ground floor of a wharfhouse situated to the south side of Tower Bridge and near to Purdy Hicks and the Design Museum. To be known as REED'S WHARF GALLERY, it opened on the last day of last month with an exhibition of twenty-one assemblages and various related photographs by Bill Brandt (to 30 October) who is the subject of a survey at the BARBICAN ART GALLERY (to 12 December) and a new monograph edited by Ian Jeffrey (Thames & Hudson £28). While Brandt's reputation as a leading photographer is not doubted, his work as a maker of boxed relief constructions, built from the material which he scavenged from the beaches of the South of France, is not known. Lacey's exhibition, accompanied by a handsome catalogue, written by Zelda Cheadle and Adam Lowe, marks an opportunity to assess this side of his activity.
Another happy development is the expansion of BEAUX-ARTS, Bath's leading gallery of contemporary British art, to Cork Street, where it occupies the small gallery vacated by Kasmin fifteen months ago. Director Reg Singh, who opened shop in the middle of last month with an exhibition of twenty-five sculptures, and drawings and prints, by Elisabeth Frink (to 6 November), is designing a complementary programme of activities for London and will be introducing new British artists in the coming season.
His arrival, and the creation of THE GALLERY IN CORK STREET to supervise a programme of exhibitions in the space vacated by William Jackson at the end of last season, leaves only the former COOLING GALLERY looking for a new tenant.
In other galleries in and near Cork Street, there are new paintings and sculptures by Allen Jones at WADDINGTON (6-30 October), works by Ben Nicholson, coinciding with his survey at the Tate Gallery, at BERNARD JACOBSON (5 October-6 November), new paintings by Brian Clarke at MAYOR (to 29 October), graphic works by leading American artists at WADDINGTON GRAPHICS (to 29 October), and "Vivid", an exhibition of contemporary American photography at RAAB (to 23 October). Surprisingly, these two exhibitions are London's only commercial connections with the survey of American art taking place at the Royal Academy.
MARLBOROUGH has opened a strong autumn programme with an exhibition of new works by Steven Campbell already shown at Talbot Rice during the Edinburgh Festival. For London, that exhibition, entitled "Pinocchio's Present", has been divided into two parts, collages and works on paper being shown at Marlborough's headquarters in Albemarle Street (to 15 October), with Campbell's oil paintings presented at the SOUTH LONDON GALLERY in Peckham Road (to 31 October). The exhibition coincides with the publication of Duncan MacMillan's monograph, "The Paintings of Steven Campbell: the story so far" (Mainstream £14.99). Then MARLBOROUGH mounts a significant event, an exhibition of thirty small portrait studies by Francis Bacon (20 October-3 December). Presented as single canvases, or as diptychs and triptychs, Bacon employed the small format only irregularly throughout his career, but with it created particularly intense images of his own features and of his other sitters. The most important exhibition of the month is the series of twenty new paintings by Howard Hodgkin at ANTHONY D'OFFAY (20 October-24 November). It is the artist's first commercial exhibition in London for five years, although he exhibited at Knoedler, New York, in 1990, and it marks a significant change in allegiance, Hodgkin having previously shown with Waddington, who publishes his graphic work. The new paintings, which continue to explore the artist's established themes of places and relationships, include references to both Patrick Caulfield and David Hockney. A new monograph, written by Andrew Graham Dixon, will be published by Thames & Hudson in spring 1994. D'Offay shows works on paper by Barnett Newman, Joseph Beuys, Cy Twombly, Yves Klein and Jasper Johns (to 15 October). In other galleries in Dering Street, ANNELY JUDA presents new paintings by Prunella Clough (to 30 October). In WHITE CUBE, Jay Jopling's new exhibition room in Duke Street, there are photographs from the seascape, theatre, diorama and drive-in series by leading young Japanese artist, Hiroshi Sugimoto (8 October-6 November), who is the subject of a museum survey being curated by Kerry Brougher for MOCA, Los Angeles, towards the end of this year (19 December-6 February 1994).
KARSTEN SCHUBERT is completing a summer of reorganisation which follows the withdrawal of partner Richard Salmon. He has vacated the gallery which he opened in Charlotte Street in 1987 and moved around the corner to a new space in 41-42 Foley Street. He sacrifices a street window, desirable for image but not, in practice, attracting any passing traffic, for a large room on the first floor of his new building, and relaunches his business with an exhibition of new abstract history paintings by Keith Coventry (25 October-20 November). A change of place has not changed Schubert's programme and he will continue to represent those artists with whom he has been associated. He becomes the neighbour of LAURE GENILLARD, who opens the new season with an exhibition of works by Padraig Timoney (to 23 October) inspired by spiders' webs which he collected during a recent visit to Jerusalem.
In other galleries beyond the West End, there are new works by Juan Mñoz and Rodney Graham at LISSON (22 October-20 November), drawings and small sculptures by Giuseppe Penone at FRITH (to 30 October), ten new paintings by Sheila Girling in her third exhibition at FRANCIS GRAHAM DIXON (15 October-14 November) and paintings by Estelle Thompson at PURDY HICKS (22 October-20 November), an exhibition which features six monumental canvases, with several smaller works, and will be shown in galleries in Winchester, Eastbourne and Darlington.
Originally appeared in The Art Newspaper as 'Bacon and Hodgkin'