It has been said that Frieze makes for better style spotting than fashion week, in part down to its glut of high net-worth attendees and their expensive tastes (you can tell by the handbags). Indeed, there is no escaping that the past decade has seen fashion and art become near-inseparable bedfellows, thanks to a slew of artist collaborations, sponsored exhibitions and art-fair takeovers – a relationship which continues this week with the arrival of the Frieze London 2024, open for previews in Regents Park today (9 October).
For a start, Stone Island will be the sponsor of Frieze Focus for a second year running – a scheme to help young galleries exhibit at the fair via a series of bursaries – while British heritage house Dunhill supports another edition of the always illuminating Frieze Masters Talks. Away from the tent, Loewe reveals an artist-led collaboration to celebrate Studio Voltaire (as well as the week’s most anticipated after-party this evening), 16Arlington’s Marco Capaldo curates a deeply felt exhibition on the subject of memory at Frieze No. 9 Cork Street, and Margaret Howell will host an exhibition on the work of Lucienne Day at its Wigmore Street store. Plus, Sarabande brings its anarchic spirit to a Carlos Place pop-up.
Here, Wallpaper* selects the best fashion happenings to add to your Frieze London 2024 schedule.
Stone Island continues its global sponsorship of Frieze
Stone Island will continue its global sponsorship of Frieze at this year’s edition of the fair, supporting 34 on-the-rise gallerists as part of Frieze Focus (to be a part of the scheme, your gallery must have been founded less than 12 years ago, with Stone Island offering a bursary to help cover the cost of exhibiting). Not only this, Stone Island has created a T-shirt adorned with ‘Artificial Sun’ by Nat Faulkner, represented by Frieze Focus gallery Brunette Coleman, which will be worn by staff across the site as a way to spotlight new talent. ‘Our partnership with Frieze highlights the importance of creative communities at the heart of Stone Island,’ says Robert Triefus, CEO of Stone Island. ‘We support emerging artists and gallerists in meaningful ways, both in sponsoring Frieze Focus, and in amplifying the work of artists through our exclusive T-shirt series.’ The uniform T-shirt will be the third such project as part of Stone Island’s international sponsorship of Frieze, and will be released alongside a short film by Faulkner.
Frieze Focus is part of Frieze London 2024, which runs from 9 to 13 October 2024 at Regents Park, London
Dunhill supports an illuminating series of conversations at Frieze Masters
There is always something appealing about the relative calm of the Frieze Masters tent, which operates more at the hushed volume of a library than the noisy hubbub of the main space next door. Even more tranquil is the space carved out by Dunhill to host a series of conversations, the so-called ‘Frieze Masters Talks’, which brings together a series of artists, cultural commentators and writers to discuss a variety of topics related to the state of the art world and the creative process (the program is always one of the week’s highlights). Curated by the creative advisor of Frieze Masters, Sheena Wagstaff and head of visual arts for the Barbican, Shanay Jhaveri, this years participants include Jeremy Deller, Nathalie du Pasquier, Ming Smith, Glenn Lowry Lou Stoppard and Zoe Whitley, each broadly addressing the subject of the ‘Creative Mind’ in the wide-ranging series.
‘[This year] we wanted to move from the idea of “talk” to “conversation”,’ Wagstaff tells Wallpaper*. 'Transforming something which is generally very one-sided into something more open-ended. One of our prerequisites was to have an artist in each conversation; the questions that artists are wrestling with, in the studio and outside of it, are foundational ones for all of us, and not to be neatly answered.’ Adds Jhaveri: ‘We are excited about these combinations of voices and we’re looking forward to seeing how their sensibilities align – or diverge!’
Seats can be secured on Frieze’s website, where you can also discover the full programme. For those unable to attend in person, the conversations will be released as a special podcast series this November.
16Arlington’s Marco Capaldo turns curator for new London show
‘Fashion or art? It doesn’t have to be one or the other,’ 16Arlington designer Marco Capaldo told Wallpaper’s Mary Cleary about his curation of a new art exhibition at London’s Frieze No.9 Cork Street gallery which opened last week to coincide with Frieze London. Titled ’Memories of the Future’ and presented by Almine Rech, the group exhibition spans both blockbuster artists (Andy Warhol; John Giorno) and a roster of up-and-coming talent, including Rhea Dillon, George Rouy and Jesse Pollock (a work by the last also appeared as part of the set for Capaldo’s S/S 2025 runway show, held at London Fashion Week last month).
‘I've always been really intrigued by the way our memories are altered by change as we move forward into our futures,’ Capaldo says of the exhibition, which is inspired by his own relationship to memory after the loss of his 16Arlington co-founder and partner Federica ‘Kikka’ Cavenati in 2021. ‘I think so many tools exist in this modern world to capture memories in their accuracy and I really wanted to investigate that. But in addition, I also really wanted to investigate the subjectivity behind memories.’ Read more
‘Memories of the Future’ runs until 16 October 2024 at Frieze No.9 Cork Street, London, W1S 3LL
Sarabande’s ‘House of Bandits’ pops up at 5 Carlos Place
The Sarabande Foundation was established by Lee Alexander McQueen, an extraordinary charitable legacy which has supported over 100 fashion designers, artists and creatives with studio space and educational scholarships from its home in a former stables in east London’s Haggerston (15 additional studios were opened in Tottenham as part of Paxton17, a new ‘creative quarter’ in the north London neighbourhood, in 2022). This week, part of the first Mount Street Neighbourhood Arts Festival (7-10 October), Sarabande’s ‘House of Bandits’ will open in 5 Carlos Place, the former home of Matches Fashion. Begun in 2020, its name comes from the fashion critic Tim Blanks’ term ‘Sarabandits’, which described the foundation’s anarchic approach to creativity. The pop-up will span fashion, art, jewellery and more from Sarabande’s wide-ranging roster of talent, offering an unruly counterpart to the glossy consumerism of the main fair.
House of Bandits runs from 7-10 October at 5 Carlos Place, part of the Mount Street Neighbourhood Arts Festival
To celebrate 30 years of Studio Voltaire, Loewe collaborates with five artists
This month, the Clapham-based not-for-profit gallery Studio Voltaire will celebrate its 30th anniversary, an occasion marked by the Jonathan Anderson-led fashion house, Loewe. Continuing a deep-rooted association between Loewe and Studio Voltaire – in 2021, the Loewe Foundation Studio Voltaire Award was launched, celebrating ‘talent and individuality’ in the arts – the project sees five artists commissioned by Loewe to create a series of limited-edition works, largely based in leather, which will be displayed in London’s Casa Loewe store (afterwards, profits will go to Studio Voltaire, aiding with the gallery’s community-based projects and civic programmes). The line-up includes Alvaro Barrington (a chain wrapped in leather which can be used as a charm or jewellery), Anthea Hamilton (a play on the fan), Sheila Hicks (a leather pouch), Sanya Kantarovsky (a moulded leather and shearling mask) and Ron Nagle (a leather paperweight).
The Loewe Foundation & Studio Voltaire’s 30th Anniversary collection will be exhibited, and available to purchase, at Casa Loewe New Bond Street during Frieze Week, 9-13 October 2024
Margaret Howell hosts an exhibition of the works of Lucienne Day
Margaret Howell’s Wigmore Street store will turn gallery this Friday, presenting a rare exhibition of the works of Lucienne Day, a British textile designer who worked largely in intricate, hand-sewn ‘silk mosaics’, the focus of this new retrospective. Demanding an extraordinary amount of work – each mosaic is just 1cm in size – they became a riposte to her day job as a designer of mass-produced textiles for brands like Heal’s and Tomkinson's. Decidedly modernist and rich in colour, they provide a satisfying companion for Howell’s collections, which will remain available for purchase in the store.
Lucienne Day Silk Mosaics 1975 – 1993 runs at Margaret Howell, 34 Wigmore Street, W1 from 11 October to 3 November 2024
