At the opening of Frieze Los Angeles on Thursday, works valued as highly as $2 million were sold, with several galleries’ sales reports noting that solo presentations did particularly well.
“Today has been our most successful first day at Frieze LA since the first year of the fair,” Hauser & Wirth president Marc Payot said in a statement emailed to ARTnews.
David Zwirner’s first-day sales included works by Joe Bradley, John McCracken, Steven Shearer, Lisa Yuskavage, Huma Bhabha, Dana Schutz and Suzan Frecon for values between $250,000 and $650,000.
Along with the mega-dealers who sold works in the early hours of the celebrity-filled fair, Casey Kaplan, Vielmetter, Roberts Projects, and Tina Kim Gallery also reported sales of works priced at $250,000 or higher.
Dominique Gallery said it placed all works in its solo presentation by Mustafa Ali Clayton, including sculptures ranging from $12,000 to $100,000. New York’s Kasmin Gallery reported ten works by vanessa german sold on opening day, each priced between $25,000 and $65,000. The artist won the Heinz Award for the Arts in 2022. pt.2 gallery from Oakland, California, said it placed all of their works by Muzae Sesay, but did not disclose sales amounts.
Below, a look at seven works that were sold during Frieze’s first couple days, according to the galleries that brought them to the fair.
(All sales are in USD unless otherwise indicated. Sales information is provided voluntarily by galleries but does not include confirmation of transactions, discounts, or other fees.)
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Richard Serra at Gladstone
Image Credit: © Richard Serra / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Courtesy of the artist and Gladstone Gallery Sold for: $2 million
The most expensive work that a gallery reported as being sold on the first day was a large six-and-a-half-foot square oilstick drawing by Richard Serra from 2009. This amount was more than twice what the drawing sold for during a Christie’s online auction in May 2014. Gladstone Gallery also said it sold a photograph by Carrie Mae Weems for $125,000 and a painting by Aaron Gilbert for $125,000.
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Loie Hollowell at Pace Gallery
Image Credit: © Loie Hollowell, courtesy Pace Gallery Sold for: $450,000
Among the top purchases at Pace’s booth was Loie Hollowell’s painting Split Orbs in yellow (2023). It was shown amid a survey of her work that is now on view at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, Connecticut, and ahead of two planned Pace solo shows. The mega-gallery also reported opening-day sales of paintings by Tony Smith and Li Songsong for $250,000 and $138,000, respectively.
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Kim Yun Shin at Lehmann Maupin
Image Credit: Courtesy the artist, Lehmann Maupin, New York, Seoul, and London; and Kukje Gallery, Seoul and Busan. Sold for: unknown
Lehmann Maupin reported that it sold six wood sculptures and two paintings by the Korean artist Kim Yun Shin on the first day of Frieze Los Angeles this year. The artist joined the blue-chip gallery in January, and will have a solo presentation at its New York location next month. Kim’s sculptures will also be shown at this year’s Venice Biennale.
The gallery also reported that it had sold Liza Lou’s Get Off My Cloud (2024) “to a prominent Swiss collection,” two textile works by Billie Zangewa in the range of $125,000 to $250,000, and works by Mandy El-Sayegh ranging for prices ranging from $55,000 to $75,000 to collectors from Los Angeles, Singapore, and the Czech Republic.
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Robert Longo at Thaddaeus Ropac
Image Credit: © Robert Longo Sold for: $1.6 million
Thaddaeus Ropac reported two seven-figure sales, with Robert Longo’s Untitled (Julien), 2016, selling for $1.6 million and Anselm Kiefer Sag mir, wo die Blumen sind, 2012/2022 going for €1.3 million ($1.41 million). Other sales from the gallery included Joan Snyder’s Even A Melon Field (2020–23), selling for $210,000; Martha Jungwirth’s Ohne Titel, aus der Serie “Goya” (2023), which sold for €420,000 ($454,000); and Jonathan Lasker’s Why Opinions Form (2021), which was bought for $175,000.
“The atmosphere so far has been very upbeat and as usual there has been strong attendance for the opening,” dealer Thaddaeus Ropac said in a statement. “It’s great to have had some collectors from Europe and China attending but as we’d expect sales so far are largely to American collectors.”
The $1.6 million Longo that Ropac sold was not the only big price achieved by the artist at Frieze, however. Pace also reported that it sold a charcoal drawing by Longo, Untitled (Dry Palm), 2023, on the first day of the fair for $700,000.
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Ed Clark at Hauser & Wirth
Image Credit: © The Estate of Ed Clark Courtesy the Estate and Hauser & Wirth. Photo by Thomas Barratt Sold for: $950,000
Hauser & Wirth reported strong sales for its artists, including a 6-foot tall Untitled painting by Ed Clark from 2010.
Notable opening day sales from the mega-gallery included Rita Ackermann’s Sandman’s Dust 3 (2023) for $425,000; Firelei Báez’s Balangandan (we are each other’s magnitude and bond)(2024) for $415,000; Frank Bowling’s Fishes, Wishes in Summertime Blue (2016) for $800,000; John Chamberlain’s MISCHIEVOUSMERRIMENT for $625,000; as well as Charles Gaines Numbers and Trees: Arizona Series 1, Tree #2, Eagle (2023) for $795,000.
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Sam McKinniss at David Kordansky
Image Credit: Photo by Dario Lasagni, Courtesy of David Kordansky Sold for: $140,000
David Kordansky reported that its solo presentation of Sam McKinniss sold out within the opening hours of this year’s Frieze Los Angeles. In addition to Three Cowboys (Randall Cobb, Byron Jones, Jeff Heath), one of many paintings that McKinniss has made based on ready-made images that circulate in the media, other works sold for prices between $30,000 and $140,000.
“The tremendous response we received to his debut presentation with the gallery from prominent collectors worldwide attests to his talent and long-time following,” Gallery partner Mike Homer said in a press statement. “We’re really looking forward to sharing more of his work in a solo exhibition in early 2025 at our Los Angeles gallery.”
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Anish Kapoor at Lisson Gallery
Image Credit: Courtesy of Lisson Gallery Sold for: £675,000
Blue-chip artist Anish Kapoor continues to sell well, with Lisson Gallery reporting Mipa 5 Light to Prussian Blue Satin that sold for approximately £675,000 ($854,000) during opening day.
The gallery’s presentation at this year’s Frieze Los Angelese included three sculptures by Olga de Amaral which also quickly sold—two for $250,000 each, one for $45,000—ahead of her participation in the Venice Biennale this year, as well as a Fondation Cartier retrospective to follow in Paris in the fall.
Other sales from the gallery included a work by Rodney Graham, two glass and bronze sculptures by Kelly Akashi, works by Hugh Hayden, and paintings by Christopher Le Brun and Li Ran.