FIAC 2007

This Year Fiac was hampered by the massive strike by the RATP. Despite this, FIAC was very well attended. All trains, metro, bus and RER were out on strike. There was literally no transport for either Thursday or Friday in or around Paris. Amazingly the Parisians didn't take offense despite the serious inconvenience. Instead they got onto their bikes, into their cars or put on their walking shoes and got on with it. There is an enormous amount of sympathy for the strikers and people believe that tolerating the events is for the greater good. Powerful attitude! The French are great at acting on principle or putting a concept before personal desires.

Art Fair time

All over Europe the art fairs are kicking in. If you were to go to all of them and have art in all of them you would have to be a prolific Octopus. Not likely! So you can visit them anyway. It's a lot of fun. In London there is the Frieze art fair. That can be a bit expensive to start collecting from but it's a great location to mix in the energy of the arts and meet galleries and artists. With the prices being limited only by your imagination.

But if you want to start somewhere more accessible there is the Affordable Art Fair which is on at the same time. You can artist spot at this event. Compare the prices of the artists work today and see how much you can guess they will be worth next year, or even if they will still be creating.

Usually it's easy enough to spot those that are in it for the long haul, or to put it more aptly, those that converse with the muse. My work is at the Arlev Art Gallery, Stand D4, Battersea Park, London. http://www.affordableartfair.co.uk/visitor.html

Here's a video of the Frieze fair. An insiders look at starting a collection of art.
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/video/2007/oct/12/frieze.collecting

In a couple of weeks the Fiac fair will be here in Paris and I'll do my own report on that here. Last year it was very intense. The crowds were impressive and some of the creations on show was really insightful and from time to time, eye popping.

There are alternative shows in Paris at the same time. Galleries that decided not to close up to do the show attract a lot of the overflow. The FIAC attracts collectors from all over the world who want to see Paris as well as the show so this is a very good place to expose your work.

On line programme-Ireland

Here's a great programme on Ireland that you can watch online. It discusses the changes coming to Ireland. It's a good show and a fair view on the state of play at the moment. I think that David McWilliams has some great points.

http://www.rte.ie/tv/thegenerationgame/prog1.html

Nuit Blanche

Last Saturday (6th October) night was Nuit Blanche in Paris. Everyone stays up all night and parties. That's the theory. This year it was a little different. This year France won against the all blacks in Cardiff, well done the French!!

I thought Parisians were pretty restrained. There was a little dancing in the streets and all the cars honked their horns. If the same thing happened in Ireland there wouldn't have been any sleep for a week.

So, normally Nuit Blanche is an artistic and cultural event that involves the museums staying open all night and much artistic performance in the streets and squares of the city. She has 20,000 artists to call upon for such events. This year the city's display was really exceptional. There was a lot to see and it would take many postings to describe everything. We had a good time. Great people and great art in a city that really gets into the groove of the theme.