The Carlos/Ishikawa booth in Frieze London’s Focus section this year features three heavy hitters all doing fairly insane things. You should definitely swing by, especially if you’re in need of some nail decor.
The first strange thing you’ll notice are little Minimal sculptures that seem to be crafted out of bread. They’re actually part of a performance by Oscar Murillo, and not for sale, though you can buy the steel table that contains the corn meal he used to make the lumpy things. (Just add water!)
But the dominant vibe of the booth is all thanks to Korakrit Arunanondchai, who outfitted everything (including some of the booth workers) with his signature denim/mirror/fire look. That wall-sized mirror in the back features paint marks by Arunanondchai’s hands and arms. “I think he just leapt off Oscar’s table,” to achieve that effect, said gallery manager Naomi Pearce.
Jeffrey Deitch discussed the mirror piece with a client, sliding a long fingernail between the crack where two of them were joined. “You know what you should do is comission him to make you one of these benches,” Deitch told his client, crouching to inspect the Arunanondchai bench.
And, speaking of fingernails, two women in Arunanondchai uniforms sent on those fabric benches, ready to do the nails of anyone who wanted, toting decals that read “ED” and the name of the gallery. This piece is courtesy of Ed Fornieles, who also has one of his fingernail paintings on one of the walls.
“I work with so many caustic chemicals I can’t even smell it anymore,” he said of the nail polish. “We saw this as sort of a branding exercise for ourselves and the gallery. It’s nice to be too precious about these sorts of things.”
Fornieles sees his nail works as an extension of his digital works, which play around with whatever’s popular on the internet at the moment. “What’s popular’s powerful,” he said. “So it’s good to tap into that.”