TEFAF New York Illuminates Art Week With Mastery Of Vivid, Radiant Color

A pair of anthropomorphic creatures embrace and appear ecstatic, one with round yellow lined eyes, the other seemingly squinting. Their entangled limbs float in a hot pink background, evoking a raucous frenzy.

Daniel Richter’s Angst, mein BROT (2024) draws viewers into a mosh pit of brazen colors and chaos, borrowing from the German artist’s previous career designing posters and record sleeves for punk bands. Richter’s monumental canvas elevates the fast tempos and raw, unpolished sound of punk music into complex compositions that pulsate with energy and emotion. The title, which literally translates into “Fear, my BREAD” evokes absurdity and invites inquiry into the human, or post-human, condition.

Alternative music fans will recall Richter’s early artistic ethos from Sonic Youth’s critically acclaimed, seminal 1988 album Daydream Nation using his 1988 painting Kerze (Candle in English), and New Order’s second studio album, Power, Corruption & Lies (1983), which was named after graffiti he spray painted on the exterior of the Kunsthalle during a 1981 exhibition.

Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac of London, Paris, Salzburg, Milan, and Seoul is showcasing Richter’s most recent series with a solo presentation at the 11th edition of TEFAF New York 2025, which is open to the public through May 13 at the Park Avenue Armory.

A blockbuster opening for this year’s U.S. engagement of the European Fine Art Foundation’s preeminent global art fair was punctuated by explosive color across a wide array of art, a much needed boost amid geopolitical turmoil. Ninety-one leading dealers and galleries from 13 countries and four continents are celebrating Modern and Contemporary art, jewelry, antiquities and design, along with exclusive curated spaces in the Armory’s 16 period rooms. As always, it’s an art historical journey through the global art world, shining as the crown jewel amid a flurry of New York fairs.

“It’s been an extremely busy opening for this year, perhaps even more so than last year, and as we’d expect from TEFAF attendees, we’re meeting with extremely sophisticated and informed collectors. Having a solo focus on Daniel Richter’s new paintings has elicited a very positive response, reflected in collectors’ swift decisions to buy. In the first couple of hours, we had sold most of the works on our booth,” said Thaddaeus Ropac.

New Yorkers and tourists may expect to encounter the work of John Chamberlain (1927-2011) at large scale, gazing up and walking aroun to admire FIDDLERSFORTUNE (Pink) (2010), BALMYWISECRACK (Copper) (2010), and RITZFROLIC (Green) on view at Center Plaza until May 29 as part of Chamberlain Goes Outdoors at Rockefeller Center.

The renowned American sculptor was more accessible at a smaller scale with a formidable presence at TEFAF New York. The taut tangle of boldly painted stainless steel, FRISKYOYSTER (1996) at Thomas Gibson Fine Art of London, offers an infusion of nutrients for the soul in the form of humor. Inspired by Shelter Island, New York, where he lived and worked in his later years, Chamberlain fluidly whirled across Modern art, Abstract Expressionism, and Neo-Dada to evolve a singular style.

Contextualizing an art historical journey like no other living master, Kehinde Wiley traverses centuries of technique and references, culminating with the street culture that amplifies the everyday successes and struggles of Black people living today. Presented by Templon of Paris, Belgium, and New York, bursts of hot pink roses are woven into a colossal dual portrait, Portrait of Nelly Moudime and Najaee Hall (2020), where color amplifies the complicated narrative that borrows from and subverts classical portraiture with ornate backgrounds and historical poses that confront the systems of power and control presented with grandeur and excess. Hall in a plaid shirt and pants is seated in a demure pose, with overlapping hands plants on his knee, while Moudime, standing in a leopard-print jumpsuit exudes feminine power, both reclaiming their place in the art historical cannon.

Wiley’s elegant, elaborate floral background marries TEFAF’s majestic fragrant arrangements woven into the fairs in Maastricht and New York. Discerning collectors and representatives from renowned institutions flooded the halls and booths during Thursday’s dazzling preview, with attendance soaring more than 11% over last year. One-day entry costs $60 ($25 for students), or $80 for unlimited visits through Tuesday, a modest price for a magnificent experience to see masterpieces that may be on view for the first or last time.

Besides the unsurprising demand for Richter, early standout sales include:

Lee Bontecou’s Untitled (1959) at Marc Selwyn Fine Art/Ortuzar for approximately $2 million

The Hultmark Horus, a bronze antiquity sold by new exhibitor David Aaron for nearly $700,000

Multiple sales of Ruth Asawa’s sculptures and drawings at David Zwirner, ranging up to $2.8 million

Over 45 of George Condo’s drawings at Gladstone Gallery