画廊如何在网上做大生意

两个月前，加州非必要企业GalleryPlatform关闭。拉launches on Friday, providing an online space to browse art as galleries remain closed. Each week, the platform will feature a different group of 10 exhibitors, starting with a formidable inaugural lineup: previously unseen works by celebrated L.A. sculptor Charles Ray, presented by Matthew Marks; a supernatural sampling of Jeffrey Deitch’s prematurely closed group show, “All of Them Witches”; Mathieu Malouf paintings presented by Jenny’s, and more. Various Small Fires chose paintings of large-scale disasters by 80-year-old artist Jessie Homer French, whose self-taught, desert-based practice resonates with our current climate, according to gallery director Sara Hantman: “In many ways, she’s always been a bit of a self-isolationist.”

这次群展是新成立的洛杉矶画廊协会(GALA)举办的首次群展。GALA由60家洛杉矶画廊组成，是为了应对封锁带来的混乱而组织的。与几乎所有其他行业一样，艺术品销售业务一直在苦苦挣扎:四分之一的画廊老板接受了调查的洛杉矶时报》报道他们有永远无法重新开放的危险。在全球市场上，在伦敦、苏黎世、纽约和香港拥有画廊的瑞士大型交易商多米尼克(Dominique Lévy)清楚地描述了形势的严重性CNN采访“我相信，业务下降了90%，如果不是95%的话。”

GalleryPlatform。拉其他类似的数字项目旨在重新连接画廊与被取消的展览和艺术博览会中疏远的观众，这些展览和艺术博览会在画廊业务中所占的份额越来越大。然而，GALA的成员们对他们的商业预期是谨慎的。“我不认为[GalleryPlatform。拉] solves the fact that we’re not having art fairs,” says Regen Projects’s Shaun Caley Regen, as the age-old traditions of art dealing haven’t quite found their place in the world of online retail.

继今年香港巴塞尔艺术展(Art Basel Hong Kong)和纽约弗里兹艺术展(Frieze New York)以在线展厅取代实体展厅之后，收藏家和交易商都对笨拙的网页设计和设计表达了失望销售低迷．

“艺术界的运作和交易依赖于一种个人魅力，”GALA成员、沙图酒庄的奥利维亚·巴雷特(Olivia Barrett)解释说。尽管她在David Zwirner和Frieze New York的在线平台上取得了成功，但她与新收藏家的电子邮件交流缺乏面对面会面的“自发性、化学反应和社交活力”。尽管大卫·兹维尔纳(David Zwirner)和豪瑟·沃斯(Hauser & Wirth)涉足了新的扩展现实和增强现实体验，但所有画廊老板都同意，绝大多数艺术作品在展示在屏幕上时都失去了一些东西。

在缺乏面对面交流的情况下，GalleryPlatform。拉strives to build a more 360-degree experience for its visitors, engaging in robust, “personality-driven” storytelling in the form of video access to artists’ studios and collectors’ homes, plus archival materials that reflect and celebrate L.A.’s “incredibly rich history,” says Sprüth Magers director Marta Fontolan. As she maps out the editorial content as part of the platform’s operating committee, she says, “I think art is best experienced in real life. But the internet, thank God for it. It’s the only means of communication we have right now.”

前面的复杂的精心设计的界面，画廊平台。拉at its core is a standard website that includes gallery guides and exhibition schedules for all 60 of its members. But “I don't think it can be understated, the symbolic value of L.A. galleries weathering this crisis together,” says Commonwealth & Council’s Kibum Kim. The simple gesture of creating a single destination to find all of its members—from global empires like Gagosian and Hauser & Wirth, whose L.A. locations are just one of a dozen or so worldwide, to younger, homegrown programs like Inglewood’s Residency Art—speaks to the project’s long-term mission toward community solidarity, and the consolidation of audiences and support for one another’s artists.

对于世界各地的画廊主来说，大流行是一个被迫的拐点，“就像冠状病毒让我们经历了一个过程，”方托兰说，“我们沟通、工作、销售和交谈方式的进化。”

从越来越不可持续的艺术博览会日程中解脱出来，让金有时间和空间重新把注意力放在家里，“重新评估并重新投入我对艺术和商业的热爱，”他说。“对我来说，画廊协会将是最持久、最强大的结果。”