Tech Support and Museum Participation

NEW YORK— Mark your Google calendars! The VIP Art Fair, an ambitious experiment in creating an online-only art fair, is gearing up to return in 2012, having absorbed some hard-won lessons from last year's rocky launch. The organizers of the digital fair have just announced that VIP2.0, as they are calling the second iteration, will be "live" between February 3-8.

Sparking loads of hype and speculation, the first edition promised to cut the costs associated with art fairs — which for galleries include shipping art and providing lavish entertainments for clients — while providing its own air of exclusivity by featuring some of the world's best galleries and having a log-in-only "VIP Lounge" with exclusive content. But the fair was bedeviled with technical issues that at one point completely crashed the site. Some dealers also complained of being unable to move big-ticket items online.

Yet despite the bugs, not everyone was unhappy. "Not only did we sell work to new clients (your ultimate goal in any fair), but we connected the dots on long-standing clients who didn't know about certain works by other artists we work with," dealer Ed Winkleman enthused on his popular blog, predicting that online fairs would become an increasingly important part of the gallery routine in the future.

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The exhibitor list for the 2012 edition is still in formation, but already includes such big names as Luhring Augustine, Marianne Boesky, Marian Goodman, Pace, Salon 94, Victoria Miro, White Cube, Yvon Lambert, and David Zwirner, as well as a host of hip emerging galleries. Close to 100 have already signed on for the second VIP.

Notably absent from the current list are some of the high-profile spaces touted for the first edition, among them Gagosian Gallery, Hauser & Wirth, and Sadie Coles HQ, who were listed as "VIP Founding Galleries" during the fair's launch, as well as big names like L&M Arts, Marlborough Gallery, and Michael Werner. (Following last year's VIP experience, Werner director Gordon Veneklasen had told Bloomberg that he was demanding his money back).

After the problems of the first VIP, organizers offered 50 percent refunds to participants and allowed dealers to continue maintaining their virtual online "booths" for months after the official close of the event. There was also talk of changing the fair's model, making available its "private room" service — which allows the display of high-resolution, interactive images of artworks — for year-round use to galleries, even ones who hadn't participated in the original fair.

However, this latter initiative seems to have gone by the wayside as VIP prepared for its 2012 return. "We made a decision to focus all of our energies on solving the problems that the fair experienced last year in order to deliver a flawless experience for our visitors and exhibitors at this year's fair," organizer Jane Cohan told ARTINFO in an email. "To this end, we regrouped, brought our tech team in-house, and have now built a robust site from which we can move forward."

One intriguing feature of VIP2.0 looks to be a virtual "Museum and Edition Hall," where an assortment of top international museums will sell editions. Cohan said that the Serpentine Gallery, Whitechapel Gallery, and Parkett magazine were already on board.

In any case, attempts to bring art commerce into the digital age proceed apace. In a recent report, Clare McAndrew emphasized that the fundamental economics of the art world were likely to motivate a trend towards a hybrid "bricks and clicks" model of art commerce, combining online initiatives with more traditional avenues. The VIP Art Fair, despite its rocky start, still seems best placed to take advantage of this emerging trend. Expect art-world observers to be eagerly clicking back come February.

Source : artinfo.com