Galleries - September 2010

for something more suited to 20th C. and Contemporary dealing be- came, two years ago, an essential element in their survival and they sold up. Now, after an intensive search for the right place and major rebuilding to bring it up to speed, they re-launch this month at 35 Albemarle Street with 2 stunning gallery spaces (Old Masters still, on the first floor) and a show of Sidney Nolan (see p13) kicking off a series of contemp- orary exhibitions at street-level. The changes are not just about buildings – for the first time the Chief Executive is no longer an Agnew family member. Tom Lighton, formerly of Waddingtons, takes on this role with Georgina Pemberton, ex-Sotheby's Australia, brought in to augment their 20th C. and Contemporary activities. 4&3 The painting illustrated above, by Margaret Barron, is one of a group of paintings by 4 young British art- ists to be sold at Cadogan Cont- emporary from 6 to 10 September to raise funds for Leonard Che- shire Disability, a charity this re- markable WWII pilot and VC winner set up in 1948, initially to help improve quality of life for ex- servicemen. Now supporting such aims on a much broader scale, it is among the top 30 charities in the country. For tickets to the PV on the evening of the 7th contact events@lcdisability.org. A good story also lies behind the Keith Vaughan on our front cover this month, one of a group of works by him, Prunella Clough, and potter Liz Fritsch, that is being sold via Anthony Hepworth to raise funds for a number of charities supported by the Har- greaves and Ball Trust – in this first instance the Wigmore Hall. Gifted scientists, the collection these two men formed was of exceptional quality, as you can see if you are quick about it – the show runs from 31 August to 4 September at Gallery 27 in Cork Street. Vaughan enthusiasts should also note the following exhibition there (6 to 11 September), of four dec- ades of his drawings. 80-90 Two major artistic birthdays this month: those of painters Alan Davie and Tony Whishaw. Still painting, aged 90, with astonish- ing vigour and originality in his Hertfordshire studio, Davie is be- ing given a major show of his new work in his home town of Falkirk and a "birthday display" opens at Tate Britain at the end of the month. But, given his stature inter- nationally and as a last major living link with Pollock et al, what more does he need to do to get that full Tate retrospective, I won- der? Tony Whishaw, meanwhile, has already been celebrating his 80th with a series of shows far and wide, culminating in the current handsome group of large paint- ings at King's Place . No slowing down here either, for an artist still in at his Bethnal Green studio every morning sharp. Another underrated dynamo . . . 193 The ability of British institutions continually to reinvent themselves has always been a thing of won- der. At 193 (it was founded in Manchester in 1817) Agnew's has long been that within the Old Master fraternity (not to mention, from J.M.W. Turner, contemporary art also, of course). Still the need to adapt when OM painting represents an inevitably contract- ing market, and to leave their grand, purpose-built listed Victor- ian premises in Old Bond Street A NTENNAE 10. GALLERIES SEPTEMBER 10 20/21 'Fair to Good' is pretty optimistic in forecast terms and in these still uncertain economic times it's ple- asing to be able to say that the 20/21 British Art Fair reports a "very high percentage return rate of dealers" to this year's event (15 to 19 September), remarkably the 23rd in a series that now seems to be weathering the second major recession of its remarkable career with some degree of comfort! And, with many of London's major public spaces becoming increas- ingly obsessed with blockbuster exhibitions of either hyper-con- temporary international or histori- cal character, the Fair now repre- sents as good an opportunity as any to see top-notch Modern British painting and sculpture as we are likely to get in the current climate. Our feature on p40 gives an idea of what many of the galleries plan to show but, just to give a taster, I was particularly caught by the thought of a group of Lanyons at Gimpel Fils, a handsome early Epstein bronze of Euphemia Lamb (1908) at Keith Chapman and a selection of Matthew Smith's from Crane Kalman. Plenty more delights like that to be found, of course, at the 60-odd galleries in this year's Fair, as well as the chance to take a punt on the many younger, highly successful artists that form the event's other main strand. Margaret Barron ‘Millennium Bridge 2’ at Cadogan Contemporary