spittle’s Frieze London survival guide: “being married puts off collectors”

POV: it’s the Saturday of Frieze Week and you’re Ruinart-drunk in a random collector’s West London flat, surrounded by trashy blue chip pieces. We’re talking Architectural Digest… not Apartamento. Hiding in the bathroom after accidentally staining the Dedar Milano silk wallpaper in the hallway with red wine, you steal a box-fresh Perfumer H ‘Humid Wood’ candle from the cabinet and realise… you’ve hit your limit. It’s time to go home. The sky outside is red with the first light as you pedal demonically through the quiet streets on a rattling Lime. After a hot shower and possibly too much Tylenol, you arrive at the pearly gates of Regent’s Park: the evil Hauser girlies, chain-smoking under the Big Sign, rake you with their eyes as you sashay bravely up the ramp into the Big Tent for the fourth time this week.

Someone in the queue for Gail’s is obnoxiously drenched in La Labo Santal 33. It’s the first coffee run of the day but the last day of the fair. You’ve already realised the minimal all-black Jil Sander (Vinted) two piece you were wearing actually had a few moth holes on the back you didn’t notice: criminal !! Shoplifting cakes (mainly Sea Salt, Caramel, Banana and Pecan; sometimes Pistachio, Lemon and Rose) has been the only activity that’s made you feel anything all week. You instinctively clutch them in your pockets whenever anyone from the New York gallery diminishes the poké bowl selection you worked so hard to source for lunch.

London in October is all hopes, dreams, and free drinks as the circus descends on Regent’s Park for gossip, peacocking, and to waste gallerists’ time pretending to be interested in the works on their booths. It’s only rational to feel apprehensive, nervous, or downright scared – whether you’re a newbie or just traumatised. But don’t fear, baby gallerinas: with years of suffering under our belts, we’re here to share tried-and-tested tips to carry you through to the final Sunday… and maybe even into Paris, too.

What to pack

First, some gentle advice on what to pack in your silly little bag. If time allows, why not consider:

• A small plastic bag for rubbish passed to you by the gallery’s senior director.
• A capacious bag to carry things the senior director doesn’t want to carry.
• Two or more power banks – one for the senior director (who won’t bring one but will wander off with yours within the first five minutes) and one for you.
• Do not, we repeat, DO NOT, bring your engagement ring. In the words of a gallery owner we once heard dressing down her (female) Senior Salesperson: “being married puts off collectors”.
• The collector cheat sheet – yes, these exist, and yes, you should memorise them. If you have prosopagnosia it’s with a heavy heart that we suggest you move to another industry.
• Talking points for the ultra-rich, ultra-boring and hard-of-hearing. Start with the age-old classic: will I be seeing you in Paris for Basel next week? 😉

What/what not to wear

Like being in a real life episode of Absolutely Fabulous, we once saw a flustered collector complaining so much about the heat in the tent that they dumped their Marni mohair jumper into a nearby bin and stropped off. With this in mind, always keep an eye on the bins – and thin layers are the way to go. Our advice? Get back to basics and start saving now for ye olde classic Pleats Please, Issey Miyake – by the time you hit 30, you may have enough set aside to afford it ! Unlike a one-bed flat ! gotta love this economy x

You’d think there wouldn’t be much walking involved in sitting around in a booth for eight+ hours a day, so why not wear a shoe that stands out? WRONG! Like professional athletes, you’ll be up, down, left, and right, so leave the Gucci horsebit mules at home. Seek comfort, not personality – nothing too high, strappy, or fun. If lacking serious inspiration, don a pair of On-Running Cloudvistas and you’ll fit in with both the 60+ American collector cohort and the slightly uncool but kind of hot senior salespeople with tanned ankles from mid-range European galleries whose names no one can ever remember.

What to do with yourself (on the booth)

After the VIP days, everything gets far less exciting; while you’ll still have a to-do list longer than George Rouy’s waitlist, you will end up insanely bored by the Saturday and Sunday, when the general population, buggies and occasional chihuahua flood the floor. So, some suggestions on passing the time:

• By the weekend, visitors will come up to you and start asking if you’re the artist. Have some fun with this – lie a little, why not.
• Befriend any gallery employee under the age of 35: if you survive in the industry you’ll see the same people at fairs all over the world ! Try not to appear too desperate.
• Finally, make a trip over to the other side of the park and visit Masters. After a long long week of schlepping contemporary painting, each dinosaur skeleton at Masters will remind you that none of this is that deep. Despite how it may seem, Frieze Week is merely a blip in the scheme of human time, and no one will remember almost all of the artists of this century as soon as we head into the next x

What to do with yourself (when not on the booth)

Whether it’s White Cube’s back-office storage champagne soirée; standing ‘dinners’ at Isabel, Maison Francois or Scott’s courtesy of David Zwirner; or candlelit terrace parties at Toklas, curated events are all within reach if you make friends with whichever gallery assistant is in charge of the G-list. Want to get into a party with a list? Give the name of a prominent editor at Frieze. Just try it and thank us later x

Be wary of decoy events; one year Frieze organised two concurrent parties in the same venue (Koko) one for losers and the other for Mark Leckey, Grayson Perry and assorted schmoozers. We see you Frieze, nice move. Given the dire financial mess the art world is in (tldr: collectors overbought during the pandemic boom while mid-level galleries overextended themselves, leading to an inescapable feeling of doom) you’d think this is unlikely to be a vintage year for opulence, but Ruinart and Diageo still have plenty of product to shoehorn into aspirationally classy art-adjacent parties, so it seems like our social lives are safe, for now.

Our hot tips for what to see

12 Oct – Frieze East End Day
Start the week with intentionality and wellness by doing a brisk gallery hop on the Sunday before the madness kicks in. A good moment to develop a gang of recently acquired friends, collect press releases and gossip. Mentally note all the good shows for when chatting up some hot-but-intimidating sales assistant from Berlin. End the day at The Approach tavern, obviously.

14 Oct – ‘Clarissa’, émergent x Soft Commodity
At Kings Cross, émergent are muscling into curation with ‘Clarissa’, a group exhibition organised with Soft Commodity, showing gorgeous works by the likes of Alexandra Bircken, Michael Dean and Michel Majerus. Go on Tuesday for the opening and you’ll get all the salacious goss we can’t publish here.

16 Oct – Alexandra Bachzetsis: RUSH(ES) at the Hellenic Centre 
Accessible insider event of the week is a performance by artist-choreographer Alexandra Bachzetsis, who is making a name for herself with taboo tripping choreo and relentlessly physical performances. Partner of big time curator Adam Szymczyk, Bachzetsis’ work is giving stripper heels, dog masks, sheet masks, robot hoovers, waders, thongs and sardonic selfies. Catnip for those in the know, get your tickets for the performance quick x

Some final words of advice

In the first 15 minutes of our first Frieze, an over-zealous Italian collector invited us to visit him at his mozzarella farm in Tuscany. In the darkest times of our Frieze Weeks since we have held on to this distant invitation. If it all goes tits up, there’s always cheese farming.

You’ll curse the queue, but looking back it’ll be the best bit of the night. Relish every celebrity sighting; embrace that three-way snog at The Edition; remember, nothing good happens after 2 am (except on weekends). There’s a proverb about that, probably.

Bon appétit babies!