The Hamptons Fine Art fair is back, and once again it is the only art fair on the East End summer landscape. Rick Freidman must be doing something right. He founded and ran ArtHamptons, the region’s first such event, 18 years ago, sold it in 2018, re-emerged with a virtual fair in 2020, and launched the Hamptons Fine Art Fair a year later.
This year’s iteration, the largest ever, opens today with 150 galleries in a 70,000-square-foot pavilion complex on the Southampton Fairgrounds, 605 County Road 39. To accommodate those who want a head start, there will be two V.I.P. openings today, one from 2 to 6 p.m. that will benefit Guild Hall, the other from 6 to 9:30, a benefit for the Parrish Art Museum. Tickets are $200.
One fair highlight will be the induction ceremony for the Hamptons Artists Hall of Fame, which will happen on Saturday morning at 11:30 in the Collectors Lounge. This year’s honorees are Herman Cherry (1909-1992), Connie Fox (1925-2023), William King (1925-2015), Elizabeth Strong-Cuevas (1929-2023), William Tarr (1925-2006), and Amy Zerner.
Tarr’s work will be on view in the William Tarr Art Gallery, whose booth has been established by his son, the artist Nick Tarr. For many years Tarr divided his time between Springs and SoHo, before moving to Sarasota, Fla., in 1997. His monumental sculptures include “The Gates of the Six Million,” which he built in his Springs studio; it can be seen at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.
Works by both Fox and King, who were married, are displayed in the booth of the Brooklyn-based Projects 28, organized in collaboration with Megan and Scott Chaskey. King is known especially for his elongated sculptures in steel, aluminum, and other materials, while Fox was a celebrated abstract painter.
Other artists with past or present East End connections whose work is on view at the fair are Oscar Molina (Oscar Molina Gallery, Southampton), Jeff Muhs (McNeil Art Group, Southampton), Dan Christensen, Jane Wilson, Robert Richenburg, and Ray Parker (Lawrence Fine Art, East Hampton), and Willem de Kooning, Perle Fine, Conrad Marca-Relli, and Robert Gwathmey (Vered/Roman Fine Art, Sag Harbor).
The fair will be open tomorrow and Saturday from 11 to 8, and Sunday from 11 to 6. Tickets are $50.
