Frieze Los Angeles Debuts with 70 Galleries and Star-Studded VIP Day

Frieze Los Angeles held its inaugural edition from February 15 to 17, 2019, in a white tent pavilion designed by Kulapat Yantrasast of wHY Architects, set in a former water tank. The fair featured 70 galleries, including emerging ones subsidized by the government, alongside established names like Gagosian, Lisson, White Cube, Maureen Paley, and three Italian galleries: Franco Noero, Massimo de Carlo, and Kaufmann Repetto. Bettina Korek served as official curator. VIP day on a rainy Valentine's Day attracted celebrities Brad Pitt, Sylvester Stallone, Jodie Foster, and Leonardo DiCaprio. Frieze Projects, curated by Ali Subotnick, took place on the Paramount Studios backlot, a fake early-20th-century New York street, with works by Tino Sehgal, Barbara Kruger, Lisa Anne Auerbach, and Tom Pope. Concurrently, the city organized 12 art itineraries, and the Brutally Early Club hosted by Klaus Biesenbach and Hans Ulrich Obrist met at 6 a.m. at MOCA. The same weekend, the FELIX art fair debuted at the Roosevelt Hotel, inspired by 1990s hotel fairs like Gramercy International.