Ah, the Many Smells of Frieze London
Among them champagne, new money, and an artist’s custom-scented bathroom installations.
LONDON — Yesterday, October 14, the international art world descended on Regent’s Park for the opening of this year’s edition of Frieze London, where they mingled, sipped on Ruinart champagne and spent lots of money. A visitor, coincidentally dressed to match an orange-and-black sculpture by Teresa Solar Abboud, reaffirmed that the preview day was as much about seeing art as it was about being seen.
In many ways, the 2026 edition is a typical offering. There was the obligatory mirrored artwork-slash-selfie spot, this time in the form of Anish Kapoor’s stainless-steel “Green and Brandy.” There were indeterminate objects lying on the carpeted floors, which could either be works of searing socio-political commentary or discarded wrappers from someone’s overpriced sandwich. There were lots and lots and lots of paintings.
A novel feature of this fair — and perhaps any art fair in history — were the loo-based installations taking the form of “urinal cakes and toilet rim blocks” that are intended to “diffuse a custom scent invoking the smells of Gray Wielebinski’s studio.” Frieze commissioned the artist to conceptualize the olfactory installations for its bathrooms, which were produced by the creative studio Dean's Bottom. Maybe it was the early symptom of a fair-week cold, but I personally couldn’t detect the “notes of pencil shavings, paint, dust and sweat.” Still, though, top marks for originality.
