“Mary Poppins†by Joana Vasconcelos.MAASTRICHT, the Netherlands â€" As floods of collectors began pouring into the cavernous convention center here for the invitation-only opening of the European Fine Art Fair on Thursday afternoon, the first artwork they encountered was a bit confounding. Called “Mary Poppins,’’ it is a monumental and wildly colorful hanging creature with elongated arms and a strangely organic body that hangs, chandelier-like, at the fair’s entrance.
The work of the Portuguese artist Joana Vasconcelos, it is fashioned from a patchwork of handmade woolen knitting and crohet, found fabrics, mass-produced objects and polyester.
Ms. Vasconcelos, who was born in 1971, was the first woman and the youngest artist to show at the Versailles palace known as the Grand Trianon where “Mary Poppins,†hung last summer, one of 15 artworks on view there as part of its four-year-old contemporary art program.
The work’s appearance in Maastricht has drawn mixed reviews. James Roundell, a London dealer who is on the fair’s executive committee, said it was chosen “to be a wow, whether you love it or hate it.†He added, “You don’t want something nobody notices.’’
Notice they did. Many dealers (who refused to be quoted by name, for fear of angering the fair’s organizers) resorted to their annual name-calling. Last year “Cylinder II,’’ a computerized light installation by the American artist Leo Villareal that hung in ! the same spot, was christened “the disco inferno’’ or “the Las Vegas light show,†among other, far less polite names.
This year “Mary Poppins’’ has not exactly gone down like a spoonful of sugar. In addition to some unprintable descriptions, one dealer said: “It looks like a piñata. I think we should all be given bamboo sticks so we can take a good whack at it.’’ For those who disagree “Mary Poppins,†like everything at this fair, is for sale. The asking price is 300,000 euros or about $389,000.
