MARFA — The Marfa Invitational announced plans last week for a VIP gala and sculpture park opening in Marfa May 10-12.
The Marfa Invitational is an art fair founded in 2019 that traditionally takes place the first weekend of May, showcasing a variety of gallerists at Saint George Hall. It is unclear whether a full-on fair, complete with the gallerists booths, will take place this year; Marfa Invitational Founder and Director Michael Phelan did not respond to requests for comment.
In an email blast sent out last week, Phelan announced that a VIP gala focusing on the opening of Marfa Invitational’s sculpture park will be held in mid-May. The invitational began showcasing outdoor sculpture on five acres just east of Marfa in 2022 and has since received a number of permanent gifts from artists, including Matt Johnson’s Sleeping Figure as well as works by artists Rana Begum and Sam Falls.
The VIP gala, for which tickets are $500 and $300 for tri-county residents, will include “cocktail soirées, artist talks, and dinners under the West Texas stars,” per Phelan’s announcement. Public open hours are also planned for the sculpture garden that weekend.
The announcement states that in addition to sculpture park viewing, two solo exhibitions by Jeremy Booth and Camilla Engström exploring the theme of the landscape will be held at the old mercantile building in Valentine — “a stone’s throw from Elmgreen and Dragset’s Prada Marfa.”
Engström will also be the Marfa Invitational’s 2024 “billboard artist,” and her work is featured on a billboard on the sculpture park property facing the highway. Last week’s announcement states a performance by Noah Faulkner, a Texas teen known for pedal steel guitar, will be taking place.
The May event announcement comes on the heels of Marfa Invitational’s loss, then regaining, of its nonprofit status and allegations from a former Marfa Invitational board advisor that Phelan misused donated funds, intended for a foundation building on the sculpture park grounds, for personal expenses.