International art and design fair Spring Masters New York will return to the historic Park Avenue Armory from Friday, May 6 through Monday, May 9, 2016. The fair will feature over 60 leading dealers of fine art, design, furniture and jewelry within a unique hexagonal exhibition layout, fostering a dialogue between the diverse periods, styles and mediums on view.

Since its inaugural edition in May 2014, Spring Masters has established itself as an important destination on the art world calendar, providing a high-quality fair focusing on connoisseurship and a rich breadth of material on view during the peak of the spring art season in New York. Spring Masters’ gallery installations are curated, regardless of the period of art sold, to fit within the aesthetic lens of 21st century collecting tastes.

The creativity and innovation that Directors Michael Plummer and Jeff Rabin of Artvest Partners brought to the New York fair scene with Spring Masters attracted the interest of TEFAF | Maastricht, the world's foremost fair of art, antiques and design presented annually in Maastricht, Netherlands. Following this year’s third edition of Spring Masters, Plummer and Rabin are using their extensive experience with collectors, galleries and museums to transition from Spring Masters and present a new joint venture with TEFAF in New York City at the Park Avenue Armory. They will present two new fairs annually: TEFAF | New York | Fall will premiere in October 2016 and focus on art from antiquity through the mid 20th century and TEFAF | New York | Spring will premiere in May 2017 with an emphasis on modern and contemporary art and design.

"Spring Masters New York was established to fill a need for a high-end, secondary market fair event during one of the most active weeks on the city’s arts calendar. We have been rewarded with quick success, and dedicated collectors now make it a destination when they travel to New York for the Evening Auctions. With both the announcement of our new partnership with TEFAF and our most dynamic mix of exhibitors yet, 2016 will be even more of a ‘must-visit’ event than in years past,” comments Jeff Rabin, co-Director of Spring Masters.

Exhibitors in the 2016 edition of Spring Masters plan to mount their best exhibitions in anticipation of possible participation in the future TEFAF | New York fairs. Spring Masters will feature a selection of exceptional works, from antique and modern tapestries presented by Vojtech Blau to 17th and 18th century white marble busts showcased by Tomasso Brothers Fine Art to French and European masterpieces displayed by Didier Aaron. Osborne Samuel will present an abstract bronze composition by renowned sculptor Lynn Chadwick, while Galerie Lefebvre’s booth will highlight works by Jean Dunand, Bernard Boutet de Monvel, Jean Pascaud, and others. The booth of Bernard Goldberg Fine Arts will be dedicated exclusively to lifetime casts by Gaston Lachaise. Further adding to the diversity of the objects on offer, Spring Masters is welcoming several new exhibitors, including Yufuku Gallery, Sladmore, and Sundaram Tagore.

The vibrant eclecticism of the range of periods on view at Spring Masters is boldly offset by the incomparable use of the Park Avenue Armory Drill Hall through architect Rafael Viñoly’s design, creating vistas and juxtapositions unlike any other art fair in the world. The fair’s signature hexagonal booths create unexpected dialogues between painting, sculpture, and design objects, encouraging a sense of discovery and aligning with the collector’s preference of cross-collecting. 

“2016 is going to be known as the year of ‘selectivity’ in the art world given larger global economic and political dynamics – a return to connoisseurship, and more established styles, periods and artists. Spring Masters, as a young and agile fair, has the ability to adapt quickly to this new fast-changing collecting environment. Moreover, despite this shift in the global marketplace, New York still remains the most vigorous city at the center of it,” commented Michael Plummer, co-Director of Spring Masters.

The fair will feature expertly curated and thoroughly vetted presentations by dealers from across the globe. The full exhibitor list will be announced in March 2016.