The Family Acid, Joan Didion in Berkeley, 1972 Chromogenic print, 20 x 24 inches. Courtesy Benrubi Gallery, New York.

For the past thirty-six years, the AIPAD Photography Show in New York has championed the photographic medium as well as the dealers who specialize in the field. Organized by the Association of International Photography Art Dealers (AIPAD), the show, which has emerged as one of the most highly anticipated (and most stylish) annual photography events in the world, is the longest-running exhibition dedicated to the medium.

Paulette Tavormina, Italian Plums, After GG, 2015. Courtesy Robert Klein Gallery.

Held from April 14-17, this year marks a bittersweet milestone for the AIPAD Show as it will be the last iteration hosted at the Park Avenue Armory.  Back in February, the show announced that it would be relocating to Pier 94 in 2017, shortly after the Armory revealed plans to focus on its role as a performance venue. The event, which started as a table-top hotel fair, moved to the historic Armory in 2006.

Lucien Clergue Zebra Nude, NY, 1997. Gelatin silver print, 23 1/4 x 17 3/4 in. Edition of x, with AP GF. Signed in ink on recto and verso. Courtesy of Throckmorton Fine Art.

This year’s AIPAD Show features over eighty-five of the world’s top fine art photography galleries, including Robert Klein Gallery, Throckmorton Fine Art, and Peter Fetterman Gallery. Works on view span from the nineteenth-century to the present day, providing a sweeping view of the medium. According to gallerist Robert Klein, who has been exhibiting at the show since its inception and served as the President of AIPAD for twelve years, there’s truly nothing like it. He says, “AIPAD attracts the most knowledgeable photography collectors and it's in the most elegant building on the wealthiest block that's populated with the most sophisticated people in New York.”

In addition to photographs, the AIPAD Show presents photo-based art, new media, and video. Catherine Edelman, President of AIPAD and Director of the Catherine Edelman Gallery, says, “The Photography Show presented by AIPAD attracts the largest group of collectors interested in photography in the U.S. They rely on AIPAD for exposure to the most talented artists working in photography today as well as important photography from all time periods.”

The AIPAD Show has earned a reputation as the ideal venue for unveiling recently discovered works thanks to its passionate and informed audience. This year, Richard Moore Photographs of Oakland, California, will debut a newly discovered work by the Italian photographer Tina Modotti. Made in Berlin in 1930, shortly after the artist was exiled from Mexico due to her political beliefs, the work is one of only a few photographs from this period in Modotti’s career still in existence.

Ysabel LeMay, Eve, 2015 Digital chromogenic dye print, 48 x 54 inches. Courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.

Among the show’s myriad other highlights is another Tina Modotti photograph offered by Throckmorton Fine Art, which will also present works by Edward Weston, Lucien Clergue, Ruven Afanador, and Nickolas Muray; a selection of modern and contemporary works, including photographs by Horst P. Horst, Bill Jacobson, Cig Harvey, Gohar Dashti, and Paulette Tavormina, offered by Robert Klein Gallery; a three-color lithograph by John Baldessari offered by Barry Singer Gallery; a magically surreal landscape by Ysabel LeMay offered by Catherine Edelman Gallery; and a nineteenth century daguerreotype by the early photographer J. Newman.

John Baldessari, Blue Boy (with yellow boy: one with Hawaiian tie, one in dark), 1989. Three color lithograph, 20 x 24 inches. Courtesy Barry Singer Gallery, Petaluma, CA.

As usual, the AIPAD Photography Show will kick off with a glamorous and likely celebrity-studded Opening Night Preview (last year’s attendees included Chris Rock, Gary Oldman, and Naomi Campbell) on Wednesday, April 13. For more information, click HERE.