Frieze Masters review – for the billionaire who has everything, what about a Magritte?

Regent’s Park, London
Bacon, Dalí, a relief from ancient Persepolis … this treasure trove of classical and modern masterpieces is dazzling, then exhausting – and finally sickening

What do you feel about money? Is it sexy, beautiful, sublime? Or disgusting?

Like a giant conceptual artwork, the Frieze Masters art fair forces you to evaluate your attitude to obscene wealth. So much of the time, we talk about 21st-century society in abstractions. It’s all very well going on about “the 1%” and producing data that shows inequality is twisting our world out of shape. The organisers of Frieze have done something much more graphic and useful. They have put the reality of money on display so we can walk among the 1%, study the art that’s theirs to buy, and make a choice. Do we go along with this or not? Is it fun, or is it all a bit … repulsive?

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