In a twist, the key moment of the festivities this week at Frieze London happened in a place that’s technically in Britain but generally considered American soil.

Last week, an email came not from the organizers of the long-running art fair owned by Ari Emanuel, but from the US State Department. “The Honorable Ambassador Jane Hartley of the Embassy of the United States of America cordially invites Mr. Nate Freeman to a reception with Frieze celebrating U.S.-UK cultural ties,” went the cryptic invitation from a state.gov address. I accepted. On Wednesday in London, after spending the day among posh socialites gawking at Carol Bove sculptures at Frieze London and collectors spending serious coinage on paintings at Frieze Masters—including $8.5 million on an Arshile Gorky painting at the Hauser & Wirth booth—I took a stroll around the edge of Regent’s Park, following the instructions of the invite.

After 20 minutes, there was Winfield House, the sprawling home of the American ambassador to the Court of St. James since the 1950s, with a tall forest in front to hide visiting heads of state. Past the 15-foot iron-wrought fence was a long path lined with American flags that led to a grass tennis court, a 35-room mansion, and the largest garden in London this side of Buckingham Palace. And it’s spread out on a 12-acre country estate that was once King Henry VIII’s hunting grounds, leased to the Americans through 2053 by the Crown Estate.

“We must have been on really good terms when we gave you this house,” said Katherine Brinson, the British-born, New York–based curator of contemporary art at the Guggenheim, as we strolled through the halls. Servers wheeled around canapés that would make a homesick Yankee swoon—finger-food quesadillas, BBQ-sauce-slathered meatballs—along with, in a truly patriotic touch, pours of Kentucky bourbon alongside the red and white wine. In the back of the foyer, French doors lead out to a gigantic lawn at dusk.

“That’s where Biden’s helicopter lands,” said the collector and philanthropist Ralph Segreti, who is London-based but American-born.

As he explained, Ambassador Hartley was directly involved in picking the art on the walls, which changes as one regime replaces another. (It’s unclear which artists loaned works to former president Donald Trump’s appointee to the court of St. James, billionaire Jets owner Woody Johnson, who was busy back home this week.) As guests enter, two massive juicy Willem de Kooning canvases greet them on either side, the state dining room’s wooden table faces Ellsworth Kelly’s Blue Curve, and the sitting room has a suite of Josef Albers works. Hanging elsewhere are Cecily Brown’s The Garden of Forgetfulness and Mark Bradford’s Lazy Parades, both plucked by the artists from their personal collections.



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