Art Basel, the great contemporary art fair, opens its 2022 edition to the public on Thursday June 16 (June 14 to professionals), in a more favorable climate for the market, after two years turned upside down by the pandemic. About 290 galleries, among the most prestigious and from around forty countries, will exhibit their finest pieces to wealthy collectors for whom the Basel fair is one of the major unmissable events for contemporary art.
The greatest signatures of contemporary art, including the Franco-American sculptor Louise Bourgeois and the German painter Gerhard Richter, will be exhibited for sale alongside works by young artists such as the British Thomas J. Price, the American Theaster Gates or his compatriot Kennedy Yanko. The Russian feminist collective Pussy Riots will also be part of a punk concert on Tuesday evening organized with the support of the fair to give a voice to these activists who are very critical of Vladimir Putin’s regime. Donations collected during the event will be donated to a children’s hospital in Ukraine.
Reduced to an online edition in 2020, then postponed to September in 2021 due to health restrictions, the Basel art fair should this year approach its pre-pandemic splendor, to once again become the showcase for the market of contemporary art. “I expect a very enthusiastic atmosphere“, presaged Hans Laenen, head of clientele for Asia Pacific and Europe at Axa XL, the branch of the insurance group specializing in the art market during an interview with AFP.
This edition is going to bethe first real fair“, “without restrictions“, where visitors will be able to take full advantage of the entertainment, he underlines, noting that “the feeling among gallery owners is rather optimistic“. After a 22% drop in 2020, the art market experienced a sharp rebound of 29% in 2021 to rise to 65.1 billion dollars (62.4 billion euros), according to Clare McAndrew, a specialist in the art market, which publishes an annual report for the Basel fair.
While this rebound mainly benefited auction houses, art galleries also saw their sales recover by 18%, to $34.7 billion, while remaining below their 2019 levels. But according to Hans Laenen, records at auction contribute to creating a climate of trust for collectors who also make their purchases from major galleries. The time is also when art could regain its status as a safe haven in the face of the war in Ukraine, the turmoil on the stock market and the tightening of monetary policies in an attempt to curb inflation. “All the ingredients are there for the Basel fair to be a great success“, according to him.
Basel is the historical cradle of this fair which has since expanded by organizing an event each year in Hong Kong and Miami, and is due to take over from the Fiac in Paris next October. This edition in Basel, the city where the artist Jean Tingely grew up, will be an opportunity for the organizers to demonstrate their know-how while the change of organizer had the effect of a thunderclap in the world. of Parisian art.
During the event, the city on the banks of the Rhine always vibrates to the rhythm of the fair, with numerous artistic events being added to take advantage of the arrival of wealthy collectors. Among other things, the Beyeler Foundation, named after a famous Basel art dealer, will pay tribute to Ukrainian artists by displaying works by photographer Boris Mikhailov across the city.
The Basel fair will open its doors to the public from June 16 to 19 after two and a half days reserved for collectors.