This year's, third consecutive, modern art fair Art15 had been declared to be a global forum with the world's widest representation. The declaration of the organizers appeared to be true – this year 150 galleries from 40 countries took part and represented artists from 60 countries from around the world.
The modern art fair, launched in 2013 and taking place on the last days of winter, changed its schedule this time, having moved in the art-calendar from February to late May. This year the headliner was Kate Bryan, who had previously headed the Cat Street Gallery in Hong Kong.
The fair's global reach and a large number of young galleries is a distinctive feature of the Art15. The participation of a fairly large number of young galleries of up to 5 years-old and for the first time taking part in such a top-level event, together with the extremely high status of the exposition forum may be counted as the Art15's innovation. Two curatorial sections were assigned for them specifically, which allowed for showing the art-market a whole bouquet of new art names that had not previously been introduced to the global modern art community. One of the sections was headed by the manager of the Birmingham Icon gallery Jonathan Watkins, the other – by the head of the Delfina Foundation Aaron Cezar.
Perhaps, this is the first time in the recent few decades, when British gallerists and visitors of the Art15 acquainted themselves in such a short time with such a broad spectrum of young artists, which had not yet established themselves in the global market.
One of the trends, emphasized by this year’s fair is the sweeping increase in the audience, which became apparent already last year, when the overwhelming success of the Art14 attracted 31.000 visitors and 6.000 VIP guests. This year’s fair has only consolidated the trend, by which the British art-market has achieved an incredible success, when museums and galleries have beaten the attendance at football games in terms of popularity.
Another bright trend is the yet again increasing representation of Asian artists, which has been invariably going down in recent years. Notably, at the Art15 this representation grew owing to the countries that had not yet been widely represented in the global art-market. The growing Asian presence added to the unexpected for many participation of Nigerian artists, spectacularly represented by a Nigerian Omenka gallery as well as a number of art-dealers from other countries.
At the latest fair has become apparent how the market may expand further – that is by attracting new artists from Eastern Europe and Latin America, which were quite poorly represented at the Art15, but nevertheless indicating a high potential.
The backside of the Art15's advantages was the expansion of the kitsch segment in galleries' expositions. The domination of “pretty” works radically crowded out the projects, based on a rigid concept. Most likely, this is an effect of the audience’s weariness of the past years’ fairs, which were loaded with conceptual art. But this might have been a blessing in disguise, and we cannot rule out that it is precisely for that reasons that the fair saw the growth in attendance.
By a number of offers and the immediate reaction of buyers to the artworks the “seasonal” preferences of the audience became apparent. This refers to pictorial and photographic images of empty interiors, like the works by Helene Schmitz, exhibited by the French Galerie Maria Lund; Massimo Giannoni from the Italian-Turkish Galleria Russo; or Nicolas Feldmeyer represented by the British Maddox Arts gallery.
On the other hand, especially popular turned out to be small sculpture works, which were actively purchased across the prie range. An excellent example of that could be Barcelona's 3 Punts Galeria, which manage to sell nearly its whole exhibition, based on the works by Gerard Mas, Jose Cobo and Samuel Salcedo. Hand in hand with the 3 Punts went the Japanese Tezukayama Gallery, which sold all the sculptures by Yoshiyuki Ooe that were put up on offer.
The extremely broad supply of this year's fair, a record-breaking attendance and large part of the works put out for sale at moderate prices could entirely provoke an emergence of a new trend in the British art-market, while the number of people purchasing art may grow radically. This certainly would broaden the kitsch segment of the modern art field, but will also have a positive impact on structural changes in the art-market. There is only one question left: will all the remaining art-fairs of the season consolidate this trend?
21-23 May – Olympia
Li Chen. Sky
Asia Art Center, Taiwan
Promotesh Das Pulak. Progressiv – 1
Galeria Maria Lund, France
Helene Schmitz, Earthworks
Galeria Maria Lund, France
Graciella Sacco, Series Tension Admisible
Diana Lowenstein Gallery, USA
Jean Charles de Menezes Borne. Aloft by Joy Gardner & Stephen Lawrence
Omenka Gallery, Nigeria
Nengi Omuku. I Can’t Feel My Legs
Omenka Gallery, Nigeria
Hu Weiyi. Flirt
Space Station, China
Double Fly. Klein Blue
Space Station, China
Jose-Maria Cano. Renminbi
Lin & Lin Gallery, Taiwan/China
Rero. Digital Dark Age
Lin & Lin Gallery, Taiwan/China
Adel Quraishi. A Poet
The Park Gallery, UK
Adel Quraishi. The Bedouin
The Park Gallery, UK
Sam Havadtoy. Love Is Hell
Kalman Maklary Fine Arts, Hungary
Sam Havadtoy. Mickey
Kalman Maklary Fine Arts, Hungary
Jame McGrath. Falling Flowers Mirror – 1
Olsen Irwin, Australia
Louise Olsen. Liquid Moon
Olsen Irwin, Australia
Patrick Hughes. New York, New York, New York
Flowers Gallery, UK/USA
Tai-Shan Schierenberg. Capitaine
Flowers Gallery, UK/USA
Edward Burtynsky. Rice Terraces #4
Flowers Gallery, UK/USA
Tommaso Ottieri. Scala
Galleria Russo, Italy/Turkey
Massimo Giannoni. Library
Galleria Russo, Italy/Turkey
Banksy. Kill Mom?
Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art, UK
Yan Pei-Ming. Contrat non Execute
Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art, UK
Julian Ople. Sara Gets Undressed
Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art, UK
Yigal Ozeri. Aquabella
Zemack Contemporary Art, Israel
Philippe Pasqua. Skull
Zemack Contemporary Art, Israel
Jonas Gasiunas. End of Romanticism
Meno Parkas, Lithuania
Natasha Peel. Dimensions Variable
Piano Nobile, UK
Natasha Peel. Velour Incandescence
Piano Nobile, UK
Desire Obtain Cherish. We Are Known By The Company We Keep
UNIX Gallery, USA
Desire Obtain Cherish. Yeah, I Keep Up
UNIX Gallery, USA
Engels. I Don’t Know Why
UNIX Gallery, USA
Kwangho Shin. Untitled #15
UNIX Gallery, USA
Humans Since 1982. Unique In White
Dillon Gallery, USA
Rado Kirov. Cube
Courtesy of Albemarle Gallery, UK
Nicolas Feldmeyer. The Sun In An Empty Room
Maddox Arts, UK
Dominic Harris. Flutter Wall
Priveekollektie Contemporary Art | Design, Netherlands
Reiner Bosch. Bang
Priveekollektie Contemporary Art | Design, Netherlands
Joshua Yeldham. Owl of Yeoman’s Bay
The Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong
El Anatsui. Timespace
October Gallery, UK
Lee Chen-Dao. Tender VI & Tender VII
AKI Gallery, Taiwan
Jin Feng. Rehearsal
Tang Contemporary, Thailand/Hong Kong/China
Janet Laurence. Untitle
Dominik Mersch Gallery, Australia
Sokari Douglas-Camp. Untitle
October Gallery, UK
Lee Waisler. S.Freud
Sundaram Tagore Gallery, USA/Singapore/Hong Kong
Jacky Tsai. The Sun Rice On the West
The Fine Art Society, UK
Emily Young. Rouge de Vitrolles Head
The Fine Art Society, UK
Subodh Gupta. Cheap Rice
Omer Tiroche Contemporary Art, UK
Cedric Christie. Malevich / Richter / Picasso
Jealous, UK
Tim Etchells. Wait Here
Jenkins Johnson Gallery, USA
Gerard Mas. Lady of Bubblegum / Broccoli
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Jose Cobo. Child Crawling Turning Up-Down
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Samuel Salcedo. Animal Thrills I, II, III
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Samuel Salcedo. Objects In the Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Samuel Salcedo. Dress Code
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Samuel Salcedo. Beauty Contest
3 Punts Galeria, Spain/Germany
Tim Shaw. The Blind Whislter
Millennium, UK
Hossein Edalatkhah. Untitle
Galerie Frank Pages, Switzerland/Germany
Hiroto Kitagawa. Untitle
Yoshiaki Inoue Gallery, Japan
Yoshiyuki Ooe. Newspaper #2
Tezukayama Gallery, Japan
Yoshiyuki Ooe. Hunter
Tezukayama Gallery, Japan