Cristina Nualart – Art Trends at Hong Kong Art Basel 2013

Foreword from Hanoi Grapevine:

“Art Fair”, “Art Basel”, “Art Stage”, “Art Expo”, “Art Show”, etc. Different names but same meaning – a commercial fair for visual arts where artists, critics, gallerists, art dealers, art collectors, art lovers gather to look, to love, to hate, to criticize and to buy art. Imagine a huge exhibition where galleries come together from both inside and outside a country to display the best artworks by their best artists!

Besides world-leading Art Fairs in Europe and the US such as Art Basel in Basel (Switzerland), Art Fair London (UK), Art Basel Miami (US), there are also many stages currently arising in Asia. For example, Art Fair New Delhi (India), Art Dubai (UAE) and the former Hong Kong Art Fair (newly rebranded to Hong Kong Art Basel as of this year). Even in South East Asia, there are also the famous Singapore Art Stage and the Malaysia Art Expo.

This type of art promotion has long been popular worldwide, however, in Vietnam the term is still vaguely understood, simply because there has been nothing as such in the country.

Now, thanks to our artist guest writer Cristina Nualart, who has just returned to HCMC from Art Basel Hong Kong 2013, we can take a look into an internationally-known art playground.

Read her opinion piece and see photos of the artworks displayed below:

Source: Cristina Nualart – Art Trends at Hong Kong Art Basel 2013

After 5 years of rapid growth the Hong Kong Art Fair this year was rebranded Hong Kong Art Basel. The space is the same, but the price of the entrance ticket has gone up – that’s what branding does. The art fair, a commercial initiative that showcases artwork from Western and Eastern galleries in equal measure, has expanded its reach with additional talks and city-wide events.

Intelligence Squared sparked off ideas with a debate on the value of art. Matthew Collings did a great job as a speaker, and the moderator was excellent, but the best contribution came from the man in the audience who told panelist Amy Capellazzo that her arguments for the market being the best judge of art had ruined, for him, the magic of the wonderful art in the fair!

Hong Kong’s art fair is popular in every sense of the word. Weaving one’s way between $20-a-glass champagne stalls and children’s buggies, some themes seemed to resurface intermittently amongst the 2 floors of world galleries. Here is an illustrated overview:

Brains

That thinking machine of ours is probably making a frequent appearance to remind us not to leave all intellectual activity to the automated machines.

Tapestry

In 2008, as all things craft were exploding in popularity, a contemporary tapestry exhibition in England led some of the world’s best known artists back to this technique which had been almost forgotten after the Renaissance. A number of examples of the thread weaving art dotted the Asian art fair.

Glitter, beading, rhinestones and other bling

Was it the rise of new money, the influence of different cultures on the global catwalk or a defiance of austerity? Whatever the reason, bling has been giving a shine to the art market in the last decade.

Collage

Along with action painting, collage seems to be one of those inexhaustibly inspiring 20th century inventions.
Pietro Ruffo’s photographic collage of an islamic patterned globe is captivating because of the 3D effect achieved by using pins to hold each shape in place.

Even some sculptures are a collage, such as the shopping trolley full of scrap metal, Wagon (miles and miles), by Ida Ekblad, or the porcelain pieces by Francesca DiMattio below:

Juicy Abstract paintings

Polyester resin (that glass-like chemical substance that Vietnamese tourist shops pass off as ‘lacquer’) or thickly dripped enamel make for a candy-gloss surface.

But the artwork that made most people smile was not in the exhibition centre, it floated happily in Hong Kong bay: Florentijn Hofman’s Rubber Duck

* Some factual notes:

Art Basel Hong Kong 2013 took place from 23 – 26 May at Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. 245 galleries from 35 countries were showcased, presenting more than 2000 artists from all over the world. Entrance fee was $25 per day.

And the second edition of Art Basel Hong Kong will be organized in 15 – 18 May 2014.