Art Basel Hong Kong 2024
This year the 11th edition of the Art Basel Hong Kong art fair returns to full scale featuring 242 premier international galleries and a vibrant program both within and beyond the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. The list includes the 69 galleries that had taken a hiatus and 23 newcomers.
As the key strategic cultural hub in Asia and Asia Pacific, the city plays an important role in bridging the evolving art landscape across regions. This year's predominance of the new generation reflects an emerging trend across Asia, as young buyers make their presence known.
According to the 8th annual Global Art Market Report, published by UBS and Art Basel earlier, “significant numbers of new, young and ambitious collectors are entering the market, particularly in China, with events like art fairs forming a pipeline of business for dealers and gallerists”, and the art fair in HK has proved such.
Discoveries, dedicated to solo presentations by emerging artists, featured 22 galleries. Several presentations tackled the complex topics of urban development and the shifting nature of public space in the modern age.
Dedicated to artists hailing from Asia and the Asia-Pacific region, the Insights sector featured 20 galleries, with a strong focus on historical presentations. The sector also featured Western galleries whose programs were dedicated to artistic production from Asia and the Middle East, as well as Middle Eastern galleries shedding light on their region’s art scenes.
This year’s Kabinett sector, staged within galleries’ main booths, featured a record 33 galleries. There was again a strong focus on solo projects from the Asia Pacific region. First introduced in 2013, Encounters section this year, was curated by Alexie Glass-Cantor, the executive director of Artspace Sydney. It featured 16 large-scale projects from global artists from Australia’s Namimapu Maymuru-White to India’s Jitish Kallat.