Alice Neel at Victoria Miro, all images via Art Observed
Once again opening in the early weeks of summer in the Swiss city of Basel, the Art Basel art fair kicked off its opening previews early this week, with crowds flocking to the Messe Basel for another week of works on view, films, talks, and other projects. Preparing for its public opening with an expansive offering of works from European galleries and those further afield, the fair continues its reputation as a flagship for the international fair brand, with over 200 leading galleries and more than 4,000 artists from five continents.
Danielle Orchard at Perrotin
Spread out across the cavernous halls of the Messe Basel, this year’s edition of the fair’s Swiss flagship continues its run with another dynamic string of shows and special projects, from talks to films, sculpture to painting, and anything in between, compiling a broad range of works that underscore the breadth and diversity of the current art landscape. At David Zwirner, the gallery was presenting a range of works by Yayoi Kusama, following up on the artist’s current show with the gallery, while at Galerie Jocelyn Wolff, one could view a selection of pieces including commanding work by painter Miriam Cahn. Also of note was a powerful Alice Neel on view at Victoria Miro Gallery, a side profile in blue and white that emphasized the painter’s mastery of detail and light. Other highlights came from Perrotin, where the gallery was showing a selection of works by Chen Ke, Danielle Orchard, and more, while over at Clearing, one could peruse works by artists Hugh Hayden, Harold Ancart, and more.
Hugh Hayden at Clearing
Miriam Cahn at Jocelyn Wolff
Sigmar Polke at Michael Werner
Over at the fair’s Unlimited section, which opened yesterday, galleries were returning to the much-loved section of the fair drawing on the Messe Basel’s immense halls, and embracing the large-scale and monumental as a prompt for the works on view. At Gagosian, for instance, the gallery was presenting a string of photographs by the luminary Richard Avedon, spanning a large swath of space and confronting the viewer with their large scale, while at a joint booth presented by a string of galleries, Jean-Marie Appriou had constructed an immense sailing ship in the center of the gallery, a challenging work that continued the artist’s mining of modern and antiquated constructions of reality and myth. Meanwhile, at Pace, one could peruse Robert Irwin’s impressive constructions of light and space, attentive arrangements that drew much from the scale and time offered for viewing the works.
Robert Irwin at Pace
Jean-Marie Appriou presented jointly by Perrotin, Clearing, Massimo di Carlo and Eva Presenhuber
Francis Upritchard at Anton kern
Over the course of the fair’s dauntingly huge install, the sense of an art world gathering back together was particularly well felt, especially in consideration of the fair’s assorted satellites happening around the city. With Art Basel back operating at full capacity, some things seem to have returned to something of a normal state.
The fair closes June 18th.
– D. Creahan
Read more:
Art Basel [Exhibition Site]
