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| Installation view, Hauser & Wirth, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
However, its organizers definitely confronted more challenges than their counterparts in Basel and Miami. Whereas most travel restrictions are lifted in the west, stringent hotel quarantine measures for inbound travellers (from 7 to 14 days) deter overseas collectors from flying to Hong Kong. Moreover, coincided with the severe lockdown in Omicron-strained Shanghai and later Beijing during the fair period, many affluent collectors cooped up in Mainland China did fail to turn up in person.
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| Installation view, Kaikai Kiki Gallery, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
An increasing number of collectors particular millennials are growing more adaptive to the hybrid format, i.e. online viewing digital platforms alongside the physical show. The so-called satellite booths, trialled last year to circumvent travel restrictions, have become the norm.
This year's event had 75 galleries from mainland China and overseas, up from 57 last year, and attended by docent-like local assistants recruited by Art Basel to greet booth visitors. Accompanied by immediate Whatsapp, Wechat or Zoom meetings with the oversea gallerists, making a deal was not impossible.
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After all, there were some outstanding booths and works which deserved a mention.
David Zwirner, with a setup in Hong Kong since 2018, juxtaposed late minimalist master Dan Flavin's sombre fluorescent light sculpture with the cheerful paintings of Katherine Bernhardt. Crescent Lunge and Warrior II, made with colourful spray paint in 2021, imagined a mischievous Pink Panther practising yoga poses. Elsewhere in the booth, paintings of Nate Lawman, Oscar Murillo, Jordan Wolfson and Lisa Yuskavage extended this mood of contemplation and resilience.
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In Lehmann Maupin's booth, a nearly 33-foot-high stainless steel sculpture of American artist Tom Friedman's Looking Up stood at a prominent corner. Visitors were invited to scan a QR code and activated an interactive augmented reality (AR) experience with the futuristic sculpture. The application helped to ignite passion and joy while walking through the halls and encountering new art pieces. Following this AR debut in Art Basel, the gallery will launch a series of multi-city and multi-venue presentations of the artist's sculptural work.
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In its satellite booth, Neugerriemschneider curated a three-artist show, exploring the interwoven issue of sustainability, social interaction and human dialogues. Acclaimed Thai artist Rirkrit Tiravanija's Ping-pong table silkscreened with "Tomorrow is the question" in Chinese text (明天才是問題) occupied the centre of the booth. The playful installation is a new edition to his ongoing series referencing Slovak artist Július Koller's 1970 work Ping-Pong Society which celebrates human interactions. Adjacent to this work, Thomas Bayrle's print on canvas displaying small iterations of the table tennis game was discovered only after careful scrutiny. Tomás Saraceno's spider web prints symbolized the fragility of nature's ecosystem. Resonating with each other, their works contemplated our way forward in troubled and turbulent times.
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Installation view, Neugerriemschneider, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
Another highlight was Axel Vervoordt Gallery's Norio Imai solo show. The Japanese artist was the youngest member of Gutai, the most influential avant-garde collective of the postwar era from 1954 until its demise in 1972. Imai's multidisciplinary conceptual works — video, sculpture, photography — inform viewers of time and human existence as a material for art, signifying Gutai's impact on his art practice. "Daily Portraits" (1979 — ongoing) consists of his daily self-portrait taken with a polaroid camera, holding the picture from the previous day. His regular performance began in 1979 and continued as he aged and his hair turned grey. The artist is also synonymous with the immense white monochrome works symbolizing full emptiness. One can feel the experimental spirit and sublime beauty underpinning his works.
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| Installation view, Axel Vervoordt Gallery, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
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| Norio Imai Daily Portrait, 1979 -- ongoing Axel Vervoordt Gallery |
Meanwhile, the large-scale installations were undertaken by artists from Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong selected by a committee. Many works manifested a fine mix of traditional craftsmanship with contemporary art practices, such as performances with ink and the employment of cultural labour to manifest their conceptual work.
Acclaimed for his public art commissions, New York-based Ming Fay from Alisan Fine Arts presented "Garden of Life" (2022) with the concept of the garden as a metaphor for Utopia. A legendary money tree symbolizing affluence hung mid-air alongside a cluster of monumental fruit sculptures. Active in Hong Kong as a professor and artist in the 1960s, Ming Fay's work was regarded as a celebration of life and positive energy galvanized through connecting with nature.
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| Ming Fay Garden of Life, 2022 Alisan Fine Arts |
The gallery also presented Angel Hui Hoi-Kiu's Embroidery on Plastic Bags: Hong Kong Goldfish Street 2 (2021), mimicking an explorative journey through Hong Kong's Goldfish Street. Inside glittering aquariums were eighteen embroidered goldfish stitched on quotidian plastic bags. Working with the women embroiders from mainland China, Hui rediscovers HongKonger's identity while deepening her appreciation of traditional Chinese handicrafts.
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| Angel Hui Hoi-Kiu Embroidery on Plastic Bags: Hong Kong Goldfish Street 2, 2021 Alisan Fine Arts |
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| Angel Hui's embroidery goldfish in close-up. |
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Installation view, de Sarthe Gallery, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
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| Mak2 Home Sweet Home: Gang 5, 2022 de Sarthe Gallery |
Some newcomer gallery's booths, like Hong Kong-based Lucie Chang Fine Arts, were so jam-packed with local visitors that it was hard to walk through.
For its inauguration, its booth spotlighted Tsou Choi Tsang (1921-2007), the self-declared "Kowloon Emperor", with graffiti-style calligraphy signifying the urban cultural memory of Hong Kong. His enigmatic bold-stroked ink calligraphy on rice paper, sometimes in red or blue markers, repeatedly recounted his ancestral history of having righteous inheritance to the Kowloon peninsula, a major territory constituting Hong Kong. Mistaken as a street vandal and madman in the 1950s, Tsang was elevated to a cultural icon when his street calligraphy began to be displayed in exhibition spaces, including the resounding Venice Biennale in 2003.
The booth reimagined Tsang's elderly home studio, bringing this great legend back to life with his brushes and ink buckets displayed.
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| Installation view of the reimagined studio of Tsou Choi Tsang at Art Basel Hong Kong 2022(Photo: Courtesy LCFA) |
Another first-time participant Vin Gallery, from the Discoveries sector, unveiled Hanoi-based Vietnamese artist Giang Lê's works in a misty white setting. The artist's interpretation of the colonial history was told on bearly visible embossed prints, challenging the myth of a submissive exotic Indochina. A sound installation surrounded by a translucent tent with handmade embroidery painting, signature Vietnamese craft echoed such a note of resistance.
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| Installation view, Vin Gallery, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022. |
Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, a special digital certificate built on blockchain technology, have sparked much craze, particularly after the record-breaking $69 million Beeple's NFT sold at Christie in 2021.
It is noticeable that Pace has been committed to showcasing artists' NFTs projects. Their NFT highlights were unmissable as the hologram version of the Baton NFT was displayed in the booth to arouse interest and awareness. Created by Glenn Kaino, the Pass the Baton project pays tribute to Tommie Smith, the 1968 Olympics medalist who saluted for human rights. In addition, NFTs from Chinese artist Zhang Huan's Celestial Burial series, which evolved from his 2002 meat bodysuit performance, were also a talking point in Pace's booth.
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| Installation view, Pace Gallery, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022 (Photo: Courtesy Pace) |
Blockchain technology has stimulated artists' experimental spirit in creating and owning art. Bank gallery's digital animation Take off, by Chinese artist Sun Yitian, is another instance. The artist showcased her collaboration with BCA Labs to develop a narrative series based on her earlier diptych depicting the owl of Minerva, the Roman goddess of wisdom.
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| Sun Yitian x BCA LABS Take Off, 2022 Bank gallery |
In response to an explosion of interest in the NFT art market, Art Basel Hong Kong had included a third-party show -- "NFTs + The Ever-Evolving World of Art". The presentation, hosted by Tezos blockchain, had a separate entrance outside the fair zone. Entering the generative art gallery, visitors were guided to mint their first NFTs, which involved setting up a digital wallet to fund their initial investment.
In response to an explosion of interest in the NFT art market, Art Basel Hong Kong had included a third-party show -- "NFTs + The Ever-Evolving World of Art". The presentation, hosted by Tezos blockchain, had a separate entrance outside the fair zone. Entering the generative art gallery, visitors were guided to mint their first NFTs, which involved setting up a digital wallet to fund their initial investment.
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| Installation view, NFTs + The Ever-Evolving World of Art, Art Basel Hong Kong 2022 |
The covid pandemic has disrupted some established norms of the art fair. Yet, at the same time, a new era with flourishing digital art, abundant creative energy and ready-to-buy millenial collectors might be around the corner.
