| ArtRegion: Basel - Oberrhein

Art Basel

Art Basel 2024

Hall 1 (Unlimited) / Hall 2 (Galleries, Statements, Feature, Kabinett, Edition)

13. – 16. Juni 2024

Art Basel will take place at Messe Basel and across the city from throughout the whole week, with Thursday 13 to Sunday 16 June 2024 as the main fair’s public days (preview by invitation only: Tuesday 11 and Wednesday 12 June).

The 2024 edition of Art Basel will feature 285 leading galleries from 40 countries and territories across the globe. They will present artworks across all media, from painting and sculpture to photography and digital works, focusing on modern and contemporary artists. 22 galleries are participating for the first time, including five galleries entering directly into the main Galleries sector of the show: Karma (Los Angeles, New York), Tina Keng Gallery (Taipei), Madeln Gallery (Shanghai), Mayoral (Paris, Barcelona), and Yares Art (New York,Santa Fe). 17 galleries will join the fair for the first time in the Feature and Statements sectors.

The main sector, Galleries is once again located in Hall 2. It features 243 of the world’s leading galleries, showcasing painting, sculpture, drawing, installation, photography, video, digital, and editioned works of the highest quality. Kabinett, Art Basel’s sector for thematic presentations within galleries’ main booths, which debuted in the Basel edition last year, returns with stunning 22 projects presented by 23 galleries.

The Feature sector, now focusing entirely on art-historical projects, will feature curated presentations from 16 galleries, including 11 first-time exhibitors. The Statements sector is dedicated to emerging artists from across the globe and will feature 18 solo presentations including 6 new entries. Up to two artists exhibiting in Statements will be awarded the 25th Annual Baloise Art Prize. Spread across both floors of Hall 2, the Editions sector will feature 8 leading alleries in the field of prints and editioned works.

Unlimited in Hall 1 is a special sector and unique platform for projects that transcend the dimensions of a traditional art-fair stand. It provides galleries the opportunity to showcase expansive installations, monumental sculptures, vast wall paintings, extensive photographic series, and video projections. Art Basel’s Unlimited Night will return on Thursday, 13 June, providing visitors the chance to experience the sector alongside special performances during extended opening hours. For the first time, visitors of Unlimited will have the opportunity to vote for their favorite artwork for the whole duration of Art Basel. The Unlimited People’s Pick will then be announced towards the end of the show week.

Outdoors, the Messeplatz will feature a site-specific presentation by conceptual artist Agnes Denes, curated for the third time by Samuel Leuenberger, founder of the non-profit exhibition spaces SALTS in Birsfelden and Bennwil. Denes’ artistic practice is distinctive in terms of its aesthetics and engagement with socio-political ideas. As a pioneer of environmental, ecological, and land art, she will present the piece Honouring Wheatfield – A Confrontation (2024), referring to her iconic land art work from the 1980s. The work will remain on the Messeplatz throughout the summer until its harvest.

Art Basel’s public sector Parcours will be curated for the first time by Stefanie Hessler, Director of Swiss Institute (SI) in New York, succeeding Samuel Leuenberger, who successfully managed and expanded the sector over the past eight years. Hessler aims to recontextualize Parcours as a curated exhibition that will meander through empty storefronts, a hotel, operational shops, and other urban spaces on Basel’s Clarastrasse, which connects the fairgrounds to the Rhine. Through ambitious projects, many of which will be site-specific and newly created, the sector will explore ideas of transformation and circulation within the realms of trade and globalization, the flow of information, and the varied climates and weathers spanning geographies and generations. Parcours Night, a convivial evening with extended opening hours, special performances and more, will this year take place on Wednesday, 12 June.

A special highlight of this year’s public sector will certainly be The Merian, situated right at the Middle Bridge along the Rhine in Kleinbasel and across Basel’s Old Town, that will host a continuous, around-the-clock program. The façade of the former Hotel Merian will be taken over by When The Sun Goes Away We Paint The Sky, an artwork by Petrit Halilaj symbolizing guidance and commemorating the 30th anniversary of the partnership between UBS and Art Basel. Evenings will be curated and enlivened by various members of the global and local arts community including Jenny Schlenzka, Director of Gropius Bau Berlin; Aindrea Emelife, Curator Modern and Contemporary at the Museum of West African Art in Benin City, Nigeria; Pati Hertling, Director of Performance Space New York; Stefanie Hessler, Director of Swiss Institute New York; Benedikt Wyss, Curator of SALTS and Finally Saturday in Basel; and others.

Art Basel’s renowned Film program is curated by Filipa Ramos, founding curator of the online video platform Vdrome and lecturer at the Arts Institute of the FHNW in Basel, in collaboration with Marian Masone, a New York-based independent curator. This year’s program will address topics such as ecology, intimacy, history, and politics in a series of short film programs, surveys, and feature films, and will be screened at the Stadtkino Basel from Wednesday to Saturday.

Finally, Art Basel’s flagship talk series Conversations offers a platform for the exchange of ideas on topics concerning the global contemporary art scene. In its 20th edition, it returns to Basel with an exciting lineup, curated for the first time by Berlin-based art critic Kimberly Bradley. It will bring together more than 25 thought leaders in 11 focused panels. This year’s conversations all circle around the pressing issue of how to build and shape contemporary culture’s future.
The program will run from Wednesday to Saturday in the Auditorium in Hall 1. Conversation events are free to the public and accessible to all.