What is Art Basel? Well, it’s the world’s most prominent contemporary art fair, and it’s loads of fun. Long-established as the one of the art world’s biggest events, this year’s Art Basel took place over June 16-19 and featured work in galleries from five continents and hundreds of the world’s most prolific contemporary artists.
The Art Newspaper listed some of their highlights and top picks from the thousands of works on display. According to The Art Newspaper’s website, one of the most intriguing pieces was Kader Attia’s Arab Spring (2014), an exhibition of display cases from
Cairo’s Egyptian Museum that were shattered during raids in 2011’s Arab Spring. During each installation, Attia stones the cases as a re-enactment of the original event. Also big movers were Ai Weiwei’s Stacked, several of Dan Flavin’s neon sculptures, and Jesús Rafael Soto’s interactive Sphère Lutétia and thousands more, according to The Art Newspaper and guestofaguest.com. In addition, more historical modern pieces like Italian artist Emilio Vedova’s …in continuum (1987-88), which consists of 100 Expressionist paintings, were also shown.
Publicity for Art Basel has only grown over time. This year’s event was incredibly well-publicized on social media, and was even included in a special Snapchat story where visitors and participants could submit their snaps of the event and have them broadcast to Snapchatters worldwide. In addition, artist Takashi Murakami got in on the social made craze. According to The Art Newspaper, several of the featured artists whose talents include self-branding, snapped selfies with fortunate Art Basel attendees.
For those of us unable to make it to Basel (Switzerland) each year, there’s good news! Art Basel holds
smaller but no less important fairs in both Hong Kong and the closer-to-home Miami Beach as well. This year’s is set for December 3-6. If you’re interested, Art Basel’s site has tons of resources for potential visitors and contemporary art aficionados as well. And I’d consider going, if you can. It seems like one of the most public-friendly contemporary art events out there.
More on Art Basel 2015 can be found at Art Basel’s site.
Thinking about Miami Beach? Here’s Art Basel Miami Beach’s guide to going.
Here are some more Art Basel 2015 picks from The Art Newspaper.
Want more pictures? Here’s guestofaguest.com’s best Instagram shots from Art Basel 2015.
