ART SG 2024: The Leading Art Fair in Southeast Asia is back!
ByTina RimCourtesy ART SG.
The leading international art fair for Singapore and Southeast Asia is back! ARTSG's second edition and return to Singapore will have a stellar line-up of 116 galleries from 33 countries and territories. The Fair will be held alongside an ambitious program of large-scale installations, insightful conversations, thought-provoking film and new media curations, and expansive city-wide activations in close collaboration with Singapore’s visual art museums, important private collections, and cultural partners, within Singapore Art Week, the city’s annual celebration of the visual arts.
ART SG 2023 showcased an assembly of leading galleries from the region and around the world. Courtesy ART SG.
“We are proud to be bringing an international art fair of this stature, magnitude and representation to Singapore once again. As the world emerges from the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, galleries are setting their sights on new horizons, with Asia taking center stage. The region's economic vibrancy and growing appetite for art collecting are drawing global attention. Singapore, positioned at the heart of Asia, stands out as an ideal destination for galleries seeking to expand their audience. Its strategic location, status as a key nexus in the region, and commitment to fostering a vibrant art ecosystem make it the gateway to a burgeoning art market. ART SG, together with the support of our partners, will continue to be a key driver in supporting Singapore’s ambition in becoming a distinctive art city and cultural hub.” — Magnus Renfrew, Co-founder, ART SG
ART SG, Southeast Asia’s leading international art fair, attracted 43,000 visitors in 2023. Courtesy ART SG.
The second edition of ART SG will feature a world-class line-up of galleries across three sectors: GALLERIES, FOCUS, and FUTURES, as well as a curated exhibition of dynamic, large-scale and site-specific installations across the fair under PLATFORM. Keep reading for a list of ART SG program highlights!
GALLERIES Sector
The show’s main and largest sector - GALLERIES - will feature 69 leading international and regional galleries, showcasing multi-disciplinary presentations by represented artists, including painting, sculpture, drawing, installation, photography, video, and digital works of exceptional quality. Highlights include:
Lehmann Maupin (London, New York, Seoul) will feature a group presentation foregrounded by artists Nari Ward, Dominic Chambers and Lee Bul.
DOMINIC CHAMBERS, Kites at Art Hill, 2023. Courtesy of the artist and Lehmann Maupin.
ShanghART (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore) will showcase seminal Singaporean artist Tang Da Wu, who will be presenting a statement work of a sampan boat comprising wooden offcuts sourced from previous historical projects; alongside other gallery artists including Robert Zhao, Singapore’s representative at the Venice Biennale 2024.
Robert Zhao Renhui, The Divine in the Trash Stratum, 2022. Courtesy of the artist and ShanghART Gallery.
Sullivan+Strumpf (Melbourne, Sydney, Singapore) will focus on expressions of materiality through new works by artists including Alex Seton, Dawn Ng, Irfan Hendrian, Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran and Sam Jinks among others.
Alex Seton, The Patch Tasmanian Tuxedo, 2022. Courtesy of Sullivan+Strumpf.
Yavuz Gallery (Sydney, Singapore) will feature a presentation of new and critical works by leading artists from Southeast Asia and Australasia, including Abdul Abdullah, Alvin Ong, Pinaree Sanpitak and Manit Sriwanichpoom.
Alvin Ong, Light of the world, 2023. Courtesy of the artist and Yavuz Gallery.
ART SG 2024 will also present a strong line-up of Southeast Asian galleries making a dynamic debut at the fair, as well as some of the most significant galleries from across the region, featuring both established and emerging Southeast Asian artists. Highlights include:
Richard Koh Fine Art (Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok) will feature the evolving tapestry and rich visual language that characterises Southeast Asia's contemporary art scene including Htein Lin, Justin Lim, Ruben Pang and Yim Maline.
RUBEN PANG, Lifehunter, 2023. Courtesy of Richard Koh Fine Art and artist.
Gajah Gallery (Singapore, Jakarta, Yogyakarta) will spotlight renowned artists with strong histories of practice, including innovative sculptures produced in collaboration with the Yogya Art Lab (YAL), such as Suzann Victor, Yunizar and Uji “Hahan” Handoko Eko Saputro.
FOST Gallery (Singapore) will create a significant showcase reflecting recent contemporary art practice in Singapore and Southeast Asia, including Donna Ong, Eng Tow, Ian Woo, Wyn- Lyn Tan, as well as Elaine Roberto-Navas and Luis Antonio Santos.
For the full exhibitor list, click here.
FOCUS Sector
Featuring 36 presentations, FOCUS spotlights galleries showcasing focussed and curated programs with an emphasis on the development of artistic practices, the exploration of different mediums, especially digital art and new media, and emerging to mid-career artists. Highlights include:
A selection of works made with generative procedures by Quayola and Refik Anadol, two of the most acclaimed artists working at the forefront of technology and machine intelligence to transform datasets into painterly abstraction, presented by bitforms gallery (New York).
Refik Anadol, Neural Paintings - A, 2023. Courtesy of the artist and bitforms gallery.
Quayola, Pointillisme #01, 2021. Courtesy of the artist and bitforms gallery.
The first-ever overseas solo presentation of Japanese artist Yutaka Aoki, featuring a selection of abstract works focussed on light as a multi-faceted element, presented by KOSAKU KANECHIKA (Tokyo).
Artinformal Gallery (Makati City, Mandaluyong City) will present a curation of three Filipino artists Kristoffer Ardeña, JC Jacinto and Zean Cabangis united by their painterly explorations of working with layers and meaning-making.
ZEAN CABANGIS, Road Maps 4, 2022. Courtesy of Artinformal.
ZEAN CABANGIS, Road Maps 5, 2022. Courtesy of Artinformal.
A selection of works, by Filipino artist Gerardo Tan who represented the Philippines at the 59th Venice Biennale, from his “Turntable Paintings” series where he refashioned a needle that paints over the vinyl records’ grooves as they play, and Maria Cruz’s “One Million Dollars” project, in which she considers the social value of money by carefully tracing the outlines of dollar coins to fill them in various colour orchestrations, presented by The Drawing Room (Manila).
For the full list of galleries exhibiting under the FOCUS sector, click here.
FUTURES Sector
In FUTURES, the sector dedicated to supporting young galleries under the age of 10 years, 11 galleries will showcase specially created presentations for ART SG. Presentations will have been created within the past 18 months and not previously exhibited in a gallery or institutional setting. Highlights include:
Spotlighting emerging Malaysian artists, Rissim Contemporary (Kuala Lumpur) will showcase paintings by Paul Nickson Atia from his series “Torun Tana? (There Is Something About Home)” which delves deep into the artist’s personal relationship with Sarawak and his Bidayuh heritage, alongside collage works by Saiful Razman from his series “Apartments”, made from medical gauze and rolled tissue paper, inspired by the design of low-cost apartments in Kuala Lumpur from the 1990s
Shedding light on the Mekong region of Thailand, Warin Lab Contemporary (Bangkok) will showcase The Study of Khon Pi Luang by ubatsat, paper works investigating the vanishing ecology of the Great Mekong river and its riparian ecosystem in the face of modernity, in addition to The Martyrs of the Plateau, Lord of the Toads, and the Monument of a Small Rice Box by Nakrob Moonmanas, which recalls Isaan folklore and political conflicts between Siam (present-day Thailand) and the Mekong.
Narob Moonmanas, Comparative View of the Height of the Principal Mountains in the World, 2022. Courtesy of Warin Lab Contemporary.
For the full list of galleries exhibiting under the FUTURES sector, click here.
PLATFORM
Featuring five artists from diverse backgrounds and generations, PLATFORM presents a curated exhibition of dynamic, large-scale and site-specific installations situated across the fair:
Immortal Words, a bio-art project by Singapore-based artist Boedi Widjaja presenting collectible DNA-spiked objects through capsule vending machines, is a continuation of his decade-long research into body, memory, language and encoding. The project is supported by the National Arts Council and developed in consultation with geneticist Associate Professor Eric Yap of Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine
British abstract painter Ian Davenport will present Lake, a large-scale painting-installation that used 120 litres of paint in its creation, and an ambitious evolution of his “puddle” paintings. The genesis of this series of work at this scale started at the 57th Venice Biennale and has continued across various sites, most recently in 2022 at Rome’s historic cloister, Chiostro Del Bramante.
Ian Davenport, Lake. Courtesy of Waddington Custot.
For more site specific installations under PLATFORM, click here.
About ART SG
The debut of ART SG in 2023 brought together galleries, artists and collecting audiences from Southeast Asia, Asia and around the world to Singapore - one of the most vibrant art cities globally. Courtesy ART SG.
As the leading art fair in Southeast Asia, ART SG is a dynamic new platform showcasing the most visionary and exciting contemporary art from the region and globally. Under the direction of Fair Director Shuyin Yang and Co-Founder Magnus Renfrew, and organized by The Art Assembly, ART SG was launched in January 2023 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre at the heart of Singapore’s financial district. In January 2022 MCH Group, the parent company of Art Basel, acquired a 15% shareholding in ART SG.
The inaugural edition of the fair welcomed significant local, regional and international galleries alongside a cutting-edge programme of commissioned and site-specific installations, experimental film, thought-provoking talks and performances.
Bringing progressive concepts and curation to the Singapore art landscape, ART SG delivered a custom-built fair of international standard and best practices, working from ground up to build a distinctive identity while fostering artistic excellence and cultural dialogue across Southeast Asia and the broader Asia Pacific region.
Differentiated from other art fairs, ART SG is geared towards the interests of the globally minded collector and aims to expand these interests by promoting new discourse and connections; encouraging cross-border collecting and a broad network of collectors and galleries forming relationships in Singapore.
Tickets: Now on sale at artsg.com/tickets
Dates: Fri, 19 Jan - Sun, 21 Jan 2024 (General admission)
Location: Sands Expo & Convention Centre, Marina Bay Sands
All images are courtesy of ART SG, the artists, and their galleries.
Any views or opinions in the post are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the company or contributors.
