Art fairs in Asia are powering through the late arrival of Omicron across the region, with Art Busan and Art Basel Hong Kong seeing decent results at their third in-person events since the pandemic’s outbreak, and Taipei Dangdai’s first physical, pandemic iteration drawing in crowds and overseas gallerists amid record-high cases in the city.
BUSAN
Featuring 133 galleries from 21 countries, the 2022 edition of Korea’s second largest fair, Art Busan (5/12–15), brought more than 102,000 visitors to the Busan Exhibition and Convention Center. Sales totaled USD 59 million, making it a record-breaking year, propelled mostly by young collectors.
Utilizing tested tactics, international galleries presented lesser-known pieces by bigname Western modernists. Reportedly the most expensive (1964), depicting a face peering at a seated female nude, was on offer at the booth of Gray gallery (Chicago/New York) for around USD 4 million. Other galleries with international footprints found takers for well-known contemporary artists. Thaddaeus Ropac (London/Paris/Salzburg/Seoul) sold one of Antony Gormley’s stacked-cube sculptures, (2021), for USD 610,000; two of Lee Bul’s pearlescent paintings (both 2022) at USD 170,000 each; and several figurative studies by Alex Katz at undisclosed prices.
