PHOTOFAIRS | Shanghai announces its program highlights and gallery list for its sixth edition which will take place at the Shanghai Exhibition Centre from September 20-22 with Presenting Partner Porsche.
Since its beginning, PHOTOFARS | Shanghai has provided an unparalleled platform for collectors and audiences across Asia Pacific to revisit the history of photography and to be challenged to redefine the medium’s boundaries. Recognizing photography as a changing and developing artform, the Fair presents moving images, installations, videos, digital art, sculptures and performance alongside classic masterpieces and still works.
This is clearly reflected throughout the Fair’s 2019 public program which emphasizes the experimental features of photography, encouraging new approaches and ideas through special exhibitions, installations and new commissions by some of the most exciting artists working in the medium today.
Staged is a curated initiative that spotlights artists working at the cutting-edge of photography. Placed throughout the Fair, Staged 2019 is powered by Ocula and features:
● Chen Dazhi (Three Shadows +3 Gallery, Beijing & Xiamen) , whose photography evokes the visualization of spirits across the dimensions of time and space.
● Johannes Wohnseifer (König Galerie, London & Berlin), whose ‘Polaroid Paintings’ challenge the functional use of Polaroids as a social and aesthetic means of documenting everyday reality.
● Michael Najjar (BANK, Shanghai), as a pioneer artist who fuses science, art, and technology into visions and utopias of future social orders emerging under the impact of cutting-edge technologies.
● Leila Alaoui (Galleria Continua, Beijing, Havana, Les Moulins, San Gimignano), with La Marocians which brings together larger-than-life portraits taken by the artist as she travelled Morocco.
● Li Binyuan (Ren Space, Shanghai), whose performance ‘Room’ (2019) brings together video art and live action sculpture.
In a newly commissioned exhibition, Para Site (Hong Kong) will bring together a diverse collection of artists from across East Asia/Asia Pacific who use photography and new media to challenge the conventional theme of landscape including Yang Yuanyuan, Lau Wai and Tan Lijie.
Titled Fieldwork, the exhibition reflects on ideas around territory, culture, identity and offers a direct response to history and a very contemporary reflection of the times we are living in. With artworks never seen in Mainland China, each artist will examine moments in history that have been previously overlooked or deliberately excluded to offer comment on the current geo-political situation. Works include:
● Intensely personal pieces such as Sim Chi Yin’s series One Day They’ll Understand. The work captures the complexity of family history in relation to the Cold War era in South East Asia and examines the hidden stories, silenced memories and contested narratives.
● Particularly pertinent against the backdrop of the Hong Kong protests, Siu Wai Hang’s Inside/ outland documents the very waters that separate Hong Kong from the mainland, a reminder of those who swam to the shores of Hong Kong to seek refuge, including the artist’s own father, and the complexity in distilling “we” from “they”.
● Motoyuki Shitamichi’s Torii project in which the artist photographs the Japanese torii outside of Japan’s national borders. Torii represent a symbolic shape in Shintoism and outside of Japan the torii lose their significance and transform into simple objects.
Artworks from the UK’s University of Salford Art Collection, which focuses on digital and Chinese contemporary art, have been selected by celebrated Hong Kong curator Ying Kwok for the 2019 Collectors’ Exhibition.
With the theme Taking the Leap, Kwok challenges collectors and audiences to move away from their comfort zone and demonstrates how to collect digital artworks by showcasing exciting artists including Cao Fei, Sun Xun, Mishka Henner and duo Jon Thomson and Alison Craighead.
The exhibition also hopes to inspire collectors to commission artists to create new work. Demonstrating this point, the leading, and often censored, female multimedia artist Lu Yang , has been commissioned to create a new photographic lightbox which will be shown in the Collectors Exhibition and will then enter the University of Salford Art Collection after the Fair.
This year, PHOTOFAIRS launched the inaugural Exposure Award powered by MODERN EYE, with the reward of a complementary stand to any gallery with a solo presentation of experimental work who had not previously shown at the fair.
From worldwide submissions judges selected a presentation Galerie Les Filles du Calvaire (Paris) of work by visual artist Noémie Goudal. Chosen for its bold concept and visual elegance, the planned installation will bring together works from three of Goudal’s recent series.
The judging panel also commended three standout submissions by Galerie 127 (Morocco) with artist Carolle Benitah, One Way Art (Beijing) with artist Ding Shiwei and Mary Mary (New York) with artist Patricia Voulgaris.
Georgia Griffiths, PHOTOFAIRS Group Fair Director, comments: “Over the last six years, PHOTOFAIRS has worked closely with our collectors and audience to nurture and deepen the understanding of photography. The Exposure Award is an exciting addition to the Fair as it embodies our commitment to exhibit the best in creative photography. The financial difficulties of presenting an experimental booth in a new market are inevitable. The prize minimizes these risks to support artists, galleries and therefore our collectors, to truly explore what photography can do.”
The Exposure Award jury included Cao Dan, President of MODERN ART and Art Director of MODERN EYE, Jiyoon Lee, Curator and Founder, SUUM Projects (Seoul); Wang Jun, Collector and Founder, The Light Society (Beijing) and Christopher Phillips, Independent Curator (New York).
Marina Abramović’s legendary series “The Lovers” (1988) is the focus of the 2019 Spotlight exhibition. A defining moment in the history of performance art, this will be the first opportunity for audiences in Mainland China to witness the final collaborative piece Abramović produced with her former partner Ulay. The work is a heartbreaking record of the pair walking towards each other along the length of the Great Wall of China, meeting in the middle to end their relationship.
The entire set of twelve color photographs with unique drawings will be on view alongside the 2-channel video of the work. In addition, we will feature an interview between the artist and Sean Kelly, owner of Sean Kelly Gallery (New York & Taipei). Abramović has pioneered performance as a visual art form and has used photography throughout her career to document her performances.
The Spotlight section of PHOTOFAIRS | Shanghai highlights an artist of international renown who is of particular relevance and importance to contemporary photography. Past exhibitions have featured Taryn Simon, Ren Hang and Hiroshi Sugimoto.
Supporting PHOTOFAIRS | Shanghai this year are 50 galleries from around the world, committed to showcasing the very best in contemporary photography.
They include: 10 Years Ago (Toronto), Alter Gallery (Shanghai), Arario Gallery (Cheonan, Seoul & Shanghai), Art Labor (Shanghai), ArtCN Gallery(Shanghai), artspace AM (Tokyo), BANK (Shanghai), bitforms gallery (New York), Brownie Project (Shanghai), Cipa Gallery (Beijing), Galleria Continua (San Gimignano, Beijing, Les Moulins & Habana), Danysz Gallery(Paris, Shanghai & London), Galerie Dumonteil (Paris & Shanghai), Galerie F16 (Paris), Flowers Gallery (London, New York & Hong Kong), Gaotai Gallery (Urumqi), Christophe Guye Galerie (Zurich), Harmony Art Gallery (Shanghai), Sean Kelly Gallery (New York & Taipei), Klemm’s (Berlin), König Galerie (Berlin & London), Leo Gallery (Shanghai & Hong Kong), Les Douches La Galerie (Paris), Galerie Les Filles du Calvaire (Paris), Ami Li Gallery (Beijing), Matthew Liu Fine Arts (Shanghai), M Art Center (Shanghai), Mohsen Gallery (Tehran), Nine Art (Shenzhen), Nine Art Space (Shanghai), Anna Nova Gallery (Saint-Petersburg), Ostlicht. Gallery for Photography (Vienna & Shanghai),Pan – View Gallery (Zhenzhou), Christine Park Gallery (New York), Pékin Fine Arts (Beijing & Hong Kong), ), Galerie Photo 12 (Paris), Rén Space (Shanghai), Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac (Paris, Salzburg & London), see + gallery (Beijing & Shenzhen), ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing & Singapore), Three Shadows +3 Gallery (Beijing & Xiamen), Timeless Gallery (Beijing), Time Space Gallery (Beijing), Up Gallery (Hsinchu City), Per van der Horst Gallery (The Hague & Taipei), View Art Gallery (Lanzhou) and University of Salford Art Collection (Salford).
More information: PHOTOFAIRS | ShanghaiSeptember 20 – 22, 2019Shanghai Exhibition Center, 1000 Yan'an Middle Rd, Jingan Qu, Chinawww.photofairs.org