The extensive gallery line up showcases a diverse cross-section of art from emerging talent to established art world favourites; alongside an inspiring programme of curated talks, panel discussions and artists insights. The fair will also provide expert insights into innovative curatorial concepts in contemporary art through its critically acclaimed curated spaces: Art Projects, offering a platform for the next generation of artists and gallerists; Photo50; showcasing current trends in contemporary photographic practice; and Platform featuring a selection of galleries presenting well-known, overlooked and emerging artists that align to an overarching annually changing theme.

Galleries Section

The Galleries Section can satisfy and meet the needs of every collector, as it ranges from prints and editions starting in the hundreds, to major works by internationally renowned artists. It also functions as platform for nurturing talent, and have played host to acclaimed artists early in their career as well as established names, with Chris Ofili and Jenny Saville awarded ‘rising star’ awards at the 1996 edition.Having early access to the participating galleries and displayed artworks of this year's fair, we are presenting our favourite creations of both emerging and established artists. Our criteria are simple: artworks that we not only love, but believe that can be a noteworthy addition to every collection. 

Anne Rothenstein's Smoking Bride has caught our attention due to her simultaneously sophisticated and innocent nature- The artist is known for her ambiguous scenes of single-block figures set in an enigmatic background. Rothenstein's family was certainly artistic. Her father was a print-maker, her mother a painter, her grandfather ran the Royal College of Art, and her uncle was directing the Tate Gallery. Surprisingly enough, she hasn't received any formal training in painting. Her influences include Francis Bacon, Mamma Anderson and Jockum Nordström, but her work is unique, very much her own expression of sardonic wit, expression, curiosity and gesture. Of course, we couldn't skip Bridget Riley, one of the most significant and beloved representatives of Modern British Art and pioneers of Op Art. She has exhibited in London, New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Shanghai, Tokyo, and Hong Kong, among many other cities. Her work belongs in the collections of institutions including Arts Council England, the Centre Pompidou, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tate, and the Stedelijk Museum and has fetched millions of dollars on the secondary market. Needless to say, her auction record is currently £4,3m.

Next up in our list the Reclining head of Julia, by Frank Auerbach, who is arguably one of the most influential painters of the 20th century. Auerbach's organic, yet unified forms are deeply rooted in capturing the essence of a person or place and are often renditions of people he knows well or of the urban landscapes near to his London studio. His signature palette is that of bold colors and a distinctive, thickly applied painting style, a rough impasto. The artist had his first solo show in 1958, has been appointed the Gold Lion along with Sigmar Polke while in the Venice Biennale of 1986, and has been offered numerous times knighthood, but keeps refusing it.  Another beloved artwork from a less known artist than Auerbach is that of Valda Bailey. Bailey's approach of photography is that of a painter: 'I used to paint, and I think as a consequence of this, I enjoy trying to push the boundaries of what photography can be. I use multiple exposures and camera movement to help simplify and abstract the detail in a scene. It is a way of working which is controllable to a certain degree, but still has a great deal of unpredictability about it.' Bailey's work might not be as high profile as Auerbach's yet, but she has images in private collections worldwide and her work has been purchased by notable members of the art and photographic community. 

Charlotte Keates' Yellow is Mellow, But Tricky to Pull off has intrigued us due to its architectural composition, which is in seamless communion with elements from the natural world. Even though the architectural aspect of her work is vivid, Keates' explores the concept of time, and in particular, temporal art.  'There is a sense of anticipation yet stillness, almost like a moment frozen in time, remembering the split second of a place or object. It is this fragility and vulnerability I want to convey, almost waiting for something to happen or even emerge.' she adds. Charlottes works can be found in collections across the globe including the UK, Europe, US, Bahamas, Taiwan and Hong Kong. On the contrary. Abraham Kritzman is interested in the concept of timelessness. His multidisciplinary work moulds the space and time of symbols and objects. Often influenced by mythical narratives and timeless human imagery, Kritzman’s technique removes the original references from his creations, forming unexpected trajectories and offering new meanings. His artworks exist in major foundations and institutions such as the Clore Duffield Foundation, London, and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art.

Art Projects

Art Projects presents a curated showcase of the freshest contemporary art from across the globe, featuring large-scale installations, solo shows and thematic group displays – selected and endorsed by a panel of key opinion formers and industry leaders.  The selection of the artworks for 2022 has a common ground: the self- reflection in relation to the world. Most of the artists look inwards at their emotions, beliefs and methodologies and examine them in accordance to their effect on the present and future world. They all arrive in the same question: How can re-evaluation help us build our ideal world?

'Expanding from an initial focus on personal trauma and childhood experiences, my practice is instinctively embarking on a wondering wandering' says Tiffany Delune.  'In a conflicted world that feels deeply saturated, I put a special emphasis on sharing a blended, unfiltered narrative in all its depth and authenticity'.  Her work No more Battlefields, only flowers is exemplary of her oeuvre: rich colours and shapes that create unique characters and dreamscapes, a boundless sense of being. Dreamworld is present in Cristina Ruiz Guiñazú's Le manteau de Spinoza too. This time, we are immersed into the unsettling dream world of Freud. The artist utilises a wide variety of visual sources including photographs, as well as imagery found online and in print material, a habit that has started in her childhood. "I collected pictures from an illustrated bible series that my mother bought me." Guiñazú has invented her own 'minimalist surrealism', and magical sense of storytelling that hat both puzzles and intrigues the viewer. Her work is found in the collections of the Frissiras Museum, Athens, Greece, the Franklin Rawson Museum, San Juan, Argentina and the Emilio Caraffa Museum, Córdoba.

That construction of his own ideal world is present in John Abell's work. The artist derives from Welsh mythology, poetry and his personal memory from his home country to create an in-between world filled with spirits, skeletons, swaying trees, and weeping women, where death is not to be feared and time is no longer relevant. There is nothing intimidating nor distressing in his world: destruction and creation coexist. A Song For the End of the World (For C.M.) is the result of the artist's personal experience of the world during Covid-19, and Milosz apocalyptic poetry. According to the artist, the work is a comment on humanity itself : 'Maybe with some of the apocalyptic poetry set to the linocuts, they have something of surrendering about them, surrendering to the situation the human race insists on building for itself'. John Abell’s prints and publications are held in private and public collections worldwide,  including the V&A; the National Museum of Wales; the British Museum, the National Library of Australia, Canberra; the National Library of Canada, Ottowa and Columbia University Library, New York.

Photo50

The latest edition of Photo50, No Place is an Island, curated by Rodrigo Orrantia, presents works by British and UK-based established and mid-mid-careeer artists responding to the idea of an island.The exhibition explores simultaneously what it means to be an island, its multiple possibilities towards the future, and the fact that the photographic medium not only isn't an isolated medium, but can be part of a wider practice combining different mediums. 

 No Place Is An Island talks about connectivity, about the fact nothing exists in isolation, it is merely a fiction, a fantasy. – Rodrigo Orrantia

The frustration with the limitation of photography as a medium has been the motive behind Dafna Talmor's creations. 'I have always found limitations inspiring and so what was initially a cause of frustration and disappointment, led to the idea of merging different places of personal meaning to create idealised and utopian landscapes, of giving meaning and function to these seemingly defunct negatives.' The artist merges landscapes from different parts of the world: Israel, Venezuela, US and UK. In her Constructed Landscapes series, she creates an undefined space where space, memory, time are non existent. Dafna's work is included in the Deutsche Bank and Hiscox collections and private collections internationally.  

The theme of constructing an undefined world is prominent in Sarah's Pickering work too. Every image is a moment between completeness and ruin, forced in a continued cycle of construction and destruction. Sarah Pickering admits: 'I’m interested in the separation of the real from the imagined, and the complexities in negotiating and representing this'. Her Landmine depicts pyrotechnic explosions used by British police and military to intensify the tension in training exercises.Training in recent times has had to become more and more realistic to psychologically prepare our forces for the worst: Police and soldiers are simultaneously disconnected from and situated closer to the “real.” Sarah's photograph captures not only a simulated scene, but an explosion that was a manufacturer's show for a police shopping trip. In that sense, the explosion itself is decontextualised: it's permanently suspended in a tranquil and contemplative moment, a permanent 'real' and 'not real' state. Pickering is the recipient of a number of awards including the Jerwood Photography Award and her work is held in the collections of the V&A, London; MoCP, Chicago; and North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh.

 Platform 

Curated by Candida Stevens, for 2022 Platform will explore the theme of Music and its Part in Contemporary Visual Art. It will display the new work of artists that explores the intersection of visual art and music, and the ways in which contemporary art can incorporate aspects of movement and rhythm. The display will range from abstract work referencing the riff of jazz music with off-key colour and off-kilter form to figurative artists representing the process of composition across both art forms. 

Particularly interested in the intersection of music and the visual arts, Vanessa Jackson believes that both serve as abstract surfaces on which musicians and artists can make their mark. Creating movement is key to Jackson's paintings, just like music that induces movement to its listeners. In her recent work Terpsichoral, which means 'relating to dance', trapezoids and circular segments interact through colour and space- their repeated shapes overlapping at carefully positioned angles in such a way that it appears they might begin to shift on the canvas at any moment.

Andy Burgess, not only explores the relation of music and art but utilises music in his creative process. 'I listen to music constantly while I work. Music is a vital companion and helps mitigate the fact that making art is often a solitary business.' Andy says. Allegria is part of his cubbist collage series that pay homage to Picasso's guitars. Firstly made in cardboard, and reconstructed afterwards in a in a more fixed and durable sheet metal form. Andy's work is represented by The Cynthia Corbett Gallery in London, as well as galleries in San Francisco, Laguna Beach, New York and by Etherton Gallery in Tucson and it can be seen at many prestigious international art collections.

That is the end of our exclusive virtual walkthrough, and we hope that our selections that deal with a variety of themes, mediums and practices will offer food thought, and perhaps a new purchase suggestion for everyone.