On Monday, Art Basel Hong Kong announced the shortlist for its inaugural MGM Discoveries Art Prize, spotlighting emerging artists Shin Min, Kayode Ojo, and Saju Kunhan. The winner will receive a $50,000 cash prize shared between the artist and their representing gallery, along with an opportunity to exhibit in Macau, China.
Shin creates large-scale sculptures that comment on violence against vulnerable groups, including low-income individuals and women. Her work will be presented by Seoul-based gallery P21. Ojo, a 34-year-old American sculptor, is known for his shimmering readymades, from bedazzled dresses to low-hanging chandeliers. At the fair, his work is presented by Berlin gallery Sweetwater. Finally, Mumbai artist Kunhan makes multi-panel landscapes inspired by archival maps and city images in charcoal on wood. Indian gallery TARQ will present Kunhan’s work at Art Basel Hong Kong.
New details were also announced about other sectors of the 12th edition of Art Basel Hong Kong, scheduled for March 28th to 30th, with VIP preview days on March 26th and 27th.
Encounters, Art Basel Hong Kong’s sector dedicated to large-scale projects, will feature 18 installations, 14 of which were created specifically for the fair. Alexie Glass-Kantor—who will soon leave Art Basel to join Art Dubai as its executive director of curatorial—has curated the area into four conceptual themes, entitled Passage, Alteration, Charge, and The Return.
Works in Encounters will include three monumental paintings by late Filipino American artist Pacita Abad (presented by Tina Kim Gallery and Silverlens) and a pop-up store installation conceived by Lu Yang. In that installation, the Tokyo-based artist will sell artworks produced by a digital avatar named DOKU, presented by de Sarthe and COMA.
Meanwhile, in an offsite work as part of Encounters, Monster Chetwynd will present a sculpture and performance piece, “inspired by cinematic choreography and metamorphosis,” according to Art Basel. This work will be presented at Hong Kong’s Pacific Place Park Court, by Galerie Gregor Staiger, Massimodecarlo, and Sadie Coles HQ.
Elsewhere, the film program at the show, curated for the first time by Hong Kong’s contemporary art institution Para Site, will include seven screenings featuring the works of 30 artists. Entitled “‘In Space, It’s Always Night,” the series is inspired by Isadora Neves Marques’s Vampires in Space (2022), which was shown at the artist’s pavilion representing Portugal at the Venice Biennale 2022. Other films to be shown include Corpo Fechado—The Devil’s Work (2018) by Colombian artist Carlos Motta, presented by mor charpentier; and Good Society (2024) by British artist duo Hannah Quinlan and Rosie Hastings.
