Art Basel has announced the winners of the 25,000 USD Discoveries Prize at the first edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong they are Navid Nuur and Adrian Ghenie, presented by Galeria Plan B from Berlin and Cluj,. The Discoveries sector showcases solo and two-person exhibitions by emerging artists from across the world.
The artists were chosen by an expert panel of judges including: Cosmin Costinas, Outset Curator of Contemporary Art and Executive Director of Para/Site Art Space, HK; Alexandra Munroe, Samsung Senior Curator of Asian Art at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NY; and Elaine Ng, Editor and Publisher of ArtAsiaPacific Magazine.
Their collaborative project, ‘The Possibility of Purple’, questions the dematerialization of painting through a dialogue between the figurative and abstract. Navid Nuur adapts his conceptual practice in approaching traditional painting and representation, while Adrian Ghenie researches abstract elements of the figurative. Both explore the phenomenology of color and use red and blue as their starting point.
Navid Nuur (1976, Teheran) lives and works in The Hague, The Netherlands. He has had solo exhibitions at: Centre Pompidou, Paris; Parasol Unit Foundation for Contemporary Art, London; and the Kusthalle Fridericianum, Kassel. His work has been featured at the Venice Biennale in ILLUMInations in 2011 and in Taking Place, a group exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.
Adrian Ghenie (1977, Baia, Mare, Romania) lives and works in Cluj and Berlin. He has had solo exhibitions at the Museum for Contemporary Art, Denver; S.M.A.K Museum, Gent; and the National Museum of Contemporary Art (MNAC), Bucharest. The artist has been included in solo exhibitions at the Palazzo Strozzi, Florence; The Venice Biennale; The Francois Pinault Collection; The Prague Biennale and Tate Liverpool.
“The installation by Navid Nuur and AdrIan Ghenie encompasses performance, sound, painting, and assemblage in a complete environment that has keen art historical and critical relevance. It wrestles with the history of modern painting while showing an exciting and fresh perspective. Working collaboratively, the artists go beyond the constraints of conceptualism and engage with more current languages of art.” Alexandra Munroe, Samsung Senior Curator of Asian Art at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NY.
27 galleries are participating in Discoveries, including Galeria Plan B, Berlin and Cluj (Navid Nuur and Adrian Ghenie); Karma International, (Thomas Sauter); Mendes Wood, Sao Paulo (Lucas Arruda); mother’s tankstation, Dublin (Brendan Earley); Paradise Row, London (Shezad Dawood); Take Ninagawa, Tokyo (Ryoko Aoki); Weingrüll, Karlsruhe (Benjamin Appel); Galerie du Monde, Hong Kong (Lam Tung Pang); and 2P Contemporary Art Gallery, Hong Kong (Tang Kwok Hin). Discoveries will feature 14 galleries exhibiting for the first time in Hong Kong: BolteLang, Zurich (Benjamin Senior); Balice Hertling, Paris (Alexander May); Galleria S.A.L.E.S, Rome (Avish Khebrehzadeh); Lisa Cooley, New York (Erin Shireff); Monitor, Rome (Adam Avikainen); Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London (Francesca DiMattio); Galerie Juliette Jongma, Amsterdam (Nina Yuen); Kalfayan Galleries, Athens (Hrair Sarkissian); RaebervonStenglin, Zurich (David Keating); GallerySKE, Bangalore (Mariam Suhail); Utopian Slumps, Melbourne (Sanne Mestrom); Workplace Gallery, Gateshead (Marcus Coates); and Leo Xu Projects, Shanghai (Wei Chen).
The first edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong, Lead Partner Deutsche Bank, opens to the public today, Thursday, May 23, and runs until Sunday, May 26, 2013 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC). The show presents 245 leading galleries from Asia, Europe, the Americas and the rest of the world, and more than 3,000 artists, ranging from young emerging talents to the Modern masters from both Asia and the West.
The public opening of the first edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong will be celebrated by an artist parade on the Harbour Front today, Thursday, May 23, from 5 – 7.30 pm. Entitled ‘Paper Rain’ and organized by Art Basel with artist and musician Arto Lindsay, the parade centers around the idea of cinema, and will feature contributions from artists, musicians, dancers, actors, and filmmakers from across Asia including Nadim Abbas, Haegue Yang, Angela Su, João Vasco Paiva, Korakrit Arunanodchai, Alice Ma, Enoch Cheng and Otomo Yoshihide, Cedric Maridet, Kung Chi Shing, Shane Aspegren.