It’s springtime and the major events of the year are underway. I visited the Art Basel 2025 last night at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai. Here’s a quick snapshot of my experience.

The Art Basel brings together an enormous number of art galleries to display the latest creation of their artists. The main purpose of the event is to sell these artwork. But art lovers are well positioned to observe the latest creative trends in the art world.

Art Basel 2025 in Hong Kong will be held between March 28 and 30 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. Tickets are available for sale here.

General Comments about Art Basel

To be honest, I am not a big fan of art, and modern and contemporary art is perhaps my least favorite genre within the fine arts sphere. I always think that art should first and foremost appeal to the aesthetic. A lot of modern and contemporary artists focus on the provocativeness of the message at the expense of the beauty of their work.

I have difficulty appreciating art that presents overtly provocative messages. And surely, at large art fairs like the Art Basel, you would come across a lot of those.

Photo: I liked this installation, feels like peas in the pod.

That said, there was enough there at the Art Basel that satisfied my soul for two hours. There were some pieces there of the great masters, including Picasso, Miro, Kusama, Dali and Klimt.

Some Highlights of Art Basel

Daphne Mandel

When I started touring Art Basel, I was really only keen about the work of one artist, Daphne Mandel, who is a wonderful painter that cares deeply about Hong Kong. Her artwork features a recreation of common sceneries that are distinctly Hong Kong, rendered in impressionistic strokes with fine touches of humanity. I missed her gallery exhibition late last year, and thought I must see her work at Art Basel this time.

I was just pulling out my phone trying to look up her Instagram account, when she simply glided right before my eyes. It was a perfect synchrony and I caught up with her there. Only one piece of her painting is on show, but it fully expresses the passion with which she has embraced Hong Kong as her second home.

Daphne Mandel is French born and she has been active in both filming and art creation in Hong Kong. Her latest work, Cha Guo, is a documentary film about the disappearing community of Kwu Tung.

Daphne’s artwork presents a side of Hong Kong that is readily recognizable and yet immediately refreshing in the bright colors and perspectives that are her own. She has the ability to bring forth qualities of Hong Kong in a full spectrum of colors and imagination that gives the otherwise banal realities of Hong Kong new life and meaning. Her booth at Art Basel is Booth 1D22.

Louis Vuitton by Takashi Murakami

You won’t miss the Louis Vuitton booth at Art Basel. The show this year features the work of Takashi Murakami, and the creator himself was there. Needless to say, there were a ton of people hovering at the booth, wanting a glimpse of the artist and the fusion venture that brought art and high fashion together.

Visitors entering the Hong Kong booth, shaped like a metallic Vuitton trunk, will pass between a pair of Murakami’s large-scale statues, “Zoucho-kun” and “Tamon-kun,” and the “Superflat Jellyfish Eyes 1” screen, which all belong to the permanent colletion of the Foundation Louis Vuitton in Paris. (Women Wear Daily).

Gustav Klimt Sketches

I love the art of Gustav Klimt. At the Art Basel there is one gallery on the upper level that was dedicated to the master of gold. No, you will not see the work of his Golden Phase, but rather the sketches of (mostly nude) models that were readily recognizable as likely to be the initial prototypes of his famed figures in his golden paintings.

Some of the postures had an erotic bent. The great mind that is shown through these sketches is well alive.

Some Other Interesting Artwork

I have rambled on about the artwork that are provocative only with no apparent aesthetic value, but there were artwork at the Art Basel that presented both dimensions of art evenly and they were very effective.

This following is called the Debate, by a Filipino artist.

This year’s event is sponsored by UBS.

Sources

Women’s Wear Daily, Exclusive: Louis Vuitton Shows Takashi Murakai Work at Art Basel Hong Kong.