Hong Kong’s Art Basel lures collectors chasing Warhol

Polychromed wood sculpture by Jeff Koons of Buster Keaton

Celebrities, billionaires and art moguls have descended on Hong Kong, lured by the chance to buy works by Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso and Jean-Michel Basquiat at Asia’s biggest art fair.
Art Basel Hong Kong, an edition of the fair that started in Switzerland, is selling as much as USD3 billion worth of art displayed by 233 galleries from 37 countries, according to insurer AXA Art.
The Hong Kong version has become a major stop on the global art fair circuit of one-stop shopping malls for the mega-wealthy seeking to diversify their stock portfolios with paintings and sculptures by brand names and hot young artists.
First night sales, in a truncated VIP preview that lasted only three hours because the fair format was revamped from previous years, indicated that the economic slowdown in China hasn’t dampened sales.
“We were in China before this for two weeks and it certainly wasn’t palpable to me,” said dealer Sean Kelly, who sold a work by Sun Xun for $145,000, as well as works by James White and by Hugo McCloud.
White Cube dealer Jay Joplin echoed Kelly’s sentiments. “It’s been excellent, I’m very happy,” he said, adding that his gallery sold works by Damien Hirst, Andreas Gursky and Theaster Gates.
Rachel Lehmann, of Lehmann Maupin was more cautious. “You cannot judge the success of an art fair in three hours,” she said. Still, by the end of the evening she had sold two Alex Prager photographs, a work by Tracey Emin, a Hernan Bas painting and several works by Korean artist Do Ho Suh.
Art Basel anchors what is informally called art week in Hong Kong, a time when luxury goods companies, private banks and Michelin-starred restaurants are pulling out the stops in their pursuit of the vast amount of wealth pouring into the city as art and commerce converge in Hong Kong.
Tate Modern director Nicholas Serota, Swiss collector and auctioneer Simon de Pury and New World Development Co. scion Adrian Cheng were among the expected fair visitors. Gwyneth Paltrow, Victoria Beckham, Kate Moss and Robin Thicke were also invited to browse the booths since they were in town for a charity benefit to raise money for amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, on March 14. Actress Michelle Yeoh was being honored at the fundraiser.
The fair, which began as Art HK in 2008, was rebranded Art Basel Hong Kong two years ago after the owners of Art Basel and Art Basel Miami Beach took over.
Mainland collectors are on the prowl for trophy works to adorn the walls of their homes in Hong Kong, Los Angeles and Sydney, or to fill private museums in China.
Billionaire Liu Yiqian and his wife Wang Wei were in town for the handover of a 15th century Tibetan embroidered thangka they purchased at Christie’s Hong Kong for $45 million in November for their private museum in Shanghai.
Wang Zhongjun, chairman of Beijing-based film company Huayi Brothers International, keeps a Vincent van Gogh still life he bought for $62 million at Sotheby’s New York last fall in his Hong Kong pied-a-terre.
Asia has 492 billionaires, according to the Knight Frank Wealth Report 2015, 53 of whom live in Hong Kong.
Still, dealers said the market lacks the depth and experience of the U.S. and Europe, where collectors have amassed works for decades. China accounted for 22.4 percent of global sales in the art and antiques market, ranking it second behind the U.S., according to an annual report published March 11 by the European Fine Art Foundation. Yet that’s a decline from 24 percent in 2013, according to the report.
“There is a vibe around Art Basel and lots of clients want to be part of it,” said Edie Hu, art advisory specialst at Citi private bank in Hong Kong. “Though a lot of the cutting edge art might not be to their taste, when they come across something like a Picasso or Warhol they have seen before it’s like comfort food, for them.”
While dealers are expanding their offerings of abstract and conceptual works, blue chip contemporary artists such as Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons have a captive audience in the region.
“I show Picasso, Basquiat, Henry Moore; they are attracted to this kind of art,” said dealer Christophe Van de Weghe, who is bringing two of Warhol’s works, and a Gerhard Richter with an asking price of about $8.5 million. Frederik Balfour, Bloomberg