Art Fairs
Art Basel Names Buenos Aires for First Partner City Initiative
Fair organizers see city as gateway to Latin America
Eileen Kinsella
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Art Basel announced that it will partner with the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina, for its first choice in the Art Basel Cities Initiative. The program, announced in March, aims to go beyond the art fair platform to work directly with cities and government bodies. In addition to hosting a unique art program in the partner city, the initiative will bring projects from the city to Art Basel shows.
A statement from Art Basel, organizers referred to Buenos Aires as a “gateway” in Latin America, noting that the city has “historically been at the forefront of innovative thinking. Buenos Aires’s avant-garde tradition has been the basis of its cultural wealth—from fashion and literature to design, architecture and art.”
Buenos Aires has more than 80 art galleries and boasts an ambitious development project of a new art and design district in La Boca and Barracas. Mayor Horacio Rodriguez Larreta remarked, “art has been one of the historical pillars of the city of Buenos Aires, and that is why we proudly celebrate that one of the most important names in the art world, on an international level, has chosen to work with Buenos Aires as the first city to become part of its new Art Basel Cities initiative.”
Art Basel global director Marc Spiegler said that “this represents a major milestone for Art Basel,” adding that the partnership “will be the first example of Art Basel’s commitment to making further use of its significant experience in staging premier art events beyond the fairs.”
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