PHOTO BASEL: SWITZERLAND
Photo basel, Switzerland’s first and only art fair dedicated to the display and promotion of photography, returns to the Volkshaus Basel for its fourth edition, when the world’s art luminaries descend on the city of Basel for international modern and contemporary fair Art Basel.
From its inaugural edition in 2015, photo basel has cemented its profile as the most prominent photography fair in the German-speaking region, bringing together over 30 emerging and established galleries from 14 countries around the world. photo basel seeks to provide a platform for the fostering of dialogue between members of the photographic and broader art world communities by attracting international media, visual art experts and collectors at a key moment and location in the annual art world calendar.
photo basel is delighted to welcome Daniel Blochwitz as curator of the 2018 edition of the fair. Blochwitz is a highly regarded expert in photography, with 20 years of experience as academic, curator, advisor and author, working both in the U.S. and Europe. He moved to Switzerland in 2011 to assume the position of Director at Edwynn Houk Gallery in Zürich and recently initiated and curated several exhibitions of the work of Vivian Maier, Hans Feurer, Arnold Odermatt and René Groebli.
Daniel Blochwitz, curator of photo basel said:
My motivations to join photo basel as curator was the undeniable potential of such a fair, the further impact this could have on photography as a collectable art and the way it can help to highlight significant positions and artists each year. I think that my understanding of the medium and my experience in the field can help to further establish photo basel amongst the important art fairs dedicated to photography.
In 2018, photo basel’s curatorial circle will work in collaboration with Daniel Blochwitz to select and oversee the content of the fair, including the participating exhibitors, special projects and special exhibitions. The participating galleries for 2018 will be announced in April 2018.
Gerhard Vormwald, Uschi an der Decke, 1975, Courtesy Prince House Gallery
The curatorial circle is comprised of:
• Dr. Felix Ackermann, Collector, Basel
• Ben Füglister, Artistic Director, Cap Prize and Images Afrique Initiator & Assistant Editor at European Photography, Berlin
• Sueraya Shaheen, Photo Editor, Tribe magazine, Dubai
• Anastasia Lepikhova, Independent Curator, Moscow, former Curator at Lumière Brothers Centre for Photography, Moscow
• Dr. Heinz Stahlhut, Sammlungskonservator Kunstmuseum Luzern, Lucerne
• Véronique Prugnaud, The Eyes Magazine, Paris
Special Projects
Alongside the main section of the fair, photo basel will host the 2018 Paris Photo – Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards. Founded in 2012, the awards celebrate the photobook’s contribution to the evolving narrative of photography. The exhibition includes 35 shortlisted books drawn from over 1,000 submissions from around the world that illustrate the highly sophisticated nature of photobook production today.
