Art Basel Paris boosts city’s Art Week, full of art fairs, exhibitions and Hollywood stars
Paris Art Week got a lift as Art Basel Paris moved into the city’s Grand Palais, attracting Hollywood stars and art lovers alike
The Louvre, Centre Pompidou, Musée D’Orsay. There are so many famous museums in the French capital it seems strange to talk about a Paris Art Week.
And yet the concentration of art fairs and major exhibitions during the second week of October exceeded even the usual artistic opulence in the City of Light.
The impetus was Art Basel. Just as the Swiss art fair brought more international collectors to Hong Kong after it took over Hong Kong-founded fair Art HK in 2012, its arrival in Paris is credited with elevating the French capital’s status as a contemporary art market.
In 2022, Art Basel launched a fair called Paris +, which spelled the end of the 47-year-old Foire internationale d’art contemporain (FIAC). It took over the latter’s regular October booking at the Grand Palais.
Paris+ did not make its debut at the Grand Palais, however, for in 2021, the 124-year-old palace of glass and steel closed for renovation and the two editions of Paris+ took place at a temporary venue.
