Scope is an exhibition for younger galleries. Not officially Art Basel - but clearly there to take advantage of the "Basel branding" and foot traffic. Just like Liste, it requires a different pass, but ireadily offer it to those with the Art Basel VIP Card - clearly trying to build its own customer base, which it will need to do for several more years at least (Liste is 14 years in its running, and still "accepting" Art Basel VIP Card just as its own and wont turn people away - rightly so to boost traffic). There's an Asia dedicated section in Scope - which seems to be "consigned out" to Art Asia which then sell spaces in Asia?Decent works overall, orderly aisles, but also means it's just like any other art fairs, and certainly more "conventional" vs Liste. A few works did impressed - Comenius Roethlisberger's 1000's of YouTube drawings, Tomoko Sawada's Lolita group photos, Fan Xiaoyan's woman robots v(surprised it wasnt Japanese!), and Kwak Seung-Yong's foreigners in Korean robes. There were 2-3 Yun Minjun's - investors ready to sell?
The few Chinese photos were good too - but have seen them elsewhere many times, eg, Hao Bo's family portraits, Li Wei's Mission Impossible-style staged photos. Grotto was there as the only rep from HK - and showing its "typical" set of works that it brings to any art fairs it seems (Wilson Shieh, Joey Leung, Halley Cheung, Stanley Wong, Fiona Wong, etc).
Perhaps the most interesting piece is sth that's not for sale, it's by NY based Reed Barrow called "you and I will be together in the end". It's a "kinetic sculptural installation" (have never heard of this term!!) "inspired by the poetic nature of the cosmos". From two walls about 12 feets apart, two smoke rings are shot and hurled towards each other and collide in the middle - quite intruiging!
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