Tokyo-based international art collective teamLab (previously) returns with another interactive exhibition titled teamLab: Continuous, this time taking the experience outdoors.

Sitting among the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong, “Resonating Life which Continues to Stand” is an abundance of egg-shaped structures covering the wedge of grass that makes Tamar Park. Softly radiating myriad hues into the darkness of night, the installation calls to the ebb and flow of human emotion and nature in contrast to the stiff, unmoving disposition of the buildings surrounding the work.

Extending from land to sea, each glowing ovoid responds to touch and movement. When pushed over by wind, waves, or human force, the resilient forms rise and change colors, triggering a chain reaction with neighboring sculptures and alluding to how humans and nature are affected by their environments. This is especially evident in the bobbing structures partially submerged in the sea, which are constantly shifted by the marine conditions. Together, each distinct component creates an illuminating conversation between viewers, their surroundings, and the physicality of the work itself.

teamLab: Continuous also includes “Resonating Trees” and is on view until June 2.

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Woven into Akea Brionne’s glimmery Afro-surrealist tapestries is an impulse toward sustainability. With a degree in the subject and a practice rooted in research, the Detroit-based artist began considering how to minimize waste while developing photographs. Curbing consumption became a grounding principle that goes beyond material excess, extending to “ideas, conceptions, thoughts, and ways of being,” she tells Colossal.

Working on digital jacquard weavings, Brionne stitches rhinestones to garments, tiled floors, and other details, adding an element of decadence to each tapestry. Many of the portraits shown here were on view recently at Lyles & King in New York for Brionne’s solo show, Roses Grow in Southern Soil, and investigate “her grandfather’s journey between Mississippi and New Mexico in the 1970s at the tail end of The Great Migration.” She is interested in the lingering effects of colonialism and the African Diaspora, particularly as it relates to memory and how stories are passed from one generation to the next.

Whether focused on a single anonymous subject or a small group in front of expansive bodies of water, the works are infused with an eerie sense of the uncanny, subtly unsettling the familiar. “I also think about excess in terms of seeing a large amount of representations of Blackness that felt restrictive, so I strive to combat that and provide some diversity,” the artist adds.

Brionne’s work will be on view with Lyles & King at EXPO CHICAGO this April and in a group exhibition MassArt Art Museum opening in June. Stay updated with her work on Instagram.

“Garden Portrait #1” (2023). Photo by Charles Benton

Detail of “Yakemein”

“Wade in the Water’ (2023). Photo by Charles Benton

Left: “Look Away From It.” Right: “Look Towards It”

Detail of “Always With You” (2023). Photo by Charles Benton

“Open Water” (2024). Photo by Charles Benton

“Always With You” (2023). Photo by Charles Benton

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Picture Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel and George W. Bush as 7-year-olds. Now set them on a playground.

What would they talk about? Would they take turns to slide? Would the world be in a better place?

It’s a thought-provoking exercise — one generated by Beijing-born artist Lí Wei’s eerie, hyperreal sculptures of six world leaders, on show this week at Art Basel in Hong Kong.

Asia’s largest art fair, which concludes Saturday, has returned to “pre-pandemic scale,” as organizers put it. More than 240 galleries from around the world were invited to participate, up more than a third from last year.

The accompanying uptick in visitors to Hong Kong, along with a slew of satellite exhibitions, public art displays and parties coinciding with the event, have provided a sense of normalcy to a city grappling with new economic and political realities.

Just days before Art Basel opened, the territory’s legislature passed a sweeping new national security law, aligning it more closely with mainland China and raising fresh concerns over Hong Kong’s future as a free and open international hub.

China and Hong Kong’s leaders say the new laws are needed to “plug loopholes” as part of their drive to “restore stability” following large-scale and occasionally violent pro-democracy protests in 2019. They argue their legislation is similar to other national security laws around the world.

But any potential censorship fears among local artists, however, seemed a distant concern at a commercial fair where many galleries are focused on selling imported art to well-heeled overseas collectors.

“A lot of people brought works that are easier to sell,” observed New York-based collector William Leung, an avid fairgoer who had returned to Art Basel Hong Kong for the first time since 2019.

“There’s a lot of uncertainty in the world right now… and it’s an election year in the US. People are wary and carefully spending their money.”

Standing in front of a painting of sensual, anthropomorphic hot dogs by artist Ivy Haldeman, Los Angeles gallerist François Ghebaly said the fair seemed like it was back to normal, although the rate of transactions felt slower.

“It’s not just the region (Asia), it’s a general caution that is happening with the market,” he added. “Things are fine, things are moving, but at a slower pace.

“It’s not an exuberant frenzy that we could have seen prior to the pandemic, and even during, when the market was heating up with all this money pumped into the economy.”

There were, nonetheless, a handful of seven-figure sales during the fair’s opening days. Victoria Miro sold three works by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama for a combined $11 million. Mega-gallery Hauser & Wirth revealed that it had sold a mixed media work by American artist Mark Bradford to a private Asian collection for $3.5 million and a Philip Guston painting (to an undisclosed buyer) for $8.5 million, while a work by abstract expressionist painter Ed Clark was purchased by a foundation in mainland China for $1.1 million.

The biggest single sale disclosed so far is the $9 million paid for Willem de Kooning’s “Untitled III,” also at Hauser & Wirth. But comparisons to previous years point to a slowing market: Back in 2018, another untitled de Kooning masterpiece was sold by another gallery for $35 million within the first hour of the fair.

But having a booth isn’t just about selling.

In the fair’s “Discoveries” section, emerging Japanese artist Fuyuhiko Takata quietly stood to the side of his display watching visitors react to his video installation “Cut Suits.” In a nod to Yoko Ono’s 1965 performance of “Cut Piece” in New York, Takata filmed models dressed like Japanese salarymen gleefully cutting fabric off each other’s suits in a homoerotic play on male masculinity.

The artist said he was nervous but happy to appear at the fair for the first time. “At this moment, I’m not yet known on the international art scene but I’m getting there,” Takata said via a translator. “So, it’s very important to show my work here at Art Basel to (gauge) the response from foreign audiences and find opportunities with overseas art galleries and museums.”

Over at Galerie Lelong & Co., fairgoers circled an outsize sculpture of a woman’s face, by Spanish artist Jaume Plensa, that appeared narrow from one angle but expanded as you walked around it. Plensa’s artworks, which are often found in public spaces, resonate with a wide variety of audiences, according to the gallery’s vice president, Mary Sabbatino. “There’s a huge response where people feel like his work is made for them,” she said.

The New York and Paris-based gallery, once a mainstay at Art Basel Hong Kong, is looking to re-establish its presence in the region after years away, Sabbatino added: “Success, for us, will be to reconnect with our clients, meet new people, reinforce existing relationships and build new ones.”

Many international galleries opted out of recent editions of the fair due to Hong Kong’s strict Covid-19 restrictions. The city only lifted mandatory quarantine for travelers in January 2023.

The city’s art scene changed dramatically in the intervening years.

Since an earlier, sweeping national security law was imposed by Beijing on the city in 2020, many politically engaged artists have either self-exiled abroad or stopped creating works that are overtly critical of China. As one local artist at the fair put it, they have “remained silent.”

“Artworks without a political message are welcome,” he added, requesting anonymity for fear of reprisals.

Opportunities for some Hong Kong artists, however, have grown. At the fair’s “Encounters” section, which is dedicated to large-scale works, a dystopian installation by local artist Mak2 features replica paintings of her works placed in a faux booth, flipped upside-down and made to look like they are decaying 200 years into the future.

“When I began as curator for ‘Encounters’ in 2015, I couldn’t get galleries to propose a Hong Kong artist,” said the section’s Australian curator, Alexie Glass-Kantor. “And last year I was able to open with Trevor Yeung and this year Mak2,” she said.

Gallery Exit, which represents mostly emerging or mid-career Hong Kong-based artists including rising star Stephen Wong, meanwhile showcased the works of over two dozen artists.  “Because people’s travels were restricted, there was quite a strong interest in local artists, because a lot of our clients are from Hong Kong,” said the gallery’s manager, Hilda Chan.

Hong Kong’s strategic importance to the global art market remains.

Due, in part, to its longstanding favorable tax and regulatory environment (Hong Kong offers tariff-free imports on art), the city still serves as the main Asian hub for Western galleries and auction houses, with both Sotheby’s and Christie’s moving to larger headquarters in the territory later this year. The city’s transport, handling and storage capacity also make it well placed to handle large volumes of art sales, while the opening of M+ in 2021, touted as Asia’s answer to London’s Tate Modern, has set a new standard for museums in the region.

So while Art Basel is a “very international platform,” Chan said, it still provides the chance to showcase homegrown talent.

“Each year, every March, there are a lot of people coming in. We can really show what we are working on to the outside world.”

When the paintings that form the foundations of André Schulze’s compositions were made, people likely had never heard of a pixel. The German artist’s elegantly framed revisions of vintage originals (previously) playfully nod to the art historical legacy of still lifes while adding a contemporary, digital-inspired twist.

Schulze’s reimagined paintings nod to the way we view art today, often interacting on our screens, which flattens and sometimes distorts the work. He superimposes a geometric veil evocative of large pixels that draw from the original piece’s blooms and leaves, creating a blurred impression of a bouquet. The hue in each square is carefully selected to express tone and contrast among its neighboring tiles, distilling the details into a vibrant aura.

Limited-edition prints of “Bouquet No. 12” and “Bouquet No. 17” are currently available for pre-order from Paradigm Gallery + Studio, and you can find more on the artist’s website and Instagram. You might enjoy checking out his process in this recent video, too.

“Bouquet No. 12” (2023), oil on vintage painting, 19.25 x 17 inches framed

“Bouquet No. 13” (2024), oil on vintage painting, 15.5 x 14.25 inches framed

“Bouquet No. 14” (2024), oil on vintage painting, 17 x 23.5 inches framed

“Bouquet No. 15” (2024), oil on vintage painting, 13 x 11 inches framed

“Bouquet No. 16” (2024), oil on vintage painting, 18.25 x 15 inches framed

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Shuttered blinds, peeling paint, and aging doors don’t usually indicate an invitation, but for French photographer Thibaut Derien, the fading facades of long-closed shops are well worth a stop. In his ongoing series J’habite une ville fantôm, which translates to “I live in a ghost city,” he captures myriad eras and architectural details in storefronts ranging from cafes to photo studios to fishmongers, drawn to what he describes as a desire to “immortalize” them before they disappear for good.

Derien, who is also a musician, has traveled all over France, visiting countless small towns and villages along the way. He often avoids major highways, preferring country roads and local streets where development is slower. “I continue this series because I’m still touched each time I discover an old shop,” he tells Colossal, “always standing despite abandonment as a resistance to the modern world. I always think about people who spent their life behind those walls.”

A closed shop represents more than simply a bygone era or an empty facade for the artist, who is interested in capturing the individuality of each location in light of the homogeneity of today’s commercial developments. Derien looks closer: “First, it’s just a facade; you can think it’s sad, but if you look a little bit more you see old paintings, old mosaics, some ‘know-how’… Many commercial centers—all the same—have replaced the small shops, each one different.”

Derien considers how technology like cars and online ordering have shifted the way people buy. Rather than stopping into one specialty shop after another, now big box stores require a drive out of the city center and much less personal interaction. “It’s the social link which disappears,” he says. “I remember going to all these shops, one after one with my mother. She was talking with every trader and with other customers, and before going back home, we made a stop at the cafe. Now we take our car to go to the supermarket, and the only person we can talk is the cashier—when it’s not a machine.”

The artist’s poignant photographs capture a sense of shifting values, evoking nostalgia for the relationships formed through small businesses, a fulcrum of community. “I heard on the radio a reportage about a butcher who was telling to a journalist that he closed his shop because he had no more clients, and he became a butcher in a supermarket,” Derien says. “The journalist said to him, ‘So, it’s the same thing for you. There is no difference.’ He answered, ‘There is a difference: now I don’t eat what I sell.’”

Derien previously released a book of more than four dozen photographs from J’habite une ville fantôm, and he is currently planning a second for release next year, including a few of the photos shared here. His work will also be on view at Gallery New York in Mannheim, Germany, from May 2 to June 30. Find more on the artist’s website and Instagram.

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Nature’s subtle irregularities and variations are fodder for Jon Foreman (previously). Using found leaves, stones, and sand, the Wales-based artist assembles swirling gradients and organic motifs that radiate across forest floors and beaches. He precisely arranges each composition by size and color, relying on basic geometric principles to transform a humble material and unconventional backdrop into stunning artworks. Considering the constructions last just a short time before they’re blown or washed away, head to Foreman’s Instagram to see them in pristine condition.

“Stone Knitting” (2024)

“Pontis” (2024)

“Aqua Exemplaria” (2024)

“Triplex Motus” (2023)

“Stella Spiralis” (2023)

“Helix” (2024)

“Crescents Glow” (2024)

“Quadratura” (2024)

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Chicago-based artist Peter Frederiksen (previously) pinpoints the most ridiculous, exaggerated moments in cartoons and animated shows to dramatize them further into absurdity. Cropping a single outlandish action or event, Frederiksen uses free-motion machine embroidery to stitch stylized compositions that, out of context, emphasize their dark humor.

Recent works include a Looney Tunes-style mishmash of feet and fists that burst through a bulging door in “Some locks won’t hold” and the tongue-in-cheek archery challenge of “Going easy on myself.” Often focusing on escalated tensions, the embroideries accentuate moments of high anxiety in a nostalgic, comforting childhood medium.

Frederiksen has started to switch to digital jacquard weavings for larger pieces. The base becomes a guide for his stitches and provides a colorful backing, which allows for less dense compositions. He’s also incorporated more unwieldy crops, including in works like “The days keep getting longer,” portraying a preposterously elongated filing cabinet.

In April, Frederiksen will open a solo show at Steve Turner Gallery in Los Angeles, along with a dual show in June at UNION Gallery in London. He plans to release a limited-edition print with All Star Press on April 25 and has a candle collaboration coming this spring with Varyer. Follow his latest works and chances to attend one of his workshops in Chicago on Instagram.

“Start in the middle and work back”

“Some locks won’t hold”

“Closer with every cut”

“Going easy on myself”

“Interrogation of desire”

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