ART FAIRS: Special Guests at Liste Art Fair Basel 2024

Liste Art Fair Basel announced this year’s special guests: the Helvetia Art Prize, an award for graduates of Swiss art schools; HEK (House of Electronic Arts), a platform for contemporary art that explores and employs new technologies and do you read me?!, Berlin’s hotspot for unique and exciting printed matter from the fields of contemporary art and culture.

Helvetia Art Prize presents award-winner Bisso Yann Stéphane: The paintings of Bisso Yann Stéphane (*1998) speak of journeys, dreams and the merging of time and space. In a unique visual language of straddling landscape, portraiture and abstraction, the artist merges memories of a personal history with depictions of a perceived present as well as future hopes and aspirations in a dreamlike space of fantasy. The results are paintings that offer intimate reflections on themes of rootedness, identity and our understanding of place and time. The Helvetia Art Prize is an important part of the internationally active insurance group’s commitment to art. The prize has been awarded annually since 2004 and is intended as start-up aid for graduates of Swiss art schools. The prize underlines the company’s longstanding commitment to Swiss art.

HEK presents Mélanie Courtinat, Andy Picci and Moritz Piehl: HEK (House of Electronic Arts) is presenting three artistic positions that use worldbuilding as an artistic tool, showing interactive and immersive works by Mélanie Courtinat, Andy Picci and Moritz Piehl. With the question of how we shape and navigate digital landscapes becoming increasingly pressing, works by these three artists present a variety of imaginative solutions of how we can inhabit such spaces. Courtinat’s “Ten Lands” (2021) is a walking simulator videogame with 10 atmospheric landscapes to explore. “Cloud 3.0” (2023) by Picci is an exhibition space, studio and virtual home in the metaverse Spatial that visitors can dive into. In his installation “An Image of Love” (2021) Piel remixes reality TV and social media into new physical landscapes.

do you read me?! – Berlin’s art bookshop at Liste: Liste Art Fair Basel teamed up with Berlin’s do you read me?! to create the fair’s first-ever bookstore featuring a handpicked selection of unique and exciting printed matter from the fields of contemporary art and culture. do you read me?! is a renowned haven for book and magazine enthusiasts nestled on a serene street in Berlin’s Mitte district. The little shop boasts an inspiring curation of printed matter, catering to the diverse tastes of print aficionados. From publications on art, photography and design to fashion, architecture, literature, music, film and food, do you read me?! offers a captivating panorama of the contemporary printed realm. At the pop-up bookstore at Liste, visitors will discover an exciting assortment of the latest contemporary art books as well as a selected number of art magazines.