Design Miami Basel (14-18 June) returns this year with 35 galleries (up from 32 last year), a new director (Marianne Goebl, previously at the Swiss design firm Vitra), and a greater emphasis on early-20th-century material. Two of this year’s first-time exhibitors are specialists in this area: Berlin’s Bauhaus expert Ulrich Fiedler gallery and early French modernist dealer Galerie Doria. “This is the only fair where you can explore design from rare early-20th-century pieces to experimental 21st-century works,” says Goebl, adding “the contemporary pieces are more anchored in this context.” On the more contemporary booths, look out for more solo shows this year: Paris’s Galerie Kreo brings the minimalist Pierre Charpin (2010 Lao suspensions €14,000-€16,000), who currently has a retrospective at Belgium’s Grand-Hornu museum (until 11 September); New York’s Johnson Trading Gallery brings Max Lamb (who won the Designer of the Future award at Design Miami Basel in 2008) and London’s David Gill brings the Swiss-born Mattia Bonetti. One highlight, says Goebl, will be a quasi-performance in Hall 5 of the Messe Complex: Paris dealer Patrick Seguin is bringing a 1944 Jean Prouvé mobile, pre-fabricated house (right), designed to be put up in three-days for refugees of the second world war, which will be built each day of the fair (price undisclosed).
Originally appeared in The Art Newspaper as 'Design Miami Basel embraces the modern'