Taipei is now home to both Asia’s oldest contemporary art fair—Art Taipei, which ran from 25 to 28 October—as well as its newest art week. Taipei Art Week (TAW, until 31 October) kicked off its inaugural edition on 19 October, incorporating almost 70 local galleries and institutions, spread over eight neighbourhoods.
On 23 October, the storied National Palace Museum welcomed VIPs for a party and rare private night view of the usually thronged institution, followed by a lively beer and fried chicken afterparty at the commercial gallery Asia Art Center.
The Palace Museum was one of 18 Taipei institutions joining TAW, alongside the Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei (Moca) and the Jut Art Museum. “This was the first time the Palace Museum has ever done an opening for an [outside] event,” says Claudia Chen, a director of Liang Gallery and the head the Taiwan Art Gallery Association (Taga), which organises both TAW and Art Taipei. “Museums have been very supportive of the art week.”
Chen says 95% of Taipei’s galleries joined for TAW, for which participation is free, as costs are handled by Taga and the government. “Some local galleries have moved to Taipei Dangdai,"—a more international fair now held in May and organised since 2019 by The Art Assembly. “A lot of them do many international fairs, and since they are located in Taipei they don’t need Art Taipei, but can join TAW,” such as Tina Keng Gallery.
For local galleries joining the fair, TAW’s earlier start boosted presales, according to Chen. Liang Gallery has also joined every edition of Taipei Dangdai, and Chen observes, “if it weren’t here, another international fair would start up in Taiwan. There is a need for something that brings in the big Western galleries.”
Taipei Pride, Asia’s largest LGBTQ+ festival celebrating the continent's first nation with same-sex marriage equality, was held this year on 26 October, and attracted some 127,000 participants and spectators. Despite its concurrence with TAW and Art Taipei, there was no programming overlap. Chen cites first year organisational limitations for this omission, and says they expect to remedy that next year, especially given the governmental support for both events.
Perrotin is taking part in Art Taipei for the first time in 12 years
Courtesy of Art Taipei
Art Taipei gathered 123 galleries in the World Trade Center, with the 50 overseas participants this year, including the global mega dealership Perrotin and Tokyo's SCAI The Bathhouse, both returning to the fair for the first time in 12 years.
“We stopped doing Art Taipei because our gallery was just participating in too many fairs,” said SCAI director Yurika Shiraishi at the opening. “This year we heard there were many international galleries coming from Japan, as well as Perrotin, so local collectors who don’t usually come to Art Taipei would come this year.” The sold around four works by artists He Xiangyu from its stand to Taiwanese collectors "skewing young", a result that was promising for the first day, Shiraishi said.
“The fair is very renao [lively]", echoed a Perrotin spokesperson. “I like Taiwan clients, they are very friendly, and all want to discuss and converse.” The gallery, which has four locations in East Asia, featured a five artist booth including Lee Bae, whose popularity around Asia brought day one reserves for all her works. The gallery is also using the fair to show works by the late Lynn Chadwick, whose estate it signed earlier this year, for the first time in Asia, garnering "various interests from local clients". And "Georges Mathieu, which also matches the collection tastes of Taiwan". Perrotin previously joined Taipei Dangdai in 2019 and 2024. “We are confident of the Taiwan market, we see Taiwanese collectors coming to Hong Kong and Shanghai so we come here to see and meet them.”
“Some fairs have big shows but few collectors; Art Taipei, after 31 editions, has a lot of collectors,” further fed into by TAGA’s small fairs in Tainan and Taichung, Chen says. “We’ve seen a lot of art fairs come and go, fizzling out after five years. We survive because the TAGA backing gives Art Taipei a strong base.”
A local think tank forecasts Taiwan’s 2024 GDP growth at 3.9%, buoyed by its strong technology sector but nevertheless dented by the regional downturn and neighbouring mainland China turning increasingly bellicose since the May inauguration of the new Taiwanese president Lai Ching-te. “From January in Singapore, everywhere has seen a bad art market. But Taipei is very reliable,” Chen adds.
Art Taipei has for a second year running defied the tense cross-strait relationship and managed to secure usually elusive visas for mainlanders to bring over a large contingent from China, including more than 100 collectors and around 30 media representatives. “We think cultural conversation is very important,” Chen says. “And lot of officials visit Art Taipei each year, and are very supportive.”
Like most gallery association fairs, Art Taipei struggles with inconsistent quality from the array of smaller galleries. “TAGA has over a hundred members, but the fair has space for 70 galleries, so we do cut many, and have to be strict,” says Chen. Recent changes like standardised booth sizes, a rule against wall overcrowding, and digital VIP passes to avoid scalping have helped professionalise the event.
Among small galleries, some affordable emerging talents and interpretations of Asian traditionalism do stand out among the many glittery Elvises, cartoon babies and sexualised anthropomorphic animals. The engrossing body horror drawings of Japan-based Malaysian-Chinese artist Nelson Hor Ee Herng at Tokyo’s √K Contemporary, participating for the first time, seemed well-suited for a market open to both queerness and cuteness, though a gallery spokesperson said business was slow on opening day.
Sales were brisk though for Art Gallery Shukado, also from Tokyo, returning for the eighth time. “We have a relationship with collectors in Taiwan because we continue to participate in the fair every year,” said its representative, Akiko Ito. The gallery saw particular interest in the wooden sculptures of the Japan-based Chinese artist Suman Weng, priced between $560 to $3,985. Fifteen of the traditionally-inspired cat portraits priced $6,850, made by Taiwanese artist Chen Pei Yi, “who is very popular in Taiwan and Japan”, sold on day one. Chen’s felines are also featured in the current Taipei Fine Arts Museum survey Too Loud a Solitude: A Century of Pathfinding for Eastern Gauche (until 2 February 2025, also part of Taipei Art Week.
The week also brought events like a pre-opening party for the new Taipei space of Hong Kong gallery GDM, and a five artist pop-up collaboration between Tomio Koyama Gallery and the local dealer PTT Space. Chen says it is the sort of energy that Taipei Art Week hopes to draw more of. However, she doesn’t envision a combination of fairs like in Seoul or Shanghai. “We don’t want Dangdai and Art Taipei to be at the same time, it is a lot for galleries to do both, and everyone gets too tired.” Taipei’s mellow vibe is part of its draw. “Taiwan is an island, we can’t handle too many visitors all at once.”