In February, the Melbourne Art Foundation announced that after 28 years and 14 biennial events, it was cancelling the Melbourne Art Fair, a marketplace for contemporary artists and galleries from the Asia-Pacific region.
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The announcement came in the wake of some high-profile galleries withdrawing from the event in recent years, among them Melbourne's Anna Schwartz Gallery and Tolarno Galleries. The costs of exhibiting at the event and a preference for showing at international fairs were cited as causes for the withdrawals.
NotFair was the first event to pop up as an alternative to Melbourne Art Fair in 2010; six years later five art fairs have emerged in its place in the week the 15th Melbourne Art Fair was due to be held.
NOTFAIR
524 Flinders Street, Melbourne, August 16-21
Representing those without gallery representation, NotFair is a platform for emerging and independent artists to exhibit their works. It's the antithesis of trade art fairs such as the Melbourne Art Fair, dominated by galleries and gallery-backed artists.
The biannual event was founded in 2010 by Melbourne-based artists Tony Lloyd and Sam Leach and Melbourne arts writer Ashley Crawford.
The 2016 exhibition, themed Sign O' The Times in a nod to Prince, will be collated by local art curator, consultant and writer Kirsten Rann. It features 25 artists including Lillian Senga Addie, Steven Asquith, Jeremy Blincoe, Michael Candy and Isabelle de Kleine and
includes a prorgam of tours and pop-up talks.
SPRING 1883
Hotel Windsor, 111 Spring Street, Melbourne, August 17-21
Spring 1883 is an international art event at the Hotel Windsor, where local and overseas galleries present their works in the hotel's rooms
It was established in 2014 as an alternative to Melbourne Art Fair by independent Melbourne gallerists Geoff Newton (Neon Parc), Vikki McInnes and Kate Barber (Sarah Scout Presents) and Vasili Kaliman (art adviser).
Last year it was held in Sydney for the first time at the Establishment Hotel. Participating galleries this year number 27, up from 19 at the original event.
Exhibitors this year include Grey Noise (Dubai), KANSAS (New York), Tolarno Galleries (Melbourne) and Hugo Michell Gallery (Adelaide).
Of the new guard of Melbourne art fairs, this one is the biggest, and the only to have international representation. However you feel about viewing art in a hotel, the quality is likely to be high.
& ART FAIR
Far East Consortium developments, 220 Spencer Street and 606 Little Bourke Street August 17-21
A showcase of 25 sculptors from 12 galleries across two locations. All items will be for sale.
This is the first event, founded and curated by Julie Collins, a sculptor with experience curating the Lorne Sculpture Biennale, and current artistic director of the Biennale of Australian Art (Ballarat, 2018).
It features artists including Bruce Armstrong, Dean Bowen, Cliff Burtt, Yvonne Kendall, Mark Cuthbertson and more.
This is the only art fair dedicated to ceramics and it will be interesting to see how they convert the space at the consortium.
602
602 Little Bourke Street, Melbourne, August 17-21
"The energy of 602 finds its roots in the rough-and-tumble Berlin style of creative collaboration" says director Scott Livesey of the fair.
Livesey of Scott Livesey Galleries in Armadale founded the inaugural event, bringing together nine galleries in the basement of a former electricity substation in the CBD.
The event will showcase the work of more than 40 Australian and international artists from Sydney and Melbourne galleries including Michael Reid, Charles Nodrum Gallery and Martin Browne Contemporary.
They had us at "rough-and-tumble Berlin style". We love a good warehouse conversion in Melbourne.
FLAIR
Various galleries, Flinders Lane
An event showcasing galleries based around the top end of Melbourne's Flinders Lane
Held for the first time this year, Flair is what happens when the Flinders Lane arts crowd gets together and decide to put on their own festival.
Events including a keynote address from leading arts administrator Michael Lynch will take place across the venues such as
Arc One Gallery, Craft, fortyfivedownstairs, Arts Project Australia, Collins Place Pop-up, Sofitel Melbourne on Collins and Global Art Projects.
Worth a look mostly for Lynch's talk and to hear from other prominent arts figures including Jane Scott, outgoing Craft Victoria CEO and Bronwyn Johnson, president of Arts Project Australia and one-time director of Melbourne Art Fair.
