DALLA FIERA D’ARTE CONTEMPORANEA AL SUO SVILUPPO IN UN MONDO IBRIDO: EVOLUZIONE DI UN MODELLO

Beginning with an analysis on the evolution of the contemporary art fair, the doctoral research aims to develop a critical and comparative investigation related to its model, understanding how it has evolved historically and how it is changing in the post-pandemic phase with the digital and hybrid world. We are dealing with a highly complex field that is difficult to define due to its historical, critical-cultural, curatorial and market aspects. Through a bibliographical, theoretical, critical, field study and quantitative approach, an interdisciplinary approach has been taken, with the aim of defining more fully what a fair is and what its characteristics are. The thesis aims to create a narrative on a historical and geographical level, with a predominantly Eurocentric view. The text develops from an analysis of the Parisian Salons, considering not only the critical writings of authors such as Diderot, Baudelaire, and Victor Hugo, with the intention of understanding the conformations of these early exhibitions, along with their current permanence in contemporary fairs. Next, the central section identifies the geography of major fairs nationally and internationally, with a specific focus on Art Basel and its evolution. Particular attention is given here to the 1970s, with an analysis of the role of a number of gallery owners in the emergence of the fair and its institutionalization, exhibition strategies, the study of maps, and the first galleries and artists who took part, thanks to an analysis carried out on a large group of collected catalogs. Emphasis is also given to the case study of the new Paris venue, named, Paris+ par Art Basel at the Grand Palais Éphémère, which led to a renewed centrality of the art market with its capital in Paris.This part was the subject of an original and impressive quantitative study, data collection and analysis, where the methodologies of Digital Art History were used. Here the first two editions of this fair were compared together with the previous and final two editions of FIAC, analyzing the volatility of galleries and artists, also finding in the exhibition choices and the relationship with the United States the reasons for such a change. Thus, the relationship between the world of fairs and Biennials is also demonstrated, examining the case of artist Julien Creuzet and Zineb Sedira, who were found to be present in all four editions analyzed, and artist represented in the current French Pavilion at the 60th Venice Biennale. In this way the relationship between Biennials and Art Fairs is also analyzed. Of particular note in the thesis is the last section devoted to hybrid fairs, which are studied and defined from the concept of Online Viewing Rooms, a new field not yet found in the literature. It is structured as a study from the historical level to the present day, with the construction of a timeline. Some exemplary cases such as the VIP (Viewing in Private) ART FAIR of 2011 are identified, but also the importance that an exhibition such as Les Immateriaux has had on a conceptual level is demonstrated, along with primal forms such as the Italian Art Diary Internet, concluding with a fair in the metaverse. Here is highlighted the emergence of a new tripartite theoretical model, termed “user-hybrid fair model” consisting of off-line, on-line and hybrid fairs, where the user plays a central role. In conclusion, emphasis is given to the methodology used to analyze the world of fairs, called “fairology” by the candidate.