Art Basel Fair 2025: hube guide

From June 19th to 22nd, the Swiss city of Basel becomes the art world’s gravitational centre. Art Basel’s fair returns for its 55th year with over 280 galleries in tow—from masters showing late-career Picasso and post-war abstraction to the sharpest contemporary players pushing material limits. Under the direction of Maike Cruse, the fair stretches across seven curated sectors, each designed to reflect where the art world has been, and more crucially, where it’s going.

This year, all eyes are watching Premiere—the fair’s newest section spotlighting works made in the last five years. Positioned at the intersection of emerging and mid-career, it captures a broader market mood: a hunt for freshness with proven value. It’s less about breakout artists or museum darlings—and more about that sweet spot in between.

Names to watch include Emalin, Arcadia Missa, Beijing Commune, and Hunt Kastner, whose booths delve into identity, memory, globalization, and materiality. Maike Cruse attempts to create the most intimate Art Basel fair yet—a space where mingling with the art world’s biggest names is simply a piece of the experience. Whether you’re here to browse, buy, or simply witness the spectacle, here are our picks for what not to miss.

Galleries

This section is filled with the heavy-weight classics—it’s the flagship sector, featuring over 200 of the world’s leading galleries. Showing everything from 20th-century icons to contemporary canon-builders, expect precise booths, maximum resale value, and zero irony.

• Gagosian: Pablo Picasso, Jean-Michel Basquiat
• Hauser & Wirth: Louise Bourgeois, Philip Guston
• Pace Gallery: Joan Mitchell, Robert Indiana
• Perrotin: Nina Chanel Abney, Genesis Belanger
• Di Donna Galleries: Leonora Carrington
• Galerie Max Hetzler: Albert Oehlen
• Thaddaeus Ropac: Eva Helene Pade, Oskar Schlemmer
• White Cube: Julie Mehretu, Georg Baselitz
• Emalin: Nikita Gale, Stanislava Kovalcikova,
  Kate Spencer Stewart, Megan Plunkett and Sung Tieu
• Take Ninagawa: Ryoko Aoki
• Chapter NY: Antonia Kuo
• Hunt Kastner: Eva Koťátková
• Sprüth Magers: John Baldessari
• Arcadia Missa: Hannah Quinlan & Rosie Hastings
• Andrew Kreps Gallery: He Xiangyu
• Galerie Thomas Schulte: Marina Adams
• Mai 36 Galerie: John Baldessari
• Sylvia Kouvali: Anna Boghiguian

Feature

A slower pace. This section is dedicated to artists deserving deeper context. Fewer names, more intention—booths that feel as if they are tightly edited museum rooms.

• Jessica Silverman: Judy Chicago
• Thomas Brambilla: John Giorno
• Anat Ebgi: Tina Girouard
• Pippy Houldsworth Gallery: Judith Godwin

Premiere

Launched just this year, Premiere is Basel’s most speculative pulse-check—showing works by artists who’ve graduated from “emerging” but haven’t yet been fossilized into the soil of the art world. Expect ongoing debates: are mid-career artists the new emerging?

• Sweetwater: Megan Plunkett, Kayode Ojo
• Galerie Jacky Strenz: Lin May Saeed
• Broadway: Abbey Williams
• Gypsum Gallery: Dimitra Charamandas 
• Edel Assanti: Lonnie Holley

Statements

Reserved for younger artists showing in Basel for the first time, Statements is the fair’s palette cleansing testing ground. It’s also the most psychically interesting, raw and riskier. Those presenting in this section are eligible for the Baloise Art Prize, giving these artists and galleries a spotlight, as well as allowing visitors to explore emerging voices that are completely unique. 

• Soft Opening: Rhea Dillon
• Nir Altman: Ndayé Kouagou
• Fanta-MLN: Michèle Graf & Selina Grüter
• Franz Kaka: Elif Saydam
• Kayokoyuki: Masanori Tomita
• Gunia Nowik: Sana Shahmuradova Tanska
• Artbeat: Nika Kutateladze

Unlimited

Featuring works of vast scale, the Unlimited section combines performance pieces with large-format works, striking a hard-to-reach balance—giving these monumental works the space they need to subsist in a fair like Art Basel. With a conceptual prowess to match the physical, this section will highlight 67 presentations curated by Giovanni Carmine.

• Katharina Grosse: Site-specific wall work across Messeplatz
• Félix González-Torres
• Martin Kippenberger
• nasa4nasa
• Konrad Fischer Gallery: Carl Andre
• Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac: James Rosenquist
• Goodman Gallery: Sue Williamson
• David Zwirner: Diane Arbus
• Taka Ishii Gallery: Oscar Murillo

Kabinett

After launching in 2023, the Kabinett sector has proved a favourite, giving galleries a chance to curate theme specific presentations at their booth. Rather than showcasing the entire ethos of their work, it gives a chance for galleries to hone in, and build a mini-sphere. At this year’s fair, look out for these little worlds—they are easy to get drawn into.

• Jenkins Johnson Gallery: Arthur Monroe, Esther Mahlangu
• Beijing Commune: Hu Xiaoyuan
• Herald St: Alekos Fassianos 
• Hollybush Gardens: Anne Tallentire

Parcours

From Clarastrasse to the Rhine, public, in-situ installations will populate historic sites throughout Basel. Curated by Stefanie Hessler around the theme Second Nature—how we hybridize urban life and ecological thinking.

• Marian Goodman Gallery: Agnieszka Kurant
• Silverlens: Martha Atienza 
• Mennour: Mohammad Alfaraj
• Layr: Anna-Sophie Berger 

Edition

Allowing visitors to take a pause, and flip through the pages of collectibles and multiples, here, there is a chance to slow down. Alongside the printed matter will be prints, showcased by major art book publishers and galleries from across the globe.

• Cristea Roberts Gallery
• Gemini G.E.L.
• Susan Sheehan Gallery

Conversations

Bringing together frontrunners in the industry for in-depth discussions and debates, Art Basel calls for reflection through its Conversations sector. Expect panels and interviews with collectors, curators, artists, and writers, voicing thoughts on topics from the purpose of public art to the art world’s invisible infrastructures.

• “Premiere artist talk: Katharina Grosse and Natalia Grabowska”: June 19th
• “Tokyo inside out: New readings of Japanese art in a global context”: June 19th
• “Radical reimaginings: Ibrahim Mahama and Lydia Ourahmane talk to Hans Ulrich Obrist”: June 20th

Adjacent Museums and Exhibitions

While the Messe Basel site will be taken over by the fair’s sectors, around Basel and Zurich, museums and cultural institutions are in full bloom, showcasing top retrospectives and exhibitions. 

• Kunsthalle Basel: Dala Nasser and Ser Serpas
• Kunstmuseum Basel: Medardo Rosso vs Rodin juxtaposition
• Schaulager: Steve McQueen
• Fondation Beyeler: Vija Celmins
• MAZE Design Fair: Urs Fisher
• The Digital Art Mile: ArtMeta, Objkt, and Tezos

The Art Basel Shop

Founded in 2024 by Sarah Andelman, the shop is the place where the global art scene becomes accessible, and take home-able. From products by artists and brand collaborations to rare collectables, the shop will bring a new batch of designs to the floor in 2025. 

• Katharina Grosse presents an exclusive capsule collection
• Limited edition Labubu by artist Kasing Lung
• Speciality prints by artists Daniel Arsham, and Amoako Boafo
• The Thomas Bayrle’s raincoat

By JULIA SILVERBERG