Art Basel 2021: Messeplatz Project

Basel’s Messeplatz features public art projects by artists Monster Chetwynd and Cecilia Bengolea, engaging the fair’s visitors as well as the city’s residents.

The public projects were conceived by artists in collaboration with two of the fair’s curators: Monster Chetwynd developed a large-scale installation and performance with Giovanni Carmine, curator of the Unlimited sector, and Cecilia Bengolea worked with Samuel Leuenberger, curator of the Parcours sector, to create a video installation and performance for the square’s fountain.

Chetwynd’s sculptural installation and performance, TEARS (2021), was inspired by Salvador Dalí’s jewel in form of a crying eye and can be seen as a continuation of her practice, which often involves performative works, various media, and oftentimes viewers themselves. On Messeplatz, Chetwynd will transform Dalí’sprecious object into a disrupted sculptural space, where so-called ‘Zorbs’ will roll around. Performers inside these giant transparent balloons will initiate the movements, following the artist’s choreography to create a scene of drops dancing. Periodically, two dancers in glamourous costumes will perform a scintillating sequence among the Zorbs. The project will create a moment of celebratory poetic absurdity in front of the entrance to the fair – a humorous but empathic comment on the historical moment in which we are currently living.

Also using dance as a tool and medium for empathy and emotional exchange, Bengolea has developed a series of videos and collages as well as a performance for Messeplatz. The artist sees performance as animated sculpture, where she herself is both object and subject in her own work, and her compositions are often formed around ideas of the body – both individually and collectively – as a medium. Her video- and collage-based installation will float in Messeplatz’s fountain throughout the week of the fair, while Bengolea and her long-time collaborators, Katrin Wow, Craig Black Eagle, and Damio BG, will activate the space through dance and (scripted) conversations on three scheduled occasions. During these hour-long performances, other dancers and the audience will be invited to engage and move together.