The 10th Cosmoscow 2022 contemporary art fair opened in Gostiny Dvor

Cosmoscow contemporary art fair: digital artists, contemporary design, collecting and art lectures

The 10th Cosmoscow 2022 contemporary art fair has opened in Gostiny Dvor. The name of the fair plays on the phrase cause Moscow (translated from English – “because Moscow”), it is held for the tenth time.

In the center of Moscow, you can see the latest ideas, trends and practices of contemporary art. 72 galleries present their stands. 11 participants arrived from the regions: St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Kaluga, Yekaterinburg, Vladivostok. You can also see the work of foreign artists from the USA, Holland, Spain, Italy, France, Estonia, China, South Korea and Japan.

For more than 10 years, Cosmoscow has been bringing together the key players in the art market – galleries and the artists they represent, on one platform, inviting all art lovers to get acquainted with the most relevant works and go on an exciting journey to create their own collection. “The decision to hold the fair in 2022 was difficult and was born in the process of communication with gallerists and collectors. Cosmoscow was originally conceived as a synergistic platform and continues to be such to unite the art community, popularize contemporary art and jointly develop the Russian art market,” Margarita Pushkina, Founding Director of Cosmoscow, said at the presentation.

Well-known and young galleries with their own exhibition space are presented in the Main section, galleries without a permanent space or working as a showroom are united in the Frame section. Circulation art is located in the Editions section, while modern and collectible design is in Design. This year, a new permanent section called Digital has been launched, with galleries dedicated to new media and digital art.

Fair participant Elvira Ternogradskaya, founder of the Syntax Gallery, says: “Cosmoscow is a great way to support the growing Russian art industry. The contemporary art fair in Russia is undoubtedly the most authoritative. The city provides effective and strategically important support to the participants.”

Contemporary art keeps pace with the latest technologies, so the fair also features online platforms for the sale of digital art, including NFT. Another new section – Network – focused on its site projects aimed at developing infrastructure, education and communications in the field of contemporary art and increasing interest in collecting. “Cosmoscow is a very important and necessary event for the cultural community of Russia. First, for us, as a young gallery, it is important to exchange experience not only with other galleries from Russia, but also with foreign artists who participate in the fair this year. In addition, to attract new clients, collectors and show our work to more people. Second, it is a unique platform for selling art and supporting the gallery’s future activities. And finally, with the increase in the number of art fairs, the interest and importance of art is growing,” says Nikolai Dmitriev, founder of Pennlab Gallery.

Traditionally, the fair has a stand Created in Moscow, which operates thanks to the Agency for Creative Industries (AKI) under the Department of Entrepreneurship and Innovative Development of Moscow. Both collective stands and business programs are presented. For example, an educational program for beginners and continuing artists, as well as for professionals. Alexey Fursin, Head of the Department of Entrepreneurship and Innovative Development of Moscow, noted: “This year, 20 digital artists who create their works only with the help of a computer joined fashion galleries at the fair. In addition, the organizers have increased the area of ​​space. In the tenth season of Cosmoscow, galleries will have large booths where they can place a full-fledged exhibition. We have expanded the area from one to 20 square meters per gallery. This will allow more work to be presented and potentially boost sales.”

The guests from St. Petersburg, the European University and the State Hermitage, presented the School of Arts and Cultural Heritage for young scientists and future museum specialists. The school was established in 2022 on the basis of the Faculty of Arts. This innovative educational program combines knowledge of art history, museum work and curation with modern technologies. Master’s programs “Word and Image: Literature among other Arts” and “Languages ​​of Art in Culture: Problems of Interaction”, postgraduate studies “Theory and History of Culture, Art” are currently running, and admission has been announced for the annual program of additional professional education “Modern Museum”.

The contemporary art fair devotes a lot of time and space to the work of museums and galleries, because the modern art industry is built on successful cooperation between the commercial and non-commercial sectors. The gallery performs primary expertise: selects promising young artists, develops their careers, sells works of art, enabling the artist to earn money. The museum carries out the most important, final examination in the art market: if an artist ends up in museum collections, this means that his value is recognized by an independent museum community and will become part of the cultural and state heritage; his price and status are confirmed, and the value of private collections, where there are already his works, is growing.

Numerous discussions make it possible to understand what formats of cooperation and interaction exist between galleries and museums today. What mechanisms for replenishing museum collections are working in Russia today, and what difficulties the gallery and the museum face on the way to building a partnership. Replenishment of museum collections: gifts from individuals and charitable foundations are also the subject of active work. Museums have individual requests to replenish their collections, including works by contemporary artists. As part of the discussion “Replenishment of museum collections: gifts from individuals and charitable foundations”, experts discuss who (collectors, artists or private foundations) today most often acts as the initiator of a gift to a museum, what this gift can be, how the expert-purchasing commission works and how the donation procedure is legally, organizationally and documented.

During the days of the fair, the Museum of Moscow hosts another exhibition of young contemporary art — the official satellite of Cosmoscow — Blazar, where objects of contemporary art from the capital’s galleries and independent digital artists are placed. Not only galleries participate, but also independent artists at the beginning of their careers, as well as creative associations, educational institutions and non-profit institutions working with authors under 35 years of age. Contemporary art keeps pace with the development of technology, which is why the new section Digital is presented at the fair in Gostiny Dvor. There you can see the digital masterpieces of 20 graphic designers and crypto enthusiasts.

Numerous musical projects became part of the parallel program: “Dance and Contemporary Art”, a unique concert of the new music festival for 6 pianos, where guests will be introduced to innovative scores of the 20th and 21st centuries, which have changed the idea of ​​what the sound of a familiar keyboard instrument, the piano, can be like. and how it can be played.

Young lovers and connoisseurs of contemporary art are not forgotten either. Guests of the fair can join educational activities and visit architectural and ceramic workshops, where interesting master classes are organized with talented teachers. In general, Cosmoscow is a large-scale structure-forming project aimed at promoting and popularizing Russian contemporary art, a platform for interaction and cultural dialogue between different participants in the art system. Its goal is to create a developed Russian art market.

Mikhail Kovalyov.

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