In July 2013, guests at Parkroyal on Pickering, 3 Upper Pickering Street, found art tucked among the hotel’s greenery and water features. Art Apart Fair, billed as Singapore’s only hotel art fair, ran from 5 to 7 July 2013 and brought contemporary work from established and emerging international artists.
Opening day, 5 July, ran from 12.30pm to 8.30pm, with admission at S$10 that year.
Who showed what
The 2013 line-up had more than 20 galleries. Among them were Charlie K. Art Space and Noon Gallery from South Korea, Nancy Gallery from Shanghai, and Jorge & Fernando Alcolea Gallery from Madrid.
One account of the weekend noted a strong Korean presence, a sprinkling of local galleries, and representatives from China, Japan and Spain. Eighteen suites were filled with work that ranged from the serious to the whimsical.
Art in the bathroom
The hotel setting was the point. Visitors wandered through suites emptied of their usual tourists and business travellers. They found pieces over toilet bowls, in bathtubs and even in showers.
The fair’s format gave buyers a practical idea of how a work might sit in a home. Pieces were shown on beds, tabletops and chairs rather than on white gallery walls.
The hotel suited the format. Its naturally ventilated corridors are lined with vertical greenery and water features, which set the art against something quite different from a conventional exhibition hall.
How it began, and what followed
The fair began in January 2013 as Worlds Apart at the Conrad hotel. Its success led to a second edition at Parkroyal on Pickering in July, and the series was later renamed Art Apart Fair. The fair’s founder and curator is Rosalind Lim.
A third Singapore edition followed in early 2014. By July 2014 the fair had returned to Parkroyal on Pickering for 18 to 20 July, this time with a spotlight on Eastern Europe. It had 23 galleries and more than 2,000 artworks from more than 200 emerging and mid-career artists, spread across rooms on level 14.
The 2014 edition also added a Russian piano performance and a charity element. A patron sponsored artists to create works, and half the proceeds from their sale went to charity.
The fair also travelled. A later edition was planned for the Imperial Palace hotel in Seoul on 22 to 24 November 2013, and the format reached London in October 2014.
Art Apart today
The fair’s own website describes Art Apart as an exhibition hosted by Rosalind Lim within Singapore hotels, including Pan Pacific, Parkroyal on Pickering and Conrad Centennial. It also runs Art Apart Pop-Up, a series of side events held with merchants and organisations.
The site currently lists one such pop-up, Miles Apart: Transcending Street Art, at Cooliv, 5 Pasir Panjang Road, with a browsable selection of works.