2nd St. Petersburg Art Fair 1703
St. Petersburg Art Fair 1703 was initiated by Gazprom PJSC and is supported by the St. Petersburg Culture Committee. The project aims to popularize contemporary art, develop the practice of collecting and unite members of the art community.
On June 18, 2023, the second St. Petersburg Art Fair 1703 finished its work in the Manege Central Exhibition Hall. 36 galleries from St. Petersburg, Moscow, Istanbul, Nizhny Novgorod and Kaluga presented more than 1,500 works of contemporary art, which could be seen by more than 15,000 visitors.
The fair was held from June 14 to 18 and brought together one and a half times as many participants as in the debut season. Gallery booths showcased all current forms of artistic practices, from generative art and digital installations to sculpture and photography.
The second season of the fair saw the first participation of a foreign gallery, Istanbul-based Ambidexter, which presented works by its leading authors. Also debuting at Fair 1703 this year were Gallery Lumiere, Crokin Gallery, Pogodina Gallery, Pro Art`s Gallery, Grabar gallery, MYTH Gallery, MAISON25, VS Gallery, Pop up Gallery, NAMEGALLERY, ARTZIP, MART Gallery, Arts Square Gallery, Tirage 1/1, 3L STORE, PALATY, 573 Gallery, PENNLAB Gallery.
Triumph gallery, Marina Gisich Gallery, a-s-t-r-a gallery, CultProject, FINEART GALLERY, E.K.ArtBuro, Béton Visual Culture Center, ART&BRUT Gallery, Generative Gallery, Masters Digital Gallery, FUTURO Gallery, ASKERI GALLERY, ARTSTORY Gallery, 11.12 GALLERY, K2 studio, Third Place NFT, Palto Gallery participated in the fair again.
During the six days of the Fair 1703, including a special preview for collectors, the galleries sold more than 150 works. The price range of works is from ₽1,000 to ₽13,800,000.
The exposition was complemented by non-commercial exhibition projects: City, of Gazprombank’s corporate collection, and Leningrad Landscape School, of the collection of St. Petersburg KGallery. KGallery special project was dedicated to the artists of the Leningrad landscape school Alexander Vedernikov, Nikolai Lapshin, Vyacheslav Pakulin and other authors who created their image of the city. Photographs by Timofey Parshchikov and Mikhail Rozanov were selected from Gazprombank’s corporate collection, as well as works by Ivan Chuikov, in which city views and their individual fragments became the material for sophisticated visual reflections.
An important part of the fair was a cultural and educational lecture program organized jointly with the Masters School. The program included discussions on gallery business, new technologies in art, collection design, young art and education in the creative industry. Speakers were leading cultural industry experts Polina Bondareva (Masters), Marina Gisich (Marina Gisich Gallery), Polina Askeri (ASKERI GALLERY), Ivan Nefedkin (founder and creative director of Radugadesign design studio), Evgeniya Popova (Popov Foundation), Alina Chereyskaya (SA lab), Ekaterina Sharova (Hermitage Media), Andrey Shelutto (art director, designer, illustrator), Zera Chereshneva (director of strategic projects at VKontakte) and others.
All lecture events were broadcast in the 1703 Group on VKontakte, the main social network of the project and streaming service of the event. During the fair, 36 lectures, discussions and mediations took place, and broadcasts of the lecture events totaled more than 2.1 mln views.
Guests and participants of the fair highly appreciated the experimental architectonics of the development. This year art occupied not only the stands, but also the entire Manege space — the lecture hall in the form of a ziggurat became a fundamental art object. The avansalon became a place of attraction, where you could reflect on what you had seen, be alone with your thoughts and art books.
Enlarged photo (JPG, 599 KB)