Art Central returned yesterday for its eleventh edition, anchoring Hong Kong Art Month with 117 galleries and more than 500 artists from over 50 countries and regions. The fair runs 25 to 29 March at its signature Central Harbourfront location.
I would be remiss if I didn't point out that the entire affair is backed by Lead Partner UOB and the HKSAR Government’s Mega Arts and Cultural Events Fund... mostly because I'll get notes from friends in PR at odd hours as, especially during event week when timing means nothing to them. Been there, done that!
Unlike the front door chaos of Art Basel (more on that later), Art Central was a smooth affair as many swanned in and out of the exhibit (the post-event numbers are pending as we go to print) and kudos to the organisational team; an event of this scale, it takes a village to hold up the sky.
*The last official amfAR Gala in Hong Kong was held in 2019 (at Rosewood Hong Kong, honouring Adrian Cheng and raising over US$2.75 million), but amfAR has not held the Hong Kong edition since then (no events in 2020–2025 either, likely due to COVID, charity fatigue, and other factors). For 2026, amfAR’s official events page lists confirmed/upcoming galas in: Palm Beach (March 28, 2026), Cannes (May 21, 2026) and Venezia, Dallas, London, and Las Vegas (dates TBA for some)... and Hong Kong is not on the 2026 lineup - paused indefinitely.
Hmmm Déjà vu?!
Art Central in Hong Kong launched in 2015, with its inaugural edition held at the Central Harbourfront since day one. It was founded by the team behind the original ART HK and positioned as a more accessible, discovery-focused satellite fair during Art Basel Hong Kong week. Just a bit earlier, Art Basel in Hong Kong launched in 2013, with its first edition taking place from May 23–26 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. Over the years, Art Basel moved calendars to an earlier date (I suspect as to not clash with other large-scale global fairs in summer). This followed Art Basel's acquisition of the earlier ART HK fair (which had run since 2008), rebranding it under the Art Basel umbrella. Both fairs are now key parts of Hong Kong's annual Art Week in March, with Art Central often running concurrently as a complementary event to Art Basel Hong Kong. Capping off art week taking advantage of the slew of celebrities, big spenders and whales in town all feeling spendy, was amFar.*
Vox populi often state that Art Central is the humbler cousin of Art Basel, which seems to get the odd celebrity sighting, large scale pieces and price-tags that touch 7-8 figures but as we roamed around Art Central, noted some significant pieces (Dali! Kusama!!) with equally breath-taking price tags too.
First impressions and post impressions... the usual mix of the great and the gaudy (people watching is so much fun at these events), all the pieces that caught our eye were notable Chinese artists where the art looks like... art. Classic oil paintings, Asian scrolls, 3-D effect paintings, frames and sculptures with a touch of humour... all good fun.
In the vernacular of youngspeak, "mad props" to those who dressed in all their multi-hued, fabric flowing, statement necklace wearing, parrot-earring-studded, vintage, every-colour-of-the-rainbow caftan wardrobe. We are all for the artists and the eccentrics who let their freak flag fly at events like Art Central where dressing the part is highly encouraged.
Vox populi often state that Art Central is the humbler cousin of Art Basel, which seems to get the odd celebrity sighting, large scale pieces and price-tags that touch 7-8 figures but as we roamed around Art Central, noted some significant pieces (Dali! Kusama!!) with equally breath-taking price tags too.
First impressions and post impressions... the usual mix of the great and the gaudy (people watching is so much fun at these events), all the pieces that caught our eye were notable Chinese artists where the art looks like... art. Classic oil paintings, Asian scrolls, 3-D effect paintings, frames and sculptures with a touch of humour... all good fun.
In the vernacular of youngspeak, "mad props" to those who dressed in all their multi-hued, fabric flowing, statement necklace wearing, parrot-earring-studded, vintage, every-colour-of-the-rainbow caftan wardrobe. We are all for the artists and the eccentrics who let their freak flag fly at events like Art Central where dressing the part is highly encouraged.
The Highlights.
This year’s edition keeps its focus tight: 30% Hong Kong-based artists and galleries, 85% from the broader Asia-Pacific. It’s the kind of platform that quietly but consistently connects collectors with both established names and emerging voices, placing regional practices in conversation with international ones. Curator Enoch Cheng returns for the gallery projects, while Zoie Yung takes charge of the creative programming, giving the whole fair a clear, considered framework that looks at the cultural, material, and technological forces shaping art right now.
The headline addition for 2026 is Central Stage — a new curated platform spotlighting artists with recent, current or upcoming presence in major international exhibitions, biennales, or significant museum acquisitions. Six presentations have been selected:
Areté Space (Beijing, 2023), Astra Art (Shanghai, 2023), BOUNDED SPACE (Beijing, 2014), Kimreeaa Gallery (Seoul, 2008), Meno Parkas Gallery (Kaunas, 1997), MJK Gallery (Tokyo, 2022), NoSugar Gallery (Wuhan, 2021), The Gallery by SOIL (Hong Kong, 2012), V&E Art (Taipei, 2018) and Wolf & Nomad (Miami, 2018).
Yi Tai Sculpture and Installation ProjectsFive new large-scale works extend beyond the booth format. Hong Kong artists feature prominently: Silvester Mok’s The Digital Fossiliser (Touch Gallery), OrangeTerry’s Found Faith (Square Street Gallery) and Alexis Wong’s Sunken Echoes (Yiwei Gallery). Also on view are Jeong-A Bang’s Oliver Stone’s Swimming and The Space Between Us (Gallery MAC, Busan) and Elnaz Javani’s The Fate (RARARES Gallery, Dubai).
Curated by Zoie Yung, the creative strand examines how digital life reshapes social and virtual experience.
Hong Kong new-media artist Kaitlyn Hau (b. 1999) presents the commissioned installation Recursive Feedback Ritual 0.01 (2026). Using motion-capture data in a recursive loop, the work maps psychiatric symptoms as cycles of repetition and dissociation, reclaiming bodily agency through generative movement and image.
The daily performance series ‘Endless Night and Midnight Sun’ uses polar extremes of light and darkness as a metaphor for AI-altered time. New commissions come from Jiaming Liao (IYKYK (ON AIR)), Chaklam Ng (Shadow Work), Isabella Isabella (I see blood in the sky.) and Susie Au (Memory In Motion – Walk-In-Cinema).
Video art programme ‘Reading the Room’ reflects on human nuance versus AI’s limitations in grasping subtext and tone. Highlights include Liang-Jung Chen’s UK Indefinite Leave to Remain Application Fee, Yifan Jiang’s One Sunday Morning, Jon Rafman’s Cloudy Heart – Strawberry Moon, and Adrian Wong’s With Love from Hong Kong and With Hate from Hong Kong.
Talks bring together artists and curators for conversations on Southern Chinese art, MV as art form, the Hong Kong Artist Commission, and art-tech ecologies.
Partner ProjectsUOB marks a decade as Lead Partner with Hong Kong artist Ling Pui Sze’s largest installation to date, White Mirror – The Vista of Inner Worlds (2026). The immersive ink-and-paper sculptural garden draws on cellular imagery and Cambridge research, evoking a cosmic Zen space that echoes the Daoist idea of “Everything as One.” Additional showcases feature 2025 UOB Art in Ink Awards winners and the UOB Painting of the Year Regional Showcase. Workshops with established Hong Kong ink artists are open for pre-registration at uobartacademy.com.hk/ws2026.
Sands China debuts at Hong Kong Art Month with a presentation of three Macao artists — Lei Ieng Wai, Leong Chi Mou and Dor Lio Hak Man — alongside aesthetic references to the city’s historic firecracker industry. Nice to see our friendly island neighbours represented.
MTN Seni Budaya (Indonesia) presents ‘Rising Currents’, a constellation of eight Indonesian galleries mapping the multiple currents in contemporary Indonesian art today.
Chance AI, the Innovation Partner, launches Chance LIVE — its “Visual Agent” technology — offering real-time on-site interpretive insights into works at the fair.Eat, Drink, ConnectBlack Sheep returns for the third year with an expanded Eat Central featuring Ho Lee Fook, Artemis & Apollo, Jean-Pierre, FALCONE and Messina gelato, complete with exclusive new dishes, but good luck standing in line waiting for paper cups.
Soho House Hong Kong set up its pop-up bar against a mural by local French artists Faustine Badrichani and Elsa Jeannedieu, serving classics like the Picante and the new Highball Fifty. After all that walking in the Ikea-maze of the exhibits, put your feet up if you can find a chair. While we were waiting in line for the obligatory champagne, a lot of wheeling and dealing was overheard; one of the Dali sculptures sold within the first few hours; prices range from HK$300,000-HK$450,000. None too shabby.
Kronenbourg 1664 created The Blue Perspective lounge, inspired by the liminal blue hour and 1664 Blanc. Easy to find, there's always a slightly bored looking model trying to muster enthusiasm while pointing to the direction of the keg. Or whatever they have going on backstage. Great beer.
illycaffè brings the latest John Armleder Art Collection, with shimmering cup-and-saucer designs that echo his light works.
All in all, I highly recommend. Got my 16,000 steps in.
Tickets are available now at artcentralhongkong.com/tickets.Fair dates: 25–29 March 2026
Venue: Central Harbourfront, 9 Lung Wo Road, Hong KongHong Kong, 24 March 2026
RELATED FEATURES
The headline addition for 2026 is Central Stage — a new curated platform spotlighting artists with recent, current or upcoming presence in major international exhibitions, biennales, or significant museum acquisitions. Six presentations have been selected:
- Arahmaiani (Yogyakarta) — a pioneering Indonesian artist whose performance and installation work has addressed politics, gender, and cultural commodification since the 1980s.
- Marta Frėjutė (Vilnius) — working across installation, sculpture and research-driven images that probe how fiction and memory shape everyday life amid shifting histories.
- Elnaz Javani (Tehran/Colorado) — textiles, sculpture and drawing that tangle personal and cultural memory, migration and identity.
- Esther Mahlangu (Mpumalanga, South Africa) — celebrated for bold geometric abstractions drawn from Ndebele traditions and brought into contemporary dialogue.
- Arno Rafael Minkkinen (Helsinki/Massachusetts) — pioneer of black-and-white self-portraits exploring the human body in nature.
- SIDE CORE (Tokyo) — the collective founded in 2012 that folds street culture and urban subcultures into contemporary art.
Areté Space (Beijing, 2023), Astra Art (Shanghai, 2023), BOUNDED SPACE (Beijing, 2014), Kimreeaa Gallery (Seoul, 2008), Meno Parkas Gallery (Kaunas, 1997), MJK Gallery (Tokyo, 2022), NoSugar Gallery (Wuhan, 2021), The Gallery by SOIL (Hong Kong, 2012), V&E Art (Taipei, 2018) and Wolf & Nomad (Miami, 2018).
Yi Tai Sculpture and Installation ProjectsFive new large-scale works extend beyond the booth format. Hong Kong artists feature prominently: Silvester Mok’s The Digital Fossiliser (Touch Gallery), OrangeTerry’s Found Faith (Square Street Gallery) and Alexis Wong’s Sunken Echoes (Yiwei Gallery). Also on view are Jeong-A Bang’s Oliver Stone’s Swimming and The Space Between Us (Gallery MAC, Busan) and Elnaz Javani’s The Fate (RARARES Gallery, Dubai).
Curated by Zoie Yung, the creative strand examines how digital life reshapes social and virtual experience.
Hong Kong new-media artist Kaitlyn Hau (b. 1999) presents the commissioned installation Recursive Feedback Ritual 0.01 (2026). Using motion-capture data in a recursive loop, the work maps psychiatric symptoms as cycles of repetition and dissociation, reclaiming bodily agency through generative movement and image.
The daily performance series ‘Endless Night and Midnight Sun’ uses polar extremes of light and darkness as a metaphor for AI-altered time. New commissions come from Jiaming Liao (IYKYK (ON AIR)), Chaklam Ng (Shadow Work), Isabella Isabella (I see blood in the sky.) and Susie Au (Memory In Motion – Walk-In-Cinema).
Video art programme ‘Reading the Room’ reflects on human nuance versus AI’s limitations in grasping subtext and tone. Highlights include Liang-Jung Chen’s UK Indefinite Leave to Remain Application Fee, Yifan Jiang’s One Sunday Morning, Jon Rafman’s Cloudy Heart – Strawberry Moon, and Adrian Wong’s With Love from Hong Kong and With Hate from Hong Kong.
Talks bring together artists and curators for conversations on Southern Chinese art, MV as art form, the Hong Kong Artist Commission, and art-tech ecologies.
Partner ProjectsUOB marks a decade as Lead Partner with Hong Kong artist Ling Pui Sze’s largest installation to date, White Mirror – The Vista of Inner Worlds (2026). The immersive ink-and-paper sculptural garden draws on cellular imagery and Cambridge research, evoking a cosmic Zen space that echoes the Daoist idea of “Everything as One.” Additional showcases feature 2025 UOB Art in Ink Awards winners and the UOB Painting of the Year Regional Showcase. Workshops with established Hong Kong ink artists are open for pre-registration at uobartacademy.com.hk/ws2026.
Sands China debuts at Hong Kong Art Month with a presentation of three Macao artists — Lei Ieng Wai, Leong Chi Mou and Dor Lio Hak Man — alongside aesthetic references to the city’s historic firecracker industry. Nice to see our friendly island neighbours represented.
MTN Seni Budaya (Indonesia) presents ‘Rising Currents’, a constellation of eight Indonesian galleries mapping the multiple currents in contemporary Indonesian art today.
Chance AI, the Innovation Partner, launches Chance LIVE — its “Visual Agent” technology — offering real-time on-site interpretive insights into works at the fair.Eat, Drink, ConnectBlack Sheep returns for the third year with an expanded Eat Central featuring Ho Lee Fook, Artemis & Apollo, Jean-Pierre, FALCONE and Messina gelato, complete with exclusive new dishes, but good luck standing in line waiting for paper cups.
Soho House Hong Kong set up its pop-up bar against a mural by local French artists Faustine Badrichani and Elsa Jeannedieu, serving classics like the Picante and the new Highball Fifty. After all that walking in the Ikea-maze of the exhibits, put your feet up if you can find a chair. While we were waiting in line for the obligatory champagne, a lot of wheeling and dealing was overheard; one of the Dali sculptures sold within the first few hours; prices range from HK$300,000-HK$450,000. None too shabby.
Kronenbourg 1664 created The Blue Perspective lounge, inspired by the liminal blue hour and 1664 Blanc. Easy to find, there's always a slightly bored looking model trying to muster enthusiasm while pointing to the direction of the keg. Or whatever they have going on backstage. Great beer.
illycaffè brings the latest John Armleder Art Collection, with shimmering cup-and-saucer designs that echo his light works.
All in all, I highly recommend. Got my 16,000 steps in.
Tickets are available now at artcentralhongkong.com/tickets.Fair dates: 25–29 March 2026
Venue: Central Harbourfront, 9 Lung Wo Road, Hong KongHong Kong, 24 March 2026
RELATED FEATURES
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| Art Central 2026 |
Hmmm Déjà vu?!
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| Art Central 2025 |
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