Press

Art Collaboration Kyoto Announces Exhibitor List for its Third Edition in October 2023 (Updated June 23)

ACK main venue, 2022 photo by Kotaro Tanaka

(Kyoto, Japan, May 31, 2023) – Art Collaboration Kyoto (ACK) announces the exhibitor list for its third edition, which will welcome 64 galleries from 16 countries and 24 cities, including 33 exhibitors presenting at the fair for the first time. Art Collaboration Kyoto will take place in the Kyoto International Conference Center from October 28 to October 30, 2023, with a preview day on October 27, 2023.

Founded in 2021, Art Collaboration Kyoto presents a new model of art fair that is rooted in the spirit of collaboration, as well as Kyoto’s welcoming ethos and rich history of art and culture. Its “Gallery Collaborations” section pairs a local Japanese gallery with its international peer in a shared booth to co-present a unique and thoughtful exhibition, while “Kyoto Meetings” features artists with distinct connections to Kyoto. Driven by a commitment to enriching and developing the art ecosystem in Kyoto and beyond, the fair also hosts additional programs, including the fair’s Public Program, which welcomes Greg Dvorak, a specialist in Pacific and Asian history and gender studies, as its guest curator. In 2022, Art Collaboration Kyoto obtained bonded status, allowing international exhibitors to be exempt from the 10% sales tax that otherwise would have been imposed pre-sale. The fair has re-applied for bonded status for its 2023 edition in October.

Yukako Yamashita, Program Director of Art Collaboration Kyoto, said: “While you may already be familiar with many of our galleries individually, the collaboration between galleries in a shared booth will spark a profound dialogue, resulting in unique presentations that can only be experienced at Art Collaboration Kyoto. At the same time, galleries in ‘Kyoto Meetings’ will propose new ways to look at Kyoto, which is one of the oldest cities in Japan and largely considered the nation’s cultural capital.” 　
　

“Gallery Collaborations” this year will welcome 27 international galleries from North and South America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific hosted by 26 Japanese galleries in shared booths. Several galleries will showcase thematic presentations, such as Taro Nasu (Tokyo) and Galerie Eva Presenhuber (Zurich), whose presentation will trace the trajectory of conceptual art, including such artists as Simon Fujiwara, John Giorno, Lawrence Weiner, Fischli & Weiss, and others; and SCAI The Bathhouse (Tokyo) and Axel Vervoordt Gallery (Antwerp, Hong Kong), who will spotlight international artists whose engagement with material and abstraction creates a space for geopolitical dialogue and meditative experience. Others will place emerging and established artists in dialogue, such as in the shared booths of Blum & Poe (Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo) and Matthew Brown (Los Angeles), and ShugoArts (Tokyo) and TKG+ (Taipei). In addition, the section will include exhibitors presenting in Japan for the first time, including Union Pacific (London), who will collaborate with XYZ collective (Tokyo); and A Thousand Plateaus Art Space (Chengdu), who will collaborate with Satoko Oe Contemporary (Tokyo).

“Kyoto Meetings” will feature 11 local and international galleries whose presentations have connections to the historic city of Kyoto, offering an opportunity to explore the city from varied perspectives. Highlights will include Karma (New York, Los Angeles), whose presentation will include a series of paintings by American artist Dike Blair that were inspired by his travel to Kyoto; Artcourt Gallery (Osaka), who will present new works by sculptor Kozo Nishino, indigo dyer Shihoko Fukumoto, and painter Chihiro Yoshioka, all of whom have formative ties to the city of Kyoto; and neugerriemschneider (Berlin), who will present works by artist Olafur Eliasson that are inspired by the spirit of Kyoto’s Zen Gardens.

This year’s edition of the fair will feature a series of programs under the curatorial theme set by Yukako Yamashita “Vision of a Torn World: Circulation and Coexistence,” which encourages exploration of ways of living in a new world emerging from division. In support of the fair’s commitment to bettering the future of the art world through educational programming and expanding the impact of art on its surrounding communities, the fair will also host ACK Talks, an international conversation series spanning diverse genres; and the Kids Program for families and youth. Further collaborations will extend beyond the fair venue and into the city of Kyoto. Additional highlights and programming details will be announced in late summer 2023.

For the full list of participating galleries, please visit https://2023.a-c-k.jp/en/exhibitors/.

Notes to Editors

About Art Collaboration Kyoto
Art Collaboration Kyoto is an art fair held in Kyoto with collaboration at its core. One of the leading art fairs in Japan specializing in contemporary art, Art Collaboration Kyoto presents unique collaborations forged between Japanese and international galleries; government and private sectors; and fine arts and other cultural spheres in Kyoto. Hosted in the Kyoto International Conference Center, the fair consists of two sections: “Gallery Collaborations”, which pairs a local Japanese gallery with its international peer in a shared booth; and “Kyoto Meetings”, which features artists with distinct connections to Kyoto. Beyond the fair, special exhibitions and public programs are held in Kyoto City.

Art Collaboration Kyoto is organized by the ACK Executive Committee, which includes the Kyoto Prefecture; Association for the Promotion of Contemporary Art in Japan; Contemporary Art Dealers Association Nippon; Culture Vision Japan Foundation Inc.; Kyoto Chamber of Commerce and Industry; and the Kyoto Convention and Visitors Bureau. The fair is presented with support from The Cabinet Office, Government of Japan in the fiscal 2023 and the Japan Tourism Agency, Government of Japan in the fiscal 2022 in cooperation with JETRO Kyoto, Kyoto City, Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Japan Association of New Economy, The Kyoto Shimbun.

The fair is located at the Kyoto International Conference Center (Takaragaike, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto City) and others. For more information, please visit a-c-k.jp.

2023 Dates
Preview (by invitation only): Friday, October 27, 2023
Public opening dates: Saturday, October 28, 2023 – Monday, October 30, 2023

About Yukako Yamashita, ACK Program Director
Born in 1988 in Tokyo to a family that runs a tea ceremony utensils business in Kyoto, Yukako Yamashita completed an MA in Art Business at Sotheby’s Institute of Art in London, then joining Sotheby’s Japan where she oversaw the sales of contemporary art. From 2017 to 2022, Yamashita was the managing director of THE CLUB, a contemporary art gallery in Tokyo, Japan. She has served as a visiting professor at Kyoto University of Arts since 2020 and was appointed Program Director of Art Collaboration Kyoto and Kyoto City Growth Strategy Promotion Advisor in 2022.

About Greg Dvorak, Guest curator of the Public program
Dr. Greg Dvorak is a Professor of International Cultural Studies (History and Cultural Studies, Art Studies, Gender Studies of Pacific and Asia) at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan. In addition to authoring several scholarly chapters in academic edited volumes, he is the Founding Director of Project35 (project sango), a grassroots network that aims to raise awareness about the Pacific Islands region in Japan through art and scholarly exchange. He served as a co-curator for “Air Canoe: Art from Northern Oceania” in the 10th Asia Pacific Triennial of Art and has helped to advise other exhibitions such as the inaugural Honolulu Biennial.

Selection Committee
Axel Dibie, Galerie Crèvecoeur (Paris)
Yoshiaki Inoue, Yoshiaki Inoue Gallery (Osaka)
Tomio Koyama, Tomio Koyama Gallery (Tokyo)
Yuichi Mori, Mori Yu Gallery (Kyoto)
Shelly Wu, TKG+ (Taipei)
Yuko Yamamoto, ANOMALY (Tokyo)

Art Collaboration Kyoto is pleased to share the following statements from the new members of the Selection Committee:

“It is a great honor to be part of the selection committee of ACK together with gallerists I admire. Since I participated in ACK in 2022 I have been strongly interested in the very unique concept of a collaboration fair between Japanese and foreign galleries. ACK is more than a fair, it is a true art exhibition within one of the most historical and refined places in the world, Kyoto.”
Axel Dibie, Co-Founder, Galerie Crèvecoeur

“I’m really excited to take part as ACK selection committee member, to have the opportunity to engage and explore new possibilities with some of the best gallerists, and to present the best of Kyoto to international audiences.”
Shelly Wu, Founder and Director, TKG+