Sad Kermit

Alex Da Corte

A 19.5-meter-long inflatable frog presides, temporarily, over Place Vendôme in Paris. The American artist Alex Da Corte (born 1980) brought it to Paris with the help of his London gallerist Sadie Coles, at the invitation of Clément Delépine—the outgoing director of Art Basel Paris, held from October 24 to 26 beneath the Grand Palais’ glass roof. In his films and installations, Da Corte habitually plays, with wit and lightness, on the clichés of mass consumption and entertainment. His Sad Kermit comes with a twist: its head is deflated.

Alex Da Corte

In popular culture, the frog is, of course, a mocking symbol of France. Given recent events, the inflatable’s melancholy could easily be read as a reaction to the astonishing theft of the French Crown Jewels from the Louvre on October 19. Enough to deflate any Gallic pride in matters of art.

Clément Delépine

Yet aside from this shocking blow to the nation’s cultural security, Paris this week—despite all political and economic headwinds—stands unmistakably as the global epicenter of art and its market. This year, Clément Delépine is welcoming 203 exhibitors to the Grand Palais and remains relatively unfazed by recent sluggish sales. After all, Sad Kermit itself represents one of the fair’s best price-to-scale ratios: it is for sale at $175,000. “We are not in a situation like the early 1990s, when sales dropped by 60%. Between 2024 and 2025, the market has only contracted by 12%,” explains the Art Basel Paris director.

Frith Street gallery in Paris

Across the city and in every price range, gallerists have made a real effort with their presentations. For sixteen days, through October 26, London’s Frith Street Gallery has even opened a temporary space near the Palais Royal and the brand-new Fondation Cartier—“because this is where things are happening,” notes founder Jane Hamlyn, setting aside any trace of national pride. At 40 rue de Richelieu, she is showing a selection of works by her artists, including major names such as German sculptor Thomas Schütte and South African painter Marlene Dumas, who lives in Amsterdam (priced between €200,000 and €1 million).

Thomas Schütte

Emma Reyes

Emma Reyes

Parisian gallery Crèvecœur, first known for its space on rue des Cascades in the 20th arrondissement, continues its remarkable rise. This October, it opens a third, smaller venue on rue de Beaune in the 7th arrondissement. At the fair and in its galleries, Crèvecœur is presenting, among others, the astonishing Colombian artist Emma Reyes (1919–2003), who ended her life in the samll French city of Périgueux and donated a substantial body of work to its museum. She was rediscovered in Europe through a 2023 exhibition at Geneva’s Mamco, while in her native country her fame has been revived by a popular telenovela inspired by her turbulent life. A former student of Mexican master Diego Rivera, she borrowed his exuberant flora and produced haunting portraits of grotesque, monstrous faces (priced between €50,000 and €80,000).

Nathanaëlle Herbelin

Nathanaëlle Herbelin

Perhaps in response to our uncertain times, there is currently a strong appetite for art that echoes classical canons—a figurative painting, often highly colored, expressed in endless variations of style and technique. Jousse Entreprise, both at its Saint-Germain-des-Prés gallery and at Art Basel, is showing work by one of France’s most sought-after young painters, Nathanaëlle Herbelin (born 1989).

In 2024, she was featured at the Musée d’Orsay alongside the Nabis. Her paintings—still-like glimpses of everyday life—focus on both the postures of her subjects and the interplay between motif and color. All the works in her show sold immediately, priced between €15,000 and €80,000. That success, however, doesn’t tempt Philippe Jousse to raise prices too fast: “We have to stay prudent and reasonable,” he says, mindful of his protégée’s future.

Nina Childress

Nina Childress

Paris dealer Olivier Antoine, of Art:Concept, presents the remarkable new series by Nina Childress (born 1961). Her portraits of women—legendary yet realistic, such as a striking young Catherine Deneuve, sold immediately at the fair—depict them as objects of desire. It’s a kind of glamorous, Pop-inflected feminism. She uses industrial paint, creating iridescent reflections and streaks on the surface. Her works sell on average of €40,000. “She has thirty years of work behind her,” Antoine notes. “In today’s market, that’s not expensive.” He concedes, however, that business has slowed considerably: “Neither Art Dubai nor Art Basel in Basel was successful. For now, we’re cutting back and only doing Art Basel Paris.”

Nina Childress

Mickalene Thomas

Nathalie Obadia gallery unveils at Art Basel and in her Faubourg Saint-Honoré gallery the latest works by one of the stars of American art, Mickalene Thomas (born 1971). These glamorous images of Black women, drawn from vintage erotic magazines, are in fact high-quality photographs cut and collaged onto aluminum, then embellished with shapes and patterns (priced between $50,000 and $170,000). Thomas currently has a solo show in Toulouse at Les Abattoirs Museum, following major exhibitions at the Broad in Los Angeles, the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia, and the Hayward Gallery in London.“They are naked and proud. At the time, it was a chic way to present desire. These are women who have taken back control of themselves,” explains the artist, determined to portray her heroines outside of any victim narrative.

Mickalene Thomas

 Gerhard Richter

In Paris, museum programming also helps attract art lovers. Notably, the stunning Gerhard Richter retrospective at Fondation Louis Vuitton, complemented by a major exhibition of around fifty works — many recent drawings — at Zwirner Gallery in Paris (which refuses to disclose prices).

 Walter de Maria

Or the show revisiting minimal art at the Bourse de Commerce, which could usefully be paired with a spectacular installation by American minimalist Walter De Maria (1935–2013) unveiled at Gagosian’s vast Bourget airport space. Truck Trilogy (2011–2017) consists of three gleaming Chevrolet trucks topped with geometric forms — a hymn to industrial minimalism (priced under $10 million).

 Rubens!

Rubens

At the Grand Palais, Gagosian also stands out with a painting by the Flemish master Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640), displayed in dialogue with contemporary works like those of John Currin, the virtuoso painter of exaggerated American female figures (one is priced at $6 million). In 2020, a Rubens canvas sold in New York for €6.4 million. In his time, as shown in his Antwerp studio, Rubens skillfully met market demand by employing numerous assistants to complete his paintings. Whether this Virgin and Child is entirely by Rubens’ own hand or only partly remains open — a question rarely raised at contemporary art fairs.

 Modigliani, Richter and Burri

Amedeo Modigliani

From the opening day, major deals were announced, particularly by global art giants: Pace sold a 1918 Modigliani painting, Jeune fille aux macarons, for just under $10 million, Hauser &Wirth an abstract painting from 1985 by Gerhard Richter for $23 million while Ropac placed a canvas by Arte Povera pioneer Alberto Burri, mixing gold and jute, for €4.2 million.

Alberto Burri

Not all galleries, however, are likely to be as pleased.

October 24–26. www.artbasel.com/paris/