ShContemporary, the grand bridge between eastern and western contemporary art , will launch its third edition in Shanghai Exhibition Centre on September 9, 2009.

Established as Asia’s most dynamic and international contemporary art fair, the 2008 edition attracted over 140 prestigious international galleries from nearly 30 countries. A team of eleven curators from around the world worked together to create special exhibition projects by 31 artists in the Asia Pacific region.

A New Artistic Direction

This year, in order to confirm ShContemporary’s place as Asia’s top art fair, the new Fair Director Colin Chinnery will lead a skilled team of curators and professionals to bring professional and unique visual feast to Shanghai. With a strong focus on artistic content, Shcontemporary 2009 will launch an important initiative that engages with emerging collectors from the region.

Colin Chinnery, fair director. He was the former Chief Curator and Deputy Director at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in Beijing. He has devoted himself in the contemporary art for many years and created the first sound art project in China. As the curator, he brought the fist exhibition of Young British Artists to China.

BEST OF GALLERIES, the main section of ShContemporary, will present invited galleries from around the world on the basis of projects and special presentations. The best galleries from the entire Asian region, exhibiting along a carefully selected group of galleries from Europe and the Americas, will show the most interesting contemporary talent, with a special focus on Asian contemporary art.

DISCOVERIES, a curated exhibition to showcase works by some of the most significant artists who came to international attention during these past two decades as well as some of the most promising emerging art in a spectacular 2000m2 arched hall; and a forum of international experts to address, through a series of public lectures and round tables, the urgent question being currently discussed throughout the centers of international art world: What precisely is Contemporary Art?

The exhibition is curated by Anton Vidokle, Mami Kataoka, Wang Jianwei, and the lecture series is organized by Anton Vidokle, with guest speakers including Boris Groys, Gao Shiming, Jan Verwoert, Carol Yinghua Lu, Hu Fang, Joerg Heiser, among many others.

Mami Kataoka, Senior Curator at the Mori Art Museum and International Curator at the Hayward Gallery. Kataoka’s recent shows include Laughing in a Foreign Language at the Hayward Gallery, and she is currently the curator of a major solo show of Ai Weiwei at the Mori Art Museum.

Anton Vidokle, writer, artist and curator, founder of e-flux, co-curator of Manifesta 6 and creator of a yearlong project, Unitednationsplaza in Berlin. As an artist, Vidokle’s work has been exhibited at the Venice Biennale, Lyon Biennial and at Tate Modern, UCLA Hammer, Haus Der Kunst, P.S.1, among others.

Wang Jianwei is one of the most versatile and consistently experimental artists in China. He was the first Chinese artist to show at Documenta, had a solo exhibition at the Walker Art Center in 2003, and last year received the prestigious Foundation for Contemporary Arts grant.

The new PLATFORM section, gives galleries representing emerging artists the opportunity for exposure. Each booth will showcase a maximum of two artists presenting work produced in the last two years, introducing a fresh new generation of artists in the Asia Pacific region and beyond.

Launch of the Asia Pacific Collector Development Program

ShContemporary is the only international art fair situated in China, and as such it is best positioned to bring the knowledge and resources both inside and outside of China together. Based on its special position, “Asia Pacific Collector Development Program” has been started with two questions : how can an art fair facilitate an emerging art market? And in what way has the financial crisis created new opportunities?

This year, Shcontemporary has created a team whose sole purpose is to engage with emerging collectors in the China region and create opportunities for learning and networking for those collectors. Colin Chinnery, the fair director said: “We have resources larger than those of individual galleries or independent advisors, and we want to put these resources to use all year round instead of just the few days during an annual art fair, to create a powerful means for the stimulation of the market.”

More specifically, the Asia Pacific Collector Development Programme is engaging in the following activities:

· To create quality market research that allows us to more accurately understand the potential of the market in China.

· To create a Collectors Club that will provide networking activities for emerging Chinese collectors to meet each other and meet collectors from other countries.

· To work with independent organizations in China that are engaging with emerging collectors, and to provide them with new opportunities.

· To work with top art schools in creating learning opportunities for collectors to better engage with the art market

· To provide support to international collectors who want to engage with the China region, and to Chinese collectors who wish to engage with the wider world of contemporary art.

The Asia Pacific Collector Development Programme aims to provide the engagement this region needs to grow into a strong and stable contemporary art market.

September 9th: the Collectors Night

On the evening of September 9th, collectors will have the first-hand opportunity to view the displayed works and procure the pieces of utmost interest in the prestigious context of the renowned Shanghai Exhibition Centre.

There will be many exciting events happening during the period of ShContemporary. Taking place in the iconic Oriental Pearl Tower, the Shanghai eArts Festival is a major exhibition that focuses on electronic and new media art; the largest group show of 2009 in China, "Bourgeoisified Proletariate", will consist of newly commissioned work by some of the biggest names in Chinese contemporary art; Liang Shaoji’s solo show at the Zendai MoMA will feature large scale and poetic installation by a recently ‘rediscovered’ master; not to mention the cocktail receptions and parties every day to make Shanghai the art destination in September 2009. It's a summer you can’t miss!