Art Basel Hong Kong is set to replicate the success of the Miami show despite worries of an overall slowdown in the art market. Sales remain chiefly propelled by private collectors, with institutions expected to assume a larger role in the future.

New York gallery David Zwirner was off to a fast start, selling five pieces prior to the show's public opening on Thursday by Belgian artist Michael Borremans crafted for Art Basel - ranging in price from HK$1.9 million to HK$12.48 million - to Taipei, Beijing, Hong Kong and Seoul-based collectors as well as the Shanghai Long Museum.

While many market watchers are holding their breath to see the results of Sotheby's auction next week to gauge Asia's art market trajectory, Art Basel Head of Asia Adeline Ooi sees fair weather ahead. She noted the market's growth has been paradoxical - with activity and growth still robust despite an economic downturn.

The two years since Ooi took over the helm of Asia's biggest art fair have remained intense, with Ooi observing that galleries are achieving in five years what would normally take two decades elsewhere. Yet despite all the excitement among private investors and galleries, she said there was much more room to grow institutional and cultural spaces for art, which she said were still few and far between.

Without revealing what is thought to be a long list of institutional buyers attending this year's show, Ooi said more Americans and museum groups are visiting while galleries from the West will hopefully continue to take the Asian market seriously and present their wares accordingly.

Private collectors remain the mainstay of business at Art Basel Hong Kong. Yet more institutions are visiting with more than a few familiar faces from the European circuit, according to art collector and author Burkhard Riemschneider.

"They are scouting, inquiring, laying down the groundwork for acquisition," he said.

West Kowloon Cultural District's M+ Museum announced Thursday it had acquired two works by Vietnamese artist Tiffany Chung - graphical depictions of Hong Kong's experience with Vietnamese refugees with clear parallels to Europe's recent humanitarian crisis.

Museum representatives from St Petersburg, Munich and Los Angeles were also turning up in droves according to One and J. Gallery co-founder and managing director Park Won-jae, who is counting on the combined surge of interest from Western institutions and growing regional museums to constitute a formidable market within a few years' time.

"They're coming to Hong Kong for Art Basel and they're also taking side trips to South Korea, Japan and elsewhere while they're in the neighborhood," Park said.

A heavier presence of US institutions including members of the Cleveland Museum of Art has expressed interest at Shanghai-based Long March Space gallery's booth, the gallery's program director Hsinke Lee said, noting Western institutions were increasingly seeking contemporary Asian art as a growing number of their museum patrons had roots in the Asian region.

There was a noticeable surge in interest from overseas combined with increasing numbers and buying power of regional institutions, she said. Although selling to institutions takes more time to satisfy purchasing protocols, the segment was a key market since they tended to buy a wider variety of "harder to sell works" - those that are too abstract, large or ambitious for the homes of private collectors.

Art Basel title sponsor UBS may lay claim to the world's largest art collection held by a financial institution, but its industry peers are also shopping at the fair. Asset management staffers from HSBC and Citibank are at the fair on official business, according to an auction house source.

tim@chinadailyhk.com

Hierarchy of Prosperity by artist Eko Nugroho attracted many visitors during a preview of the Art Basel Hong Kong show on March 22, 2016. Edmond Tang / China Daily

At Art Basel Hong Kong this year, artists Richard Maloy (above) and Luke Ching (below) had their own takes on the idea of recycling. Edmond Tang / China Daily

(HK Edition 03/25/2016 page8)