The Atlanta Art Fair will welcome around 60 galleries for its inaugural edition, including more than a dozen local dealers, reflecting the city’s status as one of the country’s rising destinations for contemporary art.
Atlanta galleries taking part in the fair will include Alan Avery Art Company, Day & Night Projects, Dunwoody Gallery, Fay Gold Gallery, Gallery Anderson Smith, Hawkins Headquarters, Jackson Fine Art, Johnson Lowe Gallery, Marcia Wood Gallery, Maune Contemporary, The Object Space, Poem 88, Sandler Hudson Gallery, Spalding Nix Fine Art and Whitespace.
The rest of the South also has strong representation at the fair. Tennessee galleries Urevbu Contemporary and Sheet Cake Gallery from Memphis and Ziehersmith and Modfellows Art Gallery from Nashville will take part, along with House of Friends from Savannah, Georgia; Scott Miller Projects from Birmingham, Alabama; Lucky Fish Gallery from Greensboro, North Carolina; Mitochondria Gallery from Houston. Florida will be represented by Fotovat Atelier from Fort Lauderdale and Steidel Contemporary from Lake Worth.
Also taking part are Luis De Jesus and Residency Art Gallery from Los Angeles, Aspen’s Casterline|Goodman Gallery and M. David & Co. and Spanierman Modern from New York. A handful of international exhibitors will also participate, including Gallery Tableu from South Korea; Galeria Baobab from Colombia; Makasiini Contemporary from Finland; Spence Gallery from Canada; and Stoney Road Press from Ireland.
The Atlanta Art Fair will mark the first-ever art fair for the galleries Hawkins Headquarters, Johnson Lowe, Residency Art Gallery, Day & Night and Modfellows The fair will reveal more exhibitors in the lead-up to the event, organisers said.
Art Market Productions (AMP), a division of a21 known for running other regional art expos like the Seattle Art Fair and the San Francisco Art Fair, is organising the new Atlanta fair. The fair will be led by director Kelly Freeman, along with artistic director Nato Thompson. Tim and Dirk von Gal, Atlanta-based advisors and founders of the Intersect Art Fair group, another regional art event company best known for its Aspen fair, are involved as advisors.
The fair will be held from 3 October to 6 October at Pullman Yards, a former sugar processing plant in east Atlanta that has been redeveloped into an event space with filming studios and restaurants. It’s the latest addition to an increasingly packed calendar of art fairs and other events. The Atlanta Art Fair will take place during Rosh Hashanah, one of the holiest holidays in Judaism, and end just days before Frieze London and Frieze Masters begin in the UK. It was scheduled to coincide with Atlanta Art Week, founded in 2022 by art advisor Kendra Walker.
Atlanta is one of the most-discussed emerging destinations for art in the US. Home to a thriving film industry (Atlanta has been nicknamed the “Hollywood of the South”) and a growing population, the city supports dozens of art galleries and has attracted national organisations like the United Talent Agency’s (UTA) second UTA Artist Space, a contemporary art gallery. The city is also bolstered by a strong contingent of local talent, including artists like Sergio Suarez, Scott Ingram, Michi Meko, Hasani Sahlehe and William Downs.