Artsy, the leading online marketplace for buying and selling fine art by leading international artists, has partnered with the African Art Galleries Association (AAGA)—led by Valerie Kabov, Co-Founder of First Floor, and Julie Taylor, Founder of Guns & Rain and AWAD Global Member —to launch an innovative new online-only event, African Galleries Now through December 16, 2020. This newly ideated event places an important spotlight on emerging African artists and exposes them to Artsy’s global audience of nearly Two million collectors and art lovers. The inaugural event features 13 gallery participants spanning 15 countries across the African continent and allows global audiences to discover and collect over 200 fresh artworks by 52 African artists to watch.
The galleries participating are at the forefront of discovering, developing and showcasing the best of the continent. Based in Africa, AAGA member galleries are invested in nurturing local art sectors and shaping the wealth of diversity that is contemporary African art in some of its most dynamic centres.
Guns & Rain located in Johannesburg, South Africa, works with contemporary visual artists from seven African countries, including South Africa, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia, Botswana, Swaziland and Nigeria. Most of their artists are young and emerging. To view their contributions to African Galleries Now follow this link.
StArt Art Gallery, also an AWAD Global Chapter member, is another of the 13 participating art galleries. The gallery is located in Windhoek, Namibia. For this online exhibition the gallery is bringing together the work of four Namibian artists – Nicky Marais, Fillipus Sheehama, Actofel Ilovu and Ismael Shivute. This presentation explores diverse media, focusing on materiality and the artists relationship with the objects they depict and work with. To see their works follow this link.
