12 years following the first edition of arteBA, the Fair has presented a renewed profile of itself: the Contemporary Art Fair. As a result of this new direction and without neglecting historic production as a result of this, the game has been opened to new expressions of art such as video art, digital art, objects, installations and soft sculptures.
With the objective of surpassing the quality of the Fair in every edition, a specialized Selection Committee was convened, which evaluated the proposals of each of the 85 art spaces (art galleries, art dealers, new art spaces and spaces for art and design).
On this occasion, the Generalitat Valenciana presented an Art and Fashion display featuring the designs of Manuel Fernández. The works of the Catalan artists Luis Prades and Francisco Sebastián accompanied the display.
The great attendance of the public is an unprecedented aspect of this Fair, more than 100,000 people visited the spaces dedicated to art, to Cultural Institutions and to the exhibited publications. The amount of people that visited La Rural exceeded the expectations of the organizers, both during the weekends (including the Monday that was a public holiday), as well as during the week. This year also saw a considerable increase in the amount of sales.
These and various other factors described previously aim at improving each year’s edition of arteBA, with the understanding that cultural production in all its disciplines (visual arts, writing, cinema) shapes the identity with which the country projects itself into the world.
The people involved with arteBA2003 would like to thank the support of the press, the public and the sponsors that made the success of this fair possible.
