Art Fairs at a Turning Point: Why Galleries Can’t Afford to Go—but Can’t Afford to Stop

Whenever the art world reckons with its global overgrowth, people point to art fairs as a central culprit. This was especially true late last year, when headlines announced the shuttering of multiple high-profile galleries and satellite spaces, after which several more galleries announced that they’d be pulling back from the fair circuit. Since Art Basel launched in Switzerland in 1970 as the first truly global fair—initially joined by a handful of regional counterparts, such as the historic Art...