A number of powerful works addressing war, conflict and terrorism made an impact at Art Basel this year - partly because they were timely presentations with a civil war raging in Syria and anti-Government protests in Turkey and partly because political work like this is not often seen at art fairs.
Visitors queued at Art Unlimited to see The Sound of Silence, Alfredo Jaar's work about the late photojournalist Kevin Carter, whose photograph of a starving child in the Sudanese desert won him a Pulitzer Prize. Other gritty, politically-engaged work presented at Art Basel included Huang Yong Ping's terracotta model of Osama bin Laden's compound where he was killed by US forces (Abbottabad), Johan Grimonprez's film exploring the global arms industry (The Shadow World) and Willie Doherty's harrowing account of the Troubles in Ireland (Remains). Read more...
Image: from Johan Grimonprez's The Shadow World
