This post was originally published on artnews.com
Emmanuel Perrotin – the French art dealer with galleries in Paris, Hong Kong, New York, Seoul, Tokyo, Shanghai, and Los Angeles – is adding a London outpost to his global operation in 2025.
“It’s important to have a gallery in the British capital,” the gallerist posted on Instagram on Monday. “We have a long-standing relationship with the UK art scene and collectors. I’ve been waiting for the opportunity to set up the gallery under the right conditions. I’m delighted to offer our artists a new exhibition platform and new projects in such a prestigious environment.”
The new, 3,800-squre-foot space will be in Claridge’s, the iconic five-star hotel in the heart of Mayfair, a relative stone’s throw from the gallery’s flagship in Paris across the Channel. “This space was inaugurated in 2021 with a Damien Hirst exhibition organized by Claridge’s,” Perrotin added. “As it happens, I organized Damien Hirst’s first two commercial exhibitions in 1990 and 1991 in my first Parisian space. At the exhibition opening in 1991, Frieze magazine was launched, and Damien’s work was featured on the cover. It was an exceptional moment in my career. I look forward to coming full circle!”
Earlier this year, Perrotin set up shop in LA just before the firth edition of Frieze LA, underscoring the city’s burgeoning role as a thriving hub for contemporary art. Perrotin said he’s interested in tapping the “energy in creative fields like music, film, and dance” in LA, which is also reflected in the gallery’s diverse program. That diversity, he said, “allows us to create synergies between the different worlds our artists inhabit, and their degrees of fame. These connections benefit everyone. Our role is to bring our artists visibility so that they too can achieve success on a long-term basis.”
After opening in Paris in 1990, the gallery has expanded rapidly since the 2010s, launching new spaces in Hong Kong (in 2012), New York (2013), Seoul (2016), Tokyo (2017), and Shanghai (2019). At the beginning of 2024, a collaboration between Perrotin and art dealers Tom-David Bastok and Dylan Lessel was called off. For two years the collaboration saw the three dealers go into business together with a focus on secondary market sales, and, under the Perrotin umbrella, adding another Paris space to his portfolio and expanding into the Middle East with an outpost in Dubai. (Those two spaces will now operate under the name Bastok Lessel.)
Late last year, Perrotin set tongues wagging when he sold a 60 percent stake in the gallery to Colony Investment Management. At the time Perrotin told Bloomberg that “The art market has experienced an enormous revolution in the past few years, but there’s still lots to come. We need to boost our activities throughout the world and conquer new geographies.”
Perrotin is warming up for opening his new London gallery next year by presenting a show by British sculptor Lynn Chadwich at Frieze London next week.