Over the past three decades, Artissima has established itself not only as a leading event for the Italian art market but also as a cornerstone of its contemporary ecosystem—and a bridge to the wider international art world. Its launch in 1994 was part of a pivotal period during which Italy, a country widely known for its historical heritage, expanded into the contemporary scene. Just a few years prior, the first museum entirely dedicated to it, Castello di Rivoli, opened. And shortly after came the founding of Fondazione Sandretto. Together, the two institutions quickly became pillars of Turin’s contemporary art scene and of Italy’s broader art ecosystem.
Artissima will open its 32nd edition to the public on Friday (Oct. 31) at the Oval (Lingotto Fiere) with 176 Italian and international galleries from 36 countries across 5 continents. Ahead of the opening, Observer connected with the fair’s director, Luigi Fassi, to discuss the distinct identity and mission the fair has maintained since its inception as one of Italy’s earliest major platforms dedicated exclusively to contemporary art.
According to Fassi, when the art fair was founded, the institutional landscape in Turin was expanding and becoming more international, along with a growing base of collectors. “Artissima emerged as a natural continuation of this engagement with contemporary art in Turin,” he says. “It was part of a broader ecosystem—creating a market platform made sense in a city already so rich in both private and public collections, foundations and permanent institutions.”
From its inception, the art fair has been anchored in the rich cultural ecosystem of institutions in Turin, which has shaped its strong curatorial focus on experimentation, research and quality. The fair is part of Fondazione Torino Musei, managed and owned by the City of Turin, which also encompasses four major institutions: GAM—Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, one of Italy’s most significant modern and contemporary art museums; MAO, the Museum of Oriental Art; and Palazzo Madama, the Museo Civico d’Arte Antica. This bond with the public sector makes Artissima not only unique—one of the few fairs globally with such a profile—but also an instructive case study in how an art fair might operate differently at a time when the global market is confronting its own contradictions and excesses.
“Artissima is deeply rooted in that institutional framework—unlike other art fairs that might have more purely commercial origins,” Fassi notes. “The history of Artissima is the history of an institution—born from collaboration with other institutions, shaped by the city’s cultural context. Because of this, Artissima has developed an institutional way of thinking. When I talk about Artissima, I talk about an institution—not just a market platform. Of course, we are a market platform; that’s our purpose. But we also have a curatorial and cultural proposal: we aim to create meaningful connections for participating galleries. It’s vital for us to collaborate with the institutions I mentioned, as well as others in Turin, across Italy and internationally.”
This institutional focus matters, he explains, because Artissima works not only with established and mid-career galleries but also with a new generation of emerging ones. As a platform that operates both in the market and within institutional frameworks, the fair has built a reputation for talent-scouting, for giving visibility to emerging galleries and artists and for supporting new artistic visions and formats. “Their expectations extend beyond sales—they’re looking for institutional visibility for the artists they represent. Many galleries participate in Artissima precisely because they know, or at least believe, that the fair can help create those institutional connections. That’s part of Artissima’s DNA: for many years it has cultivated strong relationships with museums and curators.”
Fassi sees the art fair as both a cultural platform and a bridge. “When I think of Artissima from an Italian perspective, I see it as a service platform created for the benefit of Italian galleries—a kind of bridge,” he says, noting that around 60 percent of the participating galleries are international and 40 percent Italian, meaning Italian galleries actually form the minority. But that’s precisely the point: it allows them to test themselves on an international stage while remaining in Italy. “For young and emerging Italian galleries, it’s an opportunity to engage directly with the global art scene without having to leave the country.”
For international galleries, Artissima is a gateway to Italy—a chance to connect with a highly sought-after network of collectors and institutions. That appeal has only grown in recent months after Italy reduced both its VAT and export tax to 5 percent, immediately reenergizing Italian collectors.
“We’re based in northern Italy, but we bring together the entire Italian art scene—from the very south to Turin—and connect it to the broader international landscape. When I think about Artissima’s local audience, I’m really thinking about Italy as a whole,” Fassi explains. “Of course, we emphasize our connection with the Turin system, but our audience is national and the fair serves as a platform for all participating galleries, each with their own goals and expectations.”
A fair by and for curators and museum directors
The fact that Artissima is guided primarily by its director and a select group of curators is what enables the fair to uphold its institutional profile while maintaining a strong focus on experimentation and research. Each year, Artissima also adopts a cultural theme that shapes the selection and curatorial approach for the entire edition.
For 2025, under the title “Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth,” the fair draws inspiration from visionary thinker Buckminster Fuller and his seminal 1969 book of the same name, published by Il Saggiatore. The idea of an operating manual invites reflection on our shared presence aboard Planet Earth—a “spaceship” entrusted to the collective responsibility of all its inhabitants, making us all its pilots, says Fassi. At the heart of this edition are pressing questions about how we can care for the planet by balancing its resources and ensuring sustainability for all living beings. “Destiny has left us without instructions, but Fuller urges us to break down disciplinary barriers and cooperate with a broader, more conscious perspective,” he adds. The entire edition is guided by the belief that great visionaries—such as artists—can chart new paths to help us understand our role as stewards of this Spaceship Earth. “Artists think holistically and independently, intuitively and creatively: they transcend specialization and short-term utility, imagining solutions beyond disciplinary boundaries.”
Since taking over in 2022, Fassi has worked to strengthen this institutional focus, giving particular importance to the fair’s curated sections: “Back to the Future,” which revisits artists from previous generations; “Present Future,” dedicated to emerging artists in collaboration with the independent scene; and “Disegni,” focused on works on paper. These sections add a more curated dimension to the fair’s primary sections—”Main Section,” “New Entries,” “Monologue/Dialogue” and “Art Spaces & Editions.”
The three special sections are curated by five independent curators who have complete carte blanche—their selections do not go through the fair’s main selection committee. “That level of curatorial autonomy is unique; no other fair operates quite like that,” Fassi notes. “I don’t interfere. I select the curators, but once they’re on board, I give them complete freedom. I’m there to support them—it’s a shared process to a certain degree—but I never question their choices.” Fassi adds that even if they decide to reject an established gallery in favor of a lesser-known one because they believe in the artist, that’s perfectly fine. “They can do whatever they want, as long as they complete the job.”
In his four years as director of Artissima, Fassi admits he has never had a curator decline an invitation. “They’re always enthusiastic. They tell me, ‘Fantastic, I love Artissima—it’s so close to us, to the curatorial world.’”
Each year, Artissima also invites—and naturally draws—a large number of curators and museum directors to the fair. Key for Fassi has been giving them agency and involving them in meaningful ways. One example is the fair’s Walkie Talkies series, which features live dialogues between a collector and an institutional figure as they walk through the fair, with recordings later published online to drive post-fair engagement.
International curators and museum directors also serve as jurors for the prizes awarded annually. Reinforcing its role as a platform for discovery and rediscovery of talent, Artissima will once again present thirteen prizes and honors organized in collaboration with partners, foundations and institutions. Among these, for the third consecutive year, Fondazione Arte CRT has expanded its 25-year-old Acquisitions Fund to a total of €300,000 for acquisitions destined for the collections of GAM – Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna di Torino and Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea.
Further strengthening and expanding the connection with the city’s institutions, Fassi also introduced a new prize in collaboration with Pinacoteca Agnelli, commissioning a new artwork to be presented above the pista, the legendary rooftop track where FIAT cars once raced.
Now in its third year, the New Entry Prize provides financial support for three exhibitors in the “New Entries” section, chosen by an international jury based on the artistic quality of their presentations at Artissima, easing the financial burden of participating in a fair of this scale. This year, the section will see the debut of twelve exhibitors from three continents, including A Sud (Pescara) with works by Adriano Costa, Gaëlle Choisne and Berenice Olmedo; ArtNoble (Milan) with sculptures by Jermay Michael Gabriel on colonial legacies; and ASNI (Riga) with a solo by Baltic artist Agate Tūna. Bliss (Warsaw) presents the spiritual art of Urszula Broll, while Bremond Capela (Paris) shows Corinna Gosmaro and Madeline Peckenpaugh in dialogue between abstraction, landscape and memory. Matteo Cantarella (Copenhagen) stages a site-specific work by Therese Bülow and Vibe Overgaard on nature and industry, while Galatea (São Paulo/Salvador) transforms its booth into a sensory installation by Carolina Cordeiro. Pipeline (London) focuses on sculpture and photography by Giorgio van Meerwijk; Soup (London) pairs new paintings by Nina Silverberg with a mural backdrop; Trotoar (Zagreb) spotlights Marko Tadić; Vohm (Seoul) presents Hana Kim and Eun Yeoung Lee on spontaneity and nostalgia; and zazà (Milan/Naples) debuts an installation by Shaan Bevan reinterpreting ancient mural traditions.
New this year is the Vilnius Residency Prize, which offers two artists, selected by CAC Vilnius under Valentinas Klimašauskas, the opportunity for residencies with curatorial support and access to the Lithuanian cultural network. The prize stems from the program Lithuanian Culture in Italy 2025-2026, created in collaboration with the City of Vilnius and the Embassy of Lithuania in Italy, reaffirming Artissima’s growing role in cultural diplomacy through its public institutional profile.
For the second year in a row, Artissima will also host a booth from the Italian Ministry of Culture—specifically the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity. “Their presence at Artissima is significant; they use the fair as a platform to present all the projects they support, both in Italy and abroad, relating to contemporary art,” Fassi notes, confirming Artissima’s status as one of the country’s most representative art events after the Venice Biennale.
This year, the Ministry will also host a panel during the preview day, focused on the recent VAT reduction, led by Fabrizio Curcio, president of the Chamber of Deputies, who officially signed the law last July. “It’s a meaningful moment: the government will essentially be in Turin to mark this milestone and the fair becomes the stage where this new measure is symbolically launched,” Fassi notes.
Quality, accessibility and “hype”
Despite an increasingly crowded November art fair calendar—and this year’s back-to-back schedule with Frieze London and Art Basel Paris—Artissima does not fear competition with the fairs in those and other cities. Fassi knows his fair still holds a special place for collectors from Italy and abroad. “This year there’s been a bit of a squeeze in the calendar, but honestly, it hasn’t changed much,” he asserts. “Before Frieze and Paris, there was FIAC, which was also held just a week earlier, so we’re used to this rhythm. Artissima has always taken place in autumn—it’s been that way for 32 years—and we feel completely at home in that slot.” Autumn is, after all, the most important season for the art market. This may not be the largest fair, but it continues to be one of the most influential.
Fassi sees this timing as an opportunity, noting how it has created a kind of porosity between London, Paris and Turin. “This year, more than 20 galleries are showing in Frieze, Art Basel Paris and Artissima and we’re seeing similar overlaps with collectors from Northern Europe and overseas,” he says. “Travel between the cities is easy—you can catch a train from Paris and be in Turin in five hours—so it naturally encourages cross-pollination.”
This year, Artissima will host Anonymous Art Project, a Japanese philanthropic initiative founded by entrepreneur Yuki Maki. Conceived as a platform to strengthen the connection between Japan’s art scene—its artists, curators and institutions—and Europe, Maki identified Artissima as the ideal context for the project to evolve. “He identified Artissima as the platform where this exchange could really grow,” Fassi says, explaining that the project will take the form of a large booth curated by an emerging Japanese curator, presenting four young Japanese artists who have never been shown in Italy and rarely in Europe. “It’s a fully philanthropic, non-commercial project and I find that fascinating—having a not-for-profit initiative presented within a commercial fair.”
At the same time, he highlights Artissima’s distinctive collector base. “All major Italian collectors come to Turin, of course, but we also attract collectors from neighboring countries—Switzerland, France, Austria, Germany—as well as from the U.K., Spain, Portugal and Eastern Europe. For us, Eastern Europe begins right next door, with Slovenia and Croatia, so those ties are natural.”
Most importantly, Artissima sustains its relevance through its focus on remaining “a fair with a human face,” as Fassi describes it, rather than a playground for billionaires. This approach reflects the unique character of Italian collecting, where a broader range of people collect—or at least maintain a deep familiarity with art. “We pay attention to the middle-class collecting culture that’s so deeply rooted in Italy—it’s part of our history since the Renaissance. Many of us grew up in homes with paintings on the walls and that tradition continues. In Italy, collecting isn’t limited to the elite; it’s something accessible. People may collect smaller works, but they collect nonetheless.”
For Fassi, it’s essential that Artissima continues to engage that audience—the collectors in between—while still serving major collectors and established galleries. This balance allows the fair to remain a place for meaningful acquisitions by the “middle class” and to foster engagement among a broader public, including younger generations.
Education is central to Artissima’s mission and ties directly to its identity as a public institution. “Part of our mission is to create excitement around contemporary art—at least during the days of the fair. That’s why we invest so much energy in projects that activate the city as well as the fair itself,” explains Fassi.
Among the initiatives extending across Turin, Luca Lo Pinto, former director of MACRO in Rome, is curating “The Screen Is a Muscle” at Gallerie d’Italia in Turin, focusing on moving images and film. The exhibition is part of Artissima’s long-standing partnership with Intesa Sanpaolo, a cornerstone of the fair’s program for years.
For the third year, Artissima will also present an outdoor installation at the Giardino Zoologico, the city’s former zoo along the Po River. This year, artist Basim Magdy will debut a video installation reflecting on human and non-human relationships as part of the site’s cultural heritage. Another installation by Renato Leotta will be on view at Hotel Principi di Piemonte in the city center. “All of these projects are free and spread across the city—you can encounter them just by walking around. The goal is to build awareness and curiosity toward contemporary art. That’s why Turin’s Art Week has become such a public experience.”
In terms of education and accessibility, Artissima Junior has become a vital part of the fair—a workshop for children ages six to eleven, led each year by a major Italian artist. This year’s edition will be led by Stefano Arienti in collaboration with Juventus Junior Club. “It’s about community, creativity and making a collective artwork together,” Fassi says. “It also gives collectors peace of mind—parents can leave their kids in an inspiring environment while they visit the fair.”
For the second year, Artissima is hosting “Word—World of Words,” a conference dedicated to the contemporary art publishing sector. Curated by Francesco Spampinato, it features leading international magazines and a series of talks exploring the politics and practices of art publishing, engaging not only art professionals but also readers interested in culture more broadly.
For Fassi, these initiatives beyond the fair’s aisles truly define its strategy: to be inclusive and generous with the city, transforming Artissima from a fair into a cultural platform—one that brings people together, sparks dialogue and keeps contemporary art alive in the public imagination.
“This is the direction I hope Artissima continues to take: strengthening its institutional capacity and its ability to generate new and unexpected networks for the benefit of participating galleries,” Fassi reflects toward the end of our exchange. “Ultimately, our role is to design the best possible conditions for galleries to operate—bringing in more international professionals, curators and collectors and expanding the ecosystem that supports them.”
