Hauser & Wirth returns to Art Basel Hong Kong with a tightly curated presentation that moves across generations, placing modern masters alongside leading contemporary voices in a dialogue that feels both expansive and sharply focused.
At the centre of the booth is a late work by Pablo Picasso, Chat et crabe sur la plage (1965), one of a series of four paintings made over just a few days. Charged with humour and invention, it captures the restless experimentation that defined the artist’s final years.
Pablo Picasso Chat et crabe sur la plage (Cat and Crab on the Beach) 14 January 1965 Oil on canvas 89 x 130 cm / 35 x 51 1/8 in 116.2 x 156.6 x 4 cm / 45 3/4 x 61 5/8 x 1 5/8 in (framed) © 2026 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY Courtesy Private Collection Photo: Jon Etter
Nearby, a suspended mobile by Alexander Calder drifts with quiet precision. Horizontal (1956) balances wire and colour into a composition that feels both weightless and exact, a signature example of Calder’s ability to translate movement into form.
Alexander Calder Horizontal 1956 Sheet metal, wire and paint 101.6 x 309.9 x 45.7 cm / 40 x 122 x 18 in © 2026 Calder Foundation, New York / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York ? Courtesy of Calder Foundation, New York / Art Resource, New York Photo: Jon Etter
The presentation moves fluidly between eras and sensibilities. A richly worked canvas by Francis Picabia reflects his late shift toward looser, more gestural forms, while Philip Guston’s Feet on Rug (1978) brings his unmistakable late language into play — intimate, uneasy, and quietly surreal.
Philip Guston Feet on Rug 1978 Oil on canvas 203.2 x 264.2 cm / 80 x 104 in 206.7 x 267.7 x 5.1 cm / 81 3/8 x 105 3/8 x 2 in (framed)© The Estate of Philip Guston, Courtesy the Estate and Hauser & Wirth Photo: Christopher Burke
Contemporary painting holds its own within this historical framework. George Condo’s Blues in F minor (2021) folds art history and musical rhythm into his fractured figuration, while Mark Bradford’s What are you doing in here (2018) draws on the textures of urban life to probe questions of class, labour and social structure.
Mark Bradford, What Are You Doing In Here, 2018 Mixed media on canvas 182.9 x 243.8 x 6 cm / 72 x 96 x 2 3/8 in © Mark Bradford, Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth Photo: Joshua White
Elsewhere, Qiu Xiaofei’s Garden (2025–26) unfolds as a space of memory and atmosphere, somewhere between personal history and dreamlike reconstruction.
Qiu Xiaofei Garden 2025-2026 Oil on linen 250 x 200 cm / 98 3/8 x 78 3/4 in 255.5 x 205.5 x 5.7 cm / 100 5/8 x 80 7/8 x 2 1/4 in (framed)© Qiu Xiaofei, Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth
Sculpture threads through the booth with equal force. A fabric work by Louise Bourgeois, Couple (2002), stages an embrace that feels at once tender and precarious, held in suspension within a glass vitrine. Roni Horn’s cast glass piece shifts subtly with light, its surface absorbing and reflecting its surroundings in real time.
Roni Horn Untitled (“We talk a lot about the weather. All of us miss the weather, which surprised us. It’s as if the only thing we can bear to have in common is weather conditions on a lost planet.”) 2022-2024 Solid cast glass with as-cast surfaces 27.9 x 121.9 cm / 11 x 48 in © 2026 Roni Horn / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth Photo: Ron Amstutz
New works by Lee Bul push further into perception and illusion. Using mirrored panels and LED light, her Infinity wall (2026) opens onto an endless, disorienting space, while Perdu CCXXVII layers materials to blur the line between the organic and the synthetic.
Lee Bul Perdu CCXXVII 2026 Mother-of-pearl, acrylic paint on jute canvas, aluminum canvas frame, stainless-steel frame, diptych 226.6 x 163.3 x 4 cm / 89 1/4 x 64 1/4 x 1 5/8 in (framed) © Lee Bul Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth Photo: Jeon Byung-cheol
Across the booth, additional works by artists including Agnes Martin, Willem de Kooning, Cindy Sherman, Rashid Johnson, Henry Taylor and Zeng Fanzhi extend the conversation, reinforcing the gallery’s ability to stage encounters between distinct practices, histories and geographies.
Zeng Fanzhi Untitled 2025 Oil on canvas, 200 x 200 cm / 78 3/4 x 78 3/4 in 206 x 206 x 6 cm / 81 1/8 x 81 1/8 x 2 3/8 in (framed) © Zeng Fanzhi, Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth Photo: South Ho
Rather than a straightforward survey, Hauser & Wirth’s presentation reads as a carefully constructed environment — one where balance, tension and continuity play out across decades of artistic production.
Art Basel 2026 Hong Kong, 27th-29th Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
Hauser & Wirth, Booth 1C21
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Mark Westall is the Founder and Editor of FAD magazine –