In pictures: meet the newcomer galleries debuting at Art Basel

Sana Shahmuradova Tanska

The Rapture (2025)

Gunia Nowik Gallery, Warsaw

The Kyiv-based artist Sana Shahmuradova Tanska’s monumental painting is timely, reflecting “the violence and atrocities committed against civilians and nature by Russia” during the war in Ukraine, says the gallery. “The piece explores the resilience of the human spirit and transgenerational trauma, focusing on collective memory in Ukraine,” says Kamila Walendykiewicz, an artist liaison representative.

Junko Oki

Baby dress (2025)

Kosaku Kanechika, Tokyo

Although she is in her 60s, the Japanese artist Junko Oki is an up-and-comer. She uses existing textiles, embroidering them by hand in an act of personal dialogue with the materials and their unique histories. This baby dress was originally made by the artist’s mother for Oki’s brother; Oki has embroidered a spiral at the bottom, leaving the needle attached as a metaphor for a story that is still continuing.

Mirella Bentivoglio

Simbolo totale (1984)

Repetto Gallery, Lugano

The Italian artist, curator and performer Mirella Bentivoglio (1922-2017) was a key figure in the 1970s who specialised in feminist visual poetry. She first displayed this tree (right-side up) in 1976 in a public square, inviting passers-by to write their thoughts on slips of paper that would serve as its new leaves. Bentivoglio later cut the trunk off and flipped the tree, sitting inside it and reading a poem she had written using the words on its leaves. In the sculpture’s present and final version, it has a wooden egg hanging in the middle—a symbol of birth and origin.

Ndayé Kouagou

A not that dirty mirror (2025)

Nir Altman, Munich

This work by the Paris-based Ndayé Kouagou follows a TV journalist conducting street interviews, asking one question: “What do you think of what’s happening here and elsewhere?” The piece underscores the power of mass media, reflecting on three universal topics and feelings the artist is keen to highlight—”unease, power and vulnerability”, the gallery says. A vast mural emblazoned with the text “where should we go from here?” accompanies the video.

Tina Girouard

Walls Wallpaper II (1974)

Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles

Although Anat Ebgi is new to Basel, the conceptual feminist artist Tina Girouard (1946-2020) first showed at the fair in 1977. Part of the 1970s New York scene, Girouard used things like vinyl flooring, wallpaper and fabric to make works that she would often also feature in world-building performances. Her materials—ranging from those given by family members to ones she found at department stores—were often already vintage by the time she used them, a reference to her working-class upbringing in rural Louisiana.

Alexandra Metcalf

Assembly: Peter, Jackson, David, Frederick (2025)

Ginny on Frederick, London

Each of these four grandfather clocks represents a man with whom Alexandra Metcalf has had “a complicated but nurturing relationship”, says Ginny on Frederick’s Freddie Powell. “She pulled them apart, then put them back together—a reference to bodily autonomy and female suppression.” Three of the clocks have already sold, and the fourth is on hold.

Nika Kutateladze

Untitled (2025)

Gallery Artbeat, Tbilisi

Nika Kutateladze has turned Gallery Artbeat’s stand into a fragmented domestic interior, evoking a typical living room in a depopulated mountain village in western Georgia. “Kutateladze’s practice explores how people are leaving remote areas, resulting in abandoned buildings taken over by nature,” says Natia Bukia, the gallery’s co-founder.