art, art, art

ART FAIR TOKYO, Japan’s largest art fair, is on again this weekend at Tokyo International Forum in Marunouchi. This year, 138 galleries will be displaying around 3,000 artworks, many of which will be available for sale. If that isn’t enough to wear you out, there are also a couple of seminars and some guided tours. The excitement kicks off tonight with a special guest/press preview and continues for the next three days, ending on Sunday the 4th. Tickets are 1,200 yen pre-purchase or 1,500 yen at the door. Get more information here.

Also this weekend is a new event with the slightly misleading moniker ART FAIR FREE. Although considerably smaller than ART FAIR TOKYO, this group exhibition offers a fun alternative to the earnest sales-driven atmosphere of its bigger, much sweatier cousin. Part silent auction, part swap meet, ART FAIR FREE gives the financially challenged a chance to get in on the game by way of a barter system in which would-be buyers offer stuff for art. Not to mention simultaneously doing away with that pesky “first-in-best-dressed” rule AND giving you the chance to clean out your closet.

Here’s how it works: 55 artists will contribute works. If you spot one you really, desperately can’t live without, you can request a special (yes, special) email address where you can write to the artist, proposing a trade. If the artist wants what you’re offering more than any of the other offers they receive, you get the artwork and the artist gets that brand new exercise machine you bought two years ago and still haven’t unwrapped.

ART FAIR FREE will be held at VACANT in Harajuku from Friday, April 2 to Sunday, April 4. The successful bidders will be announced at a party on Sunday night. Entry to the exhibition is 1,000 yen. Click here for more.