BRAFA

BRAFA’s new Expo base hailed as a success as Belgian fair returns to face-to-face business

The summer season is back in force. For the first time since 2019 there is a wealth of major art and antiques events for eager buyers and dealers.

From mid-June Brussels will be a hive of activity on the art and antiques front with plenty on offer to interest residents and draw visitors to the city.

With Brussels’ major art and antiques fair BRAFA postponed from its usual January slot until June, a group of exhibitors have got together to present a foretaste of the type of pieces on offer later in the year at Brussels Expo in galleries around the city under the title Brussels Art Walk supported by BRAFA.

La Biennale fair opens in Paris this week at the Grand Palais Ephémère and runs from November 26-December 5.

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including the organiser's decision to postpone the BRAFA Art Fair in Brussels due to take place in January.

A group of objects belonging to dealers who took part in the BRAFA art fair in Brussels were seized following an investigation by Interpol.

BRAFA Art Fair, Brussels’ major international art and antiques show, is one of the earliest events in the European fairs calendar.

One of the attractions of BRAFA, the Brussels art and antiques fair which is traditionally a new-year opener in continental Europe, is its breadth. This is not a specialist event: it concentrates on quality across a range of disciplines.

Among the numerous dealers at BRAFA showing early works of art is Brussels’ Gallery Desmet, which specialises in sculpture and objects ranging from Antiquity to the Grand Tour.

Whitford Fine Art from London is a long-standing BRAFA stalwart (understandably given that the gallery’s core stock is work by 20th century Belgian and international artists).

With so many tribal art galleries concentrated in Brussels it is no surprise to find 10 specialists in the field showing at BRAFA, six of them from the Belgian capital.

Another returning BRAFA exhibitor is the Paris dealer Xavier Eckhout, who specialises in animalier sculpture from 1880- 1950.

Finch & Co from London has been showing at BRAFA for 12 years. “We regard it as one of the most successful and well-organised art and antique events in Europe,” notes the firm’s Jan Finch.

BRAFA is a big draw for the visitor in late January but as well as enjoying all that Brussels has to offer in general cultural terms there are other art and antiques-related events on at the same time.