{"id":51707,"date":"2025-07-02T17:04:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-02T16:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/?p=51707"},"modified":"2025-07-02T17:04:17","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T16:04:17","slug":"the-treasure-paradox-treasure-house-fair-2025-through-the-eyes-of-a-fl-neur-in-the-age-of-interdisciplinarity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/the-treasure-paradox-treasure-house-fair-2025-through-the-eyes-of-a-fl-neur-in-the-age-of-interdisciplinarity\/","title":{"rendered":"The Treasure Paradox: Treasure House Fair 2025 through the eyes of a fl\u00e2neur in the age of interdisciplinarity"},"content":{"rendered":"
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London has been sweltering for the second week in a row, and exhibitions have become one of the best ways to spend time wisely \u2014 among fascinating people, in air-conditioned beauty. Royal Hospital Chelsea has once again \u2014 for the third year \u2014 welcomed the stands of Treasure House Fair 2025. This \u201cFair of the House of Treasures\u201d is the reincarnation of the renowned interdisciplinary Masterpiece art fair, held annually from 2010 to 2022, and rooted in the tradition of summer art fairs going back to the 1930s. By now, it\u2019s far more than a sales event \u2014 it\u2019s a kind of ritual gathering where art dealers and collectors (both newcomers and the well-established), museum curators, society figures, artists, and art-world bloggers converge to discuss not just antiques, but contemporary art as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s worth noting that the organisers have succeeded in assembling a truly intriguing roster of participants: 70 carefully vetted galleries, each presenting compelling works. For aspiring collectors, such fairs are an ideal chance to \u201ctrain the eye\u201d and hear expert insights into trends.<\/p>\n\n\n

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What matters is not just what\u2019s on display, but how it\u2019s presented: the exhibition structure unfolds like a well-written novel, full of paradoxes and contrasts. There\u2019s no visual overload here \u2014 the selection is thoughtful, the arrangement spacious, and the viewing experience almost private.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here, for example, is a fragment of the Aguas Zarcas meteorite, which once pierced the roof of a doghouse in Costa Rica, presented alongside the very same charred wooden board bearing the impact scar. (It\u2019s important to read the labels: at first glance, some objects \u2014 like Lynchian owls \u2014 are not what they seem.) This is no mere relic \u2014 it\u2019s a material event, as a cosmogonist might say. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Or take the tiny silver-and-sodalite bird by Guji Amashukeli, a master whose works serve the procession of Notre Dame and the Pope of Rome. Between the celestial and the domestic, the tangible and the sacred \u2014 there runs a barely perceptible thread. And here, having seen it, touched it, even tried it on (if wearable), you feel just a little closer to history.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Another example: a childhood drawing by nine-year-old Prince Charles, depicting a dragon regatta \u2014 a paper cloud torn from the memory of the future monarch, now gently lit by the maturity of royal restraint. And again, it\u2019s curious \u2014 and moving \u2014 to realise the simplest of truths: we\u2019re all human, and all mortal, but some are kings, and others \u2014 spectators. Art reminds us of this, sometimes with disarming ease and humour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Treasure House Fair is less about the passion of collecting, and more about collecting as a way to resist the disintegration of time. This year, the dialogue is particularly vivid \u2014 not only between eras, but between ways of seeing art. A surrealist landscape by Cedric Morris hangs next to a Picasso, while a 1938 table by Gio Ponti (Giovanni Ponti, 1891\u20131979) seems to laugh in response to the sombre severity of chairs by Thomas Chippendale.<\/p>\n\n\n

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This is the new eclecticism, much discussed by the fair\u2019s curators this year. Look closely at the exhibits and their interplay, and you\u2019ll see not a whim of fashion or gallerists, but a curatorial synthesis: from a carousel piglet to a gilded nude sculpture by Hepworth, from a Buddhist map of the universe to a French Art Nouveau floral brooch \u2014 all of it comes together as a single score, where the soloists are Memory, Object, and Myth. And that is especially precious in uneasy times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fair also includes events designed to deepen knowledge. One of them is the Sculpture Walk, themed for 2025 as \u201cRupture ~ Connection\u201d, curated by Melissa L. Gustin (Walker Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool). The format is intriguing: no signs, no explanatory labels \u2014 just intuition and sensation. Sometimes the \u201csculpture\u201d turns out to be, for example, an eighteenthcentury child\u2019s wardrobe shaped like a doll\u2019s house. Such a rupture transforms the object into an apophatic sculpture \u2014 something that speaks more than it can ever say outright. It\u2019s precisely these collisions that define the spirit of Treasure House Fair \u2014 a place where categories don\u2019t just blur, but become elegantly posed questions.<\/p>\n\n\n

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This is a space for self-education. And it\u2019s a pleasure to find that not only museum curators but also gallery representatives are happy to engage in conversation. The latter, in particular, are full of stories and facts \u2014 their aim is to sell, and yours is to figure things out. It\u2019s a chance to discover what truly appeals to you \u2014 and, perhaps, understand yourself a little better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFestival\u201d is exactly the right word. But I\u2019d add: this is not a festival of art, but of what can become art \u2014 through the right gaze. It\u2019s the gaze that turns a chair into monarchy, a mineral into eternity, a toy horse into the image of freedom. Everything here depends on our hands, our minds \u2014 and a touch of imagination.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Photo by Andrew Kitsen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

For me, Treasure House Fair is not just an exhibition \u2014 it\u2019s a visual essay, written in the language of vitrines, colour, and shadow. It\u2019s a point where museum-like reverence and theatricality call a truce and open the gates to a new audience. And maybe true art isn\u2019t what\u2019s on display, but what emerges in between: between the artist\u2019s hand and the viewer\u2019s attention, between the past and that very moment of the present \u2014 when you, holding your breath, meet the gaze of a silver beast staring at you from a two-hundred-year-old future and reminding you of what you love, what you fear, what you dream of. And through that encounter \u2014 you become just a little happier. Because I truly believe: art, like beauty, can make us just a little better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lena Esaulova,
Collector, jewellery designer, fairy
Telegram: https:\/\/t.me\/+SgL8KG5I5fVa_EOS<\/a>
Instagram: instagram.com\/lenaginarium<\/a>
Photo by Andrew Kitsen: andrewkitsen.com<\/a>
Official website: treasurehousefair.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cEvery work of art is a bridge. But some lead to beauty, others to mystery, still others to memory \u2014 and only a chosen few, to revelation.\u201d \u2014 From the reflections of Guji Amashukeli by the pavilion with the silver dove. To this beautiful thought by the artist, I\u2019d add that sometimes, one encounters bridges that lead nowhere \u2014 or worse, into a dark cul-de-sac where revelation is hard to come by. But then again, each work of art has its own viewer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":153,"featured_media":51642,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[86],"tags":[],"type_post":[184],"column":[],"class_list":["post-51707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/153"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51707"},{"taxonomy":"type_post","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type_post?post=51707"},{"taxonomy":"column","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londoncult.co.uk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/column?post=51707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}