Art Stage to be presented on new canvas

IN an increasingly competitive art fair market, Art Stage has overhauled itself to stay ahead of the game. For its fourth edition next January, it has reduced the number of galleries - from 130 this year to just 100 next year. But in their place, there will be eight country or region-based platforms created by top curators around the region.

The eight platforms are India, China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Central Asia and South-east Asia. Possibly controversial is the decision to subsume Singapore - which for the past three Art Stage editions had its own platform - into the South-east Asia platform, comprising also Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, the Philippines and Thailand.

Arguably, the creation of platforms - especially the Central Asia and Australia ones - will offer a window into these regions' art, which hitherto were either missing or lost in the cornucopia of art on display.