The event is run by the same committee that organises the well-regarded Salon du Dessin held in the same building every spring.
This new undertaking occupies the time slot formerly taken by Paris Tableau, the fair dedicated to Old Masters that started in 2011 and was last staged there in November 2015. (The following year, Paris Tableau formed a section of the Paris Biennale, but this year it relocated to Brussels for a mid-summer staging in June.)
The organisers of FAP, who have a strong belief in the future of specialised fairs and in Paris as a major centre for them, are applying the same principles as they do to their Salon du Dessin. These are stand locations drawn by lot, a comfortably unostentatious setting on a human scale and a vetting committee composed of non-exhibiting specialists.
Billed as “a stroll through periods; subjects, techniques and galleries”, one idea behind the new fair is that exhibitors can offer a mix of the three different disciplines on their stands.
The 34 names who have signed up for the inaugural staging include many of the French and International regulars from the Palais Brongniart’s works on paper and Old Masters fairs which, given the nature of its genesis and the fact that it covers the same disciplines, is not surprising.
Half are French, chiefly Parisian, galleries. Of the remainder, the US and Switzerland each field four exhibitors; Italy three; Spain and the UK two and Germany and Belgium one each.
