BRUSSELS.- Art on Paper is an art fair devoted to contemporary drawing. 25 contemporary art galleries from Belgium and around the world will come together at the BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels for the third edition of the fair, taking place from 7 to 10 September 2017. Each gallery displays a solo show featuring an established or emerging artist whose focus is on drawing. An artist's stroke will thus stand out within each exhibition space.

Drawing has returned to the forefront of contemporary art and its value, as both a practice and a medium, is widely recognised. Art on Paper is designed to showcase the best in contemporary drawing through a curated mix of established and emerging galleries. An artistic director, supported by a selection committee, maintains the lasting and demanding line drawn for the show. The stage design structures the space in response to the specifics of the project that hosts it.

For this third edition, the format of the 25 solo shows does not change, it evolves. These are all efflorescences supported by galleries from around the world, from Basel to Manchester, from Paris to Munich, from The Hague to Seoul, from Cologne to Tokyo, from Paris to Berlin, without omitting a beautiful Belgian representation in Brussels, Ghent, Liège and Antwerp.

This breadth of view reflects the willingness of the selection committee to take risks by revealing novelties and a taste for freedom

It also expresses the desire to open up to international currents and sources of inspiration that are often the very soul of drawing, especially Asia. Two Asian galleries are present with artists who are both discoveries of Art on Paper: A-Lounge in Seoul, with Shubigi Rao, and Gallery Kitai in Tokyo with Reiko Tsunashima.

Art on Paper is:

• A specialized art fair held in a major cultural institution

• A show that asserts to the vitality of contemporary drawing and its expanded field

• 25 exhibitors presenting 25 artist's solo shows selected by a rigorous committee for a highly qualitative event

• Belgian, international, young and established galleries meeting in Brussels, core city of the contemporary art scene

• The opportunity to meet influential art collectors and professionals of the artworld.

Some highlights

Signatures : Pavel Buchler, Silvia Bachli, Bettina Carl
Three confirmed artists lend themselves to the game as equilibrists. Pavel Büchler illuminates the strangeness of everyday life with skepticism, humor and lucidity. Silvia Bächli creates an experimental imagery rooted in reality. With her images, Bettina Carl creates ephemeral and momentary collisions of indecisive elements.

Discoveries: Pier Vittorio, Reiko Tsunashima, Laetitia of Chocqueuse
They all love the paradoxes of simplicity. Pier Vittorio Aureli seeks the tradition of landscape, repressed by modern life. Reiko Tsunashima recreates the natural landscape in Japanese ink, the Sumi. And Laetitia de Chocqueuse proposes visual paradoxes, accidents of illogical or contradictory objects, creators of novelty.

Current events: Raphael Zarka, Dirk Zoete, John Murphy
These three artists are searchers of forms. Raphaël Zarka draws his raw material in cultural forms, mixing photo, video and writing.

Four Belgians : Robert Devriendt, Tinus Vermeersch, Johan De Wilde, Peter Morrens
These four Belgians have a liking for illusion. Robert Devriendt, composed of cinematic cuts where surprising characters and accessories create changing scenes, where misunderstanding plays a central role. Tinus Vermeersch aims at small, monochrome or tempera-like shapes, inhabited with surprising movement. Works of Johan de Wilde seem to be printed in horizontal and vertical lines, layer after layer, interwoven forms. As if he were drawing the canvas he painted. To realize the plethora of ideas that he harbors, Peter Morrens creates a multiple work that strikes with its profusion and its density ...