As the new coronavirus continues to spread around, concerns about the outbreak of the epidemic have swept the world, allowing governments in various countries to announce the closure of the museums or cancel/postpone the exhibitions. In particular, Japan, the country where Taiwanese likes to travel most, its confirmed cases continue to rise. To take the precaution of stopping spreading the virus, popular tourist attractions such as Tokyo Disney, Universal Studios Osaka, Ghibli Museum, Mori Art Museum, National New Art Museum have been announced to close until mid-March. In addition, the epidemic may seriously affect the Tokyo Olympics in July. Whether the event will be suspended will be announced in late May.
South Korea, which has swept the four prizes at the Oscar ceremony for "Parasite" a few days ago, is now the severely affected country second to China. Art museums such as the Leeum Samsung Art Museum, the National Museum of Modern Art Seoul, the National Museum of Korea, and the Daegu Art Museum have been temporarily closed.
The JINGART Art Fair Beijing, which should have the third edition this year, also officially announced its cancellation due to COVID-19. The exhibition was created by the ART021 Shanghai team. The success of the previous two editions has made the JINGART Art Fair getting popular. It is a pity to cancel.
As the outbreak in Italy was out of control, it was soon listed as the most serious country in Europe. The Italian government has cancelled the Venice Carnival in 2020. It is a great loss whenever it should be a joyful and festive atmosphere for Italy. Since the outbreak in the north, cities such as Milan, Venice, and Durin have been temporarily closed. Famous museums also closed such as the Pinacoteca di Brera, Museo Correr, Palazzo Ducale, and Murano Glass Museum, Peggy Guggenheim Collection. In addition, Giorgio Armani, an Italian luxury brand, first adopted a live stream to become the first big show without guests, thereby reducing the possibility of people gathering and spreading the coronavirus. The Milan Design Week, originally scheduled for the end of April, was also postponed to June. The Venice Architecture Biennale, which was fixed in May, has not yet released the relevant measures for the epidemic. The detailed status is still to be discussed, but for Italy, which is in an important tourist season, this epidemic has hit its tourism economy.
Since Italy became a severely affected area, Switzerland has announced that no large-scale events of more than a thousand people will be held before March 15th. Accordingly, the annual international trade fairs have been cancelled. Yesterday (February 28th) the official announced that it will postpone this year's watch and jewellery exhibition until January next year. Baselworld can be described as the world's largest watch fair. Since it founded in 1917, it has a hundred years of history and is estimated to attract more than 80,000 people every year. Art Basel in Basel, scheduled to be held in late June, has not yet announced the latest press. However, due to Swiss policy, if the epidemic continues to deteriorate, it is likely to taking cancellation.
In response to the epidemic prevention measures, Sotheby ’s Hong Kong auction has moved some April spring auctions to New York, while the remaining auctions have been postponed to Hong Kong in early July; Christie ’s Hong Kong has postponed the March auction to May.
For now, it is still not getting better. Whether coronavirus will affect the activities in the second half of the year remains to be concerned. Finally, Yiart would like to appeal to everyone that it is our responsibility to prevent this global epidemic.
Figure 1: Carnevale di Venezia 2020. Courtesy of Carnevale di Venezia.
Figure 2: Baselworld 2019. Courtesy of Baselworld.
