A London-based gallery captivated the London Art Fair by showcasing all-female talent at the 2025 edition.
In collaboration with its 2025 museum partner, the celebrated Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, the London Art Fair showcased the work of seasoned and aspiring artists from international galleries from 21-26 January at the Business Design Centre.
Alice Black, who founded gallery ArtULTRA in 2021, chose to highlight two female artists at this year’s prestigious London Art Fair due to the lack of equality and female representation in collected art.
Black said: “If museums and galleries are not showing the work of female artists then people won’t be buying and they won’t be valued in the same way.”
A Burns Halperin report revealed that of the $196.6billion spent on art at auction between 2008 and the first five months of 2019, work made by women accounted for around just 2% at $4billion.
The report also noted that works by Pablo Picasso generated $4.8 billion at auction during the same period, more than the total spent on every single female artist in their data set combined, which totals almost 6,000 women.
Furthermore, a study by the Freelands Foundation’s Dr Kate McMillan uncovered that only 1% of the artwork in the National Gallery Collection is by women.
Black said: “I want to get people looking at art in a different way – work by female artists, work by diverse artists.
“This is where it starts.”
The works featured by ArtULTRA at the London Art Fair were by artists Beatriz Santos and Christine Ankaoua.
Santos, 28, is a London based multimedia artist whose works derive from her own poetry, often depicting everyday subject matter with innovative perspectives, warm colours and a blend of two and three dimensional art.
This year’s art fair marked Santos’ debut as an emerging artist, having completed a Painting MA at UCL’s Slade School of Fine Art in 2024.
She was thrilled to be showcasing her work at the fair as she believes it is extremely difficult for emerging artists, who have to hone their craft and build important connections whilst making ends meet.
She was the winner of the 2023 Richard Ford Award and the 2024 Dolbey Travel Award, and is definitely one to watch.
Santos said: “I am so passionate about showing my work and presenting myself as an uncompromising female artist but also encouraging much more dialogue and transparency around the art world.”
In contrast, established French abstract artist Christine Ankaoua’s career spans nearly four decades, having exhibited several times at the FIAC (the forerunner of Art Basel Paris), moving in prominent artistic circles with the likes of James Baldwin, and collaborating on a high profile UNESCO project in the 1990s.
Art critic Yves Michaud said: “Ankaoua’s monochrome is worked, researched, nuanced: the colour is deep and rich, the result of a sedimentation of moments.”
Despite an illustrious career with works shown in over 40 exhibitions worldwide, nowadays, Ankaoua’s extensive body of work is largely out of the public eye, which is a fate that has befallen many female artists of her generation.
This led to ArtULTRA spotlighting Christine’s work at this year’s fair, as a way of reintroducing Christine’s creations to a newer audience.
Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts director Jago Cooper added the London Art Fair is an excellent opportunity for artists to connect, share their work, and gain invaluable exposure.
Cooper said: “It’s really important for emerging artists to find that pathway to how they might actually make a career.
“Ultimately, artists have to find a way for financial remuneration [for their work].”
The Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts also showed work from its own collection including pieces by Francis Bacon, Elisabeth Frink, and Alberto Giacometti.
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