Noah Horowitz

Without art fairs, today’s highly globalized and commercialized art world would not exist. While many galleries complain about the high cost and grueling travel required to participate in international trade shows, they also rely on them to expand their clientele and turn buying art into an event. As chief executive of Art Basel, the most famous brand in art fairs, Noah Horowitz understands this paradox well. Since he took on the role in 2022, he has doubled down on Art Basel’s core business, most visibly by allying with the Qatari royal family to launch the firm’s fifth annual fair in Doha this past February and shepherding its Paris show to the historic Grand Palais in 2024. But he has also expanded the brand’s reach in forward-looking ways, including by augmenting its fairs with the dedicated digital art section Zero 10 and a retail shop for branded and artist-created merchandise, as well as diversifying Art Basel’s partnerships lineup with big names like Miu Miu, Samsung, and Qatar Airways. “I felt there was more Art Basel could do proactively and creatively… to meet an evolving market where it was,” Horowitz says. Now, he and his team are “working double time” to get there.