The organisers of the Art Car Boot Fair (ACBF) have risen to the challenge posed by the Covid-19 pandemic by developing an online version of their famously exuberant one-day event.

The first ever Viral Art Car Boot Fair will take place exclusively online on Sunday 20th September between 12 – 6pm, with Gavin Turk, Polly Morgan, Marcus Harvey, Sara Pope, Helen Beard, Pam Hogg and Pure Evil joining the line-up of over 100 artists.

Says Karen Ashton, founder of the Art Car Boot Fair: ‘We’d been thinking of developing a digital counterpart to our Live Art Car Boot Fair events for some time, both to extend our reach and to access new audiences. The challenges presented by the global pandemic have pushed us in a new and exciting direction.’

The ACBF team are also taking this opportunity to launch a new membership programme alongside its online debut. For a special half-price introductory offer of only £12 for the year, new members will be able to access the inaugural digital Art Car Boot Fair, as well as all other upcoming digital events over the coming year, 25% off tickets for future live events, exclusive offers with ACBF partner organisations and discount vouchers redeemable on selected artworks. Indeed, those who purchase membership before the 1st September will be entered into a prize draw to win a £100 voucher to spend at this year’s fair.

The fair will be delivered through a specially created event website. Each artist will have their own virtual car boot ‘pitch’ featuring not only all of their artworks, but also specially created films and live links direct to the artists’ studios. Just as with ACBF Live events, the Viral edition will offer direct access to a fantastic line-up of artists, all of whom will be making work especially for the day and selling for astonishing ‘boot fair’ prices. There will be countdowns, virtual queues, waiting rooms, art drops, exclusive editions, lots of originals and a myriad of ways for visitors to get involved, including artist-led experiences, quirky interactions from artists like Mr Bingo and the Misfortune Teller, and a few surprises to boot. And there’ll be another chance to scoop up even more fantastic art bargains at the free access 'Everything Must Go' follow-up event on Monday 21st September, 6 – 8pm.

Ashton adds: ‘We hope that this year’s digital event will deliver all the anticipation, frivolity and anarchic delight that has made the Art Car Boot Fair such a roaring success for the past 15 years.’

The full line-up of participating artists will be announced in the first week of September. The artists confirmed thus far include:

Gavin Turk
Pam Hogg
Jealous Gallery
L-13
Amelia Troubridge
Kate Knight
Nina Fowler
Sara Pope
Keira Rathbone
Flying Leaps
Christian Furr
Tracey Neuls
Sophy Rickett
Hi-Noon
Camille Phoenix
Wildcat Will
Holly Allan
Margi McDaid
Jess Albarn
David Edmond
Holly Allan
Quiet British Accent
Heath Kane
Julia Maddison
Adam Dant
Ian Dawson
Abigail Fallis
Rankin Helen Beard
Polly Morgan
Kristjana Williams
Pure Evil
Art on a Postcard
Smithson Gallery
Mr Bingo
Jake Clark
Misfortune Teller
Geraldine Swayne
Turps Banana
Marcus Harvey
Carrie Reichardt
Lady Muck
Wilma Johnson
Artists Pledge/Matthew Burrows
Paul Davis
Worton Hall Studios
Susie Hamilton
Kelly-Anne Davitt
Wilfred Wood
Alice Herrick
Rob & Nick Carter
Rachel Megawhat
Wilfrid Wood
David Saunders
Robert Rubbish
Trolley Books

About the Art Car Boot Fair:

The Art Car Boot Fair is a vibrant cross between an art fair and a car boot sale – a quintessentially British afternoon of art buying, mingling and entertainment.

The first Art Car Boot Fair was held in London in 2004 with a line-up of around 30 artists including Gavin Turk, Abigail Lane, Mat Collishaw, Fiona Banner and Bob & Roberta Smith. The ACBF has been held every year since, except for 2005, and it currently takes place twice a year and features an invited line-up of 150 artists with Turner Prize winners pitching next to rising stars, fine artists next to street artists and everything in between. The art is exclusively commissioned for the event and presented at fabulously reduced, just-for-the-day prices by the artist in person.

The main aim of the Art Car Boot Fair is to be a day when the artists let their hair down and for visitors to engage with art and the artists in an informal way, and to pick up some real art bargains to boot. The Art Car Boot Fair is an exciting and energised one-day event, widely regarded as the most democratic and fun way to buy art.

Founded and produced by Karen Ashton, a curator and independent art consultant and writer, and originally produced with Helen Hayward, the ideas behind the Art Car Boot Fair developed out of Joshua Compston’s ‘Fête Worse than Death’ and Gavin Turk’s ‘Livestock Market’ and ‘Articultural Shows’, Hoxton-based events that blazed a trail in the late 90s. The first Art Car Boot Fair picked up where they left off with the intention of re-introducing some summer fun and frivolity into a thriving but increasingly commercial London art scene.

This year the organisers of the Art Car Boot Fair have risen to the challenges posed by the global pandemic by developing an online version of their famously exuberant one-day event, bringing the anarchic spirit of the ACBF to digital life. The first Viral Art Car Boot Fair will take place on Sunday 20th September 2020. It will act both as a "lockdown" iteration in response to the Covid-19 crisis and also as our digital counterpart for all our future events, keeping the artist at the centre and extending our event to a new global audience.

Image credit: Bob & Roberta Smith, Art Car Boot Fair, King’s Cross, London, 2018 © Mathew Kelly

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