TEFAF Maastricht 2020

It is the first few days of March. As the world began to collapse around us, with more and more tales of sadness pervading the air from the streets of urban China to the countryside of rural Italy, with new cases repeatedly reported in Tokyo to New York, from Paris to Hong Kong, the question on the minds of not only Team Yufuku but of all the exhibitors at TEFAF was quite simply: would the show go on?

It did.
And did clients show up?
They did.
And in hindsight, was this a good thing?
I’m still not quite sure!

Firstly, please allow me to express my deepest gratitude to our clients and my team for taking the great risk of coming to Maastricht last month. Despite the circumstances, our presentation was a great success thanks to your support and guidance. And my many thanks and warm applause go out to our artists for providing such wonderful works yet again. I am always so proud to be able to represent your beautiful pieces!

Secondly, I would like to extend my support and gratitude to the organisers of TEFAF for not only their bravery in going on with the fair, but for their bravery in ending the fair at that exact moment in time. These were unquestionably difficult decisions to make, and I think TEFAF had executed them with both courage and grace.

It is quite easy to criticise TEFAF for going ahead with the fair, esp. with the knowledge we have now. Yet I assure you that each and every exhibitor who manned a stand had fully grasped the gravity of the situation, and ultimately, it can be said that the first 4 days of the fair were quite safe, surprisingly productive, and was fully approved not only by the Dutch government, but by the exhibitors themselves. Thus, to point fingers is rather easy ex post facto, but at that point in time, it did feel right.