New Campaign Supporting the Capital’s Culture Industries to Launch at Frieze London 2023

Prior to the pandemic, London’s creative economy delivered £58.4 billion, and four out of five visitors to the UK capital cited culture as a reason to come here. One in seven jobs in London is a creative one. Now, after a hugely challenging time for the sector, a new campaign to highlight and champion the enormous contribution that the arts make to London will launch at Frieze London 2023.

London Creates celebrates the capital’s world-leading cultural and creative industries, initially focusing on the city’s visual arts sector, with the ambition to extend to other areas of the arts in which London is preeminent: fashion, film, theatre and music. The campaign is supported by the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan.

Leading figures from the art world – artists, gallerists, museum directors and auction house experts – will launch London Creates on Wednesday 11 October at the 20th-anniversary edition of Frieze London. It’s an appropriate moment and location to champion London’s place in the art world. For two decades, Frieze has been a visible embodiment of the creative power of London, not just within the UK, but globally, extending its presence to the US and Asia.

Eva Langret, Director of Frieze London said: ‘London is a global capital for the arts and has a history and infrastructure like no other. This year, our 20th anniversary gives us the opportunity to celebrate the cultural diversity of the city and recognize the influence that we have across the world. The innovative edge of the city is unparalleled and continues to evolve, attested to by the new institutions and galleries that drive our creative spirit.’

The UK remains the second largest art market in the world, just behind the US, with 18 percent of sales globally. It is larger than the rest of Europe combined. Beyond those figures, though, London’s global reputation as a creative and cultural capital is unparalleled; earlier this year, London was voted both the best place in the world to study the arts and the most artistic city in Europe. The capital has more than 200 museums and 800 galleries, most of them free. London also has the greatest concentration of artists of any city in the world.

Despite the pressures of the pandemic, London continues to evolve and rejuvenate: the recent reopening of the National Portrait Gallery, the complete rehang of Tate Britain, the opening of the new Young V&A and the new Roundhouse Works creative studio workspace for young people, plus the ever-renewing roster of emerging independent galleries demonstrate that the city is hardy as well as imaginative. East Bank, at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, is the city’s largest new culture and education district in more than 150 years. Its first spaces opened this year.

Justine Simons OBE, London’s Deputy Mayor for Culture and the Creative Industries, said: ‘Creativity is built into the fabric of our city. Our artists, the diversity of voices here and the infrastructure that underpins them is what makes London such a dynamic creative capital. We are proud that artists are at the heart of our city […] and will do all we can to support our creative industries and help them thrive.’

Discover more at Frieze London 2023

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