What to see at the Frieze Art Fair 2015: from Felix the Cat to £4m Sunflowers

Now 13 years old, the Frieze Art Fair is becoming as much of a fixture in the British calendar as Wimbledon and Royal Ascot.

Even if the format appears much the same there is still plenty to entice and amuse collectors and the public alike in the work brought to Regent’s Park by 164 galleries from 27 countries.

It provides a massive variety of art, and scope for surprise. Whether you’re in search of the instant hit or a more contemplative experience, there remains much to catch your eye.

It's a good idea to visit Frieze Masters after Frieze London. This may be only its fourth edition but it has quickly established itself as the original fair’s older, more sophisticated sibling, whose calmness is welcome after the frenetic activity over the other side of Regent’s Park.

There’s much fuss about “curated” booths, where a theme and decor create an installation rather than just a gathering of disparate works. Last year, Helly Nahmad caused a stir with his reconstruction of a Sixties collector’s pad, and this year he has created Jean Dubuffet: The Asylum, a “reimagining” of the conditions in which the French artist encountered Art Brut, or outsider art, often made by people suffering mental illness. It features art and text scrawled on the walls of a suite of rooms evoking an asylum. It’s one thing to acknowledge Dubuffet’s debt to these untrained artists, and the rawness of their creations, but it’s quite another — and in dubious taste — to build a mock asylum in a chi-chi art fair where you’re selling Dubuffet’s paintings.

Elsewhere, highlights abound. The new, scholarly Collections section, curated by Norman Rosenthal, features lovely displays of majolica at Bazaart gallery and Egyptian wooden sculptures at Sycomore gallery, and there are strong solo booths dedicated to Frank Auerbach (Marlborough) and Carmen Herrera (Lisson), among others. And the variety seems greater this year: Andrew Edmunds’s stand, above, dedicated to Gillray is a riot of savage satire and Jörn Günther’s gathering of illuminated manuscripts and books of hours is utterly exquisite.

Dotted throughout the fair are stirring individual works: a tender Degas of a father and daughter, at Acquavella, is the one I most longed to take home.

Frieze London, Regent’s Park, NW1 (020 3372 6111; friezelondon.com) is open daily, noon to 7pm, until Saturday. One-day entry, £34, evening ticket (5pm-7pm), £16; combined fair ticket, £50; concessions available. Frieze Masters is open daily, 11am to 7pm, until Sunday.

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