Ah, the irony! Scope, which featured an artist-designed, kid-friendly funhouse at its last Miami fair, recently got into a turf war — with children. Its third Basel edition opens this month in the city’s Sportsplatz Landhof, a much-used greensward near Art Basel’s venue, but only after a fight. Shortly after Scope signed a four-year contract with the canton of Basel in mid-February, local groups voiced objections to the agreement, saying that kids in particular would lose out on a favored spot. The dispute came to a head in early April, when the opponents scrawled an anti-Scope message in white chalk on the sports field; the local newspaper, Basler Zeitung, printed a photograph of the demand. In late April, the issue was resolved, with Scope firmly holding its (play)ground.

"Kids Today..." originally appeared in the June 2009 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's June 2009 Table of Contents.