A Guide To May 2026 Photography Festivals & Exhibitions

A diverse array of international photography festivals and exhibitions are scheduled for May 2026. Key events include Bieler Fototage in Switzerland, focusing on vulnerability as a social condition; Photo London, which is relocating to the Olympia and introducing new curated sections; Hard Copy New York at the ICP, exploring photocopied imagery; Fotofestival Lenzburg, an open-air exhibition in Switzerland; and several other events across Europe and the US.

Gitterman Gallery : Ruth Thorne-Thomsen

Gitterman Gallery is presenting an exhibition of vintage gelatin silver prints by artist Ruth Thorne-Thomsen, on view through June 6, 2026. The show features a selection of her work from several series, including 'Expeditions' (1976-1984), 'Door' (1981-83), and 'Views from the Shoreline' (1986-1987), which showcase her signature technique of staging and photographing dioramas within landscapes to create surreal, dreamlike scenes.

Mastering the Mood: Exhibition explores emotion through light and color

American Legacy Fine Arts in Pasadena is launching a new exhibition titled 'Mastering the Mood: Atmospheric Emotion,' running from April 24 to June 6. The show features approximately 45 works by 25 contemporary-traditional artists, focusing on how light, color, and atmosphere in representational painting can evoke emotional responses in viewers.

New media art fair launches second edition in Busan, questions the genre's direction

The Loop Plus media art fair has launched its second edition in Busan, South Korea. The fair, dedicated exclusively to new media art, is confronting fundamental market challenges, specifically the public and collector uncertainty about whether such technologically dependent works can be owned and collected. It aims to build the market and ecosystem for the genre.

Retrospective exhibition traces Li Xiaoke's artistic journey

A retrospective exhibition titled "Distant Horizons · Traveler: The Footsteps of Li Xiaoke" opened at the Fangzhuang Culture and Art Center in Beijing, showcasing the work of the late artist Li Xiaoke. The exhibition, organized by the Li Keran Art Foundation, features his ink paintings, prints, and photography, all centered on his 34 journeys to the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau.

‘We’re attached to this land like a tree is rooted in soil’: unexpectedly timely exhibition speaks up for the people of south Lebanon

An exhibition titled 'Forget Me Not: South Lebanon in Memory and Motion' was held at London's Palestine House earlier this month. It featured archival news footage from 2000, photographs, audiovisual materials, and children's drawings to document the history, culture, and resilience of southern Lebanon, a region experiencing renewed conflict.

Protest Art Exhibitions

The CART Department has organized an exhibition titled 'Ai Weiwei LEGO Story' at Free Parking in New York, running from April 24 to May 3, 2026. The show presents a focused selection of the artist's brick-based works, including pieces from his Zodiac and After series and his BMW art car, highlighting accumulation and repetition as core methods.

Arles Drawing Festival: What Not to Miss at This Fourth Edition

Festival du dessin d’Arles : ce qu’il ne faut surtout pas rater pour cette quatrième édition

The fourth edition of the Arles Drawing Festival has opened, featuring over forty exhibitions across the city. The highlights include two major private drawing collections being publicly presented: Marin Karmitz's collection, displayed at the Sainte-Anne church under the title "Et la vie continue…", and the Collezione Ramo from Milan, showcased at the Museon Arlaten chapel as part of a focus on Italian art.

Has the world grown weary of art biennials? In search of an antidote, a Portuguese festival turns to anarchism

Anozero, a biennial art festival held in Coimbra's Monastery of Santa Clara-a-Nova, has opened a ghostly edition that uses installations—including Taryn Simon's sound piece of laments in multiple languages—to protest plans by the Portuguese government to redevelop the 17th-century convent into a hotel under its Revive programme. Festival co-founder Carlos Antunes threatens to cancel the biennial if the development proceeds, framing the event as a warning to the developer about the spirits that haunt the building.

Paul Kroner showcased in first solo exhibit, 'What Have I Done?'

Paul Kroner, an award-winning contemporary visual artist and gallerist, is presenting his first solo exhibition, "What Have I Done?," at his artist-run gallery, Studio Kroner. The show marks his 25th exhibition at the space and coincides with the gallery's fifth anniversary. Featuring nearly 50 works, some begun as early as 2020, the exhibition reflects on themes of creation, responsibility, and inner life. Kroner purchased the studio in 2021 after it was previously owned by Dick Waller, and the exhibition represents a full-circle moment following the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 protests in Over-the-Rhine.

RC Foundation Project Space Exhibition Series 2025–27

The Hayward Gallery in London, in partnership with the RC Foundation in Taiwan, has announced a new exhibition series for its HENI Project Space running from October 2025 to March 2027. The series features five solo exhibitions by artists Val Lee, Samuel Laurence Cunnane, Kulpreet Singh, Musquiqui Chihying, and Andrius Arutiunian, each exploring themes ranging from political violence and surveillance to climate change, ritual, and alternative cosmologies. The exhibitions are curated by a team including Yung Ma, Rachel Thomas, and others.

Andreas Angelidakis: Escape Room

The Greek Ministry of Culture has selected artist Andreas Angelidakis to represent Greece at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Angelidakis will present an installation titled "Escape Room" at the Greek Pavilion, curated by George Bekirakis with MOMUS as National Commissioner. The project reimagines Plato's allegory of the cave as an immersive environment addressing post-truth, nationalism, and digital illusions, while also confronting the troubled history of the Pavilion itself, including its 1934 inauguration amid the rise of fascism.

MIT List Visual Arts Center celebrates 40 years

MIT's List Visual Arts Center celebrated its 40th anniversary on April 10, 2026, with performances, receptions, and the opening of a new exhibition titled "Performing Conditions," which explores work, debt, and labor. Housed in the Wiesner Building designed by I. M. Pei, the museum manages public art across MIT's campus, including works by Olafur Eliasson and Sanford Biggers, and runs a Student Lending Art Program that loans about 700 works annually. An anonymous donor has launched a $1 million matching challenge grant for conservation of the public art collection.

painting unfolds across earth, canvas, and space in katharina grosse’s london exhibition

Katharina Grosse's exhibition 'I Set Out, I Walked Fast' at White Cube London presents a continuous environment where painting extends beyond the canvas into space. The show features new works, archival material, and a large in-situ installation that combines mounds of earth, a partially submerged canvas, and a bronze-cast sculpture into a single painted field. Grosse uses an industrial spray gun to apply acrylic pigments, creating works that blur boundaries between surface, site, and viewer. The exhibition avoids chronological order, instead connecting pieces from different periods to form a spatial network where individual works function as nodes.

Local artist work on exhibit in Tulsa

Living Arts of Tulsa is presenting “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides?”, an exhibition by Kenneth and Isabelle Watson Reams, with support from JustArts Gallery. Kenneth Reams, a former Arkansas death row inmate now serving a life sentence, created over 50 works including paintings, drawings, sculptures, and poetry alongside his wife Isabelle. The show opened April 3 and runs through April and May, exploring themes of incarceration, capital punishment, and social justice through the lens of Reams’ 31 years on death row.

A WHOLE NEW LEVEL OF ARTISTRY 👏 BTS leader RM is set to showcase his artwork from his personal collection in his upcoming exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art from October 3 to February 7, 2027. Tap the link in the comment section.

BTS leader RM will present an exhibition of artworks from his personal collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). The show, titled "RM: Resonance," is scheduled to run from October 3, 2026, to February 7, 2027, and will feature a selection of contemporary pieces he has acquired.

‘Breeders’ is a collaborative Lawrence art show on parenthood that took a village

A group of 17 Lawrence-based artists with children have collaborated on a new exhibition titled 'Breeders' at Cider Gallery, opening April 24. Organized by local artist and teacher John Sebelius, the show explores the joys and challenges of parenthood through diverse media, including paintings, collages, and ceramics. A sister show, 'Offspring,' featuring works by the artists' children, will open simultaneously at Seedco Studios. Participating artists include Mona Cliff, Stan Herd, Angie Pickman, Kevin Willmott, Megan Embers, and Katie Winter, among others.

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art's new central building is a 'machine of discovery'

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) has opened its new central building, the David Geffen Galleries, to the public. Designed by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor at a cost of $724 million, the 347,600-square-foot structure reorients the museum with a single, flowing second-story floor plan, eschewing a traditional main entrance or atrium to encourage wandering and serendipitous encounters with art. The galleries are named for major oceans and are designed to blend cultures and artworks from different eras.

In conversation with Mia curator Tom Rassieur: 1940s Germany, modern art and its mirrors today

The Minneapolis Institute of Art has opened a major exhibition, 'Modern Art and Politics in Germany 1910-1945: Masterworks from the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin.' The show, curated by Tom Rassieur, presents a chronological journey through German art from the Expressionist era through the World Wars, featuring key works by artists like Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Vassily Kandinsky, and Franz Marc. It highlights groups like Der Blaue Reiter and uses deliberate pairings, such as portraits of Jewish art dealers by Otto Dix and Lovis Corinth, to explore themes of societal tension, propaganda, and identity.

Lies, Virtual Reality, and Conceptual Art—Spring/Summer 2026 Exhibitions at PHI

PHI in Montreal presents two spring/summer 2026 exhibitions: "Come See, Lies Lies" by Paola Pivi and "Other Worlds" by Jakob Kudsk Steensen. Pivi's show features surreal installations including wall-mounted shoes, suspended velvet mattresses, and a metal house with TV screens broadcasting false statements, blending fairy tale and satire. Steensen's exhibition comprises six major works from the past decade, using virtual reality, video games, and sound installations to explore ecological themes and digitized environments like Bora Bora and volcanic seabeds. Both exhibitions open April 23, 2026, and run through September 13, 2026.

'Claude Viallat' at Templon, Brussels, Belgium on 22 Apr–6 Jun 2026

Galerie Templon in Brussels is presenting a solo exhibition of Claude Viallat, celebrating the 60th anniversary of his signature bone-shaped motif. The show features around thirty recent experimental canvases and objects from 2024 to 2026, exploring his practice of repetition and variation on diverse fabrics and found materials.

Tale of a Riderless Horse

The National Gallery in London is hosting an exhibition titled "Stubbs: Portrait of a Horse," focusing on the 18th-century artist George Stubbs and his masterful equine paintings. The show features studies, drawings, and key works like "Whistlejacket" (c. 1762) and "Scrub" (c. 1762), highlighting Stubbs's unique anatomical knowledge gained from dissecting horses.

In Milan, the furnishings of the White House go on display. Design and architecture to talk about propaganda

A Milano vanno in mostra gli arredi della Casa Bianca. Design e architettura per parlare di propaganda

An exhibition titled 'The White House. Domestic Propaganda' has opened at Dropcity, an experimental center in the tunnels beneath Milan's Central Station, as part of the city's Design Week. Curated by students from the Politecnico di Milano's Interior Design Laboratory, the show critically examines the White House as a domestic space for political propaganda, using installations, models, and drawings to explore how its architecture and furnishings project cultural and social meanings.

14 Must-See Museum Shows in New York This Spring

New York museums are launching a significant slate of spring exhibitions, featuring major retrospectives and thematic surveys. Highlights include "Noguchi's New York" at the Noguchi Museum, exploring the sculptor's unrealized urban projects; "Raphael: Sublime Poetry" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a comprehensive look at the Renaissance master; and "Gothic by Design: The Dawn of Architectural Draftsmanship," also at the Met, focusing on medieval architectural drawings.

'Femarmony' art exhibition opens in Karachi

A group art exhibition titled 'Femarmony' opened at the Sanat Initiative gallery in Karachi. The show features works by artists Imran Ali Kazmi, Nabiha Gillani, Saba Haroon, and Ujala Hayat, focusing on emotions, identity, and the evolving role of women in society through diverse painting styles and visual narratives.

Top Seattle art shows to see in May 2026

Seattle's art scene in May 2026 features six diverse exhibitions. Highlights include 'Influences: Japanese Prints and Northwest Art' at the Cascadia Art Museum, exploring the impact of Japanese woodblock printing on regional artists; a site-specific installation by Carly Sheehan at the appointment-only Double Garage Gallery; Clare Johnson's exhibition of over 6,000 artworks on sticky notes at Gallery 4Culture; Emma Bergman's surreal multimedia installation 'The World to Come' at Specialist Gallery; and a landmark retrospective of light-art pioneer Tom Lloyd at the Frye Art Museum.

Seattle May art shows include speakeasy-style gallery attached to house

A series of diverse art exhibitions are opening across Seattle in May. Highlights include a show exploring the influence of Japanese woodblock prints on Northwest artists at the Cascadia Art Museum, a site-specific installation in a private garage gallery called Double Garage, and a large-scale display of drawings on sticky notes by Clare Johnson at Gallery 4Culture. Other featured shows include Emma Bergman's surreal multimedia installation at Specialist Gallery and a landmark retrospective of light artist Tom Lloyd at the Frye Art Museum.

The Nerve Center of This Art Fair Isn’t Painting. It’s Couture.

The Independent art fair in New York is featuring a significant presentation of designs by Rei Kawakubo and her label Comme des Garçons. The works, which include garments and sculptural objects, are being presented as a curated exhibition within the fair, challenging traditional art fair categories.

Immersive Room-Sized Exhibit Environments

Spazio Viruly is presenting the exhibition 'UNBOXING: A Room as Instrument' at Superattico in Milan during Milan Design Week. The installation, created by designers Matthijs Koerts and Merijn Haenen, deconstructs everyday devices to reveal core elements like energy and sound, then rebuilds them into immersive, room-sized environments. The experience is enhanced with live dance performances by Eleonora Cattaneo and custom soundscapes.

Finlandia Art Gallery exhibit highlights a local artist in the Keweenaw Peninsula

The Finlandia Art Gallery in Michigan's Keweenaw Peninsula is opening a solo exhibition titled "Liminal Sanctuaries" by local artist Bonnie Loukus. The show features her latest collection of oil paintings depicting solitary animals in ethereal, human-free environments.