Designboom has published its monthly 'Radar' feature, highlighting a curated selection of notable art and design exhibitions opening globally in April. The list serves as an international guide for enthusiasts and professionals, spanning various museums, galleries, and cultural institutions.
The Emeritus Student Photography Exhibition 2026 has opened to the public, showcasing the work of older adult students from the Emeritus College photography program. The exhibition features a diverse range of photographic subjects and techniques, highlighting the creative output of non-traditional, lifelong learners.
The Hazleton Art League has opened a new exhibition featuring works by local and regional artists. The show includes a diverse range of media, such as paintings, photography, and sculpture, highlighting the creative output of the community.
The Berks County Intermediate Unit is hosting its annual Secondary Art Exhibition, showcasing the work of student artists from middle and high schools across the county. The exhibition features a diverse range of media, including painting, drawing, sculpture, and digital art, highlighting the creative output of the region's youth.
The Claremont Lewis Museum of Art will present a new photography exhibition titled 'Happiness Pursued. Paradise Lost.' The show will feature photographic works exploring the complex themes of human aspiration and the often-elusive nature of fulfillment.
Artist Proof Studio, a community printmaking center in Johannesburg, is marking its 35th anniversary with a major exhibition. The show features works from its extensive archive and by its alumni, highlighting the studio's role as a vital hub for artistic creation and education in South Africa.
The University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW) is presenting its Spring 2026 Senior Art Exhibition, showcasing the culminating work of graduating art students. The exhibition serves as a capstone event, highlighting the diverse artistic practices and creative achievements developed during their academic careers.
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.
Yoko Ono's first solo museum exhibition in Southern California, 'Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind,' opens at The Broad in Los Angeles on May 23, 2026. The exhibition, organized with Tate Modern, features interactive works from the 1950s onward, including the outdoor Wish Tree installation, text-based pieces from her book 'Grapefruit,' and collaborative anti-war works with John Lennon like 'Bed Peace.'
Artist Joanna Tam's solo exhibition "when blue meets blue" opened at the 25/8 Art Gallery on April 13, 2026. The show, presented in partnership with the Harvard Square Business Association and Intercontinental Management, features photographic works and installations exploring the ocean and sky as motifs tied to migration, memory, and the complex duality of nature. Tam, who grew up in Hong Kong and moved to the US, draws from personal experience to create a space for meditation on comfort, freedom, trauma, and tension.
MoMA PS1's sixth edition of the "Greater New York" quinquennial exhibition has opened, showcasing the work of over 50 artists and collectives. The show aims to capture the current state of New York's art scene, highlighting new and ambitious work created despite challenging economic and political conditions.
A set of 15 bronze and copper mirrors by Claude Lalanne sold for $33.5 million at Sotheby's in New York, shattering the artist's previous auction record and surpassing the record price for works by her late husband and collaborator, François-Xavier Lalanne. The ensemble, which far exceeded its $15 million high estimate, drew fierce competition from five bidders over ten minutes.
À Bordeaux, le MADD dévoile sa sublime métamorphose et rend hommage à une étoile filante du design
The Musée des Arts décoratifs et du Design (MADD) in Bordeaux has unveiled a significant architectural renovation and expansion of its public spaces. The project, led by the architecture firm Antoine Dufour, transformed the 18th-century Hôtel de Lalande, creating a new open-air passage, a café-restaurant, a ticket office-shop, and improving accessibility and circulation between the historic mansion and the adjacent former prison used for temporary exhibitions. The redesign emphasizes natural light, reveals original stone walls, and incorporates contemporary, clearly distinguishable interventions.
Kyiv-born illustrator Tania Yakunova creates lush digital and graphite illustrations characterized by grainy textures, gestural lines, bold shapes, and vibrant colors. Her work, which often features expressive human figures entwined with plant life, conveys brand narratives and personal emotions, such as homesickness following her 2023 move from Ukraine to London.
The Association of International Photography Art Dealers (Aipad) has opened the 45th edition of The Photography Show at New York's Park Avenue Armory. The fair features around 65 exhibitors in its main section, with a new Focal Point sector highlighting 13 solo presentations by boundary-pushing artists. Returning participants include major New York photography galleries, alongside first-time exhibitors and galleries returning after an absence.
A solo exhibition titled "Beyond Imagination" by Canadian artist Jack Lockhart is on view at the Alex Dufresne Art Gallery in Callander. The show features roughly 35 paintings spanning 60 years of Lockhart's career, highlighting his evolution from traditional watercolour, acrylic, and oil painting to innovative 3D works created using ChromaDepth glasses.
Adam Golfer, the director of the short film "Camille Henrot: In Movement," reflects on the process of creating the documentary. He describes following the artist Camille Henrot over a full year in New York and Paris, capturing her wide-ranging creative process from sketches to paintings, model-making to large-scale sculptures, and the evolution of her film work.
Arkansas Tech University's Department of Art is presenting "Proof of Process," an exhibition featuring the graphic design work of its senior students. The show is on view at the Norman Hall Art Gallery on campus until May 1, with a free public reception scheduled for April 23.
20e édition des Journées Marteau
The 20th edition of the Journées Marteau (Hammer Days) will take place from May 26 to 31, 2026, across Paris and France. Organized by the Symev, the event invites the public to discover how auctions work and to have objects, jewelry, and artworks appraised. For this anniversary edition, auctioneers are highlighting the color red through a curated selection of lots, while workshops, conferences, and meetings will illuminate the mechanisms of the art market.
Manet à la loupe
A new documentary film titled 'Le Monde dans un tableau : les lampes de Manet' offers a detailed investigation into Édouard Manet's final major painting, 'Un bar aux Folies Bergère'. The film features an eclectic mix of interviewees, from a Folies Bergère lighting technician to a Shintō monk and a Tokyo print editor, weaving together art history and broader historical context around the iconic work.
Dans l’ombre des génies
A podcast episode from France Culture's "Affinités Culturelles" series, titled "Ces femmes d'artistes à l'ombre de l'histoire de l'art," examines the lives and artistic contributions of women who were partners to 20th-century masters Edward Hopper and Pablo Picasso. It focuses on figures like Joséphine Hopper, Françoise Gilot, and Dora Maar, exploring how they were often relegated to the roles of muses and models, with some sacrificing their own creative careers for their relationships.
Photographer Paula Hornickel captured a moment between an elderly care home resident named Waltraud and a social robot named Emma in Albershausen, Germany. The robot, designed for companionship in settings with staff shortages, engages residents in conversation, tells jokes, and discusses topics like favorite flowers, simulating social interaction.
Ndéyé Kouagou has opened her first solo exhibition in Italy at Collezione Maramotti, presented in conjunction with the Fotografia Europea 2026 festival. The exhibition, titled 'Ghosts of the Moment', features recent works and new commissions that showcase her language-driven practice, blending text, performance, and image to explore unstable meaning and contemporary subjectivity.
A series of new gallery and community art exhibitions are opening across the Hamptons and Montauk. Highlights include Timothy Tibus's solo painting show "Live Forever" at The Lucore Art in Montauk, the group exhibition "Echoes of Matisse" at The Drawing Room in East Hampton, Ann Pibal's solo show at Halsey McKay Gallery, and a one-week solo exhibition for Marcie Honerkamp at the Springs Community Library.
A group exhibition titled 'Ephemeral Geographies: Where Land, Light and Time Shift' opens at Gallery Pradarshak in Mumbai on April 24, 2026. The show features ten emerging and mid-career Indian artists—Alistan Dias, Amol Pawar, Bhoomika Karbhari, Manthan Tambe, Meetul Agarwal, Pradip Suryawanshi, Rohan Bhavsar, Sharu Anjirbag, Siddhant Bansod, and Suresh Jangid—who present landscapes across mediums like painting and mixed media as evolving conditions shaped by perception, memory, and atmospheric change.
Oman has chosen artist, architect, and curator Haitham Al Busafi to represent the country at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Al Busafi will curate and present his own monumental installation, Zīnah, in the national pavilion, commissioned by the Omani Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth. The work transforms a traditional Omani horse harness into an interactive spatial experience using sand, metal, and sound.
A visitor recounts a personal gallery crawl through New York City neighborhoods like Tribeca, Chelsea, and the Lower East Side, highlighting specific exhibitions at Andrew Kreps Gallery, James Cohen Gallery, Chapter NY, and Bortolami Gallery. The article details works by artists including Thérèse Oulton, Elias Sime, Sonya Kelliher-Combs, Rosha Yaghmai, Vian Sora, and Sophie Reinhold, emphasizing the diversity of styles and materials on view.
The Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition opens at Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery on 25 April 2026, running until 20 June. The exhibition, on loan from London's Natural History Museum, showcases winning images from an international competition that received over 60,000 entries. A local community photography competition focusing on 'Wildlife on your doorstep' will be displayed alongside the main show.
An art exhibition has opened that focuses on themes of women's resilience, personal growth, and strength, specifically highlighting the beauty and power found in life's imperfections. The show presents works that explore these concepts through a feminine lens.
A major exhibition celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Aesthetica Art Prize will be presented across four venues in North Yorkshire, England. The show, featuring works by 50 leading contemporary artists, will be divided into four thematic parts and staged at Skipton Town Hall, the Mercer Art Gallery in Harrogate, Scarborough Art Gallery, and Scarborough’s Woodend Gallery from late April through September.