More Art Like This, Please
Our 2026 picks for exhibitions around the world.
WORDS: Ninette Paloma
There is a blank canvas quality to the first few weeks of spring, when the holiday maximalism of winter is quietly washed away by the tide of a new season. Aristotle referred to this unfettered state as a tabula rasa, a clean-slate mindset to be filled with new inspiration.
But what if the influence of seasons’ past can’t help but carry over into the now? Colombian artist Doris Salcedo believed weaving together fragments of yesterday with today was a necessary labor of the human experience, a preservation of circumstance. To demonstrate this in her 2017 series Tabula Rasa, five wooden tables were shattered and then painstakingly glued back together: wholeness within the intricate burden of memory.
I thought of this constant conversation between the past and present while compiling our list of not-to-be-missed art exhibitions for the coming months. Some of the most memorable concepts on display last year had a regenerative quality to them; it seemed short-sighted to trade them in for the fleeting promise of new. Museums around the world seemed to be taking a similar approach, digging deeper into the themes that enjoyed record-breaking attendance in 2025. From a thoughtful list of many, and stretching across continents and cities, these are the approaches that continue to endure – and where in the world to discover them.
But what if the influence of seasons’ past can’t help but carry over into the now? Colombian artist Doris Salcedo believed weaving together fragments of yesterday with today was a necessary labor of the human experience, a preservation of circumstance. To demonstrate this in her 2017 series Tabula Rasa, five wooden tables were shattered and then painstakingly glued back together: wholeness within the intricate burden of memory.
I thought of this constant conversation between the past and present while compiling our list of not-to-be-missed art exhibitions for the coming months. Some of the most memorable concepts on display last year had a regenerative quality to them; it seemed short-sighted to trade them in for the fleeting promise of new. Museums around the world seemed to be taking a similar approach, digging deeper into the themes that enjoyed record-breaking attendance in 2025. From a thoughtful list of many, and stretching across continents and cities, these are the approaches that continue to endure – and where in the world to discover them.
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The Preservationists
Back in 2011, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art debuted The Steins Collect, an exhibition highlighting the Parisian avant-garde through the lens of some of its most impactful patrons: Gertrude, Leo, Michael, and Sarah Stein. Among the Cezannes and Lautrecs and Renoirs, the art of stewardship itself was on luminous display, with testimonials and historical anecdotes – even a meticulous replica of Gertrude’s rue de Fleurus apartment – dancing around nearly 200 paintings. This past March, Paris’s Musee L’Orangerie honored art dealer Berthe Weill – another prominent supporter of Paris’s young modernists – with a glorious glimpse inside the workings (and challenges) of a gallery during les années folles, and the once obscure artists she famously elevated. This month, the International Center of Photography in New York City unveils the work of Paris streetscape photographer Eugène Atget through the story of his greatest promoter: photographer Berenice Abbott, who acquired Atget’s archives shortly after his passing. In Eugène Atget: The Making of a Reputation, we learn that Abbott’s keen eye and fierce instincts sustained the legacy of an artist once destined to fade into obscurity. To champion those who’ve spent their lives advocating for others; more of this, please.
On that note: Preservation takes on literal meaning where artist Rebecca Louise Law and her dried flora installations are concerned, and this spring, the state of Schleswig-Holstein in Germany will be hosting State of Nature, her expansive floral sculpture exhibition spread across four locations in the region.
Back in 2011, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art debuted The Steins Collect, an exhibition highlighting the Parisian avant-garde through the lens of some of its most impactful patrons: Gertrude, Leo, Michael, and Sarah Stein. Among the Cezannes and Lautrecs and Renoirs, the art of stewardship itself was on luminous display, with testimonials and historical anecdotes – even a meticulous replica of Gertrude’s rue de Fleurus apartment – dancing around nearly 200 paintings. This past March, Paris’s Musee L’Orangerie honored art dealer Berthe Weill – another prominent supporter of Paris’s young modernists – with a glorious glimpse inside the workings (and challenges) of a gallery during les années folles, and the once obscure artists she famously elevated. This month, the International Center of Photography in New York City unveils the work of Paris streetscape photographer Eugène Atget through the story of his greatest promoter: photographer Berenice Abbott, who acquired Atget’s archives shortly after his passing. In Eugène Atget: The Making of a Reputation, we learn that Abbott’s keen eye and fierce instincts sustained the legacy of an artist once destined to fade into obscurity. To champion those who’ve spent their lives advocating for others; more of this, please.
On that note: Preservation takes on literal meaning where artist Rebecca Louise Law and her dried flora installations are concerned, and this spring, the state of Schleswig-Holstein in Germany will be hosting State of Nature, her expansive floral sculpture exhibition spread across four locations in the region.
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The Art of Fashion
The dandy as muse was on full display in 2025, with Los Angeles’s Getty Center, Chicago’s Art Institute, and Paris’s Musee d’Orsay teaming up to bring worldwide audiences Gustave Caillebotte: Painting Men. Portraying the European male in various forms of dress and undress, work and leisure, the French impressionist painter captured the everyday male experience with tender vulnerability and a refreshing disregard for gender norms. At The Met in New York City, the Black American dandy held our gazes with Superfine: Tailoring Black Style delving deep into the history and symbolism of dressing to the nines. Through a series of striking and chronological groupings, the exhibit highlighted fashion and its role as a material signifier of respectability and pride throughout Black history. This month, the fashion designers themselves are the subject of analysis in The Antwerp Six at the MoMu Fashion Museum in Antwerp. What was once an eyebrow-raising nickname for Ann Demeulemeester, Dries Van Noten, Dirk Van Saene, Dirk Bikkembergs, Marina Yee, and Walter Van Beirendonck – when their Flemish names proved too challenging for the foreign press – has now come to signify a breakthrough moment in Belgian fashion. The Antwerp Six offers the first in-depth perspective of the 1986 graduates of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, their singular influence, and their collective and undeniable impact on a global scale.
On that note: Can’t get enough of the dandy? Head over to Milan for The Gentleman: Style and Jewelry for Men at the Palazzo Morando where ornamentation and identity will be on dazzling display.
The dandy as muse was on full display in 2025, with Los Angeles’s Getty Center, Chicago’s Art Institute, and Paris’s Musee d’Orsay teaming up to bring worldwide audiences Gustave Caillebotte: Painting Men. Portraying the European male in various forms of dress and undress, work and leisure, the French impressionist painter captured the everyday male experience with tender vulnerability and a refreshing disregard for gender norms. At The Met in New York City, the Black American dandy held our gazes with Superfine: Tailoring Black Style delving deep into the history and symbolism of dressing to the nines. Through a series of striking and chronological groupings, the exhibit highlighted fashion and its role as a material signifier of respectability and pride throughout Black history. This month, the fashion designers themselves are the subject of analysis in The Antwerp Six at the MoMu Fashion Museum in Antwerp. What was once an eyebrow-raising nickname for Ann Demeulemeester, Dries Van Noten, Dirk Van Saene, Dirk Bikkembergs, Marina Yee, and Walter Van Beirendonck – when their Flemish names proved too challenging for the foreign press – has now come to signify a breakthrough moment in Belgian fashion. The Antwerp Six offers the first in-depth perspective of the 1986 graduates of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, their singular influence, and their collective and undeniable impact on a global scale.
On that note: Can’t get enough of the dandy? Head over to Milan for The Gentleman: Style and Jewelry for Men at the Palazzo Morando where ornamentation and identity will be on dazzling display.
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In Likeness
Dating back thousands of years, the tradition of portraiture was a common practice among the wealthy and regarded. Over the past few decades, it has taken on new significance, representing self-identity and autonomy as in Jenny Saville’s explosive retrospective The Anatomy of Painting last summer at the National Portrait Gallery in London and Kehinde Wiley’s powerful exhibition Flourish at the Museum Van Loon in Amsterdam. Using highly personal (and personalized) subjects, both of these Gen X artists impressed upon the subject of representation with fresh eyes in 2025: Saville with her bold strokes of flesh and fervor, Wiley with his vibrant hues and lush backgrounds. This season, we’re kicking it back to Wiley’s predecessor Thomas Gainsborough, whose genius style of melting subject into landscape is on view in The Fashion of Portraiture at The Frick Collection in New York City. At the Cavallerizza in the charming city of Lucca, Giovanni Boldini’s emboldened women are on full display in La Seduzione Della Pittura, where subversion and abstraction jump off the canvas to sensual effect.
On that note: Approaching her subjects with humor and whimsy, artist Rose Wylie will take over the Royal Academy of Arts in London this spring with The Picture Comes First, her largest solo exhibition to date.
Dating back thousands of years, the tradition of portraiture was a common practice among the wealthy and regarded. Over the past few decades, it has taken on new significance, representing self-identity and autonomy as in Jenny Saville’s explosive retrospective The Anatomy of Painting last summer at the National Portrait Gallery in London and Kehinde Wiley’s powerful exhibition Flourish at the Museum Van Loon in Amsterdam. Using highly personal (and personalized) subjects, both of these Gen X artists impressed upon the subject of representation with fresh eyes in 2025: Saville with her bold strokes of flesh and fervor, Wiley with his vibrant hues and lush backgrounds. This season, we’re kicking it back to Wiley’s predecessor Thomas Gainsborough, whose genius style of melting subject into landscape is on view in The Fashion of Portraiture at The Frick Collection in New York City. At the Cavallerizza in the charming city of Lucca, Giovanni Boldini’s emboldened women are on full display in La Seduzione Della Pittura, where subversion and abstraction jump off the canvas to sensual effect.
On that note: Approaching her subjects with humor and whimsy, artist Rose Wylie will take over the Royal Academy of Arts in London this spring with The Picture Comes First, her largest solo exhibition to date.
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Larger Than Life
There was no shortage of big male energy coursing through our institutions last year, with John Singer Sargent holding court at The Met in New York City before heading to the Musee d’Orsay in Paris later that fall. Joining him in the City of Light was Gerhard Richter, where all 11 galleries of the Fondation Louis Vuitton were dedicated to a comprehensive viewing of the German artist’s multiple mediums. This season, the visionary influence of women will be highlighted with Frida: The Making of an Icon at the Tate Modern in London, and Hilma af Klint at the newly refreshed Grand Palais in Paris. In Frida, the legendary artist’s canvases, garments, jewelry, and photographs will be exhibited alongside 200+ works by some of the artists she has influenced. Using chronology, the exhibit lays out the foundation of Kahlo the woman, before evolving into Frida the inspiration. Eight years after the first major international debut of af Klint’s Paintings for the Temple, her remarkable 193-works series will be presented alongside additional pieces within the storied halls of the Grand Palais. Convinced that audiences would not be ready to receive her over 1,200 intricate abstractions until at least 20 years after her death, it is only in recent decades that af Klint’s work has been made public – simultaneously galvanizing her position as the pioneer of Euro-American abstraction. To take in the full scope of her swirled and spiraled color gradient masterpieces beneath the gleaming steel and glass rotunda of the Grand Palais is to surrender to the mysticism that af Klint herself channeled when painting in her studio. If you are to see one major exhibition this summer, consider this a cosmic sign.
On that note: If you find yourself near Switzerland this summer, head over to the Kuntsmuseum Basel, where Helen Frankenthaler’s saturated and outsized canvases will be on luminous display in Europe for the first time.
There was no shortage of big male energy coursing through our institutions last year, with John Singer Sargent holding court at The Met in New York City before heading to the Musee d’Orsay in Paris later that fall. Joining him in the City of Light was Gerhard Richter, where all 11 galleries of the Fondation Louis Vuitton were dedicated to a comprehensive viewing of the German artist’s multiple mediums. This season, the visionary influence of women will be highlighted with Frida: The Making of an Icon at the Tate Modern in London, and Hilma af Klint at the newly refreshed Grand Palais in Paris. In Frida, the legendary artist’s canvases, garments, jewelry, and photographs will be exhibited alongside 200+ works by some of the artists she has influenced. Using chronology, the exhibit lays out the foundation of Kahlo the woman, before evolving into Frida the inspiration. Eight years after the first major international debut of af Klint’s Paintings for the Temple, her remarkable 193-works series will be presented alongside additional pieces within the storied halls of the Grand Palais. Convinced that audiences would not be ready to receive her over 1,200 intricate abstractions until at least 20 years after her death, it is only in recent decades that af Klint’s work has been made public – simultaneously galvanizing her position as the pioneer of Euro-American abstraction. To take in the full scope of her swirled and spiraled color gradient masterpieces beneath the gleaming steel and glass rotunda of the Grand Palais is to surrender to the mysticism that af Klint herself channeled when painting in her studio. If you are to see one major exhibition this summer, consider this a cosmic sign.
On that note: If you find yourself near Switzerland this summer, head over to the Kuntsmuseum Basel, where Helen Frankenthaler’s saturated and outsized canvases will be on luminous display in Europe for the first time.