Highlights: Frieze Seoul 2026

The fifth edition of Frieze Seoul opened from September 2 to September 5 at COEX Center, Seoul. Featuring over 130 exhibitors from 30 countries and regions, the exhibition drew 70,000 visitors, including collectors and institutions from around the world.

Galleries that showed African art at the fair included White Cube, Mendes Wood DM, and Sprüth Magers, amongst others. White Cube presented works from El Anatsui, Tesfaye Urgessa, and Ibrahim Mahama, amongst others.

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On View: The File Cannot Be Restored at THK Gallery

THK Gallery presents a group exhibition titled The File Cannot Be Restored. The exhibition embraces fragmentation, layering, and material transformation as ways of understanding how memory endures – continually rewritten through the stories we inherit, the places we inhabit, and the futures we imagine.

Featuring the works of Nicola Brandt, Sahlah Davids and Tshepiso Moropa, the exhibition examines how memory persists across landscapes, archives, inherited traditions, and everyday acts of making. Working across photography, collage, and textile assemblage, these artists approach history as a contested and continually unfolding terrain.

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Four African Filmmakers You Should Know

From Lagos to Dakar, and beyond, here are filmmakers shaping African cinema one frame at a time.

MATI DIOP

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Temitayo Ogunbiyi And Sungi Mlengeya’s Upcoming Solo Exhibitions

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Where To Go As An Art Collector

As an emerging art collector, there are art-centered spaces where you can go to collect artworks and connect with artists, curators, and fellow collectors.

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Outdoor Sculpture Exhibitions You Should Know About

Here are four monumental outdoor sculpture exhibitions on view this quarter.

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Four African Artists Working With Textiles

African artists have used stitching, knotting, braiding, sewing, quilting, and felting to explore themes of family, identity, gender stereotypes, and political narratives over the years. As they draw from personal experiences and cultural memory, these four contemporary African artists are using textiles as a medium of communication.

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Three African Pavilions At The 2026 Venice Biennale

The 61st edition of the Venice Biennale opened on May 9, with more than 80 countries staging their own national pavilions across the city. Here are 3 standout national pavilions at the 2026 Venice Biennale.

Uganda Pavilion

Title: Kampala

Commissioner: Acaye Kerunen Elizabeth

Curator: Taga Francis Nuwagaba

Exhibitors: Joseph Ntensibe, Lilian Mary Nabulime, Ronex Ahimbisibwe, Lakwena Maciver, Sheila Nakitende, Stacey Gillian Abe, Aloka Mark Trevor

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Three Art Exhibitions You Should Know About

Featuring the works of Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Otobong Nkanga, and John Akomfrah, these are three major art exhibitions on view this time of the year.

To Improvise A Mountain by Lynette Yiadom-Boakye

De La Warr Pavilion

June 27 – September 13, 2026

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African Artists Expanding The Ideas of Masculinity

These artists are exploring the multifaceted ideas of masculinity by capturing tenderness, uncertainty, and vulnerability, an emotional landscape rarely seen in Black male subjects.

Through mixed media, these three artists are inviting viewers to think about masculinity as a field of emotional, political, and visual production rather than as a stereotype or closure.

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Nigerian Artists You Should Know

Working across different mediums and exploring themes of identity, spirituality, and emotional alchemy, these are three exceptional artists living and working in Nigeria that you should know.

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African Artists Whose Works Sold At Art Basel 2026

Art Basel 2026 recently concluded after five days at Messe Basel. The 55th edition of the art fair brought together 290 galleries from 43 countries, presenting works by more than 4,000 artists across several standout presentations.

There are reported sales of works from these four African artists at the fair.

Ibrahim Mahama

White Cube reported the sale of Ibrahim Mahama’s artwork, Kulala (2026), for $113,000. Ibrahim Mahama was born in 1987 in Tamale, Ghana.

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4 Art Books By LGBTQIA+ Artists

From visual artists to art historians, art writers, and activists, here are 4 remarkable art books that highlight the contributions of LGBTQ+ artists, photographers, performers, and communities.

Somnyama Ngonyama, Hail the Dark Lioness by Zanele Muholi

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Three African Artists Portraying Queer Love In Their Practice

For Pride Month, we are spotlighting these three African artists who depict expressions of queer identity in their artistic practice.

Sola Olulode

Born in 1996, Sola Olulode is a British-Nigerian artist who creates delicate portrayals of queer love through her figurative works. Her work offers intimate depictions of Black queer identity, often adopting a gestural style that emphasises the importance of the body.

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Three African Art Biennials To Look Forward To In 2026

These are 3 African art biennials to look out for as the year progresses and the Venice Biennale’s programming runs fully.

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Three African Documentary Photographers You Should Know

These are 3 documentary photographers of African descent living on the continent and in the diaspora who deserve your attention.

Joana Choumali

Joana Choumali lives and works in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast). Her practice spans conceptual portraiture, mixed media, and documentary photography. Her work captures everyday scenes from life in Côte d’Ivoire and across Africa. Much of her work responds to and reflects the diverse cultures surrounding her. Choumali layers her photographs with image cutouts, fabric swatches, and intricate stitchwork. She transforms her original frames into sites of fantasy that burst with color, texture, and imagination. In her recent works, Choumali embroiders directly onto her photographs, completing the creation of the photographic image with a slow and meditative gesture.

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Open Calls For African Art Professionals in Q2

Here is a list of opportunities open for African artists, curators, and researchers. Emerging and established art professionals should consider sending out their CVs and portfolios for this quarter.

Zeitz MOCAA & UWC 2027 Museum Fellowship Programme

Deadline: June 30, 2026

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Four Artists To Watch At 1-54 New York

The 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair returns to New York for the 12th year! As usual, the fair brings together a focused group of galleries from across Africa, Europe, and the Americas. The fair, which takes place at the Starrett-Lehigh Building in Chelsea, offers a snapshot of contemporary practices from Africa and its diasporas, and a space for exchange between artists, collectors, and ideas.

This year’s curated focus, 1-54 Presents: Brazil Beyond Brazil, led by Igor Simões, explores Afro-Brazilian practices within a broader diasporic framework, offering a more layered perspective on contemporary production. A series of special projects expands the fair beyond the booth format, with presentations such as Vilanismo: Collective Practices of Refusal across the Black Atlantic, Ekene Ijeoma’s Black Forest, and TM Arthouse’s Entanglements exhibitions, all of which offer immersive, research-driven approaches.

These are four artists to watch at the fair this year.

Serge Attukwei Clottey

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African Artists With Their Fashion-Inspired Artworks

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute will unveil “Costume Art,” an exhibition that focuses on the relationship between fashion and the body. The grand Met Gala, held on May 4, 2026, was influenced by this theme. The exhibition will open on May 10, 2026, inaugurating a nearly 12,000-square-foot gallery suite adjacent to the Great Hall, known as the Condé M. Nast Galleries. The exhibition will match about 200 artworks with approximately 200 garments and accessories. The exhibition will survey representations of the dressed body across primarily Western art from prehistory to the present.

In keeping with the recent trend, this article spotlights African artists integrating fashion into their artworks. Featuring paintings of colourful headpieces and sculptural installations of shoes and distinctive batiks on figures, these artists are interpreting the dynamic relationship between fashion and contemporary art.

Anthony Akinbola

Nigerian-American artist Anthony Akinbola is known for his signature wall-mounted paintings, single and multi-panel works that utilize the ubiquitous du-rag as their primary material. He explores the du-rag as both a material for art-making and as commentary on larger issues of identity, respectability, and commodification of African American culture. His layered, richly colored compositions celebrate and signify the distinct cultures that shape his identity. Some of these large-scale pieces have been exhibited in solo presentations at the Museum of Arts and Design and the Queens Museum.

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The Invited Artists At The Venice Biennale 2026

The 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia will open in May and run through November. Themed In Minor Keys, the exhibition expands upon the late Koyo Kouoh’s relational geography of encounters with artists over her lifetime.

The Venice Biennale will feature 110 invited participants, among them, individual artists, collaborative duos, collectives, and artist-led organisations, from many different geographies and regions. Selected by Koyo Kouoh, who was nominated as the artistic director of La Biennale di Venezia’s visual arts department in November 2024, and paying particular attention to resonances, affinity, and possible convergences between practices, these artists are from Dakar, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, and so on.

The selected artists are: Akinbode Akinbiyi, Kader Attia, Seyni Awa Camara, Nolan Oswald Dennis, Godfried Donkor, Adebunmi Gbadebo, Wangechi Mutu, Otobong Nkanga, Kaloki Nyamai, Temitayo Ogunbiyi, Kambui Olujimi, Thania Petersen, Johannes Phokela, Issa Samb, Berni Searle, Mmakgabo Mmapula Helen Sebidi, Billie Zangewa, Victoria-Idongesit Udondian, Buhlebezwe Siwani, Ranti Bam, and Sammy Baloji.

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