ART SG 2026: Our First Glimpse Into Next Year’s Must-See Highlights
Art fiends, here’s what to look out for at Southeast Asia’s leading contemporary art fair in 2026.
The start of a new year means one thing for the visual arts scene in Singapore – the return of Singapore Art Week (SAW). As with previous editions, the anchor fair ART SG remains a focal-point for galleries, creators and art-curious souls alike. Now in its fourth edition, the fair is bigger and better than ever. To get you ready, here’s a curated look at the highlights worth keeping on your radar.
What’s New For Art SG in 2026
One Ticket for Double The Art: S.E.A. Focus at ART SG
An anchor event for SAW, S.E.A. Focus spotlights Southeast Asian contemporary art by both distinguished and up-and-coming artists. In 2026, the event will be integrated into ART SG’s programming in a bid to strengthen both platforms’ reach as a key pillar of SAW. For the first time, a single ticket grants you access to both events, now housed under one roof.
Themed The Humane Agency and curated by John Z.W. Tung, the upcoming edition features local galleries such as Mr. Lim’s Shop of Visual Treasures and STPI, alongside regional names like The Drawing Room (Manila) and ISA Art Gallery (Jakarta). The showcase considers artists not merely as observers of socio-political issues, but active partakers in shaping an increasingly volatile global future – themes that feel especially resonant today.
Debut of ART SG FUTURES Prize
Next year also marks the launch of the ART SG FUTURES Prize, a USD 10,000 award presented by UBS to an outstanding emerging artist in the fair’s FUTURES sector — a meaningful boost for rising talent and a nod to UBS’s ongoing commitment to nurturing a more vibrant art ecosystem.
At the UBS Art Studio, the UBS Art Collection will spotlight Melati Suryodarmo’s I Love You (2007), a five-hour endurance performance captured on video. The artist moves through a stark red room repeating the phrase “I love you” while carrying a heavy glass panel, turning a simple declaration into a ritual of longing and emotional persistence.
Installations To Look Out For At Art SG
The section where ART SG goes full-scale and fully immersive, this year’s PLATFORM section pulls viewers into environments that embrace spectacle.
It Feels Like Home… The Journey Continues by Anne Samat (Marc Straus Gallery, New York)
Anne Samat transforms everyday household objects — keys, corks, curtain rings — into towering woven figures imbued with personal and cultural memory. In this new iteration, she reflects on belonging, migration and identity through a self-portrait that is both fiercely intimate and visually striking.
Bedtime Stories by Citra Sasmita (Yeo Workshop, Singapore)
After all that art prompting existential thought, Sasmita offers a counterpoint by creating zones of calm and softness: suspended cushions, textile constellations and open-hand motifs that invite rest rather than spectacle. Rooted in Balinese cosmology and contemporary feminist thought, Bedtime Stories uses art as a way to hold ancestral and spiritual memory.
Films to Watch At Art SG 2026
Curated by X Zhu-Nowell, this year’s Film programme – Would You Tell Me a Story Until I Fall Asleep – gathers works that unfold slowly and emotionally. It’s intimate, introspective and a little hypnotic. Highlights include Geoffrey Pugen’s Electric Silence, a speculative dive into a forming digital consciousness, and Sim Chi Yin’s Time Travels with a Rotten Suitcase, which narrates the artist’s personal family history through the Malayan war and hits incredibly close to home.
Time Travels with a Rotten Suitcase by Sim Chi Yin
Performance Art To Experience
Singaporean artist John Clang invites visitors into an intimate encounter with Nine Chairs, Table of Inquiry, Reading by an Artist, where he offers one-to-one life readings using Purple Star Astrology – a traditional Chinese divination system. Blending performance, ritual and conversational exchange, Clang prompts participants to consider how cultural belief systems shape the stories we tell about ourselves. The table itself becomes part of the performance: its canvas surface is weighted by nine stones and holds handwritten questions left by previous participants alongside Clang’s own responses.
Reading by an Artist by John Clang
New Curatorial Initiatives
The TVS Initiative for Indian and South Asian Contemporary Art is a new cultural sponsorship that places renewed emphasis on artistic production from across the region. Centred on South Asian Insights, the initiative foregrounds the region’s diverse cultural narratives and positions South Asia as a vital site of contemporary practice.
Alongside this, The Institutum joins as a new cultural partner, presenting its inaugural collaboration with Hampi Art Labs, a residency located within the UNESCO World Heritage landscape of Hampi, Karnataka, India. The partnership underscores cross-cultural dialogue and ecological inquiry, featuring works by Singaporean artist Robert Zhao and Indian artist Atul Bhalla.
23 - 25 January 2026, at Sands Expo and Convention Centre, Marina Bay Sands. Part of Singapore Art Week, which runs 22 - 31 January 2026
Beyond The Galleries: Other Highlights from SAW
Wan Hai Hotel: Singapore Strait at The Warehouse Hotel
Curated by X Zhu-Nowell, ART SG and Shanghai’s Rockbund Art Museum (RAM) will transform the lobby of The Warehouse Hotel into Wan Hai Hotel: Singapore Strait, an immersive exhibition that draws inspiration from the seafaring traditions of the region. This marks the exhibition’s first showcase outside of Shanghai with film programmes, installations and other interactive works.
ZHAISHENGJI® Series 5 – Singapore Edition at Tiong Poh Road
Part of a series of independent projects that utilise mundane spaces to articulate ideas about the relationships between humans and other facets of life, ZHAISHENGJI® Series 5 explores themes of migration and domesticity as the platform’s first exhibition. Set inside an actively occupied HDB flat, this project turns everyday domestic gestures into quiet, shared moments of meaning. Rather than merely staging an exhibition, visitors are invited into its rhythms — the rituals and the unspectacular acts that shape who we are.
Where: 82 Tiong Poh Rd, #01-07
When: Now to 28 February 2026
The Pierre Lorinet Collection: Digging Stars by Ibrahim Mahama at Gillman Barracks
For his Southeast Asian debut, Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama brings a suite of new works made from jute sacks and discarded materials. His installations reflect histories of labour, global migration and trade, translating them into something tactile and deeply human.
Where: 6 Lock Road, Gillman Barracks #02-10
When: 13 January to 8 February 2026, 11am-7pm
STPI Creative Workshop and Gallery’s The Print Show & Symposium
Celebrating artists and influential voices in printmaking, STPI’s programme digs into printmaking’s rebellious history — from its political legacies to the rise of memes and NFTs. Expect conversations with Michael Craig-Martin, Pinaree Sanpitak, Salima Hashmi and Rirkrit Tiravanija, plus a Singapore edition of Crit Club by Cem A., the artist behind the cult meme page Freeze Magazine.
Where: 41 Robertson Quay (The Print Show), 72-13 Mohamed Sultan Road (The Symposium)
When: 22 to 31 January 2026 (The Print Show), 23 to 24 January 2026 (The Symposium)