The 2026 Whitney Biennial Reveals Its 56 Participating Artists and Collectives

The Whitney Biennial, the longest-running survey of American art, which offers a window onto the contours of the nation’s cultural and political landscape, has revealed the lineup for its next edition, which opens on March 8, 2026.

After a year of frenetic travel and more than 300 studio visits, the curators Marcela Guerrero and Drew Sawyer have assembled a show of 56 individual artists, duos, and collectives. Unlike previous editions of the Biennial, the 82nd remains, for now, untitled, and is loosely based around relationships, an idea that emerged through the curators’ conversations with artists. This spans family ties, our connection with technology, interspecies relationships, geopolitical entanglements, and beyond. Rather than offering answers for life today, the Biennial promises to capture the complexity of modern life and present surprising ways of living together.

The show continues the Biennial’s tradition of broadening the scope of American art by highlighting artists from places impacted by the long arm of U.S. power. This includes artists from Afghanistan, Iraq, Japan, Palestine, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Vietnam. Still, the epicenter of American contemporary art remains well-represented with more than 20 artists identifying New York (including Brooklyn) as a home base.

The Biennial has often served a role of introducing young talent to a wider audience and while the majority of artists (around 60 percent) were born after 1980—i.e. millennials—it remains an intergenerational affair. The youngest artist is Taína H. Cruz, born in 1998, whose work often centers on the manipulation of digital images, and the oldest artist is Carmen de Monteflores, who curators discovered after contacting her conceptual artist daughter, Andrea Fraser, whose work is also included in the show. The Biennale also includes the work of two dead artists: José Maceda, a Filipino artist who died in 2004, and Kimowan Metchewais, a Cree, Cold Lake First Nations artist who died in 2011.

The best-known name included in the Biennial is arguably Julio Torres, a writer, actor, and comedian, who previously worked on and produced the HBO series . At the Whitney, Torres will present a new performance work with the American visual artist Martine Gutierrez. Elsewhere, there’s a series of abstract digital artworks by Samia Halaby, the Palestinian New York-based artist; work from the colossal Indigenous sculptor Raven Halfmoon; photographs of bar tenders, performers, and soldiers on Okinawa by Mao Ishikawa; and commentary on global capitalism from Ignacio Gatica.

“Rather than coming to our research for the Biennial with a preconceived container, Marcela and I let our conversations with artists guide us,” Sawyer, the Whitney’s curator of photography said in a statement. “Together, these artists’ work make space for forms of relation that are intimate, improvised, and contested.”

Here is the full list of artists participating in the 2026 Whitney Biennial:

Basel Abbas & Ruanne Abou-Rahme
Born 1983 in Nicosia, Cyprus, and Boston, MA, respectively
Live in Brooklyn, NY and Palestine

Ruanne Abou-Rahme
Born 1983 in Boston, MA
Lives in Brooklyn, NY and Palestine

Kelly Akashi
Born 1983 in Los Angeles, CA
Lives in Altadena, CA

Kamrooz Aram
Born 1978 in Shiraz, Iran
Lives in New York, NY

Ash Arder
Born 1988 in Muscatawing (Flint, MI)
Lives in Waawiyatanong (Detroit, MI)

Teresa Baker
Born 1985 in Mandan/Hidatsa
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Sula Bermudez-Silverman
Born 1993 in New York, NY
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Zach Blas
Born 1981 in Point Pleasant, WV
Lives in Toronto, ON, Canada

Enzo Camacho & Ami Lien
Born 1985 in Manila, Philippines and 1987 in Dallas, TX, respectively
Live in Berlin, Germany and New York, NY

Leo Castañeda
Born 1988 in Cali, Colombia
Lives in Miami, FL

CFGNY (Daniel Chew, Ten Izu, Kirsten Kilponen, and Tin Nguyen)
Founded 2016
Based in Brooklyn, NY

Nani Chacon
Born 1980 in Gallup, NM
Lives in Albuquerque, NM, Navajo Nation

Maia Chao
Born 1991 in Providence, RI
Lives in Philadelphia, PA

Joshua Citarella
Born 1987 in New York, NY
Lives in New York, NY

Mo Costello
Born 1989 in Seattle, WA
Lives in Athens, GA

Taína H. Cruz
Born 1998 in New York, NY
Lives in New Haven, CT

Carmen de Monteflores
Born 1933 in San Juan, Puerto Rico
Lives in Berkeley, CA

Ali Eyal
Born 1994 in Baghdad, Iraq
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Andrea Fraser
Born 1965 in Billings, MT
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Mariah Garnett
Born 1980 in Portland, ME
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Ignacio Gatica
Born 1988 in Santiago, Chile
Lives in New York, NY and Santiago, Chile

Jonathan González
Born 1991 in Queens, NY
Lives in New York, NY and Philadelphia, PA

Emilie Louise Gossiaux
Born 1989 in New Orleans, LA
Lives in New York, NY

Kainoa Gruspe
Born 1995 in Louisville, KY
Lives in Honolulu, HI

Martine Gutierrez
Born 1989 in Berkeley, CA
Lives in New York, NY

Samia Halaby
Born 1936 in Palestine
Lives in New York, NY

Raven Halfmoon
Born 1991 in Oklahoma City, OK
Lives in Norman, OK, Caddo Nation

Nile Harris with Dyer Rhoads
Born 1995 in Miami, FL, and 1996 in Portland, ME, respectively
Live in Brooklyn, NY

Aziz Hazara
Born 1992 in Wardak, Afghanistan
Lives in Berlin, Germany

Margaret Honda
Born 1961 in San Diego, CA
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Akira Ikezoe
Born 1979 in Kochi, Japan
Lives in New York, NY

Mao Ishikawa
Born 1953 Okinawa under U.S. Administration
Lives in Okinawa, Japan

Cooper Jacoby
Born 1989 in Princeton, NJ
Lives in Miami, FL and Paris, France

David L. Johnson
Born 1993 in New York, NY
Lives in New York, NY

kekahi wahi (Sancia Miala Shiba Nash and Drew K. Broderick)
Founded 2020
Based in Honolulu, Kona, Oʻahu, HI

Young Joon Kwak
Born 1984 in Queens, NY
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Michelle Lopez
Born 1970 in Bridgeport, CT
Lives in Philadelphia, PA

José Maceda
Born 1917 in Manila, Philippines
Died 2004 in Quezon City, Philippines

Agosto Machado
Born in New York, NY
Lives in New York, NY

Oswaldo Maciá
Born 1960 in Cartegena de Indias, Colombia
Lives in Santa Fe, NM and London, United Kingdom

Emilio Martínez Poppe
Born 1993 in Baltimore, MD
Lives in New York, NY

Isabelle Frances McGuire
Born 1994 in Austin, TX
Lives in Chicago, IL

Kimowan Metchewais
Born 1963 in Oxbow, SK, Canada
Died 2011 in Saint Paul, AB, Canada, Cree, Cold Lake First Nations

Nour Mobarak
Born 1985 in Cairo, Egypt
Lives in Athens, Greece and Bainbridge Island, WA

Erin Jane Nelson
Born 1989 in Neenah, WI
Lives in Santa Fe, NM

Precious Okoyomon
Born 1993 in London, United Kingdom
Lives in Brooklyn, NY

Aki Onda
Born 1967 in Tenri, Nara, Japan
Lives in Mito, Ibaraki, Japan

Pat Oleszko
Born 1947 in Detroit, MI
Lives in New York, NY

Malcolm Peacock
Born 1994 in Raleigh, NC
Lives in Brooklyn, NY

Sarah M. Rodriguez
Born 1984 in Honolulu, HI
Lives in Ojo Caliente, NM

Gabriela Ruiz
Born 1991 in San Fernando Valley, CA
Lives in Los Angeles, CA

Jasmin Sian
Born 1969 in the Philippines
Lives in New York, NY

Jordan Strafer
Born 1990 in Miami, FL
Lives in New York, NY and Athens, Greece

Sung Tieu
Born 1987 in Hai Duong, Vietnam
Lives in Berlin, Germany

Julio Torres
Born 1987 in San Salvador, El Salvador
Lives in New York, NY

Anna Tsouhlarakis
Born 1977 in Lawrence, KS
Lives in Boulder, CO
Navajo Nation and Creek

Johanna Unzueta
Born 1974 in Santiago, Chile
Lives in Berlin, Germany and New York, NY