SP-Arte 2026 and everything worth doing in São Paulo that week

SP Arte is in its 22nd edition and runs from 8 to 12 April 2026 at the Pavilhão da Bienal, in Parque Ibirapuera, São Paulo. This year, the fair brings together more than 180 participants: contemporary art galleries, authorial design studios, cultural institutions, and publishers, cementing its place as the leading art and design platform in Latin America. Here we run through some of the highlights from the fair itself, alongside the exhibitions and events happening across the city that same week, so you can plan your visit properly.

What the Galleries Are Bringing to SP Arte 2026

The 22nd edition of SP-Arte takes place at a moment when many of the artists represented by the participating galleries featured in the 36th São Paulo Biennial, held in 2025 in Parque Ibirapuera itself, and will, just weeks after the fair, be showing at the Giardini and Arsenale in Venice for the 61st edition. The London Art Walk has been following the programme that SP Arte has been publishing on its social media and shares here some highlights:

Paulo Darzé Galeria brings Ayrson Heráclito, a Bahian artist whose work is deeply rooted in Afro-Brazilian culture and its sacred elements, and whose pieces are held in major international collections, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Heráclito is one of the Brazilian artists confirmed in the main exhibition of the 61st Venice Biennale, “In Minor Keys”.

Mendes Wood DM presents Sonia Gomes and Rosana Paulino, who will represent Brazil in Venice in May alongside Adriana Varejão in the Brazilian Pavilion “Comigo ninguém pode”, curated by Diane Lima. The gallery also shines a light on the work of Lygia Pape (1927–2004), one of the central figures of Brazilian Neo-Concretism, known for works that push at the boundaries between art, body and space, and whose practice is represented in the collections of the world’s most important museums.

Almeida & Dale takes a different approach this edition, dedicating two stands to a century of Brazilian art, from Modernism to the present, with works by Tarsila do Amaral, Di Cavalcanti and Beatriz Milhazes.

Janaina Torres Galeria bets on figurative painting across three generations: Caio Pacela, Manuela Navas and Deborah Paiva (1950–2022), for whom the gallery is presenting the anthology “Uma Antologia”, curated by Tadeu Chiarelli, on show at the gallery space until 30 April and not to be missed if you’re in São Paulo during the fair. The exhibition brings together works from across different moments in the career of an artist who built, with freedom and aesthetic rigour, a path entirely her own.

Baró Galeria (São Paulo / Palma de Mallorca) presents an internationally minded stand, with works by Ayako Rokkaku, a self-taught Japanese artist who paints directly with her fingers in an instinctive and performative engagement with the medium, alongside Joana Vasconcelos, Daniel Arsham and Bruno Novelli.

Galería Sur (Punta del Este) presents a selection of artists connected to Constructivist art, including Joaquín Torres García — recently shown at CCBB São Paulo — alongside contemporary names, with a highlight being Margaret Whyte, a 89-year-old Uruguayan artist selected to represent Uruguay at the 61st Venice Biennale

The 2026 edition also brings back the Showcase sector — after a few editions away — with international galleries including Ruth Benzacar (Argentina) and Crisis (Peru). It also launches Design NOW, a new section dedicated to authorial Brazilian design, with ten studios selected under the curatorship of Livia Debbane, who joins the fair this year as artistic director of design. Rounding things off is the curatorial exhibition “Existe uma Árvore”, which offers a reading of modern and contemporary Brazilian furniture through the lens of the country’s native trees, drawing connections between nature, raw materials and the history of design.

For more information and updates on the 22nd SP-Arte, follow our Instagram and SP Arte’s own channels (@sp_arte).

What’s On Around the City: Exhibitions During SP-Arte

If you’re in São Paulo during the fair, there’s plenty more to see beyond the Pavilhão da Bienal. Museums, institutions and galleries across the city have strong shows running over the same period.

At the MASP, the entire year is dedicated to “Histórias Latino-Americanas”. The highlight during SP-Arte week is the solo exhibition of Santiago Yahuarcani (3 April – 2 August 2026), an indigenous artist from the Uitoto people and one of the standout figures of the 2024 Venice Biennale, who paints on llanchama — cloth extracted from Amazonian tree bark, depicting the cosmology of his people and the traumatic episodes of the rubber boom.

At the Pinacoteca, Nocaute (7 March – 2 August 2026) is the first institutional solo show in Brazil by Cameroonian artist Pascale Marthine Tayou, filling seven rooms of Pina Luz with sculptures, paintings and installations that reflect on identity and cultural exchange. In the Octógono of Pina Luz, Rio-born Cristina Salgado presents “A Mãe Contempla o Mar” (7 March – 2 August 2026), her largest work to date — an installation built from over 3,500m² of fabric that explores the female body, the sea and psychoanalysis, created especially for the space. At Pina Estação, the group show “Macunaíma é Duwid” (28 March – 13 September 2026), curated by indigenous artist and activist Gustavo Caboco, revisits the iconic Brazilian literary character through the perspective of Brazil’s original peoples.

At Itaú Cultural, April marks the opening of “Mestre Didi — Invenção e Ancestralidade na Arte Afro-Brasileira” (April – July 2026 — check the institution’s website or social media for official dates), dedicated to the Bahian artist and candomblé priest (1917–2013) who fused spiritual devotion with sculptural language in objects of remarkable formal power.

At IMS Paulista, “Zumví — Arquivo Afro-Fotográfico” (28 March – August 2026) brings together around 400 photographs documenting decades of the Black Brazilian movement. Also on show, “Fotografia Agnès Varda Cinema”,  dedicated to the Franco-Belgian filmmaker and photographer, a key figure of the French postwar cinema, closes on the very last day of SP-Arte (until 12 April 2026), making a visit to IMS all the more pressing for anyone in the city during the fair.

At the Instituto Tomie Ohtake, the programme is split across two addresses. At the main space on Avenida Faria Lima, two shows run concurrently: a retrospective spanning fifty years of architect Isay Weinfeld‘s career (7 March – 17 May 2026) and an exhibition of new work by young Rio-based artist Allan Weber (18 March – 24 May 2026). At the Casa-ateliê Tomie Ohtake in Campo Belo, which, after years of occasional public visits, is now opening its first full exhibition cycle as part of the Institute, “Ruy Ohtake: Percursos do Habitar” (7 March – 31 May 2026) brings together six residential projects by the architect spanning the 1960s to the 2010s. Listed as a heritage site by the city, the house designed by Ruy Ohtake for his mother is one of the icons of São Paulo’s Brutalist architecture.

Among the galleries, a highlight is “Pedra de Rumo”, a solo exhibition by Nelson Felix with a text by Keyna Eleison (21 March – 2 May 2026) at Almeida & Dale. The show brings together sculptures in marble and bronze intertwined with plant elements, alongside the series “½” eu and “Caymmi”, a body of work the artist himself describes as “a symphony to São Paulo”. 

The 2026 edition doesn’t end at the Pavilhão da Bienal, the city responds with a programme of its own: museums, institutions and galleries that, each in their own way, deepen and expand the conversations that arrive at SP-Arte. For anyone who follows Brazilian art closely, whether as a collector, a student or a keen observer, it’s a chance to see, in one go, where things stand and imagine where they might be heading. April in São Paulo is worth the trip.

Marília Lopes for London Art Walk
March 2026