A Decade of Contemporary Art: Gallery Weekend Beijing Turns 10

Gallery Weekend Beijing (GWBJ) will mark its 10th anniversary with the opening of its 2026 edition on Friday 22 May, running through Sunday 31 May. While the initial 3 days are set aside for VIPs, it will be open to public from 26th onwards.

Founded in 2017, GWBJ runs every year with a series of art events centred around a curated selection of new exhibitions from galleries and non-profit institutions across Beijing. The art event includes an opening ceremony, media guided tours, VIP guided tours, academic forums, performances, artist studio visits, private collection visits, parties, and an annual dinner.

The VIP programmes feature important domestic and international museum directors, collectors, art critics and media. Art professionals and collectors are able to discuss and share knowledge through a series of academic activities. The public programmes aim to provide the public with the opportunity to learn more about art and provide Beijing residents with an insightful guide to art exhibitions in their own city. 

A decade on, the 2026 edition arrives as a moment to take stock of the platformʼs development alongside that of Beijingʼs contemporary art scene. Anchored once again in the 798 Art District, this yearʼs programme will extend across the city to sites including Caochangdi and the CBD Art District, tracing the wider geography of Beijingʼs art ecosystem. 

Elected by the 30 galleries that participated in the Main Sector of the ninth edition, Gallery Weekend Beijing has announced the Academic Committee for its 10th edition. The committee will jointly determine the participating galleries for the Main Sector and oversee implementation of the 2026 edition.

The members are: Guo Xi, Deputy Director, UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Leng Lin, Founder, Beijing Commune, Tian Yuan, Founder, WHITE SPACE, Xi Tao, Founder, A26 Space, Yang Beichen, Director, MACA Art Center. 

Through a rigorous review and voting process, the five-member committee selected 25 returning galleries from among previous Main Section participants. To further refine the line-up and reinforce a content-led model of practice, each committee member also nominated one Beijing-based gallery that has been operating for at least one year. Together, the 30 selected galleries will present major new exhibitions, from which the highly anticipated Best Exhibition Award and Boundless Exploration Award will also be selected. Non-profit Institutions Highlights The 10 non-profit institutions participating in the Main Sector reflect the breadth and depth of Beijingʼs institutional landscape, from major museums to collection-based and artist-focused platforms. Together, they present a wide-ranging programme of exhibitions by Chinese and If you would like to be removed from our media lists, please contact info@flint-culture.com. international artists, spanning major surveys and focused solo presentations that engage history, technology, memory, identity, and lived experience.

Highlights include institutional presentations by Yang Fudong and Duan Jianyu at UCCA Center for Contemporary Art; new projects by Zhou Yilun and Ning An at Wind H Art Center; a group exhibition examining how artistic strategies shape and intervene in space at Beijing Inside-Out Art Museum; parallel solo exhibitions by Rao Fu and Tesfaye Urgessa at Red Brick Art Museum; and an expansive survey of recent work by Qin Qi at SONG Art Museum. Further institutional highlights include Espace Louis Vuitton Beijing, marking its 20th anniversary with a presentation by Jean-Michel Othoniel; Taikang Art Museum, with a major retrospective dedicated to Fu Luofei; and 798CUBE, presenting first institutional solo exhibitions in China by Julien Charrière and Laurent Grasso. X Museum contributes its fifth collection exhibition, while MACA Art Center presents solo projects by Luan Xueyan and Zhu Kaiting. Special Exhibition Highlights Nirvana by Ouyang Chun A highlight of the anniversary edition, the Special Exhibition programme will present Nirvana, a new solo exhibition by Ouyang Chun, organised by WHITE SPACE.

With exhibition design by Tian Jun, a spatial designer and collector of contemporary art, it opens on 28 April at D01 in the 798 Art District and remains on view through 7 June. Special Sector: Visiting Sector Returns As one of Gallery Weekend Beijingʼs signature initiatives, the Visiting Sector will bring forth presentations by galleries from China and abroad within the industrial architecture of the 798 Art District, over the course of two weeks. Conceived as a platform for substantive exhibition projects by invited galleries, the sector places individual programmes and artistic practices in dialogue with the siteʼs singular spatial context, foregrounding the conditions through which art is viewed, encountered, and understood.

The Public Sector and Up & Coming Sector will also return in 2026. For the first time, the Public Sector will extend beyond the 798 Art District into sites across Beijing, presenting large-scale installations and moving-image works in outdoor settings and on urban screens. The Up & Coming Sector will spotlight a special project by artist Ai Kuo and curator Yang Zi in Building A08 of the 798 Art District, focusing on the creative and research practices of a younger generation of artists and curators. 10th anniversary forum Gallery Weekend Beijing will also convene a forum marking its 10th anniversary, focused on key questions shaping contemporary art in China over the past decade. The full list of participating galleries for the 10th edition of Gallery Weekend Beijing is available in the annex. Additional highlights will be released in the coming weeks. If you would like to be removed from our media lists, please contact info@flint-culture.com.