Program 2026

With an unwavering commitment to emerging artists, Kunsthalle Basel is delighted to break the frame again in 2026, with a program curated by Mohamed Almusibli: Join us for the institutional debuts in Switzerland of Diambe, Janiva Ellis, and Özgür Kar. See what’s next at Dominique White’s and Gili Tal’s largest solo exhibitions to date. Discover Shuang Li as she presents her first institutional solo exhibition in Europe, and look closer as we invite Barcelona’s art space Cordova to co-curate the Back Wall Project by Samuel Guerrero.

“Working with artists at pivotal moments in their careers is a privilege and a responsibility. Our 2026 program brings together artists whose practices push the boundaries of contemporary art, inviting audiences into exhibitions of risk, reflection, and reinvention.” – Mohamed Almusibli, Director & Chief Curator

January 23, 2026–April 12, 2026
Diambe
Diambe presents their first institutional solo exhibition in Switzerland, offering an expansive installation that spans sculpture, painting, and film. Rooted in personal identity, their work intertwines nature, ritual, and movement, creating a hybrid and immersive artistic language.

February 20, 2026–May 17, 2026
Dominique White
Dominique White makes her institutional solo debut in Switzerland with sculptural works that interweave maritime mythologies of the Black diaspora with ideas of Black futurity. Centered on the concept of “shipwreck(ed),” her work explores transformation and new possibilities beyond the norms shaped by colonial history.

May 1, 2026–August 9, 2026
Janiva Ellis
Janiva Ellis presents her first institutional solo exhibition in Europe. In her work, she explores the persistence of white supremacist myths built into dominant cultural narratives while demonstrating the contradictions and destruction left in their wake. Drawing from the tradition of figuration, she puts visibility, erasure, and survival up for debate.

June 12, 2026–September 13, 2026
Shuang Li
Shuang Li presents her first institutional European solo exhibition and premieres her most ambitious film installation to date. By engaging with extreme weather phenomena and the practice of storm chasing—the targeted pursuit and observation of severe weather, especially thunderstorms, tornadoes, and hurricanes—her installations reflect on global communication, attention, and information, exploring how humans relate to technology and media.

August 28, 2026–November 15, 2026
Gili Tal
Gili Tal presents her most comprehensive solo exhibition to date. Using strategies from commercial image-making, Tal reveals the aesthetic and ideological structures of urban space. Interested in how the language of advertising is reflected in us, she explores commercial image production strategies from product display setups to real estate and architectural photography. Her work challenges the way we see and inhabit the city.

October 30, 2026–January 24, 2027
Özgür Kar
Özgür Kar makes his institutional debut in Switzerland. His multidisciplinary practice probes existential questions through transformative environments. By bringing together diverse cultural forms—such as theatre, animation, and drawing—he condenses opposing emotions into a stripped-down visual language that hovers between the grotesque and tenderness.

Samuel Guerrero
Kunsthalle Basel x Cordova: Back Wall Project
In collaboration with Barcelona’s art space Cordova, Samuel Guerrero creates a new commission investigating time as a social and political structure. His work explores the interplay of nature, technology, and perception, merging organic processes with mechanical systems. In 2026, Kunsthalle Basel invites Cordova to co-curate the Back Wall Project with Guerrero, continuing this tradition of presenting experimental, site-specific works that engage audiences beyond the exhibition spaces.

With this program, Kunsthalle Basel reinforces its commitment to bold voices that confront the social, cultural, and perceptual questions shaping our time. Across the year, each exhibition invites our audiences into spaces of critical reflection, where new forms of dialogue and perception can emerge.