ART PARIS 2026

Babel and Reparation at the Grand Palais

From April 9 to 12, 2026, Art Paris returns to the Grand Palais, shaped by two major themes: Babel and Reparation. Together, they structure both the selection and the wider programme, giving the fair a clear focus and a strong internal logic.

Babel: Art and Language in France brings together 21 artists presented by exhibiting galleries. Curated by Loïc Le Gall, the section highlights practices in France that treat language as material and as a system of signs. Words appear as visual forms, as structures, and as sites of translation, where meaning shifts across context, medium, and time. Text, lettering, the relationship between image and writing, and the instability of meaning in contemporary formats form the backbone of the selection.

The second theme, Reparation, features 20 international artists presented by exhibiting galleries. Alexia Fabre approaches reparation as an active field in contemporary art, linked to personal and collective narratives, care, preservation, and the rebuilding of continuity. Here, reparation becomes a gesture that connects experience, memory, and meaning.

Sarfo Emmanuel Annor, Paralleled Paths, 2024. Courtesy of the artist and The Bridge Gallery

Around these two themes, Art Paris 2026 expands across the Grand Palais, with around 165 French and international galleries. The Promesses sector brings together 27 galleries founded within the past ten years, presenting 56 artists, including 31 women. The Solo Show format features 24 monographic presentations, conceived as a concentrated encounter with a single body of work within the fair.

Design also returns in a clearly defined form through the French Design Art Edition, installed on the balconies along the north side of the Grand Palais nave. Around 15 exhibitors present unique pieces and limited editions at the intersection of design, interiors, and artistic practice. The segment also hosts the FD100 awards ceremony on April 9, 2026, rewarding the 100 interior design and design projects that have contributed to developing the reputation and influence of French creativity outside France.

Lyndi Sales, The Weight of the World, 2021. Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Maria Lund

Javier Carro Temboury, Intercontainers (Desert Tales), 2025. Courtesy of the artist and Manon Sailly

Things From - LGD Distribution, STOOL BRASS WOOD.. Courtesy of Things From _ LGD Distribution

A highlight of the fair is the City of Paris collection. The Ville de Paris presents Fonds d’art contemporain, Paris Collections as a public collection shown within the fair. With almost 23,400 works, spanning the late 19th century to the present, the presentation creates a dialogue between institutional memory and contemporary practice, with particular attention to historical layers and questions of representation in public collections.

Babel and Reparation give Art Paris 2026 a clear route through the fair, while the Grand Palais becomes a setting where contemporary art unfolds through signs, language, memory, and the material presence of ideas.