Special Projects, Artist Collaborations, and Panel Discussions for the Untitled Podcast underscore Houston’s expanding presence in the contemporary art landscape.
Houston, TX - August 27, 2026 – In the lead-up to the second edition of Untitled Art, Houston, which returns to George R. Brown Convention Center October 2–4, 2026, with a VIP and Press Preview on October 1, the fair is excited to share a first look at its robust slate of programming for the fall. With an expanded roster of 98 galleries from 20 countries and territories, this year’s edition builds on the momentum of 2025 with an ambitious citywide program of Special Projects, prizes, live podcast panels, and community partnerships that speak to Houston’s increasingly vital role in contemporary art. Founder Jeffrey Lawson, Houston Director Michael Slenske, and Executive Director Clara Andrade continue to shape a curatorial approach rooted in close dialogue with the local arts community, extending the fair's mission to champion innovation, accessibility, and inclusivity in contemporary art.
On the show floor, 11 Special Projects offer artists, galleries, and institutional partners the opportunity to realize site-specific work alongside the fair’s booth exhibitors. Highlights include Dave Muller’s Record Pavilion 2.0 (2026), presented by Meliksetian | Briggs and the Landing. First staged in Los Angeles in 2022, this fully operational, walk-in record store is assembled from Muller’s own collection, complete with sound system, paintings and ephemera. Erina Libertad's Duet (2026), with Main sector exhibitor Hannah Sloan, transforms a stretch of the fair into an opportunity for an impromptu dance between strangers. Josh Callaghan’s Big Rig (2026) exhibited by Main sector exhibitor Night Gallery, a new main sector gallery, recasts wheelchairs as icons of American mobility while a series of densely layered, kaleidoscopic paintings inspired by King Nobuyoshi Godwin’s synaesthesia are on display in The Artist Is Having a Good Day (2026) from SAGE Studio & Gallery.
Houston itself remains the connective tissue of this year’s programming, with an array of presentations foregrounding the artists, local histories, and communities that have shaped the city’s cultural landscape. The Floyd Newsum Jr. Art Estate expands The Journey Never Ends, a 2005 painting by the late artist, with a living “artchive” tracing his four-decade influence on generations of Houstonians. The installation unfolds over three acts, including a live video feed, Untitled Voyage (2026), connecting a traveling iteration of the project with its presentation at the fair. Reconstructing historical LGBTQIA+ spaces and sites of the queer community in Houston, Nick Vaughan and Jake Margolin's Town Meeting 1978–2028 (2026) is a monumental drawing and performance lecture exhibited by Main exhibitor McClain Gallery. Reynier Leyva Novo's Blue Bones (2026), a public art project presented by PAC PUBLIC, unfolds through a community archive in the neighborhood of the Third Ward. For the presentation, Novo covers images and objects in blue paint, shifting their function to a material evidence of the survival, loss and urban change in the Third Ward. In The Iconic Portrait Strand (Houston), an on-going series of portraits from 2008-2026, Houston-based artist Nestor Topchy renders egg-tempera and gold-leaf portraits of Houstonians in the tradition of Byzantine icons. Topchy’s presentation, with Josh Pazda Hiram Butler, will grow during the run of the fair through live portrait sittings. Estefania Puerta's Prop (2025) is a reflective figurative sculpture built from cast forms and photographs taken in Rome and Colombia, and presented by the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston as part of the inaugural CAMH Commission Prize awarded to the artist at the inaugural edition of the fair. Houston-based artist JooYoung Choi’s sculptural installation, WE CAN MAKE IT IF WE TRY, The Journey of Poundcake Man and Emma Poundcake Girl (2024), showcased by Inman Gallery, explores themes of identity, belonging, trauma, and resilience inspired by the artist’s childhood memories. Meanwhile, Houston legend Mark Flood stages Daily Flood (2026), a lived-in artist’s studio/private viewing room, with paintings stacked on the floor, leaned against walls, and set among furniture and found objects.
The Houston Artist Market returns for its second year, expanding its reach beyond the city to showcase artists, publishers, collectives, and cultural organizations from across Texas. Curated again by Adam Marnie, editor of F Magazine and a Nest exhibitor at the fair, the initiative reflects Untitled Art’s broader commitment to foster regional cultural ecosystems, providing a retail-style platform alongside the fair's international roster. This year's edition brings together 12 presentations, including two collaborative booths.
“I’m really excited to be bringing the Artist Market back to Untitled Art, Houston for its second, expanded edition,” says Marnie, who welcomes back Basket Books & Art, The Reading Room HTX in a split booth with SANMAN Studios, Jardin, St. Agnes Academy Visual Arts (Houston), and Picnic Surf Shapes (Galveston), alongside a group of new participants including Friends Gallery, Stinson House, Bill’s Junk, and the split booth of Zine Fest Houston and The Orange Show (Houston); East Side Pot Shop (Austin); MORTADELLA (Fort Worth); and CHEERLEADER (Dallas). “For me, the real strength of the Artist Market is that it represents a vital collection of the artist-run organizations creating community and connection on the ground in Greater Houston and beyond.”
Untitled Art’s six-day VIP program offers collectors, curators, and patrons unparalleled access to Houston’s cultural infrastructure and community. Highlights include studio visits with artists Trenton Doyle Hancock, JooYoung Choi, and Nestor Topchy; private collection tours with FreshArts founder Marita Fairbanks and local advisor Katharine Barthelme, both Founding Host Committee members, and Mara and Erick Calderon, founder of Art Blocks; visits to the PAC Art Residency with artist Teresa Serrano; a meditation at the Rothko Chapel; and open studios at the MFAH Core Residency Program and Rice University. The program will also include visits to exhibiting galleries, an evening at the James Turrell Skyspace, and a screening and panel discussion at Rice University in partnership with the Houston Cinema Arts Festival with Lita Albuquerque about the film made of her seminal performance at the Buffalo Bayou Park Cistern for the inaugural edition of the fair. The Untitled Podcast returns with a slate of live discussions in development, covering art and civic action in Houston, art and wellness, the past, present, and future of art writing in the South, and generative art, among others. Confirmed panelists include Rachel Mohl, Executive Director of University of Houston Public Art; Jennifer Finkel, Associate Vice President, Art Experience at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center; Danielle Burns-Wilson, Executive Director of Project Row Houses; writer and University of Houston professor Roberto Tejada; and Claudia Mattos, Associate Curator at the Moody Center for the Arts, with additional panelists to be announced in the coming weeks.
The fair will also host Kalup Linzy’s performative fashion show, In My Feelings About It All, a component of the artist’s Queen Rose: World Building presentation with Tulsa Artist Fellowship. The performance features Linzy’s fictional persona, Katonya, through drawings on all-over prints and painted garments. In a live fashion show at the fair, Katonya will be accompanied by local models on the runway. Original music from the performance will be released as a five-song EP on streaming platforms with apparel from the show available for purchase.
Another defining feature of the 2026 edition is the expansion of Untitled Art’s Prizes and Partnerships, connecting museums, universities, healthcare, hospitality, and cultural organizations that invest in artists through acquisitions, commissions, and residencies. This year, UT MD Anderson, Public Art University of Houston System, Hotel Daphne, and Houston Grand Opera join returning partners Casa Santa Ana and PAC Art in a growing network. The fair also welcomes Park House Houston as a new Prize Partner. The 2026 Park House Houston Acquisition Prize commits at least $10,000 toward one or more works from the fair. The partnership joins two organizations focused on bringing contemporary art to wider audiences and reinforcing Houston's position as a growing cultural capital.
2026 Programming Participants
The full list of participants across this year’s programming are as follows:
Special Projects
Dave Muller | Meliksetian | Briggs and the Landing
Erina Libertad | Hannah Sloan
Estefania Puerta | Contemporary Arts Museum Houston
Floyd Newsum Jr. | The Floyd Newsum Jr. Art Estate, in collaboration with Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church, University of Houston–Downtown, Project Row Houses, the Houston Museum of African American Culture, and Bond Contemporary
JooYoung Choi | Inman Gallery
Josh Callaghan | Night Gallery
King Nobuyoshi Godwin | SAGE Studio & Gallery
Mark Flood | Daily Flood
Nestor Topchy | Josh Pazda Hiram Butler
Nick Vaughan & Jake Margolin | McClain Gallery
Reynier Leyva Novo | PAC PUBLIC
Houston Artist Market
Bill's Junk (Houston)
Basket Books & Art (Houston)
CHEERLEADER (Dallas)
East Side Pot Shop (Austin)
Friends Gallery (Houston)
Jardin (Houston)
MORTADELLA (Fort Worth)
The Orange Show (Houston)
Picnic Curatorial Projects (Galveston)
The Reading Room HTX (Houston)
SANMAN Studios (Houston)
St. Agnes Academy Visual Arts (Houston)
Stinson House (Houston)
Zine Fest Houston (Houston)