The cultural calendar in Mumbai begins anew with the fourteenth edition of the Mumbai Gallery Weekend (MGW), a landmark event that has charted the evolution of the city's contemporary art scene for nearly a decade. This year, the event, opening on 8 January 2026, showcases a powerful synergy between 39 art spaces across the metropolis. Of these, 33 are launching fresh exhibitions, while six are ushering in the new year with ongoing shows, some of which will extend beyond the event's official dates.
Expanding Access and Embracing New Audiences
Marking a significant structural shift, MGW 2026 is deliberately expanding its geographical footprint beyond the traditional art strongholds of Fort and Colaba. Ayesha Parikh of Art & Charlie, who co-leads the Mumbai Gallery Association, emphasises this change is essential for growth, noting that most of Mumbai's population lives outside South Bombay. A symbolic move includes relocating the opening party to Lower Parel. The leadership itself reflects this expansion, with Parikh and co-lead Sanjana Shah of Tao Gallery representing galleries outside the Colaba circuit, aiming to include audiences previously marginalised by location.
Furthering accessibility, galleries will remain open on Sunday, a rare annual occurrence. Another key change is the unified opening of all spaces at noon on Thursday. This allows walkthrough partners Art & Wonderment, led by Alisha Sadikot and Nishita Zachariah, to conduct comprehensive four-day tours across different city clusters, enabling deeper public engagement.
The 2026 edition will also see a strengthened global dialogue, with a greater presence of international curators like London-based Beatriz Cifuentes Feliciano and art historian Devika Singh. They will participate in talks to situate Indian contemporary art within a worldwide context. A pivotal thematic focus will be on anti-caste art, highlighted especially at collector-led socials through performances by Yogesh Barve and the Yalgaar Sanskrutik Manch, a collective inspired by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar.
Spotlight on Diverse Artistic Practices
The participating galleries present a rich mix of solo and group exhibitions, revealing the vast spectrum of current artistic practices. A major historical show, Face to Face: A Portrait of a City at DAG, features 30 portraits tracing Mumbai's social and artistic transformation from the 19th to the 20th century, anchored by V. B. Pathare's portrait of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar.
Several artists are unveiling new chapters in their work. Prabhakar Pachpute presents Lone Runner’s Laboratory at Experimenter Colaba, a profound series of sculptures and paintings examining the ecological and human cost of mining. His Length of a Dream bronze series poignantly intersects personal and public memory.
At Jhaveri Contemporary, UK-based Lubna Chowdhary's Double Consciousness showcases new work balancing legibility and sensuality. Pratap Morey's third solo, Brobdingnag Paradox at Tarq, continues his critique of urban life, playing with scale and perception to compress skyscrapers into miniatures and magnify small details.
Other shows bring lesser-known facets to light. Akara Modern's Piraji Sagara: Enduring Forms highlights the late modernist's overlooked sculptural works from the 1980s and 90s. Subcontinent's A Painter with a Camera delves deeper into Jyoti Bhatt's innovative photographic experiments with multiple exposures and hand painting.
Reimagining Materials and Challenging Perspectives
A compelling thread through MGW 2026 is the creative reuse of discarded materials to convey powerful messages. The group show Necropolis of Remains at Priyasri Art Gallery, featuring artists like Aasha Keshwala and Suraj Kamble, responds to themes of overconsumption and climate change inspired by Saumya Roy's book Mountain Tales.
At 47-A, the duo WOLF (Ritu and Surya Singh) redefines beauty in Gul, crafting cascading blooms and floral arrangements from recycled post-industrial metal scrap. Similarly, Prashant Pandey's solo Biography at Gallery Maskara presents 70 fragile sculptural forms crafted from urban waste and cigarette buds, tracing human consumption.
Mithu Sen's What Do Birds Dream at Dusk at Chemould Prescott Road confronts political narratives of visibility and blindness. Integrating Braille with imaginary scripts, Sen challenges what society chooses to see or ignore.
Celebrating a major milestone, Sakshi Gallery marks four decades with The Fourth Wall, a retrospective showcasing highlights from its journey since 1986, featuring works by masters like Krishen Khanna, K.G. Subramanyan, and Rekha Rodwittiya alongside archival material, contextualising shifting artistic practices over 40 years.
