People-Watching at Frieze New York 2026

Sensory overload was the informal theme of Frieze New York 2026, which was already bustling by the time it opened on Wednesday. The global arts fair is in its 15th year and more lively than ever: 68 galleries from 26 countries have set up shop across multiple floors of the Shed. For the art-world elite — museum curators, gallery owners, appraisers — the four-day event is only one stop on a global art sprint that encompasses the Whitney and Venice Biennials, the overlapping European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF) at Park Avenue Armory, and the Independent Art Fair at Pier 36. Frieze is their opportunity to network, catch up with old friends, and perhaps peacock a little: Almost all of the attendees I saw were exceptionally well dressed, either in structured neutrals or billowy colors, looking like artwork themselves.

On the Shed’s second floor, I caught art advisers Paulina Kolczynska and Jim Kelly — the former a Polish woman in New York, the latter American and based in L.A. and Dallas. “We’ve known each other for 30 years,” Kelly told me. “Actually, 31,” Kolczynska interjected. She remembered their first meeting: July 1995 at Site Santa Fe, a New Mexico–based arts nonprofit that launched what may be the first contemporary biennial in the United States. (Kelly, one of the founding members, claims credit for the idea.) Around the corner, Rita de Alencar Pinto of the nail-art exhibition studio Vanity Projects and Maile Gamez of the Miami Beach EDITION Hotel were at Rio de Janeiro’s A Gentil Carioca booth attempting to flag their friend Marcio Botner down for a photo. Sly and charismatic, the gallery owner kept disappearing to chat with visitors eager for his attention.

Latin American galleries have an especially strong showing at this year’s Frieze: At Mitre, another Brazilian exhibitor, I found Larry Ossei-Mensah, who proved to be the most popular person of the day. The founder of the BIPOC arts-advocacy collective Artnoir, he gently inquired about my experience at the fair — whether I felt comfortable as a first-timer and free to ask questions. This year, Frieze felt more open and diverse, with more representation from the Global South, he said. Shortly after, Ronald Sosinski and Ellen Marie Donahue, luminaries of the downtown contemporary art scene, chimed in and said, “We live one block from Larry.” A magazine freelancer tapped me: “Larry is a very important person.”

Chatting it up on the fourth floor of the Shed was Ludlow Bailey of Contemporary African Diasporic Art (CADA) and Ernestine White-Mifetu, African art curator at the Brooklyn Art Museum. They had met minutes prior, though they appeared to be lifelong friends. “I’ve been networking all day,” Bailey said, flashing a gap-toothed grin. He was clearly elated about it. They were eager to see work from Stevenson and Southern Guild: “It is exciting to see creativity from the African continent equally on the global plane with talent from the rest of the world,” White-Mifetu said. They discussed several recent shows, including Julie Mehretu at New York’s Marian Goodman Gallery, Wifredo Lam at MoMA, and the “Nigerian Modernism” exhibit at the Tate Modern in London: “That is really changing the narrative about Africa. It’s often said that Picasso, for example, was very influenced by African sculpture,” Bailey told me.

Maya Lin, the legendary American architect best known for designing the Vietnam Veterans memorial, had been at Frieze, but I missed her; I also spotted who I thought might be the actress Gina Gershon, though I couldn’t tell. That was fine; I’d already had my fair share of memorable encounters. The best advice came from Keely Orgeman, the modern and contemporary art curator at the Yale University Art Gallery. I’d seen her earlier in the day, after she’d spent time admiring Sarah Sze’s trippy mixed-media painting Badlands at the Gagosian booth: “There are so many works like this that are so intricately constructed — that’s what I love about being here, just looking closely.” She advised newcomers like me to take breaks: “Get a little water, sit down on a bench, collect yourself, and then come back in so that you’re refreshed to look at art.”