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Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent

March 12, 2025

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Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Sonya Kelliher-Combs, Credible Idiot Strings, 2022, courtesy of Tureen, Dallas and Independent

Independent is pleased to announce further details of the artists and galleries participating in the fair’s 16th edition this May. Taking place from May 8–11 at Spring Studios in Tribeca, New York, the 2025 fair will feature exhibitions by over 130 artists presented by 85 international galleries and nonprofit organizations, curated by Independent’s founder Elizabeth Dee, founding curatorial advisor Matthew Higgs, with Berlin-based advisors Alexandra Alexopoulou and David Ulrichs. 

An invitation-only fair, Independent’s mission since its inception in 2010 has been to inspire encounters with extraordinary contemporary art for discerning collectors and institutions. Building on the fair’s history of launching artists to a new level of recognition, a new curatorial initiative titled Independent Debuts provides a dedicated platform for solo exhibitions of emerging talent in New York. This year, Independent Debuts will spotlight 26 artists. 

Over the past two decades, Independent’s gallery network has brought together the most creative and inspired programs of emerging, mid-career, and established artists from around the world. The 2025 fair will feature diverse aspects of more established artists through several significant solo presentations which have been especially conceived for Independent. A number of exhibitions will address timely socio-political themes such as the climate crisis and Indigenous identity, while others grapple with the enduring role of humor in art.

 

Independent Debuts

Alicia Adamerovich, Michael Kohn Gallery
Turiya Adkins, Hannah Traore Gallery
Sameen Agha, Indigo+Madder
Grgur Akrap, The Hole
Nooshin Askari, Cibrián
Amel Bashier, Addis Fine Art
Lewis Brander, James Cope x Vardaxoglou Gallery
Zoë Carlon, South Parade
Nicole Economides, Callirrhoë
Laura Footes, SHRINE
Mandy Franca, Night Café
Savannah Harris, Harlesden High Street
Adam Higgins, Chris Sharp Gallery
Clinton King, George Benias Gallery
Satoru Kurata, Tomio Koyama Gallery
Travis MacDonald, LINSEED
Tincuta Marin, Plan B
Ada M. Patterson, Copperfield
Jean-Claude Silbermann, galerie Sator
Kiriakos Tompolidis, Galerie Judin
Achraf Touloub, Parliament
Jake Troyli, moniquemeloche
Alix Van Der Donckt-Ferrand, april april
Gunnel Wåhlstrand, Andréhn-Schiptjenko
Shafei Xia, P420
Klara Zetterholm, SUPRAINFINIT

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Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Pope.L, Unknown title (washcloth painting with OJ Simpson), 1990, courtesy of The Estate and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York and Independent

Established Artist Solos

Acclaimed American performance artist Pope.L continuously challenged audiences to question deep-seated beliefs surrounding class, race, language, and identity through his diverse works across performance, installation, sound, writing, drawing, and painting. He enticed the viewer into dialogue by harnessing humor and familiar public figures, often reassigning roles to challenge and dismantle preconceived notions of history. A solo presentation will feature previously unseen works from the 1990s and early 2000s. Presented by Mitchell-Innes & Nash.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Tseng Kwong Chi, Cape Canaveral, Florida, 1985, courtesy of Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York and Independent

Between 1979 and 1989, the New York-based queer immigrant artist Tseng Kwong Chi created East Meets West, a groundbreaking series of photographic self-portraits in which he posed in a “Mao suit” and mirrored sunglasses at a range of American and European monuments and tourist sites. This mischievous personification of otherness raises questions of masquerade and identity, belonging and estrangement, as well as the displacement of the Asian diaspora. A selection of Tseng’s portraits (1985-88) of his artist friends in their studios, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, and Andy Warhol, will also be on view. Presented by Yancey Richardson Gallery.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Rosa Barba, Aggregate States of Matters, 2019, courtesy of Vistamare, Milano, Pescara and Independent

Rosa Barba explores film as both an immaterial carrier of meaning and a physical material with sculptural properties. Expanding on her practice of orchestrating larger installations of works that open a visual and auditory dialogue, Barba will include a tribute to the late Ettore Spalletti. The presentation coincides with the Museum of Modern Art’s solo survey exhibition, Rosa Barba: The Ocean of One’s Pause (May 3–July 6, 2025). Presented by Vistamare.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Michelle Grabner, Untitled (Janitorial Still Life), 2024-2025, courtesy of Abattoir Gallery, Cleveland and Independent

Michelle Grabner, whose painting, printmaking, and sculpture has consistently mined the vocabularies of domestic patterns and fabrics, will exhibit a new body of work. This presentation extends her interest in the replication of everyday domestic items from the home and the overlooked realm of janitorial labor in the United States. Grabner has concurrent exhibitions at the Haggerty Museum of Art, Milwaukee WI (through May 2025), and the Schneider Museum of Art, Ashland, OR (April–August 2025). Presented by Abattoir Gallery.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Douglas Coupland, Exxon Valdez, 2023, courtesy of Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto and Independent

Douglas Coupland continues his sustained investigation of the 21st-century condition and the relationship between the natural and unnatural in his recent paintings, in which the abstracted form of an iceberg is repeatedly broken apart. Presented by Daniel Faria Gallery.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Bambou Gili, Avian Arc, 2024, courtesy of Night Gallery, Los Angeles and Independent

Thematic Highlights: Climate, Indigenous Identity, and Humor

Ecology and the Climate:

Jane Lombard Gallery’s multidisciplinary group exhibition of works by Ilke Cop, Karolina Maszkiewicz, and Eva Struble explores the intersection between the personal and the ecological at a time when the effects of climate change are increasingly evident. Vielmetter Los Angeles’s two-person presentation centers eco-feminist new works by Andrea Bowers and Shanna Waddell. While Bowers connects resistance to patriarchal violence and environmental destruction, Waddell imagines a utopian artist commune, where women collectively tend the land and paint the natural world around them in peaceful co-existence. Presented by Night Gallery, Bambou Gili’s vivid, atmospheric paintings tenderly address ecological issues such as animal extinction and the changing seasons, bridging between water sources, the land, and the sky.

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Terran Last Gun, Shifting Harmonies, 2023, courtesy Diane Rosenstein Gallery, Los Angeles and Independent

Indigenous Identity: 

Tureen features sculptural and textile-based works by Anchorage-based artist Sonya Kelliher-Combs ​​(Iñupiaq and Athabascan) that integrate traditional and synthetic materials, from walrus gut to acrylic gel polymer, porcupine quill to nylon thread. Her materials serve as the foundation for surfaces and forms that recall post-minimalists like Eva Hesse while revealing the beauty and injustice experienced by her people and homelands. Diane Rosenstein Gallery presents abstract ledger drawings by Santa Fe-based artist Terran Last Gun (Piikani), whose bold explorations of color and form often reference Blackfoot painted lodges, which he considers “visual masterpieces of the Great Plains.” Last Gun has been commissioned for the upcoming SITE SANTA FE International Biennial, Once Within A Time (June 2025–January 2026).

Announcing Featured Artists for the 16th Edition of Independent - Features - Independent Art Fair

Guy Richards Smit, Elaborate Coping Mechanism, 2024, courtesy A Hug From The Art World, New York and Independent

Humor:

Humor emerges as a material in its own right through Guy Richards Smit’s incisive gag-cartoons, published by The New Yorker since 2022. Ahead of a forthcoming anthology from Hunter’s Point Press, A Hug From The Art World celebrates Smit’s larger works on canvas, which traverse themes of narcissism, desire, power, and failure. Matt Kenny employs humor and banality in equal measure to explore the intersection of poetry and politics through various tropes: New Jersey wastelands, faithful oil reproductions of masters such as Courbet and Goya, and New York cityscapes inhabited by the World Trade Tower as a cartoon monster. F presents Kenny’s new body of work, which takes on the eyes as windows of the mind, plumbing the depths of his overactive imagination. Adam Higgins’s all-over aerial compositions, on show with Chris Sharp Gallery, depict salads dressed with raw proteins to dazzling and perplexing effect. With photorealistic skill and deadpan humor, Higgins evokes the conventions of Dutch still-lifes, Jackson Pollock’s drip paintings, and contemporary food photography. This presentation will also be part of Independent Debuts.

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Liliane Tomasko, A Solid, some Light, and Things that transform this shadowy Bright, 2024, courtesy of Kerlin Gallery, Dublin and Independent

Liliane Tomasko, A Solid, some Light, and Things that transform this shadowy Bright, 2024, courtesy of Kerlin Gallery, Dublin and Independent

Graham Marks, Candelabra No. 4, 2022, courtesy of Hostler Burrows, New York and Independent

Graham Marks, Candelabra No. 4, 2022, courtesy of Hostler Burrows, New York and Independent

Peppi Bottrop, N1, 2022, courtesy M. LeBlanc, Chicago and Independent

Peppi Bottrop, N1, 2022, courtesy M. LeBlanc, Chicago and Independent

Sylvia Fragoso, Untitled, 2015, courtesy of NIAD Art Center, Richmond, CA and Off Paradise, New York and Independent

Sylvia Fragoso, Untitled, 2015, courtesy of NIAD Art Center, Richmond, CA and Off Paradise, New York and Independent

Juliette Blightman, View before storm, 2024, courtesy of Niru Ratnam, London and Independent

Juliette Blightman, View before storm, 2024, courtesy of Niru Ratnam, London and Independent

Elizabeth Radcliffe, Caron in Sheepskin, 2007, courtesy of Margot Samel, New York and Independent

Elizabeth Radcliffe, Caron in Sheepskin, 2007, courtesy of Margot Samel, New York and Independent

Installation View of Mary Carlson: Garden at Kerry Schuss, courtesy of Kerry Schuss Gallery, New York and Independent

Installation View of Mary Carlson: Garden at Kerry Schuss, courtesy of Kerry Schuss Gallery, New York and Independent

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Other notable exhibitions include: 

Gallery 495 presenting Ellon Gibbs
Alexandre Gallery presenting Lisa Sanditz
The Approach presenting John Maclean
George Benias Gallery presenting Clinton King
Bradley Ertaskiran presenting Margaux Williamson
Broadway presenting Andrew Kuo
Corbett vs. Dempsey presenting Sadie Benning, Arch Connelly, and Jeff Perrone
CURRO presenting Alejandro Almanza Pereda and Juan Manuel Salas
EUROPA presenting Suyi Xu
Fair Warning presentation details to be announced
Fleisher/Ollman Gallery presenting Thornton Dial, Sarah Gamble, Augustin Lesage, Molly Metz, M’onma, and Toshiko Takaezu
Fredericks & Freiser presenting Sam Mattax
Gaa presenting Wendy White
The Gallery of Everything presenting ACM, Alikan Abdollahi, Morton Bartlett, Freddie Brice, Chomo, Raymond Coins, Helen Director, Howard Finster, Rev BF Perkins, Francis Marshall, & Seyni Awa Camara
GAVLAK presenting Lita Albuquerque, Jose Alvarez (D.O.P.A.), Jessica Cannon, and Rob Wynne
Gern en Regalia presenting Tyler Ormsby and Will Yackulic
Haverkampf Leistenschneider presenting Maximilian Kirmse and Aubrey Levinthal
Heidi presenting Will Sheldon
Hostler Burrows presenting Maren Kloppmann, Graham Marks, Eun-Ha Paek, Pekka Paikkari, and Kim Simonsson
i8 Gallery presenting Yui Yaegashi
Nina Johnson presenting Anna Betbeze and Rochelle Feinstein 
Kerlin Gallery presenting Aleana Egan, Ailbhe Ní Bhriain, and Liliane Tomasko
M. LeBlanc presenting Peppi Bottrop and Cameron Spratley
LINSEED presenting Travis MacDonald
Long Story Short presenting Keita Morimoto
Magenta Plains presenting Roberto Juarez
Management x NıCOLETTı presenting Nana Wolke
MARCH presenting Claudia Keep
The Meeting presenting Tod Lippy
Charles Moffett presenting Julia Jo
Night Gallery presenting Bambou Gili and Dan John Anderson
Off Paradise presenting Mitchell Charbonneau, Sylvia Fragoso, and Maximilian Schubert
Maureen Paley presenting a group show including works by Merlin James, Studio K.O.S., and Reverend Joyce McDonald
Kendra Jayne Patrick presenting Ada Friedman and Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias
Praise Shadows Art Gallery presenting Duke Riley and Jean Shin
Niru Ratnam presenting Juliette Blightman and Laila Majid
Ricco/Maresca Gallery presenting a selection of Vintage American Game Boards
Diane Rosenstein Gallery presenting Jay Kvapil and Terran Last Gun
RYAN LEE presenting Tim Braden
Margot Samel presenting Sarah Margnetti and Elizabeth Radcliffe
Sea View presenting Jane Corrigan
Kerry Schuss Gallery presenting Mary Carlson
The Sunday Painter presenting Emma Hart, Tomas Harker, and Zearo
Swivel Gallery presenting Lucia Hierro
Vigo presenting Ibrahim El-Salahi and Jordy Kerwick
Voloshyn Gallery presenting Roman Khimei, Yarema Malashchuk, and Abi Shehu
White Columns presenting Huddie Hamper; ‘Anonymous’ drawings from the collection of Vince Aletti; and prints by Ann Craven, Rachel Harrison, Sam McKinniss, Arthur Simms, and Tabboo!
YveYANG Gallery presenting Allan Rand and Huidi Xiang

 

For media inquiries, please contact Puja Patel and Emily Stewart-Han at press@independenthq.com.