8 Must See Art Exhibitions in NYC This April
From a rare Domenico Gnoli survey to Frida and Diego at MoMA, here are eight art shows worth crossing town for this month.
Isa Genzken: VACATION | Source: David Zwirner
This month in New York, you can stand inside a gallery transformed into a kinetic terrain of rotating aluminum mobiles, watch sculptures of stone and steel hold their balance through nothing but careful placement, and walk through MoMA galleries redesigned to feel like an opera set. There are shows about the politics of rest, the precise distance between things, and what it means to make art in the final years of a life.
Whether you are a seasoned gallery-goer or someone trying to spend a Saturday afternoon doing something other than scrolling, here are eight exhibitions worth your time.
1. Kishio Suga
Kishio Suga | Source: Mendes Wood DM
Where: Mendes Wood DM | 47 Walker Street, New York
When: March 13 through May 23, 2026
Mendes Wood DM is presenting a solo exhibition of Kishio Suga, one of Japan's most celebrated artists, whose practice spans site-specific installation, assemblage, and performance. Since 1968, he has built temporary installations from natural and industrial materials (wood, metal, wire, and concrete) to reveal the reality of mono (things/materials) and the jōkyō (situation) that holds them together. Suga was a central figure in Mono-ha (School of Things), a movement that marked a significant turning point in postwar Japanese art history.
About the Artist: Born in Morioka, Japan in 1944, Suga lives and works in Itō, Shizuoka Prefecture. His work is held in major institutional collections including the Centre Pompidou-Metz, Tate Modern, Dia Art Foundation, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, and the Pinault Collection, among others.
2. Isa Genzken: VACATION
Isa Genzken: VACATION | Source: David Zwirner
Where: David Zwirner | 52 Walker Street, New York
When: March 13 through April 18, 2026
VACATION, Isa Genzken's solo exhibition at David Zwirner's Tribeca space, draws from the artist's proclamation that "the entire art system urgently needs a vacation," revisiting her 2000 solo show Urlaub at the Frankfurter Kunstverein. Curated by Ebony L. Haynes, the show spans the late 1970s to the 2010s, with little-seen film, painting, photography, and sculpture, centered on Yachturlaub (1993), thirty-six prints documenting the interior of art collector Frieder Burda's yacht. The exhibition coincides with Genzken's solo show at Galerie Buchholz, inaugurating its new space at 31 West 54th Street.
About the Artist: Born in Bad Oldesloe, Germany in 1948, Genzken lives and works in Berlin. Her multidisciplinary practice spans sculpture, painting, photography, and film, and her work is held in major collections including MoMA, the Stedelijk Museum, and the Hirshhorn Museum, among others.
3. The Adventure of Domenico Gnoli
The Adventure Of Domenico Gnoli | Source: Lévy Gorvy Dayan
Where: Lévy Gorvy Dayan | 19 East 64th Street, New York
When: March 18 through May 23, 2026
The largest exhibition of Domenico Gnoli's work in the United States in more than five decades, The Adventure of Domenico Gnoli at Lévy Gorvy Dayan follows his celebrated 1969 solo presentation at Sidney Janis Gallery. Organized in collaboration with Gnoli's widow, Yannick Vu, and the artist's estate, the show features paintings, drawings, etchings, notebooks, and letters. Gnoli's late paintings picture everyday objects, including clothing, hair, beds, and sofas, enlarged, fragmented, and suspended. The canvases are at once absorbing and uncanny, revealing secrets of contemporary life yet unconsidered.
About the Artist: Born in Rome in 1933, Domenico Gnoli (1933–1970) began his career as an illustrator and set and costume designer before arriving at his mature painting style in 1964. His work was the subject of a major retrospective at the Fondazione Prada, Milan in 2021–22.
4. Jose Dávila: The Simple Act of Positioning
Jose Dávila: The Simple Act of Positioning | Source: Sean Kelly Gallery
Where: Sean Kelly Gallery | 475 Tenth Avenue, New York
When: April 17 through May 30, 2026
For his fifth solo exhibition at Sean Kelly, José Dávila continues his investigation into one of sculpture's most elemental gestures: placing one thing in relation to another. Employing stones, concrete forms, steel beams, sandbags, and geometric volumes in configurations that appear both precise and improbable, Dávila approaches sculpture not as an object but as a situation. Rather than transforming materials through carving or modeling, meaning emerges through deliberate acts of positioning. Gravity becomes an active collaborator: once an object is placed, stability is never entirely guaranteed.
About the Artist: Dávila has presented solo exhibitions at the Museum Haus Konstruktiv in Zürich, Dallas Contemporary, JUMEX Museum in Mexico City, and Hamburg Kunsthalle, among others. His work is held in the permanent collections of the Guggenheim, Centre Pompidou, and MoMA Luxembourg, among others.
5. David Novros
David Novros | Source: Paula Cooper Gallery
Where: Paula Cooper Gallery | 534 West 21st Street, New York
When: March 7 through April 25, 2026
In 1970, Donald Judd commissioned David Novros to create a fresco at 101 Spring Street, which remains on view at the Judd Foundation today. Paula Cooper Gallery's current exhibition continues to bring Novros's work to New York audiences, following his inclusion in the landmark 1966 Guggenheim exhibition Systemic Painting and a two-person debut with Mark di Suvero at Park Place Gallery in 1965. In Fall 2026, the Hamburger Kunsthalle will open the most comprehensive exhibition of his work to date.
About the Artist: Born in Los Angeles in 1941, Novros lives and works in New York City. His work is held in major collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, MoMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Menil Collection, and the Walker Art Center, among others.
6. Suki Seokyeong Kang: Our Spring
Suki Seokyeong Kang: Our Spring | Source: Tina Kim Gallery
Where: Tina Kim Gallery | 525 West 21st Street, New York
When: March 12 through April 25, 2026
One year after the untimely passing of Suki Seokyeong Kang (1977–2025), Tina Kim Gallery honors her legacy with Our Spring, a solo exhibition bringing together significant sculptural and two-dimensional works from the last decade of her life, including the New York debut of pieces from her most influential series. Central to the exhibition is Mountain–hours, an immersive installation of aluminum mobiles accompanied by poems recited in Korean by the artist, transforming the gallery into a kinetic terrain. The show follows critically acclaimed surveys at the Leeum Museum of Art (2023) and the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver (2025).
About the Artist: Kang's practice was rooted in the Korean concept of Jari, denoting a "place," "seat," or "territory." Working with steel, aluminum, silk, thread, and hanji (Korean mulberry paper), she developed a visual vocabulary defined by the limits of her own physicality, with sculptures scaled to what she could lift, carry, or embrace.
7. Frida and Diego: The Last Dream
Frida and Diego: The Last Dream | Source: MoMA
Where: MoMA | 11 West 53rd Street, New York
When: March 21 through September 12, 2026
A first-of-its-kind collaboration between MoMA and the Metropolitan Opera, Frida and Diego: The Last Dream is organized in conjunction with the Met's new production of El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego. The presentation features artworks by Kahlo and Rivera in an elaborate setting designed by Jon Bausor, the opera's set and co-costume designer, who evokes the artists' lives and work through his theatrical designs. The fictional narrative of the opera begins three years after Kahlo's death, following an aging Rivera as he summons her back to life on the Day of the Dead.
About the Artists: Key figures in a movement to redefine Mexican culture and identity after the revolution of 1910–20, Rivera worked through monumental murals and Kahlo through intimate self-portraits. The two were romantically involved from 1928 until Kahlo's death in 1954, and their influence continues to resonate across the visual and performing arts.
8. Maysha Mohamedi: Maysha the Fool
Maysha Mohamedi: Maysha the Fool | Source: Pace Gallery
Where: Pace Gallery | 540 West 25th Street, New York
When: March 10 through April 25, 2026
Thirteen new canvases make up Maysha the Fool, Maysha Mohamedi's latest exhibition at Pace Gallery, all created in 2025 after a year-long break from painting. The title comes from Gimpel the Fool, a short story by Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer about a naïve, goodhearted baker whose innocence and faith ultimately fortify him against human cruelty. The new work draws on themes of transcendence and enlightenment, informed by Mohamedi's recent pursuits: writing plays, acting in local theater productions in Los Angeles, weightlifting, and exploring new methods of spiritual devotion. A facsimile of her studio notebook, published by Pace Publishing, accompanies the show.
About the Artist: Mohamedi is a self-taught artist raised in San Luis Obispo, California, who trained as a neuroscientist before pursuing painting. She lives and works in Los Angeles. Her work is held in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, LACMA, the Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, and the Zhi Art Museum in Chengdu, China.
Notes:
Most of these exhibitions are free to visit and do not require advance reservations, with the exception of MoMA, which requires timed entry tickets. Galleries in Chelsea are generally open Tuesday through Saturday; the Upper East Side and Tribeca spaces tend to keep similar hours. If you are planning a full day, start in Chelsea (Sean Kelly, Tina Kim, and Pace are all within a few blocks of each other) and then head down to Tribeca for Mendes Wood DM and David Zwirner on Walker Street, which are practically next door to one another. For the most up-to-date hours and extended programming, check each gallery’s website before you go.