APAA’s Top Picks From Frieze New York, TEFAF New York, and NADA 2026
Image Courtesy of Amir Hamja for The New York Times.
New York’s eagerly anticipated spring art week begins as the city’s leading fairs open their doors, including Frieze New York, TEFAF New York, and NADA New York.
APAA advisors have thoughtfully curated a selection of exceptional highlights from both fairs. Thank you to our advisors for sharing their top picks.
Top Picks from Frieze New York
Luiz Zerbini, Bóia Amarela, 2023.
“One of the leading contemporary artists in Latin America, Luiz Zerbini is a multi-disciplinary artist whose works deftly combine references to art history and pop culture. His paintings speak to the rich precedents established by Brazil's historic and modern artists, but the way in which he integrates both geometric and organic forms feels fresh and utterly masterful.”
Acrylic on canvas
13.7 x 19.6 inches
Presented by Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel
Gabriel de la Mora, 2,937, 2025.
“My pick from Frieze, New York this year is a ‘painting’ by Mexico City-based artist Gabriel de la Mora. It would be easy to walk by this work as it reads as a small, minimal white monochromatic surface. But anyone familiar with de la Mora knows his work is rarely what it seems. There’s always an element of surprise mixed with meticulous precision. Here you’ll find a compilation of eggshell fragments, sorted and arranged by hand across the entire plane. His work reminds me of the old adage about making something from nothing. Whether he’s repurposing feathers, butterfly wings, or shoe soles, he consistently brings an unexpected sense of wonder.”
826 concave eggshell fragments, 2,111 convex eggshell fragments on museum board
Framed: 25 9/16 × 25 9/16 × 2 3/8 inches
Presented by Perrotin
Ming Fay, Money Tree Branch, 1990's-2000's.
“This work by Ming Fay brightens any space it's in.”
Mixed Media
30 x 43 x 15 inches
Presented by Kurimanzutto
Leo Mock, BFFs, 2026.
“Leo Mock's BFFs occupies an uneasy space between the recognizable and the strange. He reconfigures open skies, rocky terrain, and shifting light into something that feels like no place on Earth. The effect is quietly surrealist, evoking a deep sense of solitude without ever tipping into overt strangeness. Mock's palette moves fluidly between earthy, muffled tones and sudden moments of brightness, a tension that adds to the eerie quality of the image. His brushwork is assured and beautiful to follow across the surface of the linen. Mock has created a world entirely of his own, one that lingers.”
Oil on linen
63 x 39 ¼ inches
Presented by Anton Kern Gallery
John Giorno, DIAL-A-POEM (Push-Button Edition), 1968–2019.
“I always relish the opportunity to celebrate a true artistic innovator such as John Giorno. Giorno merged the visual arts with poetry, performance, and music, redefining the possibilities of linguistic form. His Dial-A-Poem series invited viewers to pick up telephones and listen to poetry recited by a cross-disciplinary network of writers. The work further pushed the boundaries of what could be considered visual art, prompting reflection on language, the ready-made, audience interaction, and community.”
Telephone, computer with 282 recorded poems from 132 poets and artists
Edition of 20
5 x 11 x 10 ¾ inches
Presented by Kurimanzutto
Maia Ruth Lee, B.B.Carmine 1-2, 2025.
“Maia Ruth Lee elegantly employs the visual language of abstraction to address the relevant issue of global migration. Progressing out of historical movements such as Gutai and Mona Ha, Lee paints over rope-bound structures with vibrant pigment to expose negative space, unfurling across the canvas into a dynamic composition, evocative of topography. The subtlety of this process imbues Lee's work with unmistakable care and humanity. In doing so, the South Korean-born artist offers a translation of her own diasporic experience into a poignant reflection on the broader condition of displacement. ”
Acrylic ink on canvas
Framed: 52.25 x 46.25 x 2 inches
Presented by François Ghebaly
Jane Dickson, Cocktails 2, 2025.
“In Cocktails 2 (2025), Jane Dickson translates the neon lights of New York’s Times Square into impressionistic oilstick that glows against matte black ground. Dickson began painting the neighborhood from her own nocturnal photographs after moving there in the late 1970s, when, in her words, ‘the city was burning, broke, and dangerous.’ In the decades since, Dickson has continuously revisited and reinterpreted these images to create works that are at once strongly graphic and dreamily diffuse, as if recalled from a memory of a long-lost urban landscape.”
Oil stick on linen
36 x 60 inches
Presented by Karma Gallery
Rob Pruitt, A Month of Early Morning Views Over Oyster Pond, 2026.
“Pruitt’s Month of Sunset/sunrises series consists of multi-panel paintings that depict the actual sunrise or sunset of a given day, acting as both a chronological and emotional record. The Month of Sunset paintings are a way to make sense of the passage of time, much like his famous Panda paintings or his Instagram projects. The work is about process in addition to the visual record of the sun's colors, which spill onto the artist's handmade frames. This is the most recent work by the artist, whose works are in great demand, so it will likely sell before the fair opens.”
Acrylic on canvas in hand-painted artist frames
64 1/2 x 111 1/2 inches
Presented by 303 Gallery
Top Picks TEFAF New York
Alvaro Barrington, Street Dreams, M, K, Coral, 2024.
“As Barrington states: ‘Art is about learning how to be, Painting is about what's in front of you, it's about learning to see.’ I'm always intrigued by the artist's surprising and virtuosic elevation of disparate materials into such thought-provoking objects that can live comfortably with modern masterpieces.”
Ink, acrylic, enamel on concrete in denim frame on enamel painted cardboard in steel frame
41 1/3 x 41 1/3 x 4 1/3 inches
Presented by Galleria Massimo de Carlo
Dominique Fung, The Quiet Arrangement of Wings, 2026.
“These jewelry boxes by Dominique Fung are always engaging with their intricacies and paintings hidden inside the drawers.”
Oil on canvas and antique jewellery box
5 ½ 8 x 4 ¼ inches
Presented by Massimo De Carlo Gallery
Chuck Close, Joel, 2002.
“In Joel, Chuck Close captures fellow artist Joel Shapiro in his signature style of portraiture, merging the hyperreal with the abstract. From a distance, Close’s monumental, grid-like composition resolves into Shapiro’s likeness, while up close, each individual square functions as a miniature abstraction. In doing so, Close challenges perception and expands the possibilities of portraiture.”
Oil on canvas
8 feet 6 inches x 7 feet
Presented by Pace Gallery
Robert Ryman, Untitled, 1999.
“Robert Ryman is known for his heavily impastoed, lyrical brushstrokes, and often monochromatic white paintings. The exceptional Untitled (1999) composition employs yellow hues as bands, with the central composition electrifying the painting. Thus, the Ryman painting presented is a joyful and radiant celebration of experimentation dictated by restraint and gestural mark-making. ”
Oil, acrylic, and graphite on board on stretched cotton canvas
13 x 13 inches
Presented by David Zwirner
Top Picks from NADA New York
Molly Lowe, Domestic Embrace, 2023.
“Trained as a sculptor and painter, the fluidity of boundaries—between figuration and abstraction, between objects and their surroundings, between foreground and background -- informs Lowe's paintings in a visceral way. Along the lines of Christina Quarles, we see bodies melded in spaces too small to contain them, and within these constraints, innovation shines.”
Oil on canvas
56 x 48 inches
Presented by Marinaro Gallery
Kansas Smeaton, What Love Did Then, Love Does Now, 2026.
“This painting by Kansas Smeaton caught our eye for its vibrancy and captivating narrative.”
Oil on linen
34 x 28 inches
Presented by La Loma Projects
