Public Programs @ the Institute

Series: Art in Advance

Inside the 2026 Whitney Biennial

Wednesday, January 28, 2026, 6:00pm

Marcela Guerrero, DeMartini Family Curator, Whitney Museum of American Art;  Drew Sawyer, Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography, Whitney Museum of American Art

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This talk will provide a behind the scenes look into the curatorial process and themes of the upcoming the Whitney Biennial 2026, co-curated by Marcela Guerrero and Drew Sawyer. The 82nd edition of the longest-running survey of contemporary American art will feature the work of 56 artists, duos, and collectives that examines various forms of relationality, including interspecies kinships, affective connections, familial relations, geopolitical entanglements, technological affinities, shared mythologies, and infrastructural supports. In addition to artists from across 25 states, the exhibition includes artists from Afghanistan, Chile, Iraq, Okinawa, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Vietnam, and elsewhere— places marked by the reach of U.S. power. Dr. Guerrero and Dr. Sawyer will situate the exhibition within both of their curatorial and scholarly practices, the history of the Whitney Biennial, as well as broader discourses in contemporary art and exhibition making.

Marcela Guerrero is the DeMartini Family Curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Most recently, Guerrero co-curated Ilana Savdie: Radical Contractions with Angelica Arbelaez. At the Whitney, she has also curated no existe un mundo poshuracán: Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane Maria and Martine Gutierrez: Supremacy (2022–23), among other exhibitions. From 2014 to 2017, Guerrero was the Curatorial Fellow for Radical Women: Latin American Art, 1960–1985, organized at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles. Prior to joining the Hammer, she worked in the Latin American and Latino art department at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Her writing has appeared in numerous exhibition catalogues and art journals. Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Guerrero holds a PhD in art history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Drew Sawyer is the Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Sawyer has previously held curatorial positions at the Brooklyn Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Columbus Museum of Art. His recent exhibitions include Mark Armijo Mcknight: Decreation (2024), Copy Machine Manifestos: Artists Who Make Zines (2023), Suneil Sanzgiri: Here the Earth Grows Gold (2023); and Jimmy DeSana: Submission (2022). Sawyer holds a Ph.D. in Art History from Columbia University.