Paris doesn’t really do “quiet years.” But 2026? 2026 is something else entirely.
This is a city going full main-character energy: blockbuster retrospectives, long-awaited touring exhibitions finally landing in France, museums reopening with confidence, and fashion, photography, music and painting colliding in the most Parisian way possible. The result is a cultural calendar so strong it feels almost irresponsible not to plan a trip around it.
If you love art with context, history with attitude, and exhibitions that leave you thinking long after you’ve left the museum café, this is your year. Below, the 12 exhibitions that genuinely justify travelling to Paris in 2026; not because you “should,” but because you’ll regret missing them.
Martin Parr: Global Warming
At the Jeu de Paume
Jan 30 – May 24, 2026
Martin Parr never photographed the world as he wished it were. He photographed it exactly as it is; awkward, excessive, funny, unsettling. Curated with his involvement shortly before his death, Global Warming feels both timely and quietly emotional.
Spanning five decades and five continents, the exhibition brings together nearly 180 photographs that look at tourism, consumption, leisure and environmental collapse with Parr’s unmistakable deadpan wit. Beach holidays, overheated interiors, artificial paradises: it’s funny until it isn’t. And then it’s devastating.
This is not subtle photography. It doesn’t ask permission. It observes, documents, and lets you sit with the discomfort. Exactly what great documentary work should do.
Facing the Sky: Paul Huet in His Time
at the Musée de la Vie Romantique
Feb 14 – Aug 31, 2026
The reopening of the Musée de la Vie Romantique is reason enough to visit, but the choice to spotlight Paul Huet makes it even better. Long overshadowed by flashier names, Huet was a quiet revolutionary of Romantic landscape painting, obsessed with light, weather, and dramatic skies.
Influenced by Turner and Constable, his work feels surprisingly modern: moody, expansive, emotionally charged. Seen alongside his contemporaries, Huet finally gets the context; and credit; he deserves.
The setting helps. Ary Scheffer’s restored house feels intimate and contemplative, the perfect counterpoint to the vastness of Huet’s skies. Go slowly. This one rewards attention.
Chiaroscuro
at the Bourse de Commerce
March 4 – Aug 31, 2026
Light versus shadow. Presence versus absence. This exhibition takes the idea of chiaroscuro far beyond its Baroque origins and turns it into a contemporary emotional language.
Drawing heavily from the Pinault Collection, the show brings together artists who use darkness not as an aesthetic trick, but as a way to explore uncertainty, vulnerability, and the psychological climate of our time. Expect photography, installation, painting; and a standout carte blanche commission by Laura Lamiel.
The circular architecture of the Bourse de Commerce makes this exhibition feel almost meditative. You don’t rush it. You move through it, slowly recalibrating.
Renoir and Love
at the Musée d’Orsay
March 17 – July 19, 2026
Renoir has long been dismissed as sentimental. Pretty. Decorative. This exhibition dismantles that cliché entirely.
Marking 150 years since Bal du moulin de la Galette, the Musée d’Orsay reframes Renoir as an artist deeply invested in intimacy, tenderness and human connection; not surface charm. The brushwork is obsessive, the compositions thoughtful, the gaze profoundly affectionate.
It’s also the largest presentation of Renoir’s early work in Paris since 1985, making it essential viewing for anyone interested in Impressionism beyond the postcard version.
Nan Goldin: This Will Not End Well
at the Grand Palais
March 18 – June 21, 2026
Few exhibitions feel as raw, immersive and emotionally demanding as a Nan Goldin show, and this one arrives in Paris after a major European tour.
Spread across purpose-built pavilions designed by architect Hala Wardé, the exhibition places Goldin’s slideshows and films front and centre. The Ballad of Sexual Dependency anchors the experience, but the focus is broader: community, resilience, joy, survival.
Despite the title, this is not a bleak exhibition. It’s deeply human, often tender, and unflinchingly honest. You don’t just view it, you absorb it.
Matisse: 1941–1954
at the Grand Palais
March 24 – July 26, 2026
This exhibition proves, decisively, that Henri Matisse’s later years were not a quiet fade-out but a radical reinvention.
Bringing together over 230 works: including an extraordinary collection of gouaches découpées, the show traces how illness and physical limitation pushed Matisse towards bold colour, simplified form and astonishing freedom.
Seen together, the late works feel joyful, defiant and surprisingly contemporary. Against the scale of the Grand Palais, they sing.
Henri Rousseau: The Ambition of Painting
at the Musée de l’Orangerie
March 25 – July 20, 2026
Often labelled “naïve,” Henri Rousseau was anything but. This exhibition reclaims his ambition, technical experimentation and influence with a focused, beautifully curated retrospective.
With rare loans from the Barnes Foundation, the show explores the materiality of Rousseau’s work and the role of art dealer Paul Guillaume in shaping his legacy. The result is a nuanced portrait of an artist who refused to fit into the academic system — and changed modern art because of it.
Africa Fashion
at the Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac
March 31 – July 12, 2026
One of the most important fashion exhibitions of the decade finally arrives in Paris; and the timing couldn’t be better.
Originally curated by the V&A, Africa Fashion traces the evolution of African fashion from the mid-20th century to today, highlighting designers who blend heritage, innovation and global influence. Shown alongside the Quai Branly’s historic collections, the dialogue between past and present is powerful.
This is fashion as identity, politics, craftsmanship and future-thinking; not trend forecasting.
Video Games & Music
at the Philharmonie de Paris
April 2 – Nov 1, 2026
Unexpected? Yes. Important? Absolutely.
This exhibition finally gives video game music the serious cultural treatment it deserves, exploring how sound shaped gameplay, emotion and memory across decades. From early technical constraints to fully orchestrated scores, it’s a reminder of how deeply embedded gaming music is in contemporary culture.
You don’t need to be a gamer to appreciate this; just someone interested in how art evolves alongside technology.
Lee Miller
at the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris
April 3 – July 26, 2026
Model, muse, photographer, war correspondent; Lee Miller lived several lives in one. This major retrospective captures all of them.
From Vogue studio work to frontline war photography, the exhibition traces Miller’s restless movement across continents and identities. It’s both biographical and deeply artistic, revealing a photographer with extraordinary range and courage.
Her work feels especially resonant now: fearless, intelligent, and unwilling to look away.
Calder: Dreaming in Balance
at the Fondation Louis Vuitton
April 15 – Aug 16, 2026
Few artists interact with space like Alexander Calder; and few buildings suit his work like Frank Gehry’s Fondation Louis Vuitton.
Featuring nearly 300 works, this is one of the most ambitious Calder exhibitions ever mounted. Mobiles, stabiles, wire portraits, jewellery; all displayed in a way that emphasises movement, balance and play.
It’s joyful, elegant, and quietly profound. Exactly what Calder intended.
LOOKS: 40 Years of Fashion
at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs
Sept 29, 2026 – April 4, 2027
To mark 40 years of the Musée de la Mode et du Textile, this exhibition turns the spotlight on the life of a garment; from creation to conservation.
Forty iconic silhouettes take over the Pavillon de Marsan, each referencing landmark fashion exhibitions from the past four decades. It’s part celebration, part behind-the-scenes, and deeply satisfying for anyone fascinated by fashion as cultural archive.
This is not a “pop in for a weekend” kind of year. It’s a plan-your-calendar-around-it year. Whether your taste leans classical, political, fashion-forward or experimental, Paris in 2026 delivers: confidently, unapologetically, and in very good lighting.
The only real question is how many museum tickets you can reasonably fit into one trip.
