Miami goes Pop for Art Basel Miami Beach

Art Basel returns to Miami Beach this December as a leading platform for modern and contemporary art in the Americas, bringing together 283 galleries from 43 countries – including 49 first-time participants – at the Miami Beach Convention Center. Anchored by the Galleries sector with 226 top dealers presenting everything from twentieth-century masters to bold contemporary statements, the fair also features 32 curated projects in Kabinett and proposal-based sectors Nova, Positions and Survey spotlighting emerging voices, historical rediscoveries and experimental statements. Reaffirming its position as the curatorial centerpiece of the fair, the sixth iteration of Meridians, curated by Yasmil Raymond, will return to showcase large-scale works under the theme The Shape of Time.

Together – from December 5 to 7, 2025, with Preview days beginning on December 3 – these platforms offer a cross-hemispheric panorama of artistic practice, innovation and dialogue shaping art today.

This year, Art Basel launches Zero 10, a new space for art of the digital era curated by Eli Scheinman. Premiering in Miami Beach before traveling to other fairs, Zero 10 gathers generative systems, robotics, sculpture, light, sound and code-based practices into one evolving conversation about how digital art is experienced and collected today. Within this platform, UBS presents Lu Yang’s DOKU–Heaven (2022) on loan from the UBS Art Collection: a hallucinatory, single-channel video in which the multimedia artist’s avatar moves through a blissful, celestial realm, its motion-captured choreography drawing on Balinese and Indonesian dance styles.

Building on the fair’s spirit of innovation and cultural dialogue, the UBS Lounge and UBS Art Studio present Beyond Pop: Art of the Everyday. The UBS Lounge will showcase a curated selection from the UBS Art Collection, featuring works by artists who transform everyday objects into icons of contemporary culture. The display sets the stage for the unveiling of Katherine Bernhardt’s newly commissioned monumental painting, Superstorm (2025), which anchors the lounge with its vibrant motifs and playful nods to pop culture. The UBS Art Studio echoes this theme and also invites visitors to join an interactive pop-inspired printmaking workshop.

While exploring the show floor, don’t forget to make time for Conversations, the fair’s live forum of talks. From the intersection of sports and art, to the evolving role of collectors in philanthropy and forward-looking discussions on the future of the art world, this year’s program spans a wide range of themes – inviting you to hear directly from artists, collectors and museum leaders offering fresh perspectives on what’s at stake in today’s cultural landscape.

Beyond the fair, the city carries just as much artistic momentum. In Miami’s Wynwood Arts District, The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse presents Pop Art: Johns, Lichtenstein, Warhol, Wesselmann, Rosenquist, Chamberlain, Segal – a textbook survey of Pop’s canon and a perfect anchor beyond the fair.

Just up the beach, The Bass offers a pair of must-see exhibitions. Faire Foyer: Sarah Crowner in Dialogue with Etel Adnan frames a monumental ceramic mural by Etel Adnan – the only example of its kind in the U.S. – with Crowner’s vivid new site-responsive installation, a dialogue in color, rhythm and light. Both Crowner and Adnan are represented in the UBS Art Collection. At the same museum, Jack Pierson: The Miami Years gathers photography, sculpture and text works steeped in Americana, tracing how this city shaped a singular voice.

Nearby at ICA Miami, Joyce Pensato detonates icons from Mickey to Batman into high-contrast paintings and drawings, bridging Abstract Expressionism and Pop with a wink and a jolt.

If you have time for a quick field trip, point the compass north to NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale for Robert Rauschenberg: Real Time, a centennial-year look at another UBS Art Collection artist – who helped dissolve the boundary between art and life and whose restless experimentation still feels freshly minted.

And when the aisles give way to the shoreline, let Miami’s imagination follow you into the water. The Miami Reef Star – an eye-catching, 3D‑printed prototype – points to a future where design doubles as habitat, while The ReefLine has begun its playful, climate‑conscious underwater sculpture park just off South Beach. Look for Leandro Erlich’s installation Concrete Coral, a life‑size “traffic jam” of marine‑grade concrete cars that turns a familiar city scene into refuge for coral and fish. It’s a perfectly Miami finale: art, environment and a dash of wonder, all in one breath of sea air.

We look forward to welcoming you at the fair and all around a city that knows exactly how to make art feel alive.