On 20 March 2026, Antwerp‘s photography museum FOMU will open four new exhibitions exploring themes ranging from race and power to family history, pop culture and queer intimacy. FOMU always reboots in early spring.
The exhibitions feature work by internationally renowned artists as well as pieces from the museum’s own photography collection, presenting a diverse programme that spans historical archives, contemporary photography and immersive video installations.
The new exhibitions are ‘Carrie Mae Weems – The Heart of the Matter‘, ‘Diane Severin Nguyen – If Revolution Is A Sickness‘, ‘Families‘, and ‘Tenderly There – Tashattot Collective‘. Together they highlight the many ways photography and moving images can reflect personal histories, social realities and cultural identities.
‘Carrie Mae Weems – The Heart of the Matter’, 20 March to 23 August 2026
The centrepiece of the programme is ‘The Heart of the Matter‘, the first major retrospective in Belgium of the influential American artist Carrie Mae Weems (born 1953).
Through powerful photographs and video installations, Weems explores themes including race, gender, power and memory. In many of her works she appears herself as subject, guide and muse, placing personal experience at the heart of a broader reflection on society.
Her work frequently begins with her own experiences as a Black woman and expands into an exploration of overlooked or forgotten histories. The artist turns her lens towards spaces that are often absent from traditional narratives — from kitchen tables and film sets to African American churches and former plantations. By weaving personal stories into her work, she exposes the complexities and injustices shaping the contemporary world.
The exhibition includes more than one hundred photographs and videos, among them well-known series such as ‘Kitchen Table Series‘ (1990) and ‘Museums‘ (2006). It also features ‘Preach‘ (2024), a new series created especially for the exhibition, which examines the role of faith and highlights art and spirituality as forms of resistance.
Weems’ work is held in major international museum collections and has been exhibited widely, including at Museum of Modern Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Tate, Centre Pompidou and Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.
The exhibition was curated by Sarah Hermanson Meister and is organised by Gallerie d’Italia – the museum network of Intesa Sanpaolo – in collaboration with the photography foundation Aperture. After its debut in Turin, the exhibition will tour internationally.
A richly illustrated catalogue, published by Allemandi in collaboration with Aperture, will accompany the show.
‘Diane Severin Nguyen – If Revolution Is A Sickness’, 20 March to 7 June 2026
The exhibition ‘If Revolution Is A Sickness‘ marks the first solo exhibition in Belgium by the American artist Diane Severin Nguyen, who has Vietnamese roots.
Nguyen’s work examines the relationship between popular culture and politics. Moving fluidly between video, performance and photography, her installations combine seductive visual aesthetics with unsettling social commentary.
At the centre of the exhibition is an immersive video installation inspired by the visual language of K-pop. The work follows a Vietnamese-Polish girl living in Warsaw as she searches for her place in a complex political landscape shaped by conflicting expectations.
Nguyen embeds a critique of power, nationalism and cultural identity within the colourful, catchy aesthetics associated with K-pop. Around the video installation, carefully selected photographs capture moments in which something is still emerging — an identity, an idea or even a revolution.
Behind the coming-of-age narrative lies a sharp reflection on contemporary society, inviting viewers both to immerse themselves in the imagery and to consider how young people construct their identities in a world full of political and cultural pressures.
Nguyen’s work has previously been shown at institutions including Maison Européenne de la Photographie, SculptureCenter and Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles.
‘Families’, 20 March 2026 to 23 May 2027
The exhibition ‘Families’ explores how photography shapes the way people remember and represent family life.
Drawing extensively on the FOMU collection, the exhibition brings together more than 200 photographs ranging from historical family albums to contemporary works by international artists. Together they question the traditional idea of the family portrait and examine the complexities — and sometimes the discomfort — of family relationships.
Visitors encounter photographs that re-write personal histories and capture intimate moments often missing from classic family albums. By juxtaposing historical images with contemporary works, the exhibition creates a dialogue between past and present, exploring what societies choose to preserve and what they dare to question.
Artists represented include figures such as Diane Arbus, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Doisneau, Sunil Gupta, Bieke Depoorter and Mous Lamrabat, alongside many anonymous photographers whose family albums form part of the museum’s holdings.
For the exhibition, Dutch author Niña Weijers contributes ten personal texts reflecting on the theme of family. At a time when concepts such as motherhood, the nuclear family and “chosen family” are widely debated, the exhibition offers a timely and sometimes unexpected perspective on a subject that touches everyone.
‘Tenderly There – Tashattot Collective’, 20 March to 10 May 2026
Tenderly There focuses on queer intimacy in the SWANA region — Southwest Asia and North Africa. The exhibition was curated by Tashattot Collective, a Brussels-based collective supporting artists from the region who are currently displaced or living in Europe.
The exhibition combines archival photographs from the collection of the Arab Image Foundation with contemporary works by artists including Kader Attia, Mohamad Abdouni and the artistic duo Jeanne et Moreau (Lara Tabet and Randa Mirza).
By juxtaposing historical archives with contemporary artistic responses, the exhibition traces a journey through time and reveals how everyday gestures and intimate moments have been recorded, remembered and reinterpreted.
The project forms part of FOMU’s ‘take-over’ programme, through which the museum collaborates with collectives and organisations to introduce new perspectives and voices into its exhibition programme.
Together, the four exhibitions demonstrate the broad spectrum of contemporary photography and lens-based art, showing how images can challenge dominant narratives, document intimate experiences and open new ways of understanding identity, culture and history.
Art and museums in Antwerp
- ANTWERP | M HKA opens new season with exhibition on censorship and artistic resistance.
- ANTWERP | Climb the Cathedral of Our Lady tower.
- ANTWERP | Rubens House appoints two design teams.
- ROYAL MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS ANTWERP | ‘The Fall of Alba’s Citadel. Image and Memory in Turbulent Times’, from 6 February to 17 May 2026.
- Antwerp’s municipal museums surpass 2 million visitors in 2025.
- ANTWERP | KMSKA schedules ambitious exhibition programme for 2026, featuring international masters such as Antony Gormley, Philip Aguirre y Otegui and Ossip Zadkine.
- Museums of the City of Antwerp look ahead to 2026.
- REVIEW | ‘La ligne de vie’ René Magritte exhibition at Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp (KMSKA).
- REVIEW | ‘Universal Tongue’, on dance, at Museum Aan de Stroom (MAS) until 4 January 2026.
- 2028 to be Music Year in Antwerp.
- ANTWERP | Museum Plantin-Moretus highlights 300 years of women’s stories in ‘Women’s Business / Business Women’.
- ANTWERP | Museum Mayer van den Bergh opens exhibition ‘Public Favourites’, from Mad Meg to Delft Blue, look at art through other people’s eyes.
- ANTWERP | Graphics Museum De Reede ft. Francisco Goya, Edvard Munch, Félicien Rops and Albrecht Dürer.
- ANTWERP | Rubens Experience and Rubens Garden at Rubenshuis.
- ANTWERP | Innovations in the Middelheim Museum provide a completely new visitor experience.
- A visit of the Flemish Tram and Bus Museum – Vlaams Tram- en Autobusmuseum (VlaTAM) in Antwerp.
- ANTWERP | Discovering queer(ed) art with the Queer Tour at the KMSKA fine arts museum.
- REVIEW | Illusion Antwerpen, an active and photogenic museum.
- Antwerp museums and sports facilities team up with European Disability Card for accessible leisure activities.
- Museum Mayer van den Bergh.
- ANTWERP | Inside Rubens House.
- Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp.
- ANTWERP | Museum Vleeshuis up for restoration.
- BOOK | ‘Antwerp. An Archaeological View on the Origin of the City’ by Tim Bellens.
- Red Star Line Museum.
- Paleis op de Meir.
- DIVA, Antwerp Home of Diamonds.
- ANTWERP | Red Star Line Museum of (e)migration.
19 thoughts on “FOMU 2026 | Carrie Mae Weems, Diane Severin Nguyen, Families, and Tenderly There by Tashattot”