For a decade, the Vilnius Gallery Weekend has become one of the most important events marking the start of the city’s exhibition season. In recent years, about 40 Vilnius galleries and art spaces have participated in the festival program. The event annually presents the contemporary art scene of the capital, encourages discovering new spaces, and fosters the habit of regularly visiting exhibitions.
The 2026 festival is entering a new phase. The new director of the “Gallery Weekend” festival is educator and cultural project curator Daura Polonskytė. After the tenth anniversary, the festival will focus more on the history and culture of Vilnius galleries, the art market, and will aim to discuss more broadly the principles of gallery operation and the importance of the international context. The program will explore what a gallery is today, what role it plays in the city’s art ecosystem, how galleries differ from other contemporary art institutions, museums, and how they work together with artists, curators, collectors, and audiences.
The 2026 Gallery Weekend will be curated by the gallery “Drifts” and its founder, art historian Jolanta Chockevičiūtė Laurent, who has been working with contemporary art galleries since 2010. The program she is shaping will present the Vilnius gallery scene in a regional and international context – taking into account the experiences of neighboring countries, the broader European art scene, and the development of local galleries.
This year’s festival will, for the first time, clearly distinguish the main program for galleries and project spaces and a separate program for museums and other institutional art spaces. The festival program will include public discussions, talks with participants from the Lithuanian and international art scene, thematic tours in Lithuanian and English, an educational program for families, individual routes, exhibition openings, meetings, performances, workshops, and a community evening.
Invitation to galleries
The Vilnius Gallery Weekend invites contemporary art galleries, project spaces, and artist and curator initiatives operating in Vilnius that enrich the city’s contemporary art scene to join the 2026 festival program. You are invited to present exhibitions, openings, tours, performances, meetings with artists, workshops, or other events that would help visitors better understand the city’s gallery and contemporary art space scene, its diversity, and operating principles. Those interested in participating can write to: Vilniausgalerijusavaitgalis@gmail.com
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The 2026 festival organizers aim to strengthen cooperation with galleries and jointly shape a program that will present not only individual exhibitions or events but also broader issues about the role of galleries in the city’s cultural life, their visibility, relationship with audiences, and international potential.
The program of participating galleries will be developed together with the festival’s artistic director Jolanta Chockevičiūtė Laurent. Galleries are invited to propose events relevant to their program, artists, and audiences, while also contributing to the common festival goal – to strengthen the visibility of the Vilnius gallery map in Lithuania and beyond.
The Vilnius Gallery Weekend will also strive to make galleries easier to discover for different audiences – both regular visitors of contemporary art exhibitions and people visiting for the first time. The 2026 festival’s educational and tour program will help better understand how the gallery ecosystem works, how exhibitions are created, and what connections link artists, gallery owners, curators, collectors, and visitors.
The festival is organized by the public institution “Gallery Weekend” together with its partner – the Lithuanian Interdisciplinary Artists’ Association. The festival is funded by the Lithuanian Council for Culture and the Vilnius City Municipality.
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