main partners
24—27.04.25 Brussels Expo
main partners
Annie Gentils Gallery / Blouin Division / By Lara Sedbon / Ceysson & Bénétière / Dep Art Gallery / Dirimart / Galerie La Patinoire Royale / Galerie Ron Mandos / Galerie Suzanne Tarasieve / Green On Red Gallery / Harlan Levey Projects / KETELEER GALLERY / MARUANI MERCIER / Maurice Verbaet Gallery / Mendes Wood DM / NEWCHILD / QG Gallery / ROBERT GRUNENBERG / rodolphe janssen / Rossicontemporary / Semiose / Sorry We’re Closed / TEMPLON / Wetterling Gallery / Whitehouse Gallery / Xavier Hufkens / z2o Sara Zanin
The Solo projects present work by established and mid-career artists and are dispersed throughout the fair. Art Brussels wishes to encourage galleries to make distinctive statements by presenting one specific projects by individual artists. This allows visitors to discover the work of an artist in greater depth.
The winning artist in SOLO at the fair is rewarded with the Solo Prize, appointed by a professional jury, including a cash award of €15.000. The Solo Prize of Art Brussels 2025 will be announced on the opening day of the fair. This year, the members of the jury are: Mirjam Varadinis, Bruno Verbergt, and Jérôme Sans.
More information on the jury members for this new edition of Art Brussels 2025 below.
The Solo Prize is supported by TheMerode.
Mirjam Varadinis, Curator-at-large Kunsthaus Zurich and Director/Founder of Mirjam Varadinis Art Agency, has an extensive curatorial career with many of her projects addressing expanding formats of contemporary curating, often working beyond the border of the institution.
Mirjam regularly contributes to artists’ publications, catalogues and art magazines and has curated a number of large-scale international contemporary exhibitions. Group exhibitions include Manifesta 12, Palermo (2018), a special project for the 5th Moscow Biennial of Contemporary Art (2013) and an annual festival of contemporary arts in Toulouse, France, using the city as material. Prominent contemporary artists featured in her curatorial projects for Kunsthaus Zurich include Marina Abramović, Yoko Ono, Olafur Eliasson, Kader Attia, Pipilotti Rist, Cindy Sherman, Rosa Barba or Urs Fischer.
Jérôme Sans is a curator, cultural agitator, and director of institutions, known internationally for his pioneering and transversal approach to new models of cultural institutions and exhibitions. His combined expertise in fields as diverse as design, fashion and architecture has pushed him towards experiencing art in multiple fields beyond exhibitions such as brands and urban development. Jérôme Sans’ visionary perspectives on public outdoor installations led him to organize several city-wide projects. He is the co-founder of the acclaimed Palais de Tokyo in Paris and was the director of the ground-breaking Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing (UCCA).
From 2022 to 2024, he was artistic director of LagoAlgo, located in the heart of the Chapultepec Forest in Mexico City, and currently of the new private institution Cookie Factory in Denver, Colorado, set to open in May 2025. In addition to his many publications he was creative director and editor-in-chief of the French cultural magazine L’Officiel Art. In 2022, he has initiated and curated public interventions on Place Vendôme in Paris with Alicja Kwade and Bernar Venet (2023). He has curated numerous major exhibitions around the world, including the Taipei Biennale (2000), the Lyon Biennale (2005), Erwin Wurm at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade (2022), and the Festival Noor Riyadh, Saudi (2023), Frieder Burda Museum (2024), Doug Aitken at Borusan Contemporary, Istanbul (2024-2025).
Bruno Verbergt is general director of Mu.ZEE (Ostend, Belgium). Mu.ZEE focuses on Art in Belgium from 1880 onwards in three museums: Mu.ZEE in Ostend (closed for renovation till 2028), Permekemuseum in Jabbeke and Peiremuzee in Knokke-Heist. Previously, Bruno Verbergt worked as general director of the Royal Museums of Art & History (Brussels) and as operational director for the Royal Museum for Central Africa (Tervuren).
In the 1990s and 2000s he was director Culture, Sports, Youth and Education Policy for the City of Antwerp and director of Antwerpen Open, where he produced VANDYCK1999, MODE2001, Zomer van Antwerpen festival, and contemporary art exhibitions such as Trouble Spot. Painting (Tuymans and Tordoir, 1999), Laboratorium (Obrist and Vanderlinden, 1999) and Orbis Terrarum (Kung, 2000). Bruno Verbergt is associate professor in general and strategic cultural management at the University of Antwerp.
The SOLO Prize was awarded to Paulo Nimer Pjota, represented by Mendes Wood DM (Brussels). The jury was impressed by the way in which the artist brings together diverse visual references – from art history, the decorative arts and popular culture – in a visually coherent and playful whole. Seemingly effortlessly, and avoiding all didacticism, the paintings coalesce a range of sources without hierarchy. They embrace visual pleasure, skillfully playing with different aesthetic categories.
2024 — Paulo Nimer Pjota (Mendes Wood DM, Brussels)
2023 — Marcos Avila Forero (LMNO Gallery, Brussels)
2022 — Seyni Awa Camara (Baronian, BE)
2019 — Lesley Vance (Xavier Hufkens, BE)
2018 — Nicolas Party (Xavier Hufkens, BE)
2017 — Benoît Maire (Meessen De Clercq, BE)
2016 — Noémie Goudal (Les filles du calvaire, FR) & Ester Fleckner (Avlskarl, DK)
2015 — Honoré d’O (Kristof De Clercq, BE) & Germaine Kruip (Sofie Van De Velde, BE)
2014 — Catharine Ahearn (Office Baroque, BE)
2013 — David Brognon/Stéphanie Rollin (Albert Baronian, BE)
2012 — Matt Connors (Cherry and Martin, USA)
2011 — Hannes Vanseveren (Hoet Bekaert, BE)
2010 — Fabrice Samyn (Meessen-de Clercq, BE)
2009 — Conrad Shawcross (Tucci Russo, IT)
2008 — Koen van den Broek (Figge Von Rosen, DE)