The New York art fair Independent will move to a new home in 2026. The fair’s May edition will take place at Pier 36 on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, a 50,000-square-foot venue that more than doubles the size of its previous home at Spring Studios.
The shift is both practical and strategic, and is in part meant to accommodate an uptick in gallery participation post-pandemic at its Tribeca location. In 2025, Independent hosted 83 exhibitors in spaces that included skyboxes and repurposed utility rooms. “Even our coat check was given over to a special project,” said Elizabeth Dee, the fair’s founder, in an interview.
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The move also reflects a broader recalibration within the art fair landscape. Pier 36’s location places Independent within walking distance of the Lower East Side galleries and in closer proximity, via FDR Drive, to TEFAF, another fair that takes place during the same week. According to Dee, aligning more directly with the city’s spring fair circuit is a deliberate step toward increasing both attendance and institutional relevance. Independent reported a 25 percent rise in foot traffic in 2025, when the fairs last coincided.
Founded in 2010 and positioned as a curated alternative to fairs such as Frieze, Independent has evolved beyond its roots in contemporary art. Its current model includes both the May fair and a separate fall edition, Independent 20th Century, dedicated to overlooked or under-recognized artists from the modern era.
Dee stressed, however, that Independent’s core remains unchanged. There will be a range of “solo shows, rising artists, and modern material that sheds light on the canon or the market,” she said.
The architectural redesign of Pier 36 will be overseen by SO–IL, the Brooklyn-based firm that has also designed Kukje’s Seoul gallery and the Amant art space in Brooklyn. The fair’s exhibition design will be led by Berlin’s D_P_S. Together, they are tasked with creating what Independent describes as a “new model for what an art fair might be.”
Whether the new venue will alter the character of the fair remains to be seen. Dee was emphatic that the change is one of scale, not direction. “If anything,” she said, “the focus has just deepened.”