TOP: Free exhibitions to see in Paris from September 30 to October 6, 2026
Nine recent openings, all free to see in Paris, from the hundred artists of the former Zara store in Denfert-Rochereau to Christian Marclay's LP at White Cube. Nothing here costs money.
Street Art Denfert: One Hundred Artists in the Former Zara Store in Denfert-Rochereau
The exhibition was originally scheduled to run for ten days in the crypt of the Madeleine Church. It will now occupy twenty-two days and 2,400 square meters across three levels, in a former Zara store whose windows face Avenue du Général-Leclerc. One hundred artists, an empty commercial space transformed into a canvas for painting, and free entry with registration.
STREET ART DENFERT
From October 3 to 25, 2026
Marcel Duchamp Prize: The Four Nominees at the Museum of Modern Art
There are four of them, and one will receive the Marcel Duchamp Prize on October 22, during Art Week. Until then, the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris is exhibiting the finalists of this 26th edition in its collections, therefore free of charge: the embroidered fabrics of Joël Andrianomearisoa, the statistics of precariousness transformed into sculptures by the duo Brognon Rollin, the lives on the margins documented by photographer Laura Henno, and the Afrofuturist mythologies of Josefa Ntjam, the youngest nominee. Four months to form your own jury.
MUSÉE D'ART MODERNE DE PARIS
From October 2, 2026 to February 7, 2027
From Figurative to Abstract: Sixteen Painters and a Sculptor at the Galerie de l'Europe
A family reunion on the rue de Seine: the Galerie de l'Europe is exhibiting sixteen painters and a sculptor side by side, the observation of reality on one side, the pure experience of matter on the other, and in between, a slope much gentler than one might think. A dense exhibition, to be seen in half an hour between two galleries in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, until October 17.
GALERIE DE L'EUROPE
From September 22 to October 17, 2026
The Ball of the Ogresses at the Institute of Islamic Cultures
Aïcha Kandisha, the Moroccan ogress whose children are threatened, protects as much as she frightens. Thirteen female artists take hold of her at the Institute of Islamic Cultures and overturn the figure of the monster: what was used to keep girls quiet becomes a power to be claimed. From Nil Yalter to Kubra Khademi, paintings, videos, and installations compose a cohesive narrative from beginning to end.
INSTITUTE OF ISLAM CULTURES - HERE LÉON
From September 26, 2026 to February 7, 2027
Rayane Mcirdi, Happy Retirement Dad, at the Frac Île-de-France, Le Plateau
Forty years in the factory, and one last day. Rayane Mcirdi filmed his father's retirement, then deconstructed the film for Le Plateau: chapters spread throughout the space, scenes echoing each other from one room to the next, so that one never truly sits down. The camera remains at shoulder height, allowing what is unspoken to emerge.
FRAC ÎLE-DE-FRANCE, LE PLATEAU
From September 24, 2026 to February 21, 2020 2027
Metamorphoses, the hats of Maison Michel, at the Galerie du 19M
Four rooms to follow a hat from raw straw to the head that wears it. Felt, wooden shapes, and the Weismann machine restored in 1975: Maison Michel reveals its craftsmanship rather than its display cases, and the 19M continues to showcase the work before the object. We watch hands grappling with a resistant material, and fashion once again becomes a matter of the atelier.
THE 19M GALLERY
From September 23 to December 13, 2026
Mobile Star in the Courtyard of the Intendant of the Hôtel de la Marine
A car is parked in the courtyard of the Intendant. It won't start, it won't go anywhere, and that is precisely the reason for its presence. A car decides to be a sculpture, placed on the cobblestones like a museum piece, in one of the most beautiful courtyards of the 8th arrondissement, and without a ticket to the Hôtel de la Marine.
COURT OF THE INTENDANT OF THE MARINE HOTEL
From September 9 to October 4, 2026
Christian Marclay at White Cube
Music leaves its mark, and Christian Marclay has made it his obsessive theme. At White Cube, he presents a work of borrowing and imprinting around the 33 rpm record: square sleeves pierced with a round hole, from solid to void, from relief to flat. An offbeat production that restores to this black object its charge of memories. Free admission.
WHITE CUBE PARIS
From September 8 to October 10, 2026
Leonora Carrington, the art of transmutations, at the Almine Rech Gallery
The Musée du Luxembourg closed its retrospective on July 19, and it was thought to be back for another ten years. It returns to the rue de Turenne through a different door: that of sculptures, tapestries, jewelry, and theatrical sets. Almine Rech takes a gamble that no museum has ever taken: to move Carrington beyond the sole realm of surrealism and to follow his hybrid creatures from surface to volume, from narrative to object.
ALMINE RECH - TURENNE
From September 8 to October 10, 2026
