TOPS ArtFest brings 300-plus artists this October

More than 300 artists will gather at TOPS in Cebu City from 22 to 25 October for Tops ArtFest 2026, a four-day celebration of contemporary art now on its third edition.

Building and breaking norms

This year’s festival carries the theme “Building and Breaking Norms,” exploring how artists engage with the traditions, conventions and assumptions that shape art and society.

The festival’s main artists are Junyee and Nune Alvarado, joined by Ronald Ventura, Romulo Galicano, Demi Padua, Charlie Co, Randalf Dila and Dino Gabito, among others.

The theme examines what artists inherit, preserve and challenge, and what becomes possible when established boundaries are reconsidered.

Beyond the gallery

The four-day program will feature exhibitions, installations, talks, workshops, performances and other artistic engagements, bringing established and emerging practices together across disciplines.

“Rather than presenting art as a fixed experience, Tops ArtFest 2026 invites audiences to enter into a conversation between tradition and experimentation, the familiar and the unfamiliar, and the structures we build and the structures we choose to dismantle,” said festival director Lorenzo Miguel Dino.

“At TOPS, art will not be confined to a single gallery or a single discipline. Instead, it will inhabit spaces, landscapes, conversations, and encounters,” Dino added.

Third edition

Tops ArtFest began in 2024, when its inaugural edition brought together more than 200 artists and 24 exhibitors. The 2025 edition carried the theme “Legacy” and featured around 200 artists and more than 1,000 artworks from about 30 galleries, while paying tribute to Martino Abellana, Julian Jumalon and Jose Joya.

For its third edition, the festival turns from artistic legacy toward the question of what artists do with what they inherit.

Tops ArtFest 2026: Building and Breaking Norms runs from 22 to 25 October at TOPS, Cebu City.