September is here, and Brussels’ art world is ready to shake off its summer daze. From 4 to 7 September, the city hosts Brussels Art Week 2025 — four days when galleries, museums, artist-run spaces, auction houses, and studios all open their doors for a burst of exhibitions and art events. Under the umbrella of RendezVous — the successor of the long-running Brussels Gallery Weekend — more than 60 venues will inaugurate the season and showcase the very best of the city’s creative energy.

This year’s headquarters is “The Tip Inn”, a pop-up bar/art installation imagined by Marseille-based British artist Zoe Williams. Inspired by artists’ historic fascination with bars (places of community and rebellion), it functions as a sort of salon: a place to mingle, dance, sip cocktails thought up by artists, and experience performances, talks, and live music. This is also where it all kicks off on Wednesday, with a proper opening bash.

To help you navigate the whirlwind, we put together a guide to the seven exhibitions and a few events that stand out from the crowd. See you there!

All That Remains at La Loge

From 4 September to 30 November

In comparison to Germany for example, where Palestinian voices, including artists, have been continuously silenced throughout the ongoing genocide, it is good to see that the Belgian art scene does the opposite. At La Loge, Inas Halabi, an artist and filmmaker who lives and works between Palestine and the Netherlands, presents her research project “The Right of Return”, investigating the establishment of Israeli national parks atop demolished Palestinian villages. At the intersection of colonialism and greenwashing, she conveys the layers of trauma shaping a landscape and its people.

By the way, RendezVous encourages you to donate to this fundraiser trying to help feed Gaza’s children. 

Two Voices at LMNO

From 4 September to 31 October

Earlier this year, LMNO — which understands itself as a laboratory of ideas where contemporary art meets ecology, science, and society — moved into the two historic pavilions that frame the entrance to Brussels’ green lung, Bois de la Cambre.

On view: the artist duo Detanico/Lain, who live and work between Brazil and Paris, presenting sculptures, works on paper, videos, and a performance that explore how art can translate between disciplines. The other pavilion is taken over by Ecologisons-Nous!, a non-profit platform investigating the intersections of contemporary art and ecology. On Sunday, during Brussels Art Week 2025, there will be a screening of Anna Maria Taipenner’s film “Wolfgang Laib, Here and Far Beyond”.

New kid: Brüsel and Illuminati at Urban Societies

There’s a new kid in town: Urban Societies, founded by curator Sébastien Ricou, a curatorial platform dedicated to exploring contemporary art through dynamic and evolving formats. For Brussels Art Week, it presents two exhibitions: 

The first, inspired by the cult film “Le Dossier B – Brussels” (1994), is an immersive installation where architecture, memory, and imagination converge, reflecting on the hidden narratives that shape the city. Meanwhile, in the smoking room of Le New Touquet, Ralph Schuster revisits painting in “Illuminati”. Through memory, repetition, and everyday rituals, he traces the fragile tension between presence and disappearance — all in the intimate, smoky setting of a neighbourhood bar.

Studio visit: Mina Enowaki at CAB

From 4 to 7 September

Brussels Art Week is also the perfect opportunity to peek behind the scenes. Many artists open their studios to the public, such as French-Japanese artist Mina Enowaki (b. 1998), currently in residence at CAB. Winner of the Fondation CAB Prize, Enowaki works across painting, photography, and sculpture, exploring the relationship between natural remains — mineral, vegetal, or animal — and myths drawn from Japanese folklore.

In 2025, she published her first book, “Sculptures for Ritsurin Garden”, presenting a series of imaginary sculptures designed for a Japanese garden. During her residency at Fondation CAB, she continues this exploration through her first bronze sculptures.

Gay Summer at CCINQ

Runs until 11 October

Gay Summer is back — hot, loud, and queer. For its second edition, the group show at CCINQ brings together bold voices exploring gender, identity, and the many layers of queer existence in unexpected ways, through painting, sculpture, video, installation, live readings, and performances.

Participating artists include Saïd Abitar, Éric Croes, Irina Favero-Longo, Cyril Bourez, and many others. Don’t miss the performances on Friday, 5 September: “Cruising Tales Readings” followed by a music performance rooted in Man Parrish’s soundtracks for the 1980s X-film industry.

Alfredo Jaar at Valérie Bach Gallery

From 4 September to 23 December

Alfredo Jaar, the Chilean artist, architect, and filmmaker of Palestinian descent, is known for tackling social injustices and human suffering through installations, photography, and film. Over his career, he has realised more than seventy public interventions worldwide, with over sixty monographs published on his work, and has exhibited at the Venice Biennale and Documenta.

Now Jaar presents “La Fin du Monde” at Valérie Bach Gallery – with an exhibition title that could not be more timely. In an attempt to reflect the current state of our world, this conceptual intervention, for which the grand nave of the gallery provides a dramatic backdrop, he poetically addresses resource conflicts over critical minerals.

On Saturday, as part of Brussels Art Week 2025, you can visit the exhibition together with the artist at 11h00 or 15h00.

Johanna Mirabel at Nathalie Obadia

From 4 September to 25 October

Nathalie Obadia Gallery presents “I Wish”, Johanna Mirabel’s first solo exhibition in Brussels. The rising French artist of Guyanese descent is a proponent of non-militant universalism, bringing together diverse cultural threads in her painting. Here, she explores the motif of ex-voto, naïve representations often created as tokens of gratitude to a spiritual force found throughout history, and  anchors them within a contemporary context.

By the way, on Sunday, the gallery will also host “Bloody Bubbled Pickle”, a performance by French artist Victoria Palacios with musician Dennis Vanderauwera at the RendezVous headquarters.

We’re a non-profit operation solely fueled by passion for the project. If you like what we do, you can buy us a digital pot of coffee!