Major art installation coming to Medina in 2026

Medina Triennial will feature 50 artists at 12 venues

Photo by Hakan Topal/Courtesy Medina Triennial – This aerial view shows the Erie Canal, Oak Orchard Creek and downtown Medina near the Glenwood Avenue bridge.

Press Release, Medina Triennial

MEDINA – The Medina Triennial, a new contemporary art triennial in Western New York, launches its inaugural edition in 2026.

The free, village-wide triennial will feature more than 50 works including site-responsive commissions by local, national and international artists presented at approximately 12 venues in Medina.

MEDINA – The Medina Triennial, a new contemporary art triennial centered in Medina along the Erie Canal, is pleased to announce its inaugural edition, taking place from June 6 to Sept. 7, 2026.

The Triennial aims to become a cultural touchstone for Western New York, offering a dynamic platform for supporting and advancing the contemporary arts landscape in the region and drawing an expected 50,000 visitors every three years.

Initiated by the New York Power Authority and the New York State Canal Corporation as part of a broader effort to revitalize the canal and highlight its contemporary significance, the ambitious Triennial will feature new commissions by local, national and international artists and collectives, to create a free, village-wide exhibition.

Grounded in place and shaped through deep community engagement, the Triennial will merge the hyper-local with global ideas, establishing a new model for site-specificity in the United States.

Visitors will experience art across approximately 12 indoor and outdoor sites highlighting Medina’s dynamic natural environment and industrial history. These sites range from post-industrial buildings, vibrant public spaces, and key locations along the iconic Erie Canal, with a central hub located in a former sandstone hotel building.

The resulting Triennial will be locally embedded and relevant to broader conversations of contemporary art. Commissioned artists will be invited to respond to Western

New York’s communities and ecosystems, often working in collaboration with local residents to create work rooted in context.

Opening in September of 2025, the Medina Triennial Hub will host public programs and events realized in collaboration with art institutions across Western New York. Upon its opening, the Hub will host programming centering on themes of community, ecology, and place, which will act as a formal launch for the Triennial’s public engagement ahead of its opening in 2026.

The Medina Triennial will be organized by Co-Artistic Directors Kari Conte and Karin Laansoo, esteemed curators and institutional leaders who bring their decades-long careers in the arts toward realizing this exciting new initiative. Buffalo-based curator Ekrem Serdar joins the Triennial’s curatorial team as Associate Curator. The curators come to the Medina Triennial with an appreciation and respect for Western New York.

In addition to her work in Medina, Conte is an independent curator and writer based in New York City and Türkiye, who holds roles with the International Studio & Curatorial Program, City as Living Laboratory, and Kai Art Center.

Laansoo is Founding Director of the Estonian Contemporary Art Development Center (ECADC) and Artistic Director of Kai Art Center in Tallinn, Estonia, one of the preeminent contemporary art institutions in the Baltic States. Laansoo also splits her time between Tallinn and Rochester, New York, giving her a personal connection to Western New York.

“The Medina Triennial will converge transformative artistic positions within a village marked by history and possibility,” Conte said. “It will offer an inclusive space where global perspectives and local sensibilities meet, with numerous works that are grounded in Medina with far-reaching perspectives. We are honored to collaborate with the communities of Western New York to realize the artist’s ideas and we are looking forward to the Triennial Hub opening this fall and to the Triennial next summer.”

“Western New York is a location of personal significance to me, as it’s a place I’ve called my home for a number of years,” Laansoo said. “Medina is a hidden gem in this region in many ways. A triennial of this scope has never been organized in the US in a community of this size, making this an unprecedented opportunity. It’s an exciting chance for us to build new regional cultural infrastructures, give local ideas global resonance, and position Medina as an emerging destination for the arts.”

The Triennial was launched to create lasting cultural and economic impact across Western New York. To shape this vision, the Power Authority and Canal Corporation team worked over two years in collaboration with key partners in Rochester, Buffalo, Medina, the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), local arts organizations, and community patrons. Recognizing the unique opportunity to expand access to contemporary art beyond major urban centers, they developed a comprehensive framework and project brief focused on broad participation and nurturing of regional artistic communities.

The curatorial project and team were selected by a Steering Committee to bring this vision to life with creativity, ambition and a deep commitment to community engagement. The triennial team works in dialogue with the Steering Committee, which includes leadership from the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, the Burchfield Penney Art Center, the Corning Museum of Glass, Memorial Art Gallery, and the University at Buffalo.

“At the New York Power Authority, we are proud to invest in initiatives like the Medina Triennial that aim to revitalize the power of our waterways and infrastructure as catalysts for creativity, economic growth, and community vitality,” said New York Power Authority President and CEO Justin E. Driscoll. “We are committed to launching this first edition and are confident it will set the foundation for an arts initiative that will remain relevant, compelling and transformative for generations to come.”

“As we commemorate the Erie Canal Bicentennial this year, our team has been deeply engaged in strategizing new ways to invest in more canal-side communities,” said New York State Canal Corporation Director Brian U. Stratton. “The Medina Triennial project represents an extraordinary opportunity for cultural enrichment, and we are proud to support the creative vision of the curatorial team in their vision at this transformative moment.”

For more information on the Triennial and to sign up for the official newsletter, please visit medinatriennial.org.