Renewal, care and community in the outdoor projects at India Art Fair 2026

The 2026 edition of the India Art Fair, along with booths featuring global exhibitors displaying works by renowned artists, also brought a series of special projects to the NSIC Exhibition Grounds in New Delhi.

Forest II — Raki Nikahetiya, presented by Max Estates

Raki Nikahetiya blurred the line between art installation and ecosystem with Forest II, a dense, compact habitat created using over 200 native plants and trees that are adapted to New Delhi’s urban environment. Based on Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki’s ‘pocket forest’ model, the self-sustaining installation is expected to grow with time, providing shade, habitat for local fauna and anti-greenhouse effects like cooling and carbon-sequestering. Forest II was created in collaboration with Max Estates, who provided the reclaimed construction metal for the installation’s enclosing sculptural boundary.

Pentad Pavilion — UHA (Upton-Hansen Architects), first shown at ADFF: STIR

UHA’s Pentad Pavilion reimagined parliament and modes of communication and civic participation in an open, outdoor installation. Two interconnecting chambers featured different formats of congregation – circular, semicircular, horseshoe, opposing benches and a classroom. The adaptable space is designed to change with use and participation from the community. The project, part of the Jaquar Pavilion Park, came to the event following its debut at ADFF:STIR Mumbai 2026.

Shadow Crossing — Aarti Vir, supported by the Indian Ceramics Triennale

Multimedia artist Aarti Vir’s Shadow Crossing is a series of life-sized doorways that invite visitors to pause, reflect and take notice of unnoticed liminal spaces, transitions and changes that thresholds represent. The project was created with the support of the Indian Ceramics Triennale.

Huh Tu Vessels — Aku Zeliang, supported by the Public Arts Trust of India

Emerging from Jodhpur Arts Week 2025, Huh Tu Vessels is a large-scale installation of three, six-foot-tall water storage vessels crafted with cane and metal. Aku Zeliang, an artist and designer from Nagaland, collaborated with artisan clusters from Jodhpur, Rajasthan, to create vessels modelled after traditional Rajasthani ‘surahi’ with patterns inspired by the tattoo traditions of Nagaland. The installation creates a dialogue between the two Indian art traditions and puts a contemporary spin on indigenous designs and materials.

Duration —  Arun B., supported by the IAF Artist-in-Residence Programme and SoulTree

Interdisciplinary artist Arun B. presented Duration, a formidable 15-foot-tall sculpture of an acrobat frozen in time. A human figure created using metal, chicken wire and wax is suspended three feet above ground from a rod overhead, capturing tension, movement and process, heightening viewers’ awareness of the human body as it exists in time.

The Charpai Project — Ayush Kasliwal x Goji, commissioned by Serendipity Arts

The Charpai Project is an interactive installation riffing on shared spaces and climate-resistant communities using stacked and layered charpais created using recycled materials. First conceptualised by Ayush Kasliwal for the Serendipity Arts Festival 2018 in Goa, the project found new life at IAF through collaboration with new media artist, Goji, who used AI to enmesh narrative into the work.

Breathing Space — Deepak Kumar, supported by Exhibit 320

In Breathing Space, Deepak Kumar recasts abandoned construction sites as spaces reclaimed by nature. The structures in his paintings are foregrounded by weeds, spontaneous plant growth and the accumulation of life in the form of flora, insects, birds and regenerating soil. Kumar depicts how spaces humans think of as abandoned or neglected are often important ecological hotspots in urban environments.

Soft Armours — Dumiduni Illangasinghe, presented by the IAF Artist-in-Residence Programme in partnership with KALĀ South Asia

A massive wall of red, populated thickly with white mushroom clusters, at a closer look, reveals itself to be made of carefully layered broken glass bangles. Soft Armours, created by Dumiduni Illangasinghe as part of the IAF Artist-in-Residence Programme, reclaimed the inauspicious connotation of broken, especially red, bangles in South Asian culture by juxtaposing them with mushrooms, which symbolise resilience and quiet growth. In this work, vulnerability became a mode of regeneration and strength rather than a source of shame.

Recycle of Life — Paresh Maity, supported by Art Alive Gallery

Black wooden stumps in a line dripping with gold, golden rods rising out of them in abstract shapes. Recycle of Life by Paresh Maity was inspired by Indian street hawkers who barter in metal, telling the story of environmental crises met with human ingenuity and the spirit of renewal. Maity’s sculptures gave new life to charred wood and recycled metal rods, becoming a metaphor for ecosystems of careful coexistence.

These projects and many more at India Art Fair 2026 reimagined local materials and techniques to create public installations that respond to issues like climate change and the loss of spaces that foster connection, community and biodiversity.