1-54 returns to Somerset House for the London edition, 15 to 18 October 2026. Thursday is the VIP and press preview; the fair opens to the public on the Friday.
Touria El Glaoui founded 1-54 in 2013 and held the first fair at Somerset House that October, as the first and still the only international fair dedicated to contemporary African art. It reached New York in 2015, Marrakech in 2018 and Paris in 2021, and added 1-54 Presents, a series of curated shows, in 2023. The London edition has stayed at Somerset House throughout, which by fair standards is an unusually long marriage to one building.
The fair exists because the market it serves was being handled as a category rather than as a continent. Galleries from across Africa and its diaspora show alongside European and American dealers who represent African artists, and the effect is a floor where an artist is seen among peers rather than as the single African name in a mixed room. That is why museum curators buy here as readily as private collectors.
The 2026 edition takes Somerset House from 15 to 18 October, in the week the rest of the London art market is in town. It runs its own programme of special projects and commissions alongside the exhibiting galleries rather than presenting stands alone. Somerset House gives it eighteenth-century rooms rather than a hall, so it is walked as a series of chambers. The Thursday is the preview and the only one of the four days not on public sale.