Each month NEXTpittsburgh features new openings and special art events in our series, NEXT in the Gallery. Keep us posted on what’s new in your neighborhood and email lemccullough@mac.com. 

In addition to the annual Three Rivers Arts Festival, June brings a Pride Hot Jam, Nikkei voices, florals and geometrics, popular mechanics, modern rituals, a centennial bridge birthday bash and many shades of BLUE.

The 67th annual Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival blossoms at the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust’s newly launched Arts Landing from June 5-7 and 11-14, infusing Pittsburgh with a creative convergence of visual artists from Pittsburgh and across the U.S. 

In addition to the Artist Market showcasing over 300 artists and artisans, this year’s festival features an array of installations, roaming and immersive performances and unconventional artistic experiences that include five opening-weekend performances of Squonk Opera’s new interactive music show “Joy Machine” and four final-weekend “The Sky Is Not the Limit” shows by vertical dance troupe Bandaloop blending choreography and climbing technology.

The Juried Visual Art Exhibition is on view through June 28 at 820 Gallery and features Andrew W. Allison, Donovan Baxter, Donna R. Charging, Molly Davis, Alica DeVrio, Dara Etienne, Teal Fitzpatrick, Ranee Henderson, Ashanté Josey, Silver Kim, DS Kinsel, Lisa Bergant Koi, Mahogany Martin, Brent Nakamoto, Adelyn Osterdahl, Camilla Brent Pearce, Sara Jean Ruiz, Natalie Sheets, Kathryn Shriver, Sukeshi Sondhi, Julie Stunden, Kate Sutter. Read more about TRAF in our June Event Guide.

“The Beach at Trouville” by Eugène Louis Boudin (Frick Pittsburgh Museums & Gardens) Photo courtesy of Brooklyn Museum.

“French Moderns: Matisse / Renoir / Degas” on view June 20-Oct. 11.

Starting in the mid-1800s, France emerged as a center of new aesthetic philosophies — symbolism, impressionism, cubism, surrealism and more — that would redefine Western art and the nature of avant-garde artistic vision over the next hundred years.

“French Moderns: Matisse / Renoir / Degas” gathers paintings, drawings and sculptures from Henri Matisse, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas and a dozen of their trailblazing contemporaries whose artwork emphasized the subjective over the objective, abstraction over reality, innovation over tradition.

The exhibit is ticketed (on sale at the Frick website) and includes opportunities to delve more intensely into the world of the French Moderns:

•  June 7. Isms of Art: Tracing “French Moderns”. Frick’s chief curator Dawn R. Brean highlights the intriguing confluence of social, political and artistic movements that influenced the French Modern artists.

•  June 24. Art Moves with Bodiography. Artistic Director Maria Caruso of Bodiography Contemporary Ballet leads a guided movement experience exploring gesture, balance, rhythm and creative expression.

•  June 28. The Sounds They Loved: Musical Connections to French Moderns. Concert pianist Leslie Amper performs works by Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel and other composers whose music inspired French artists of the era.

“Crown Series: Iris,” “The Oviary I,” “Protest Shield: Zulu Nots” by Sharif Bey (Andy Warhol Museum). Photos courtesy of artist.

“Sharif Bey: Homecoming” on view June 26-Oct. 12, opening reception June 26, 7-9 p.m.

“Ritual and tradition become ways of sustaining one’s identity, whether it’s cultural memory or personal identity,” ceramic sculptor Sharif Bey has noted. “Homecoming” will display his newest creations alongside pieces by Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat. 

A professor of studio art at Syracuse University, Bey is a native of Pittsburgh’s Beltzhoover neighborhood and took youth art classes at Pittsburgh CAPA school and Manchester Craftmen’s Guild. His work provides commentary on identity, home and reconnection with artistic roots and personal traditions inspired by modernism, functional pottery and Oceanic and African art. Many of Bey’s pieces reflect the “power figure” or nkisi style, a mode of sculpture originating from the Congo River basin of central Africa.

“Homecoming” builds on two recent shows in Pittsburgh that have included his “Excavations” exhibit at Carnegie Museum of Art in 2021-22 and a “Dialogues in Clay and Glass” residency at Pittsburgh Glass Center in 2018.

The opening reception for “Homecoming” features live music by Bey’s cousin, Ublai Bey and his band, Timeless. On Aug. 28 from 6-8 p.m. Bey will present an artist talk on the inspirations behind his work and the emergence of community as a through line in his practice. 

“Guardian Angel Series No. 2,” “Dad’s Shoes,” “Burgh Birds” by Cue Perry (Two29 Gallery). Photos by artist.

“BLUE: New Work by C.B. Perry” on view June 12-July 15, opening reception June 12, 5-10 p.m.

“There’s something about blue,” observes painter C.B. “Cue” Perry. “It doesn’t ask for attention, it holds it. Blue carries emotion. Black creates structure. White gives everything room to breathe.” Perry’s show “BLUE”  is subtitled “Beauty Lives Under Everything” and highlights the tension between structure and emotion, chaos and calm, visibility and introspection found in the color blue.

“Fashion portrait-A3” by Gavin Benjamin (ZYNKA Gallery). Photo courtesy of ZYNKA Gallery.

“Gavin Benjamin: In The Air Tonight” on view June 6-Aug. 9, opening reception June 6, 5-8 p.m.

Gavin Benjamin’s new show presents a series of vivid mixed-media collages evoking a New York City of the 1990s, a canvas autobiography revealing layered memories of a city, a generation and a more innocent state of mind that can never fully exist again.

“manuscript,” “the moon knows my secrets,” “blinded by love” by Bianca Black (Sweetwater Center for the Arts). Photos by artist.

“lux ex tenebris” on view June 4-July 17, opening reception, June 4, 6-8 p.m.

Curated by painter/photographer Bianca Black, “lux ex tenebris” (Latin phrase meaning “light out of darkness”) invites viewers to explore light, shadow and storytelling through the lens with new work by Black and Jacob Ames, Amber Balsinger, Mark Barbera, Maddie Draffan, Summer Emory, Ashlee Keeney, Michael Kelly, Michael Lotenaro, Donnie O’Brien, Anita Prentis and Chase Reed. 

“68 Million Tons,” “Hold on by My Teeth,” “Spring Plate” by Ali Pirl (Sweetwater Center for the Arts). Photos by artist.

“Ali Pirl: Modern Rituals” on view June 4-July 16, opening reception, June 4, 6-8 p.m.

Ali Pirl is Sweetwater’s 2026 artist-in-residence and uses ceramics and mixed media to explore ritual, memory and ornament through clay, paper, image and object informed by her Jewish heritage and a playful, yet dark, sensibility. “These pieces present ceramics as memory, as rupture, as ritual,” she says. “Made in the shadow of ongoing violence in Palestine and drawing from Jewish paper-cutting traditions, this work wrestles with questions of faith and complicity.”

“Pattern 9,” “Untitled Artwork 30,” “Untitled” by Edward Kerr (Christine Fréchard Gallery). Photos by artist.

“Florals & Geometrics: New Work by Edward Kerr” on view June 6-30, opening reception June 6, 4-7 p.m.

For the last half-century, painter Edward Kerr has exhibited internationally with a blend of abstract expressionism and geometric designs. His new show at Christine Fréchard Gallery introduces wild-card elements of lush florals.

Selections from “Everything Must Go” by Ashley Andrykovitch (mossArchitects). Photos by artist.

“Ashley Andrykovitch: Everything Must Go” on view June 5-June 30, opening reception June 5, 6-9 p.m.

In “Everything Must Go,” painter Ashley Andrykovitch offers a haunting homage to mid-20th-century local mall architecture, including the recently demolished (Century III) and the days-are-numbered (Monroeville, Pittsburgh Mills). “I hope to communicate what it means to be nostalgic for places designed for us as consumers,” she says. “And how these disappearing parts of our landscape spark memories that resonate deeply inside us.”

Clockwise from left: “Shibuki” by Shohei Katayama, “I’ll Show You! (Who I Am)” by Loring Taoka, green stoneware bowls by Reiko Yamamoto (Atithi Studios). Photos by artists.

Group shows:

“Nikkei: Pittsburgh Voices” on view June 6-July 25, opening reception June 6, 6-8 p.m.

This multidisciplinary group exhibit celebrates the experiences, identities and artistic journeys of Japanese and Japanese American artists living and working in the Pittsburgh region — Shohei Katayama, Hiromi Katayama, Brent Nakamoto, Eriko Hattori, Loring Taoka, Reiko Yamamoto. Opening-night entertainment features the Kato family performing Japanese traditional music led by world-champion Taiko drummer/flutist Takumi Kato.

“Unapologetic” on view June 4-27, opening reception June 13, 4-8 p.m.

“Artists Choice Exhibition” on view June 4-27, opening reception June 13, 4-8 p.m.

“Error 404: Identity Not Found” on view June 4-27, opening reception June 13, 4-8 p.m.

Since relocating to the new 20,000-square-foot Aluminum City Arts center earlier this year, Manos Gallery has expanded its schedule to include three monthly exhibits showcasing the work of 48 artists spanning a plethora of genres.

“6th Annual Member & Student Exhibition” on view June 26-Sept.13, opening reception June 26, 6-8 p.m.

The full panoply of local art styles will be on display when PCA&M celebrates 80 years of arts education and the new work of 49 artists alongside ephemera from the group’s historical archives. 

“Eyes to See: Contemplating the Invisible through the Visible” on view June 5-27, opening reception June 5, 5-8 p.m.

The Christian meditational practice of using a sacred image or work of art to enhance prayer is known as “visio divina” (Latin for “divine seeing”) and traces its roots to sixth-century Italian monk St. Benedict. An exhibit organized by Lawrenceville’s Assisi Arts Community presents a multimedia panoply of artwork on the topic of faith by Pittsburgh artists Marie Lou Caccam, Dante Campudoni, Louise Criss, Rebecca Devendra, Raquel Kueffner, MeeLi Lee, Bill Lucas, Sasha Phillips, Ann Schmalstieg Barrett, Randi Sider-Rose, Joshua Sturm, Nathan Van Patter, Susan Walker and Suzanne Werder.

During the exhibit run at Spinning Plate Gallery, additional programs include artist talks, poetry open mics and workshops in botanical watercolor, portrait and iconography.

“Hot Wheels” by Darian Johnson (VaultArt Studio). Photo courtesy of VaultArt Studio.

Check these art happenings, too:

•  June 4, 6-9 p.m. Ketchup City Creative hosts photographers featured in the Spring 2026, Volume 1, issue of OBSRV, a new art journal celebrating street photography and community engagement. 612 Main St., Sharpsburg.

•  June 5, 6-10 p.m. Pittsburgh’s longest-running visual art stroll, Unblurred: First Fridays on Penn Avenue, returns with a lively evening of art openings, live performances, sidewalk markets and innumerable diverse food and beverage selections along the 4800–5500 blocks of Penn Avenue in Bloomfield/Garfield/Friendship. Highlights this month include Pride HOT Jam at Pittsburgh Glass Center (5472 Penn Ave.), “Popular Mechanics” at VaultArt Studio (5100 Penn Ave.) and closing night of Laura Jean McLaughlin, James Simon & Robert Qualters at Irma Freeman Center for Imagination (5006 Penn Ave.).

•  June 9, 6-8 p.m. Pedantic Arts Residency welcomes a new trio of creative thinkers to Pittsburgh for a one-month cross-disciplinary program. Fabricator/community organizer jinseok choi (Los Angeles), curator Joyce Chung (Philadelphia) and playwright Andrew Saito (Brooklyn). KST Alloy Studios, 5530 Penn Ave., Friendship.

•  June 11, 6:30-9:30 p.m. Phipps Conservatory hosts La Fleur at Phipps:  A Music x Art x Culture x Botanicals Soirée live floral art by Claire Hardy, Elizabeth Sickles and Peggie Habets and live-model fashion displays from designers Brian David, Patti Fowler, Patricia Gallagher, Michael Kouri, Lana Neumeyer, Virginia Nicoll,  Suz Pisano. 1 Schenley Drive, Oakland.

•  June 12, 6-9 p.m. On second Fridays May through October, the Carnegie Crawl enlivens East and West Main Street with gallery openings, live music and food highlighting the borough’s growing artmaking community — Double Dog Studios, Firebox Art Studios, 3rd Street Gallery, Pittsburgh Pottery, Eccentricity Designs, Matt Polk Photography and Studio Forget-Me-Not. Main Street, Carnegie.

•  June 12, 7-11 p.m. Mattress Factory’s Garden Party fundraiser takes on a Gothic theme featuring an art auction of Gothic-inspired art by local artists and live music by several local bands including Zinnia’s Garden, Carsickness, Lefafa and more. 500 Sampsonia Way, North Side.

•  June 26, 5:30-9 p.m. Pittsburgh Cultural Trust’s spring Downtown Gallery Crawl is a free, multi-venue open house spotlighting Pittsburgh’s dynamic art and entertainment scene featuring live music, dance, spoken word and visual arts at 707 Penn Gallery, 820 Liberty Gallery and SPACE Gallery.

•  June 27, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Allegheny County hosts an Andy Warhol Bridge 100th Birthday Bash along the Downtown-North Shore Andy Warhol Bridge (built in 1884, redesigned as a Three Sisters Bridge in 1926, named for Andy Warhol in 2005).

•  June 28, 12-5 p.m. Bad Bitch Bazaar outdoor vendor market features handmade craft and curated art from Pittsburgh’s women/nonbinary/queer-owned businesses. Allegheny Commons East, 255 E. Ohio St., North Side.

“Underwater Explorer” by Shauna McChesney (Cranberry Artists Network). Photo by artist.

More June openings:

•  Shauna McChesney Solo Exhibit (Cranberry Artists Network, June 5-30)

•  Popular Mechanics (VaultArt Studio, June 5-30)

•  Homespun: Paintings by Joseph Noderer and Alexandra Lakin. (Bottom Feeder Books, June 6-July 11) 

•  Contemporary Landscapes: Mark Poss, Paul Roden, Rachael Burke, Nicole Renee Ryan (JL Schorr Gallery, June 6-July 31)

•  “archive this!” Selections from the Contemporary Craft permanent collection (Contemporary Craft, June 12-Oct. 10)

•  2026 New Member Exhibition: Opening Reception (Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, June 13-Aug. 14)