Jessie Marie Beals
Press Release
FERRARA SHOWMAN GALLERY proudly presents the 30th Annual NO DEAD ARTISTS International Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Art. For the 2026 installment of the exhibition, eighteen artists from and/or living and working across the United States, as well as: Argentina, China, Iran, Jamaica, Japan, Scotland, Turkey, and Taiwan. The finalists were selected by the jury from over 400 submissions by artists worldwide. The exhibition will be on view from 12 September through 24 October with an opening reception on 3 October 5-8 PM in conjunction with the Arts District New Orleans’s (ADNO) First Saturday Gallery Openings and city-wide event Art for Arts’ Sake.
The NO DEAD ARTISTS exhibition was founded by Jonathan Ferrara in 1995 to give a voice to emerging artists. The exhibition’s name is derived from the old adage that artists never achieve success until they are dead. NO DEAD ARTISTS turns that notion on its head and often gives emerging artists their first break in the art world. In the 90’s, the exhibition was open to New Orleans-based artists and subsequently grew to include artists of Louisiana, then becoming a national juried exhibition in 2010. In 2014, Matthew Weldon Showman opened the call internationally, expanding the opportunity to artists everywhere and producing an even more diverse and compelling survey of Contemporary Art. Now in its 30th iteration, the exhibition has been a springboard for numerous artists; leading to national press coverage, recognition, gallery representation, art fair exhibition, and acquisitions by museums and other prominent collections. Each year the gallery invites a panel of renowned arts professionals and collectors to select the newest creative talents from around the world.
::: The 2026 NO DEAD ARTISTS Jury :::
For the 30th Anniversary of this important exhibition, the gallery diverged from the usual three-person jury panel of arts professionals worldwide, and instead – for the first time ever – invited our staff to lend their eyes and interests to the selection of NDA 2026, making this the most personal exhibition to-date.
MATTHEW SHOWMAN partner + director JONATHAN FERRARA founding partner
TOMAS MORENO registrar + preparator SARAH BISHOP marketing coordinator
::: The 30th Annual NO DEAD ARTISTS Finalists :::
JESSIE MARIE BEALS - New Orleans, Louisiana
JOSIAH BOLTH - New Orleans, Louisiana
CHRISTA CAPUA - Asheville, North Carolina
PAULA CHRISTENSON - Cedar Hills, Utah
SAMANTHA COMBS - Baton Rouge, Louisiana
KRISTIN CRONIC - Jacksonville, Florida
MICHELLE DRUMMOND - Delray Beach, Florida
DAVID EMMITE - Portland, Oregon
JAMEY GRIMES - Tuscaloosa, Alabama
BERK GUNAY - Istanbul, Turkey
HOPE HICKMAN - New Orleans, Louisiana
EMILY HOLT - Nashville, Tennessee
CHINGKE LIN - Taipei, Taiwan
YASUAKI MATSUURA - Tokyo, Japan
MERCURY.N - Edinburgh, Scotland
MARYAM RAJABZADEH - Shahr-e Kord, Iran
ASHER REY - New Iberia, Louisiana
MICHAEL BOYD ROMAN - Oberlin, Ohio
Press Release cont'd
Comprised of painting, drawing, photography, digital media, sculpture, textile/fiber, ceramic, printmaking, collage, video, and mixed media installation, NO DEAD ARTISTS continues to exhibit a great diversity in media with a cohesive cross-section of the pulse of contemporary art. Common threads throughout the exhibition is a penchant for texture and color, and subject matter ranges from figurative and landscape to architecture and abstraction. This expansive exhibition continues to be a highlight of the gallery’s annual program and a source to welcome new artist’s to the gallery’s regular roster of solo exhibitions.
For the grand prize of the exhibition, one of the selected jury-winning artists will be awarded a solo exhibition at FSG in 2027. Previous recipient awardees include: Marna Shopoff (2013 + 2014), Jenny Day (2016 + 2017), Kat Flyn (2018), Trenity Thomas (2020), Michael Tole (2021), Brandon V. Lewis (2022), Ginger Williams Cook (2023), and Noe Kuremoto (2025). In addition to these award winners who have all since become represented by the gallery, FSG has continued to exhibit and take under representation other former finalists: Tony Dagradi (2017), REWA (2018), Kristin Moore (2019), Barbara Kuebel (2020), Becca Fuhrman (2023), and Ben Hamburger (2025).
Not only have all of these past finalists received solo shows at the gallery but some have also successfully continued on to exhibit at art fairs in New York, Miami, Basel (Switzerland), Leipzig (Germany), San Francisco, Houston, Seattle, and other traveling exhibitions and museums worldwide. These artists and the NO DEAD ARTISTS exhibition have garnered great interest from curators, museums, and press, and have also been acquired by many prominent public and private collections. . . Stay tuned for the announcement of the 2026 winner at the close of the exhibition and their subsequent exhibition in 2027.
For more information, press or sales inquiries please contact Partner + Gallery Director Matthew Weldon Showman at 504.343.6827 or matthew@ferrarashowman.com. Please join the conversation with FSG on Instagram (@FerraraShowmanGallery) via the hashtags: #NoDeadArtists, #NDA2026 #FerraraShowmanGallery, and #ArtsDistrictNewOrleans.
