Kenny Scharf at Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza
Madrid, Spain
29 September 2026 - 17 January 2027

From 29 September, the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza presents an exhibition dedicated to Kenny Scharf, placing renewed attention on an artist who emerged as a prominent figure of New York’s East Village scene in the 1980s. Organised as part of the museum’s programme devoted to the Blanca and Borja Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, the exhibition explores a multidisciplinary practice spanning painting, sculpture, installation, murals, performance, and fashion.

Scharf’s visual language brings together popular culture, Surrealism and science fiction through fantastical anthropomorphic figures, saturated colour and densely animated compositions. Closely associated with the downtown New York art scene of the 1980s, he developed an approach that challenged distinctions between so-called high and popular culture. Scharf himself coined the term “Pop Surrealism” to describe a practice rooted in the accessibility of Pop Art while extending towards more hallucinatory, comic and futuristic imagery. His participation in the 1985 Whitney Biennial marked an important stage in the growing international recognition of his work.

The Thyssen exhibition highlights the breadth of this vocabulary and the way Scharf has sustained it across different media and over several decades. Recurring characters, cosmic environments and exaggerated expressions create a world that is playful and immediately approachable, yet also reflects his longstanding interest in consumer culture, technology and the transformation of everyday imagery. 

Coinciding with the museum exhibition, Opera Gallery is presenting a focused selection of Kenny Scharf’s work in Madrid, offering a complementary view of the motifs and visual language that have shaped his practice and an opportunity to encounter different facets of Scharf’s work in the city.