Raleigh Exhibitions

2026 Raleigh Exhibitions

2026 in Raleigh will feature exhibitions at A Photographers Place, Artspace, Block Gallery, Jobe House and the Click! Plein Air Fence exhibit in downtown.

Henry Horenstein: Show

A Photographers Place Gallery 5100 Lacy Ave. Suite 100 Raleigh, NC 27609
On exhibit: October 2 - 31, 2026

Opening Reception:
October 2 , 2026, 5:00-9:00pm

"SHOW" by Henry Horenstein captures the raw and artistic essence of modern burlesque, blending glamour and grit in a disappearing world of performance art.

A Photographers Place is extremely proud to present SHOW, a sensuous but candid look at modern burlesque, by the noted Boston-based photographer Henry Horenstein. Taken between 2001 & 2009, SHOW pays homage to the resurgence of burlesque in the last several years.

“For subjects, I prefer older cultures & places, especially disappearing ones.” — Henry Horenstein

The photographs in this exhibition are a lavish display of ‘noir-styled’ images, which are a bewitching combination of the tantilising & titillatingly sexy, alongside the harsh, true reflections of the mysterious & raw world that they document.

Portraying all aspects of the Burlesque: the classic striptease, drag, fetish & the bizarre. SHOW’s dark, grainy images, mix feathers, fishnets, tattooed bodies, glitter & whips, with the more shocking & rawer, perhaps uglier side of the world of burlesque.

August 19 through October 30, 2026

ART WHAT YOU EAT

Block Gallery Exhibition Raleigh Municipal Building 222 W Hargett St, Raleigh, NC 27601

Food and art have an intertwined history, from the rustic Egyptian murals depicting bread-making to the colorful fruits by Cézanne. However, probably most notable are the hyper realistic Dutch still lifes with highly skilled renderings of reflective silver and glassware, dew drops on flower petals, and feathers and fur of dead carcasses. No matter the style in which any of these is illustrated, they all reflect the times in which they were created. Food is an essential part of life and culture, and artists have continued to document our relationship to it in personal and profound ways.

Each of the "Art What You Eat" photographers works with food as their subject matter but has a unique approach to tell their individual story. Whether it is the captured moments of food preparation by Anna Routh Barzin, the frozen-in-time images of Harsha Sipani, or the abstracted, minimalist design approach of Dhanraj Emanuel, their work reflects and celebrates our current culture.

October 1 -30 2026

Click! Plein Air Exhibition

 Click! Plein Air comes to Dix Park in Raleigh this year from October 1-30.

The theme is: OPEN. We are looking forward to presenting striking and engaging photographic work in a diverse public audience in an open-air setting.

The fence is a collaboration of photographers who submit from all over North Carolina and beyond and juried this year by Jerome De Perlinghi from the American Center for Photographers in Wilson, NC.

October 2 - November 1, 2026
Opening Reception: October 2, 2026 6:30pm – 8:30pm
Visual Art Exchange, Jobe House, 909 W Morgan St, Raleigh, NC 27603

Skipping Sundays: A Photography Exhibition by Heather Evans Smith

In "Skipping Sundays," Evans Smith reflects on her Methodist upbringing in a rural North Carolina town, revealing how a steadfast belief has always remained just out of reach. Through imagery, she explores the complicated dynamics of religion and faith, as well as the feelings of isolation that can occur when one's beliefs differ with those of those around them. How is it that some can wholeheartedly embrace traditional faith while the rest of us are left questioning?

October 2-30, 2026
Artspace,
201 E. Davie St.
Raleigh, NC

North Carolina State Fair Poultry Portraits: Robert & Robbie Bailey

With the intention of creating a cheeky “Best in Show” for chickens, Robert and Robbie Bailey rig a flashy, full-scale portrait studio inside the Poultry Tent.  What they discover is so much more: tradition, dazzling showmanship, and humanity at its very best. The dedication of the people showing their prized poultry matches the Baileys’ dedication to the art of photography. Telling their stories with reverence becomes paramount. The birds may win blue ribbons, but the people who care for them will win your heart. What you see here is honest portraiture of real people doing what they love, captured by two people doing what they love.

Micah CASH

A Photographers Place Gallery 5100 Lacy Ave. Suite 100 Raleigh, NC 27609
On exhibit: October 2 - 31, 2026

Opening Reception:
October 2 , 2026, 5:00-9:00pm

Waffle House Vistas focuses on the built environment as seen through the windows of Waffle House restaurants from across the southeastern United States. The collected images contemplate the surrounding architecture of habitat and commerce through the lens of a southern cultural icon. These photographs ask viewers to look up from their hash browns and acknowledge the institutions and structures that create real, yet rarely acknowledged boundaries that seem impossible to break through for many of us.

While the photographed locations vary by state, population density, and proximity to the Interstate highway system, the surrounding built environments share commonalities. The images look out from booths and chairs, placing the viewer as a witness to the intertwined narratives of economic stability, transience, and politics. 

Breaking Free: The Photographic Object

Friday, October 2, 2026

5:00 PM 9:00 PM
A Photographers Place
5100 Lacy Ave Ste 100,
Raleigh, NC 27609

Curator: Dale Rio

Contemporary photography is escaping its historical confines as a two-dimensional medium and exploding into an expansive array of three-dimensional forms as artists take an experimental approach to creating photo objects. 

The three artists in Breaking Free: The Photographic Object exemplify different approaches to transforming a photographic image into a 3D work of art. From a 2D starting point, each creates treasured objects that form a bridge between private reflection and public engagement. Exploring issues such as memory, time, and personal and communal aspirations, each embraces the tactility of fabrication and the manipulation of her chosen material through the use of a personalized creative methodology.     

Sally Chapman creates photo book objects that can present as standard book structures or be displayed as sculptural pieces. In them, she creates imagined worlds that explore the myths, ideals, and spiritual aspirations of the communities in which the original images were made.
Using a collection of found studio photographs as source material,.

Séverine Chauveau prints images onto handmade clay pieces and stones using liquid emulsion and creates reliquaries, icons, and video art. With these “memory objects”, she explores concepts of erasure; the preservation and loss of memory, humanity’s relationship with the passage of time, and our own eventual but inevitable disappearance.  

Dawn Surratt’s work is informed by over two decades of witnessing the human condition while working with hospice patients and families. Creating an intimate experience for the viewer through her choice of scale, she creates both small objects and sites of visual meditation through large-scale installations that feature image-based tableaux, reliquaries, and book structures that incorporate both handmade and found objects.  

PHoto Exhibitons

If you have upcoming photo-based exhibitions planned, please let us know and would be happy to share that with our audience.