2026 Guest Curators
Thursday March 5, 2026
This year, we are proud to welcome three powerhouse artists as Guest Curators for the 2026 BUMP Festival. Each brings a distinct voice, perspective, and set of questions that will shape the direction of this year’s festival.
Marigold Santos and Said Dokins will serve as guest curators of our 2026 Mural Program, working with us to develop the central theme that will guide this year’s festival artists. Their ideas will ripple across the entire program, informing the murals, conversations at the Urban Art Conference, and the broader artistic dialogue that unfolds across the city this summer through our programming.
Calgary based Marigold Santos is internationally recognized for her multidisciplinary practice spanning painting, sculpture, and installation. Her work explores diasporic identity, migration, mythology, and the layered experiences of the Filipino diaspora, creating deeply poetic worlds that connect memory, family, and transformation. This year, Santos will also be presenting work as part of the 2026 Venice Biennale, bringing her powerful storytelling to one of the world’s most significant international art stages.
From Mexico City, Said Dokins is an artist and researcher whose work explores writing as a living system that travels across bodies, landscapes, and technologies. Through monumental calligraphy, murals, video, sound, and archival research, Dokins transforms language into a spatial and political gesture, examining how meaning is written into the world and how it can be rewritten.
Joining them is Ken Lum, who will lead the inaugural edition of our Public Sculpture Program. Lum is one of Canada’s most influential contemporary artists, internationally acclaimed for his work examining identity, public space, and the social meanings embedded in monuments and urban environments. His curatorial leadership will guide a new chapter for BUMP as we expand into sculpture and long-term public installations.
All three guest curators will join us this summer at the 2026 Urban Art Conference, where artists, thinkers, and the public will gather to explore the ideas shaping this year’s festival.
We are incredibly honoured to have them with us as we continue to push BUMP forward into its next decade.
Stay tuned, we have much more to come.