Image: Sayre Gomez, Untitled, 2026. Courtesy the artist and Xavier Hufkens, Brussels
Sayre Gomez will present ‘Sim City’, a new body of paintings, figurative sculptures and works on paper, at Rivoli in Brussels from 24 September to 28 November 2026. The exhibition, his third with Xavier Hufkens, continues the artist’s engagement with the urban framework that defines the landscape of Los Angeles. An opening is scheduled for 24 September from 5 to 8pm.
The exhibition approaches Los Angeles as both a physical city and a constructed image. According to the gallery’s description, the city functions as “a protagonist and backdrop, home and fantasy, paradise and myth”, while its familiar visual shorthand—palm trees, sunsets and freeways—coexists with more complex histories and infrastructures. ‘Sim City’ examines the gap between these widely circulated representations and the conditions they can conceal.
The works address the city’s histories, infrastructures, politics and climate, presenting them as inseparable rather than discrete subjects. The exhibition text describes Los Angeles as a cultural construction and a symbol of artifice, a place in which optimism and dread occupy the same horizon. Gomez’s new paintings, sculptures and works on paper collectively wrestle with the representation of a city whose identity is often summoned through images that appear generic or immediately recognisable.
Gomez was born in Chicago in 1982 and lives and works in Los Angeles. His selected institutional solo exhibitions include ‘Enterprise’ at Sifang Art Museum in Jiangsu, China, in 2022, and ‘Renaissance Collection’ at Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Turin, Italy, also in 2022. His work is held in public collections including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney, the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, and mumok in Vienna.
‘Sim City’ follows two previous exhibitions by Gomez with Xavier Hufkens: ‘True Crime’, held at the gallery’s Van Eyck location from 15 April to 15 May 2021, and ‘Heaven ‘N’ Earth’, held at its St-Georges location from 12 January to 2 March 2024. The upcoming presentation is listed at Rivoli, one of the locations associated with the Brussels gallery’s exhibition programme.
The exhibition will coincide with Gomez’s institutional exhibition ‘Closed Forever’ at SITE Santa Fe in New Mexico, listed by Xavier Hufkens from 16 October 2026 to 11 January 2027. ‘Sim City’ itself remains on view at Rivoli, Brussels, through 28 November 2026.
