JAMES MAIKI
FRIEZE
The Migration Narratives of Studio Lenca
The artist known as Studio Lenca discusses his new installations for the Deutsche Bank lounges at Frieze London & Frieze Masters 2026. Born Jose Campos in La Paz, El Salvador, Studio Lenca entered the US as an undocumented migrant and now lives and works in the UK. His work features narratives of displacement, conflicted identity and cultural influence.
‘The first time I encountered Western contemporary art,’ he says, ‘was when I was helping my mother clean houses.’In this video shot in his Margate studio, he describes one of the new installations. Ojala – the Spanish for ‘hopefully’, will see handmade Salvadoran hammocks cradling volcanic rocks suspended above the heads of Frieze visitors, hinting at the precarity of migrant existence, and different concepts of time, from the geological to the length of a coffee break.
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: @marimarilv @shakstevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: @crystalpulse @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki
Production: Frieze
Sampha X Frieze
Watch the London musician as he prepares to bring a Frieze Music performance to the Collectors’ Dinner.‘When it’s a more intimate setting,’ says musician Sampha of his performances, ‘I feel a bit more free, and that there’s a little bit more room to experiment or try something new.’
This video tracks the London-born musician at an after-hours Frieze London, as he prepares to perform a surprise set at the Collectors’ Dinner – taking the BMW-supported Frieze Music inside the fair for the first time. As Sampha strolls around the now-empty fair, he talks about his admiration for artists Kerry James Marshall, whom his collaborator Kahlil Joseph ‘reintroduced’ him to. Sampha takes inspiration from visual arts, including frieze magazine, when he’s writing music – always looking for new creative paths.
‘One of the songs I’m gonna play is off my album Lahai – “Spirit 2.0” – but I’ve tried to change it a bit,’ he says, coming at the song ‘from a different angle.’ Something that Frieze London and Sampha share: a love of innovation.
Team:
Director / Cam op: James Maiki
Cam op: Guy Stephens
Cam assistant: Chris Hart
Sound: Ali Solfagari
Edit: James Maiki
Production: Frieze
The winner of the second Degussa Young Generation Art Award is London-based artist Ken Nwadiogbu, who describes the journey that led him to art in this video filmed in and around his studio. Now in its second year, the prize was established by @degussa.gold and @monopolmagazin to support emerging artists under 35.
Born in Lagos, Nwadiogbu worked as an engineer and photographer before turning to art. ‘My life has changed drastically moving from Lagos to London,’ he says. ‘I still miss Lagos a lot.’ His multidisciplinary practice documents his personal journey to explore, as he puts it, ‘what it means being Black in a global context’. In his work, Nwadiogbu uses elements such as Igbo fabrics – which will feature in his installation, ‘I Know the Shadows Will Always Be There’, in the Degussa lounge at Frieze London 2026 – and packaging: ‘You use cardboard to ship things to different parts of the world,’ he says. ‘The cardboard itself is a migrant.’
Team:
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: @shakstevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: @crystalpulse @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki
In this video, four of the particpants in the Frieze x Deutsche Bank Emerging Curators Fellowship explain why the programme – which Casely-Hayford describes as ‘one of the few initiatives making real strides in curatorial diversity’ – has been so vital for them.
The fellowship, which supports Black and global majority heritage curators through 12-month, full-time, paid placements within leading arts organizations, was established in 2020 amid the Covid pandemic and a time of self-reflection on the part of UK museums and galleries.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrvAr6w3-6U
Idris Khan Wants You to Fall into the Frame
At Sean Kelly’s new Los Angeles gallery, the artist proposes new landscape patterns
https://www.frieze.com/video/idris-khan-sean-kelly-los-angeles-2022
The artist known as Studio Lenca discusses his new installations for the Deutsche Bank lounges at Frieze London & Frieze Masters 2026. Born Jose Campos in La Paz, El Salvador, Studio Lenca entered the US as an undocumented migrant and now lives and works in the UK. His work features narratives of displacement, conflicted identity and cultural influence.
‘The first time I encountered Western contemporary art,’ he says, ‘was when I was helping my mother clean houses.’In this video shot in his Margate studio, he describes one of the new installations. Ojala – the Spanish for ‘hopefully’, will see handmade Salvadoran hammocks cradling volcanic rocks suspended above the heads of Frieze visitors, hinting at the precarity of migrant existence, and different concepts of time, from the geological to the length of a coffee break.
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: @marimarilv @shakstevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: @crystalpulse @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki
Production: Frieze
Sampha X Frieze
Watch the London musician as he prepares to bring a Frieze Music performance to the Collectors’ Dinner.‘When it’s a more intimate setting,’ says musician Sampha of his performances, ‘I feel a bit more free, and that there’s a little bit more room to experiment or try something new.’
This video tracks the London-born musician at an after-hours Frieze London, as he prepares to perform a surprise set at the Collectors’ Dinner – taking the BMW-supported Frieze Music inside the fair for the first time. As Sampha strolls around the now-empty fair, he talks about his admiration for artists Kerry James Marshall, whom his collaborator Kahlil Joseph ‘reintroduced’ him to. Sampha takes inspiration from visual arts, including frieze magazine, when he’s writing music – always looking for new creative paths.
‘One of the songs I’m gonna play is off my album Lahai – “Spirit 2.0” – but I’ve tried to change it a bit,’ he says, coming at the song ‘from a different angle.’ Something that Frieze London and Sampha share: a love of innovation.
Team:
Director / Cam op: James Maiki
Cam op: Guy Stephens
Cam assistant: Chris Hart
Sound: Ali Solfagari
Edit: James Maiki
Production: Frieze
Degussa Young Generation Art Award winner Ken Nwadiogbu
The winner of the second Degussa Young Generation Art Award is London-based artist Ken Nwadiogbu, who describes the journey that led him to art in this video filmed in and around his studio. Now in its second year, the prize was established by @degussa.gold and @monopolmagazin to support emerging artists under 35.
Born in Lagos, Nwadiogbu worked as an engineer and photographer before turning to art. ‘My life has changed drastically moving from Lagos to London,’ he says. ‘I still miss Lagos a lot.’ His multidisciplinary practice documents his personal journey to explore, as he puts it, ‘what it means being Black in a global context’. In his work, Nwadiogbu uses elements such as Igbo fabrics – which will feature in his installation, ‘I Know the Shadows Will Always Be There’, in the Degussa lounge at Frieze London 2026 – and packaging: ‘You use cardboard to ship things to different parts of the world,’ he says. ‘The cardboard itself is a migrant.’
Team:
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: @shakstevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: @crystalpulse @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki
Frieze x Deutsche Bank Emerging Curators Fellowship
In this video, four of the particpants in the Frieze x Deutsche Bank Emerging Curators Fellowship explain why the programme – which Casely-Hayford describes as ‘one of the few initiatives making real strides in curatorial diversity’ – has been so vital for them.
The fellowship, which supports Black and global majority heritage curators through 12-month, full-time, paid placements within leading arts organizations, was established in 2020 amid the Covid pandemic and a time of self-reflection on the part of UK museums and galleries.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrvAr6w3-6U
Idris Khan Wants You to Fall into the Frame
At Sean Kelly’s new Los Angeles gallery, the artist proposes new landscape patterns
https://www.frieze.com/video/idris-khan-sean-kelly-los-angeles-2022
Celebrating Five Years of Innovation with BMW Open Work
Curator Attilia Fattori Franchini and others reflect on the pioneering collaboration, which has seen a diverse range of commissions, including this year's installation by Madeline Hollanderhttps://www.frieze.com/video/celebrating-five-years-innovation-bmw-open-work
From Joan Armatrading to Mama Thornton: The Black Women Who Inspired Nikita Gale’s Guitars
At Frieze London, Ray Aggs, Alpha Maid and Joviale activate the guitars named after five female identifying black musicians
https://www.frieze.com/video/joan-armatrading-mama-thornton-black-women-who-inspired-nikita-gales-guitars
Hwang Sueyon on Weight, Memory and Material at Frieze London 2026
South Korean artist Hwang Sueyon discusses the ideas and materials behind We Are Old Weight, Still Tender (2026), presented at Frieze London as part of the longstanding collaboration between Frieze and the Korea Arts Management Service (@KAMS).
Working with sand, resin, water and glass, Hwang explores the physicality and resistance of materials, considering how different states of matter and time come together to shape our experience of the world. In this video, she reflects on the significance of physical and emotional weight, and the ways in which memory, movement and human relationships inform her sculptural practice.Hwang hopes the submerged forms will bring to mind audiences' own memories and experiences.
She also reflects on their potential for movement and transformation within the work, and how even as we navigate the weight we carry, the possibility of forming relationships with others remains.
Produced by Frieze Studios
Producer: Sherie Sitauze
DOP & Edit: James Maiki
2nd Camera & Sound: Chris Hart
Interview & Translation: Grace Eunyhe Park
Pablo Bronstein’s Breguet Commission Imagines the Rise and Fall of Machines
The artist’s series of panoramic wallpapers engage hand drawing, digital design and master craft in a narrative about technology and culture concludes at Frieze Los Angeles 2023
https://www.frieze.com/video/pablo-bronsteins-breguet-frieze-los-angeles-2023
YBA & BEYOND
This exhibition explores the dynamic evolution of British art from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. After going through the Thatcher era (1979-1990), a charged and uncertain social climate gave rise to a new generation of artists who challenged traditional norms and embraced bold, experimental practices. Many of the newer generation of artists who came to prominence in the 1990s were referred to in the art and popular media under the title Young British Artists (YBAs). Alongside other artists active at the time, these artists explored themes such as popular culture, personal identity, and shifting social structures.
They worked across a diverse range of media, including painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installation. Featuring around 100 works by approximately 60 artists, the exhibition traces the radical creativity and groundbreaking approaches that redefined British art in the 1990s.
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: Shakira Stevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: Chris Hart @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki
They worked across a diverse range of media, including painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installation. Featuring around 100 works by approximately 60 artists, the exhibition traces the radical creativity and groundbreaking approaches that redefined British art in the 1990s.
🎬 Direction: @jamesmaiki
📽️ Production: Shakira Stevens @Frieze
📷 Camera: Chris Hart @jamesmaiki
🎙️ Sound: @threekeyaudio
✂️ Edit: @jamesmaiki