Informa, the London-based events and publishing group, has acquired Clarion Events in a £2.24 billion deal. They will also add New York’s Independent art fairs to their expanding portfolio. The financial terms of Informa’s acquisition of the Independent art fair have not been publicly disclosed.
The transaction was announced on 6 October, although Informa’s acquisition of Independent was quietly completed in 2025. That signifies both the spring 2026 edition of Independent and the autumn edition, Independent 20th Century, were already operating under Informa ownership.
Elizabeth Dee, Independent’s founder and creative director, will remain in her role and continue to oversee both fairs. For a fair that has built its reputation around a strong curatorial identity and a deliberately unconventional approach to the commercial art fair, the change of ownership marks a significant moment.
Independent was founded in New York in 2010 by Dee, then a gallerist, alongside London dealer Darren Flook and Matthew Higgs, director of White Columns. Higgs remains involved as a curatorial adviser. From the beginning, Independent set itself apart from the standard art fair model. Its layout avoided the familiar grid of booths, while its organisers preferred to describe it as a collective or exhibition forum rather than simply an art fair.
That distinction became part of its identity. Independent was designed to feel closer to an exhibition than a trade show, with galleries and nonprofit organisations presented alongside one another. The format has since been widely adopted across the fair sector.
The first five editions were held at a former warehouse in Chelsea that had previously housed the Dia Centre for the Arts. In 2016, the fair moved to Spring Studios in Tribeca. Independent also briefly expanded internationally with Independent Brussels, which ran from 2016 to 2018 at Espace Vanderborght.
The original New York fair has continued to change. In 2026 it moved to Pier 36 on the Lower East Side, more than doubling in size. Among the presentations that attracted attention was a solo fashion art fair presentation by Rei Kawakubo, founder of Comme des Garçons.
Independent 20th Century followed a different path. Launched in 2022 by Dee, Higgs and Sofie Scheerlinck, formerly of TEFAF, the fair was conceived around art made between 1900 and 2000. Its stated ambition was to broaden the conventional canon and present a more diverse account of 20th-century art.
The fair spent its first four years at the Battery Maritime Building in Lower Manhattan. Its fifth edition moved to the Breuer building, the former home of the Whitney Museum of American Art, where the 2026 edition expanded to 57 exhibitors from 31 at its previous venue.
The acquisition places Independent inside a much larger events business. Informa was founded in 1998 and now operates trade shows and business events across a wide range of industries, including technology, aviation, fashion, jewellery, pharmaceuticals, food, hospitality and security. Its portfolio includes Cannes Lions and the Monaco Yacht Show. At the same time, its wider group also encompasses South Florida Ventures, which operates Untitled Art, Art Miami and Palm Beach Modern and Contemporary. The Independent will remain separate from South Florida Ventures.
The Clarion acquisition substantially increases Informa’s presence in the global events industry. Clarion brings more than 100 business-to-business event brands into the group, including IFA Berlin, one of the world’s largest consumer electronics exhibitions, and Defence and Security Equipment International at ExCeL London.
Informa reported revenue of $2.7 billion for the first half of 2026, with adjusted operating profit of $723.7 million. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange and forms part of the FTSE 100. It employs around 14,000 people across approximately 42 countries.
The wider Clarion deal is being funded in part through a £940 million equity placement arranged with RetailBook. Clarion said joining Informa would give its brands greater scale, investment and international reach, while allowing the business to expand its digital and data capabilities.
Lisa Hannant, Clarion Events chief executive, described the transaction as a new chapter for the company, pointing to the strength of its brands and the markets in which it operates. For Informa, the acquisition is another step in consolidating a global live events business.
For the Independent, the question is rather different. The fair has always depended on its sense of distinction. Its appeal lies partly in its scale, but more importantly in the way galleries and artists are presented.
The acquisition gives Independent access to the resources of one of the world’s largest events groups. Still, it also places a highly individual New York art fair inside a vast commercial organisation whose interests extend far beyond the art market. The challenge will be to gain the benefits of that scale without losing the qualities that made Independent different in the first place.
Both Informa and Independent remain committed to the fair’s creative and curatorial autonomy. The intention, she said, is to continue developing Independent as a curated platform for modern and contemporary art under the leadership of its existing team.
For a fair approaching its twentieth anniversary, the timing is significant. Independent has spent much of its history resisting the conventions of the art fair. It is now entering a much larger commercial structure, but the real measure of the deal will not be its price or the size of Informa’s balance sheet. It will be whether Independent can continue to feel Independent.