At frieze, we often like to close our year by taking stock of the moment and looking ahead – twin poles for this issue, our last of 2025. Ahead of New York’s Performa Biennial, our columns section looks closely at some of the artists revolutionizing contemporary performance. Aria Dean writes about building characters for her new play; Jeanette Bisschops looks at how the algorithm is shaping in-person performance; philosopher Saidiya Hartman describes the possibilities that unfold from endings; Miriam Stoney reflects on performance art’s return to the theatre; and assistant editor Cassie Packard profiles our cover artist, Ayoung Kim, whose visionary practice constructs a multiverse of astonishing worlds. In our features section,

the theme of performance continues with a profile of Tau Lewis, whose Performa commission revisits ancient Sumerian poetry