A Complete Guide to the 2026 Venice Biennale National Pavilions

While Genti Korini』s paintings and sculptures may sometimes resemble the fashionable kind of figurations seen in commercial galleries across the globe, his work is rooted in heady ideas about Eastern Europe』s past, present, and future. He』ll return to those ideas with his Albanian Pavilion, titled 「A Place in the Sun,」 which will feature pieces that draw on both Albanian history and Polish experimental theater traditions. Małgorzata Ludwisiak will curate.

Venue: Arsenale

You』ll want to watch your step at Matías Duville』s Argentine Pavilion, since the entire floor will be covered by a drawing made using charcoal and salt. Such a gesture may not be exactly unexpected for those familiar with Duville, who often works with burnt wood to create images of scorched landscapes. His latest outing will be titled 「Monitor Yin Yang」 and will be curated by Josefina Barcia.

Venue: Arsenale

This year』s Armenian Pavilion may offer the rare case where one of its curators is better known than its artist representative. That curator is Tony Shafrazi, who is best known as a dealer of the 1980s New York scene; he will co-organize the pavilion with Tina Shakarian. Together, they are spotlighting artist Zadik Zadikian, who acted as an assistant to Richard Serra early in his career and has since produced an array of abstract sculptures, including a monument to Armenian soldiers killed in the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh. At the Independent 20th Century fair this past fall, Shafrazi, who had not participated in an art fair since 2012, showed Pop-inflected work by Zadikian and a sculpture of gold bricks revisiting one of his pieces from the 』70s.

Venue: Fondamenta Case Nuove 2738/C, Castello, Tesa 41, Arsenale Militare

Already, no pavilion at the 2026 Biennale has proven more controversial than Australia』s, which is being done by artist Khaled Sabsabi, who is working in tandem with curator Michael Dagostino. Not long after its initial announcement, in February 2025, Sabsabi』s pavilion was canceled by its organizer, Creative Australia, which raised concerns over prior works by the Lebanese-born artist, including one that featured images of a Hezbollah leader. Creative Australia said that 「a prolonged and divisive debate」 would pose a 「risk」 to the pavilion; Sabsabi and Dagostino said they were being censored. But the cancelation ended up itself provoking a divisive debate that saw Creative Australia board members resign and open letters issued, and eventually, five months later, Sabsabi was reinstated as Australia』s representative. He and Dagostino said the reinstatement provided them with 「a sense of resolution.」

Venue: Giardini

Continuing an emphasis on dance seen at Anna Jermolaewa』s 2024 pavilion, Austria』s 2026 pavilion will be given over to the choreographer Florentina Holzinger. Holzinger has quickly risen as one of the most in-demand choreographers worldwide for pieces that are often sexually charged and sometimes tough to watch. Sancta, her opera featuring nuns who roller-skated in the nude and a lesbian priest, was bitterly critiqued in her home country upon its premiere in 2022, with religious figures condemning her. When it traveled in 2024 to Germany, it raised controversy anew after audience members complained of severe nausea while watching a scene involving a piercing. Her project for the Biennale, titled 「Seaworld Venice」 and curated by Nora-Swantje Almes, has the potential to be no more pleasant.

Venue: Giardini

Best known for his installations in which traditional Central Asian rugs hang on the wall as they dissolve into pools of melted colors, Faig Ahmed will represent Azerbaijan for the second time, having participated in a group show for the country』s 2007 pavilion. His solo outing, curated by Gwendolyn Collaço, will take the title 「The Attention」 and aim to serve as 「a space where external noise and anxiety recede, with the convergence of sound, material presence, and rhythm inviting visitors into a meditative mode of perception,」 according to a release. Drawing on the work of the Hurufi poet Imadaddin Nasimi, he will produce a site-specific project titled I Can Contain Both Worlds but I Do Not Fit Into This One (2026), which will span all the rooms of the exhibition space.

Venue: Campo della Tana, Castello 2124/A, Castello 2125 

Participating for a second time in the Venice Biennale more than a decade after its debut, The Bahamas has chosen both a living artist and a dead one as its representatives. The pavilion will serve in part as a tribute to John Beadle, who died in 2024, leaving behind an oeuvre that explores how traumatic histories of enslavement and colonialism linger on. His work will be shown alongside that of Lavar Munroe, whose paintings and installations explore how individuals are shaped by local traditions. Art historian Krista Thompson will curate.

Venue: San Trovaso Art Space, Dorsoduro 947

Belarus last participated in the Biennale in 2019, though the country won』t be participating in this year』s festival in an official capacity either. Instead, the Belarus Free Theatre, which has been in exile in 2020, will present a collateral event title 「Official. Unofficial. Belarus.」 The presentation will feature works, including site-specific paintings, large-scale sculptures, and a sound installation, that look at how art is 「made, censored, and experienced under authoritarian power and constant surveillance,」 per a release.

」Most of the pavilions are state pavilions that represent governments, and what governments want to represent varies enormously across nations,」 Daniella Kaliada, the pavilion』s curator and the theater』s cofounding artistic director, told ARTnews. 「We position ourselves entirely outside of that. The Biennale is allowing us to make that distinction visible, allowing unofficial narratives to re-enter a space that has long been reserved only for what official governments want to say.」

Venue: Chiesa di San Giovanni Evangelista, San Polo 2454

Belgium has selected Miet Warlop, who is known for her performances that combine the visual arts with theater, as its representative for the 2026 Biennale. Supported by MORPHO in Antwerp and Kanal–Centre Pompidou in Brussels, her pavilion will take the title 「IT NEVER SSST」 and is to be curated by Caroline Dumalin. Warlop』s performances have been staged at S.M.A.K. in Ghent, the KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin, and the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, as well as at the 2012 Baltic Triennale in Vilnius, Lithuania, and the 2024 Venice International Theatre Festival.

Venue: Giardini

Bosnia and Herzegovina will be represented by Mladen Bundalo, a Bosnian artist who is now based in Brussels. Curated by Isidora Živković of the Museum of Contemporary Art of Republika Srpska, the pavilion will be titled 「Domus Diasporica」 and focus on the artist』s long-term concerns around the idea of home while being in diaspora, drawing on his own experience of growing up in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the 』90s.

Venue: Palazzo Malipiero, San Marco 3198

In Portuguese, the phrase 「Comigo ninguém pode」 can act as a saying that translates to 「Nobody can beat me」 or as the colloquial name for a plant known as dumbcane. It lends its name to this year』s Brazilian Pavilion, which will be done by artists Rosana Paulino and Adriana Varejão, both of whom are well-known internationally—the former for installations that attest to histories of enslavement that continue to afflict the Afro-Brazilian community, the latter for lush paintings and installations that allude to violence more obliquely. They are set to work with Diane Lima, who recently organized the Panorama of Brazilian Art in São Paulo. Can the pavilion live up to its name and win the Biennale』s top honors? Time will tell.

Venue: Giardini

The Bulgarian Pavilion will this year be known as 「The Federation of Minor Practices,」 operating as 「the headquarters of afictional research lab operating within a care oriented political imagination」 that is also 「conceived as an interactive environment based on a computer game,」 according to a release. Four artists—Gery Georgieva, Maria Nalbantova, Rayna Teneva, and Veneta Androva—have been commissioned to make new films for the pavilion. In a statement, pavilion curator Martina Yordanova said, 「The Pavilion does not propose a future. It sustains the conditions through which futures begin to take form collectively, attentively, and through care.」

Venue: Sala Tiziano at the Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli, Fondamenta Delle Zattere Ai Gesuiti 919

Catalonia, an autonomous region of Spain, will have a presence at the Biennale via a collateral event that will be staged at the Docks Cantieri Cucchini (between the Arsenale and Giardini). For 「Paper Tears,」 artist Claudia Pagès Rabal will create work that engages with a selection of 15th-century watermarks drawn from the Museu Molí Paperer de Capellades, as a way to think through the historic links between Venice and Catalonia, particularly via extractive colonial transit routes. The show, according to an exhibition description, is structured as a waltz, its circular steps mimicking the watermark, with performers 「dressed as contemporary jesters」 and a script that frames our present reality—marked by 「boycotts, exclusion, exhaustion, and universal violence」—as a tragicomedy. Who the joke is remains to be seen.

Venue: Docks Cantieri Cucchini, Castello 40/A

Cameroon will be represented by six artists and collectives: Jail Time Records, Sylvie Njobati, Bienvenue Fotso, Zora Snake, Neals Niat, and Beya Gille Gacha, the latter of whom will also serve as the pavilion』s curator. Few details for the pavilion have been publicly revealed beside its name, 「NZENDA: The Path Home.」 A site for the pavilion bills it as 「an experimental immersive temple for healing rooted in ancestral Cameroonian cosmologies.」 On Instagram, Niat, one of the participating artists, said the pavilion 「also honors the legacy of Cameroonian curator Koyo Kouoh, whose vision continues to resonate across the contemporary African art scene and beyond.」

Venue: Palazzo Canal Dorsoduro 3121

In Canada, Abbas Akhavan has steadily racked up accolades, appearing in the Toronto Biennial of Art, winning the Sobey Art Award for Canadian artists, and staging shows at well-regarded institutions. He is set to receive a new level of fame in the country he now calls home with this pavilion, which will continue his fascination with how national histories become embedded in material objects. Born in Tehran and now based between Montreal and Berlin, Akhavan has gradually gained international recognition as well. In 2026, Minneapolis』s Walker Art Center will survey his work. Titled 「Entre chien et loup」 (Between dog and wolf), the pavilion will be curated by Kim Nguyen, director of programs at the Ruth Foundation for the Arts in Milwaukee.

Venue: Giardini

Norton Maza has kept his Chilean Pavilion, titled 「Inter-Reality,」 cloaked in mystery. He has teased the immersive installation, which will involve water and sound, as being akin to a 「canal of life; you travel through different levels of water and their intensities」—a fitting gesture for Venice. Marisa Caichiolo will organize the installation.

Venue: Arsenale

Titled 「Dream Stream,」 China』s participation at the 2026 Venice Biennale will be curated by Yu Xuhong and feature more than three dozen participants, including Yang Fudong, Method Scenography Group, and Crude_Castin. The full list of participants is as follows: Game Science, Feng Ji, Yang Qi, Liu Chenglong, Wang Yixin + Wang Yu, Weng Jie, Lin Zhe, Zhou Haosong, Fei Si, Huang Chengxi, Yang Tingmu + Yang Hancheng + Xie Xianhui, Team of China Academy of Art and Zhejiang Lab, Xu Jiang, Wang Dongling, Yang Fudong, Lining Yao+Guanyun Wang+Danli Luo, Method Scenography Group (Mou Sen, Ma Yuanchi, Xin Ge, Mei Yuezi, Zhao Da), Wu Ziyang + Crude_Castin (Xu Jing, Zou Nan, Ye Qi, Yan Zhenghao), Nie Shichang, Jiang Suxuan + Yu Jiangfan, Hu Yueming + Lin Yuxin + Ji Huanhuan, Zhang Zhoujie.

Venue: Arsenale

Dubravka Lošić will take over the Croatian Pavilion with an exhibition titled 「Compelled by Fright and Beauty.」 Branko Franceschi, the director of the National Museum of Modern Art in Zagreb, will serve as the pavilion』s curator. Featuring paintings and sculptures from several different bodies of work, Lošić』s exhibition will evoke 「the interplay between containment and flow: the works are wrapped, compressed, protected — yet something always escapes,」 per a description.

Venue: Palazzo Zorzi, Salizada Zorzi, 4930

For the Cuban Pavilion, Juan Roberto Diago Durruthy will present works from 「Hombres Libres / Free Men,」 his series of large-scale busts made from wood, metal, plastic, and other salvaged materials. The Havana-based artist previously represented his home country at the Biennale in 1997 and 2017. His forthcoming pavilion is curated by Nelson Ramirez de Arellano, the director of the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam, which organizes the Havana Biennial. According to a release, 「Roberto Diago』s work stands as a perpetual reminder that freedom is not given, it is conquered; it is not a passive state, but a continuous practice—a constant tension that demands keeping memory sharp and dignity intact.」

Venue: Il Giardino Bianco – Art Space, Via Giuseppe Garibaldi, Castello 1814

Sculptor Marina Xenofontos will represent Cyprus at this Biennale, and she』s given her pavilion the lush name of 「It rests to the bones」—a poetic evocation of her interest in traditions of the past that are not so dead after all. Kyle Dancewicz, who formerly showed Xenofontos』s work at SculptureCenter, the New York art space where he is deputy director, will organize her pavilion.

Venue: Associazione Culturale Spiazzi Castello 3865

Whereas in 2024 the Czech Republic and Slovakia mounted separate presentations, they will, in 2026, stage a combined pavilion entitled 「The Silence of Mr. Mole.」 Jakub Jansa and Selmeci Kocka Jusko (a duo composed of Alex Selmeci and Tomáš Kocka Jusko) will work together on the pavilion, whose titular protagonist 「has turned into a mascot of cultural diplomacy, a licensed commodity, and a nostalgic myth, a symbol of stolen fantasy,」 according to the pavilion』s description. 「Sent to represent the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic as a diplomatically acceptable, politically neutral figure, the mole also embodies reproach, silence, and a confused identity.」 Peter Sit, a curator who serves as art director of e-flux, will organize their presentation.

Venue: Giardini

The three-part title of this pavilion, 「Simba Moto! Seize the Fire! Saisis le feu!,」 recasts the same phrase in Lingala, English, and French, a gesture meant to highlight the diversity of the Congo and its diaspora. Loosely themed around fire』s ability to bring about change—sometimes for the positive, sometimes for the worse—this pavilion features artist based in the DRC and beyond the nation, which has never before had a pavilion in Venice. Two of the participants are in Koyo Kouoh』s main exhibition as well: Sammy Baloji and Léonard Pongo. Alongside them are Arlette Bashizi, Patrick Bongoy, Damso, Gosette Lubondo, Nelson Makengo, Aimé Mpané, and Géraldine Tobé, with Nadia Yala Kisukidiserving as curator.

Denmark has its youngest Venice Biennale representative ever in Maja Malou Lyse, whose photography, installations, sculptures, and more consider how media consumptions shapes one』s desires. Billed as 「Danish art』s fourth-wave feminist,」 Lyse』s Danish Pavilion will take the title 「Things to Come」 and explore 「whether an image could be powerful enough to alter humanity』s fertility potential – and whether pornography can rescue the human species,」 according to a release. 「I』m ready to give the biennale some sex appeal,」 the artist, who was born in 1993, said in a statement at the time of her announcement. Chus Martínez will serve as curator.

Venue: Giardini

Titled 「Tawna & Oscar」 after its participating artists, the Ecuadorian Pavilion this year will be done by Oscar Santillán and Tawna, a collective of Sápara, Kichwa, and mestizx artists that consists of Sani Montahuano, Enoc Merino, Boloh Miranda, Mukutsawa Montahuano, Lucía Ferré, Ipiak Ushigua, and Tatiana Lopez. The pavilion is curated by Manuela Moscoso, executive and artistic director of the Center for Art, Research and Alliances (CARA) in New York, with Ecuador』s Museum of Anthropology and Contemporary Art (MAAC) in Guayaquil serving as commissioner. Bringing together two practices that have been shaped by the Amazonian and Andean territories of Ecuador, the pavilion 「does not propose a single narrative or a unified image of Ecuador,」 a release notes.

Venue: Castello 1636/A

Making its debut at the Venice Biennale, El Salvador will be represented by J. Oscar Molina, a Salvadoran American artist who was born in the country. His pavilion, titled 「Cartographies of the Displaced,」 will feature at least 15 works from his 「Children of the World,」 which explores the concept of migration via rising splashes of color. In Venice, each work will be exhibited alongside a QR code that links out to a message from a member of a displaced community. Alejandra Cabezas, a Salvadoran poet and art historian, will curate his pavilion.

Venue: Palazzo Mora, Cannaregio 3659

There are few places of quietude in Venice during the Biennale, but Armen Agop plans to provide one with his Egyptian Pavilion, titled 「Silence Pavilion: Between the Intangible and the Tangible.」 Agop, who was born in Cairo and is based in Italy, hasn』t provided too many details about his pavilion, teasing it only with a cryptic text whose language recalls phrases in Koyo Kouoh』s statement about her main exhibition. 「The Egypt Pavilion is an invitation to slowness and to listen, to attune oneself to the imperceptible—to the silences between gestures, to the vibrations of stone, and to the quiet murmurs of being,」 Agop』s text says.

Venue: Giardini

One of the seven countries with a debut Biennale pavilion this year, Equatorial Guinea』s Venice premiere is a forest-themed group show that』s aptly called 「The Forest/The Undergrowth.」 Curator Joan Abelló has assembled a wide-ranging group of artists comprised of Fernando Nguema Madja, Modest Gené Roig, Rani Bruchstein, Barbara Cammarata, Florin Codre, Jianqi Du, Martin Emschermann, Alessia Forconi, Fulvio Merolli, Alfred Mirashi Milot, Mfochive Oumarou, Hannou Palosuo, Valeria Pérez Fuchs, Andrea Roggi, Sonia Ros, Carlotta Flora Saavedra González, Sandro Sanna, Giuseppe Saporito, Ingrid Seall, Michele Stanzione, Vassilis Vassiliades, Liu Youju, and William Marc Zanghi.

Venue: Palazzo Donà dalle Rose Cannaregio 5038 / 5101

Within Estonia, Merike Estna is well-known for her attempts to expand painting beyond the tried and true oil-on-canvas format. While she has regularly created abstractions that hang on walls, she has applied craft techniques in certain works, extended motifs shown on her canvases by repeating them throughout galleries, and added sculptural elements. Her pavilion will take the title 「The House of Leaking Sky」 and be organized by Natalia Sielewicz, the chief curator of the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw. According to a release by the pavilion』s commissioner, the Estonian Centre for Contemporary Art, Estna will transform the Patronato Salesiano Leone XIII into her studio for the entirety of the Biennale』s run, during which time she create a monumental painting on-site by 「gradually saturat[ing it] with colour and form.」

Venue: Calle S. Domenico, 1285

Tegene Kunbi, who was born in Addis Ababa and is now based in Berlin, will represent his home country of Ethiopia at the Biennale this year. Curated by Abebaw Ayalew, his exhibition will take the title 「Shapes of Silence」 and present a new series of work that combines abstract painting, textiles, and assemblage into large-scale canvases. Per a release, the exhibition looks at 「silence as a social and political condition,」 particularly through how it is embodied in Ethiopia』s folkloric traditions, in which noiselessness is 「praised as a virtue while simultaneously regarded as a potential misdeed.」

Venue: Palazzo Bollani, Castello 3647

Jenna Sutela, an artist known for boundary-pushing sculptures that utilize biological matter, AI, and digital technologies, has been picked to do Finland』s pavilion for the 2026 Biennale. Taking the 「Aeolian Suite,」 the pavilion will become a multisensory 「windscape of sound and movement,」 featuring an artwork 「composed using meteorological data, musical instruments, and the winds from Venice, Helsinki, and beyond,」 according to a release. Collaborators include hair artist Sara Mathiasson and set designer Celeste Burlina, whose scenography is 「set in the spirit of Commedia dell』arte traveling theatre.」 Stefanie Hessler, the director of New York』s Swiss Institute, will curate Sutela』s pavilion.

Venue: Giardini

Yto Barrada, one of France』s most famous living artists, will represent her home country in 2026. Barrada, who is of Moroccan descent, makes sculptures, installations, and conceptual artworks touching on a variety of interests, from the ways that ideas traverse the world to the means by which political movements are historicized. Barrada』s work has appeared in the main exhibitions of two Venice Biennales, though this is the first time she is doing a national pavilion. Myriam Ben Salah, director and chief curator of Chicago』s Renaissance Society, will organizer her pavilion. Referencing 「a well-known phrase from the French Revolution,」 the pavilion takes the title 「Comme Saturn」 and draws inspiration from the Renaissance belief that 「artists were believed to be born under Saturn, the planet of melancholy, withdrawal, and slow thought,」 per a release.

Venue: Giardini

In ancient Greek mythology, Georgia holds significance, since an island off its shore is said to have held the Golden Fleece. Curators Shalva Khakhanashvili andNino Metreveli have used that narrative as the basis for their Georgian Pavilion, which will feature the work of Tatia Darchiashvili, Konstantin Mindadze, Guram Nikoladze, Nestan Mikeladze, Manuchar Okrostsvaridze, Guela Patiachvili, Mamuka Tsetskhladze, Merab Buliskiria, Karim Borjas, Jean-Dominique Ferrucci, Aliska Lahusen, Eve Ramboz, Annette Turrillo, Pedro Morales, Eizo Sakata, Mauro Marcenaro, and Silvano Rubino.

Venue: Palazzo Querini – Calle Lunga San Barnaba 2691

In April 2025, the commissioner of the German Pavilion, ifa – Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen, announced that its pavilion would be curated by Kathleen Reinhardt, director of the Georg Kolbe Museum in Berlin, where she has organized acclaimed shows for Lin May Saeed and Noa Eshkol. A month later, Reinhardt selected Henrike Naumann and Sung Tieu as its representative artists for the 2026 Biennale, who will develop site-specific works for the pavilion. Both artists are known for creating large-scale installations that look at various political systems.

「With their conceptual and sculptural work, Sung Tieu and Henrike Naumann pose questions about historical responsibility,」 Reinhardt said in a statement at the time. 「They examine the role of individual and collective agency from the perspective of a young generation that situates the major themes of the German Pavilion in a completely different coordinate system.」

Naumann passed away on February 14, 2026, of cancer, according to her studio. A statement from her partner Clemens Villinger, and their one-year-old daughter Nina, said that Naumann』s contributions to the German pavilion will be 「realized in the same way that her career began: as a Gemeinschaftswerk, a collaborative effort, guided by Henrike』s artistic vision.」

Venue: Giardini

Lubaina Himid, the 2017 winner of the Turner Prize, will represent the Great Britain this time around, making her the second Black woman ever to receive the honor. A key figure of the British Black Arts Movement of the 1980s, she is known for paintings and installations about Black liberation, often with a special focus on women. In addition to her art practice, she has also organized a string of key art shows in the UK centered around Black artists, in particular Black women artists. Titled 「Predicting History: Testing Translation,」 the pavilion will be curated by Ese Onojeruo, who previously worked with Himid on the artist』s yearlong community project Creative Space, tied to her 2021 Tate Modern show.

Venue: Giardini

As has become common at the Venice Biennale, Andreas Angelidakis』s Greek Pavilion will be a meditation on nationhood itself. Titled 「Escape Rooms」 and curated by George Bekirakis, his pavilion will feature an installation rooted in Plato』s Cave and allude to the Nazis』 rise to power, focusing specifically on 1934, a pivotal year in the party』s ascent. (That year, as Angelidakis pointed out in a description for his exhibitions, was also when Greece and Austria opened their dedicated Biennale pavilions.) But more than merely gazing backward, Angelidakis will also chart how a fascination with illusions continues into the present. 「Replace Cave with Screen,」 he said in a statement, 「and it is every MAGA Variant staging Fascism in 2025.」

Venue: Giardini

Taking its cues from Koyo Kouoh』s curatorial text, Grenada』s pavilion will this year be focused on islands. Under the title 「The Poetics of Correspondence,」 curator Daniele Radini Tedeschi has assembled a group of artists that includes Edward Bowen, Arthur Daniel, Josine Dupont, Alexandra Kordas, Lilo Nido and Chris Mast, Jeverson Ramirez, the Holzwege Group, and Russell Watson.

Venue: Spazio Berlendis, Cannaregio 6301/A

Guatemala』s pavilion this year called 「Las Invisibles,」 a reference, curators Stefania Pieralice and Elsie Wunderlich have said, to 「Mayan women who offer their lives to the community daily, using mill, stone, and clay slabs to process corn, the source of everything and a tool for the appropriation of a people』s identity.」 Paying homage to those women』s ancient traditions and the earth they tend daily, the exhibition will feature work by ARKEO, Luana Bottallo, Jorge Chavarría, Manuel Navichoc, Ana Lorena Núñez, SOY artistic group, and Wunderlich.

Venue: Spazio Berlendis, Cannaregio 6301

Guinea is making its Venice Biennale debut with a pavilion that includes not just one or even a few artists, but more than 60 of them. Curator Bilia Bah has organized the pavilion, which is titled 「Le Son de l』Art: L』Écho de la Matière」 and features the following artists: Francesco Tullio Altan, Paola Arrigoni, Bella Bah, Nino Barone, Stefania Basso, Emiliano Bazzanella, Giuliana Bellini, Milena Bellomo, Bluer (Lorenzo Viscidi), Alda Bòscaro, Alessandro Cadamuro, Carmine Calvanese, Carmela Candido, Giancarlo Caneva, Tommaso Cascella, Giancarlo Cazzaniga, Bruno Ceccobelli, Giorgio Celiberti, Giorgio Celiberti Jr., Maurizio Cervellati, Marco Ciani, Massimo Clemente, Bachir DiaIlo, Bruno Donzelli, Mauro Filigheddu, Mirko Filipuzzi, Pasquale Fraccalvieri, Ferruccio Franz, Carla Galli Morandi, Omar Galliani, Andrea Marco Ghia, King Emmanuel, Gianni Maglio, Paolo Marazzi, Rossella Marchesin, Marvin, Enzo Migneco (Togo), Zdravko Milić, Giampaolo Muliari, Lucia Paese, Bruno Paladin, Giorgio Pastres, Ottavio Pinarello, Giuseppina Pioli, Manuela Pittana, Adriano Piu, Stefano Pizzi, Claudia Raza, Rosaspina, Andrea Rossi Andrea, Marco Nereo Rotelli, Gernot Schmerlaib (BIX), Cesare e Noah Serafino, Alessio Serpetti, Leo Strozzieri, Sékou Oumar Thiam, Lucia Tomasi, Angelo Toppazzini, Maurizio Valdemarin, Andrea Vizzini, Luciana Zabarella, Marina Zambon, Tono Zancanaro, Leonardo Zanin.

Venue: Isola di San Servolo

Artist Enock Placide will represent Haiti this year with a presentation entitled 「Yelena』s Garden.」 Curated by Mario Savini, that exhibition will feature a glass sphere, a video, and paintings that evoke 「an open and processual system,」 per the press materials. Some of the paintings will depict sunsets.

Venue: Palazzo Albrizzi-Capello Cannaregio 4118

The pavilion for the Vatican, or the Holy See as the city-state』s government is officially called, was among the most talked-about national presentations out of 2024』s Biennale, and the 2026 edition looks to continue the attention-grabbing spirit of the last one. Serpentine Galleries artistic director Hans Ulrich Obrist and chief technology officer Ben Vickers will serve as curators, working in collaboration with Soundwalk Collective for a show called 「The Ear Is the Eye of the Soul」 that will feature 24 artists and collectives and be spread across two venues: the Mystical Garden of the Discalced Carmelites and the Complesso di Santa Maria Ausiliatrice, in Castello.

The participating artists are Caterina Barbieri, Tatiana Bilbao Estudio, Carminho, Suzanne Ciani, Ilda David』, Benedictine Nuns of the Abbey of St. Hildegard Eibingen, Brian Eno, Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst, Devonté Hynes, Jim Jarmusch, Bhanu Kapil, Alexander Kluge, Laraaji, Kazu Makino, Kali Malone, Meredith Monk, Moor Mother, Otobong Nkanga, Precious Okoyomon, Terry Rile, Patti Smith, FKA Twigs, and Raúl Zurita. A quote by Pope Leo XIV guides the pavilion: 「The logic of algorithms tends to repeat what 『works,』 but art opens up what is possible. Not everything has to be immediate or predictable.」

Venues: Complesso di Santa Maria Ausiliatrice, Fondamenta S. Gioacchin, Castello 450; and Giardino Mistico dei Carmelitani Scalzi, Cannaregio 

Hong Kong does not have an official pavilion at the Biennale because it is not recognized as a state in Italy, but, as a special administrative region of China, it has staged a national presentation as a collateral event since 2001. During the making of its 2026 outing, Hong Kong changed things up, dropping M+ as its longtime organizer and bringing on two artists instead of one. Those artists are Angel Hui and Kingsley Ng, whose presentation will focus on 「the poetic rhythms of daily life,」 according to its description. Titled 「Fermata: Hong Kong in Venice,」 the pavilion』s new organizer is the Hong Kong Museum of Art and the Hong Kong Arts Development Council.

Venue: Campo della Tana, Castello 2126

Budapest-based artist Endre Koronczi will represent Hungary with a project titled 「Pneuma Cosmic,」 which will continue his long-term studies into 「the movement of air」 via 「fictional research revealing the forms of the cosmic breath that fills the entire world and manifests as air movement,」 according to a release. Koronczi was selected through an open-call process administered by the pavilion』s commissioner, Julia Fabényi, the director of the Ludwig Museum in Budapest; Luca Cserhalmi will serve as the pavilion』s curator.

Venue: Giardini

Many artists work in multiple mediums, but even by those standards, Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir』s oeuvre is pretty diverse. In addition to writing poems and making music, she has also produced what are commonly described as experimental operas. Guiding much of her work is a fascination with words, which she often tries to communicate in ways that exceed traditional forms of writing and speaking. Organized by independent curator Margrét Áskelsdóttir and artist Unnar Örn, Iceland』s 2026 pavilion sees the exhibition move to a new location, the Docks Cantieri Cucchini, which will inform the experience of the exhibition. For the pavilion, according to a release,Sigurðardóttir will consider 「where faith is placed, and on the friction between imagination and reality—moments where the two overlap, blur, and create new possibilities for belief.」

Venue: Docks Cantieri Cucchini, San Pietro di Castello

Returning to the Biennale for the first time since 2019, the Indian Pavilion this year take the title 「Geographies of Distance: remembering home,」 with work by five artists: Alwar Balasubramaniam (Bala), Sumakshi Singh, Ranjani Shettar, Asim Waqif, and Skarma Sonam Tashi. Per a release, the pavilion will look at how the concept of home 「becomes less a fixed place and more a portable condition: part memory, part material, part ritual, part personal mythology.」 The exhibition will be curated by Amin Jaffer, director of the Al Thani Collection, and it is being presented by the Indian Ministry of Culture, in collaboration with the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre in Mumbai and Serendipity Arts Foundation in New Delhi.

Venue: Arsenale

It』s been seven years since Indonesia has shown at the Venice Biennale, but now the nation is back with a pavilion called 「Printing the Unprinted.」 Aminudin TH Siregar, a curator at the National Gallery of Indonesia, will organize the presentation, which will features artists such as Agus Suwage, Syahrizal Pahlevi, R. E. Hartanto, Nurdian Ichsan, Theresia Agustina Sitompul (Terre), Mariam Sofrina, and Rusyan Yasin.

Venue: Scuola Internazionale di Grafica, Cannaregio 1798

Few details for Iran』s pavilion were available when the Venice Biennale announced every national exhibition this past March. That remained the case at the start of May, leaving it uncertain what form this pavilion will take—especially considering that Iran is still locked in a war led by the US and Israel (both of whom are participating in the Biennale). All that was known about the pavilion is that Aydin Mahdizadeh Tehrani is the pavilion』s commissioner. Then, on May 4, just as the Biennale was readying to open, it said Iran had dropped out, without much explanation.

This pavilion has been canceled.

Dublin-based artist Isabel Nolan will represent Ireland, with Georgia Jackson, director of the Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art at Trinity College, serving as curator. Nolan works in a variety of mediums, and her practice often explores themes of cosmology, mythology, history, and mortality. For the pavilion, she will present hand-tufted tapestry, drawing, and sculpture. Its title, 「Dreamshook,」 according to a release, 「describes the feeling of waking from a dream, when reality is destabilized and realms of possibility linger and dissipate.」

Venue: Arsenale

At the 2024 Biennale, the Israeli Pavilion never opened, as artist Ruth Patir said she would keep it closed until Hamas released Israeli hostages and Israel agreed to a ceasefire. (Neither happened before that Biennale ended, so the pavilion remained shuttered to the public.) But that is not likely to happen with the 2026 edition, by the Romanian-born, Haifa-based sculptor Belu-Simion Fainaru, which looks to be moving forward as planned—even as artists in the Biennale』s main exhibition have protested the pavilion, claiming it is inappropriate to 「platform the Israeli state as it commits genocide.」 (The Biennale has said it won』t remove that pavilion—or Russia』s—from the show.)

Fainaru』s pavilion will take the title 「Rose of Nothingness,」 with Avital Bar-Shay and Sorin Heller serving as curators. Drawing inspiration from poet Paul Celan, Fainaru will create an installation involving 16 pipes that will drip black water into a pool. It will be staged in the Arsenale rather than in the Giardini』s permanent pavilion for Israel, which the nation has said is under renovation.

Venue: Arsenale

Italy has one of the biggest Venice Biennale pavilions, and the nation has historically filled its walls with extravagant, grand, and showy installations. Italy』s 2026 representative, Chiara Camoni, seems likely to buck that trend because she works in a more understated manner. Her sculptures are often composed of terracotta, ceramic, and fabric elements that are combined to create forms similar to ones seen in nature. Sometimes, Camoni also sculpts mysterious images of women that seem one step removed from the days of antiquity. Her Venice pavilion, titled 「Con te con tutto」 (With you, with everything), will be curated by Cecilia Canziani.

Venue: Arsenale

Even though Ei Arakawa-Nash gave up his Japanese nationality several years ago, he has gained a wide audience in the country where he was born, with a sprawling survey for him staged by the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo in 2024. Known for imaginative works in which he stretches the possibilities of painting, turning activities typically done behind closed doors in a studio into public-facing performances, the Los Angeles–based artist will now take on a personal topic: his journey as the queer father of two baby twins. His pavilion, titled 「Grass Babies, Moon Babies,」 will take as its jumping-off point the 1962 Japanese film Being Two Isn』t Easy, about the trials and tribulations of a family unit as observed by a little kid. Lisa Horikawa and Mizuki Takahashi will curate.

Venue: Giardini

Qoñyr, the Kazakh term that lends this pavilion its title, refers both to a shade of brown and a certain kind of sound that is shot through with nostalgia. The works in this show organized by artist and curator Syrlybek Bekbota are thus muted and typically sound-oriented. Artists showing here include Ardak Mukanova, Assel Kadyrkhanova, ADYR‑ASPAN (Gulmaral Tattibayeva and Natalia Ligay), Anar Aubakir, Smail Bayaliyev, Nurbol Nurakhmet, Mansur Smagambetov, and Oralbek Kaboke.

Venue: Museo Storico Navale, Castello 2148 (Riva S. Biasio)

The Arts Council Korea selected Binna Choi as the curator for its upcoming pavilion, from a list of 18 candidates. Choi is a fixture on the biennale circuit, having curated the 2016 Gwagnju Biennale, served as co–artistic director of the 2022 Singapore Biennale, and co-curating the Hawaii Triennial 2025. Choi has selected Seoul-based artist Goen Choi and New York–based artist Hyeree Ro as the country』s representatives for a pavilion entitled 「Liberation Space,」 a nod to the three-year period following Japan』s defeat in World War II and Korea』s subsequent liberation from colonial rule.

In a statement, Choi recalled this moment recently when the country 「experienced an abrupt declaration of martial law by our sitting president, followed by over four months of nationwide impeachment rallies despite a deeply divided polity.」 The 「Liberation Space,」 for which the artists will create a 「living monument,」 will offer a site to consider that postwar moment』s 「evolution, continuity, and transnational potential amidst today』s geopolitics.」

Venue: Giardini

For the first time, Kosovo will be represented by a painter: Brilant Milazimi, whose figurative canvases often feature people with elongated bodies. According to the pavilion』s jury, the new works produced by Milazimi will ask: 「what happens to a person, a body, a nation, when it is endlessly in motion? What habits are formed in stillness? What tensions accumulate during pause?」 José Esparza Chong Cuy, director and chief curator of New York』s Storefront for Art and Architecture, will curate the pavilion, titled 「Hard Teeth.」

Venue: Chiesa di Santa Maria del Pianto

Alexey Morosov will represent Kyrgyzstan this year with a pavilion titled 「BELEK,」 its name translating from the Kyrgyz to 「gift.」 The titular installation will center around bodies of water and will invoke Brutalist architecture and Kok Boru, a game played on horseback by people belonging to Central Asian cultures. Curated by art historian Geraldine Leardi, the pavilion will mark 「not a return to the past, but a movement through it.」

Venue: Ex Chiesa di Santa Caterina, Convitto Foscarini, Cannaregio 4941

Whereas most pavilions tend to highlight artists still working, Lativa』s 2026 representative will be a collective that disbanded more than two decades ago. Untamed Fashion Assemblies, which was active between 1990 and 1999, will be the subject of the Latvian Pavilion, which approaches the collective as an 「unfinished project, one that speaks to urgent conversations around artistic experimentation, gender self-performance, anti-consumerist production, and collective imagination,」 per a release. Founded by artist Bruno Birmanis, the collective』s output bridged the gap between art, fashion, and other fields, and sought to divine connections between disparate countries in the Baltic region, Central Europe, Western Europe, and elsewhere. Inga Lāce and Adomas Narkevičius, the pavilion』s curators, described the group not as 「an attempt to mirror the West, but something stranger, and radically its own.」 The duo MAREUNROL』S will also contribute to the pavilion, titled 「Untamed Assembly: Backstage of Utopia.」

Venue: Arsenale

Nabil Nahas, a painter known for abstractions inspired by natural phenomena and architecture, will represent Lebanon at the Biennale. His pavilion, titled 「Don』t Get Me Wrong,」 will be curated by Nada Ghandour and is being organized by the Lebanese Visual Art Association, which praised Nahas for making art that 「resonates with contemporary concerns while evoking both the spiritual and the material, the intimate and the cosmic.」

Venue: Arsenale

Commissioned by the Lithuanian National Museum of Art and curated by independent curator Louise O』Kelly, Lithuania』s pavilion will be done by Eglė Budvytytė, who has titled it 「animism sings anarchy.」 The artist is no stranger to Venice, having shown in the main exhibition of the 2022 Biennale, organized by Cecilia Alemani. Based in Amsterdam and the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, Budvytytė is known for performances and video art. For this Biennale, she will show Warmblooded and Wingless, an ongoing work begun in 2024 that encompasses a multichannel film as well as sound and spatial components. 「Having worked with Egle for several years, I am particularly attracted to her authentic approach to embodiment, social relations and our symbiotic relationship with the environment,」 O』Kelly told LRT. 「Having grown up in Lithuania, she opens up a unique worldview in her works, showing the importance of lost belief and other systems of knowledge and ways of coexistence.」

Venue: Fucina del Futuro, Castello 5063/B

Born in Brussels, Aline Bouvy is now based between Luxembourg and Belgium. The multidisciplinary artist often looks at the relationship between bodies and the spaces that they inhabit. Her work has taken the form of sculptures, paintings, photography, and more. Titled 「La Merde,」 the pavilion takes its name from Bouvy』s first film; in this presentation it will take 「the form of an immersive audiovisual installation combining cinema, sound, and sculpture」 and be 「[c]entered around an anthropomorphic excrement figure,」 per a release. It is curated by Stilbé Schroeder, curator and head of department for exhibitions and programme at Casino Luxembourg – Forum d』art contemporain, which serves as its commissioner.

Venue: Arsenale

Fok Hoi Seng, O Chi Wai, and Lei Fung Ieng will work together for this pavilion, titled 「Jacone』s Polyphony」 in reference to the Portuguese name for Chinese painter Wu Li, who spent time in Macao. Their pavilion will take up the notion of cultural fusion and will be curated by Feng Yan and Ng Sio.

Venue: Arsenale, Campo della Tana, Castello 2126/A

Three artists—Adrian MM Abela, Charlie Cauchi, and Raphael Vella—will represent Malta under a project titled 「No Need to Sparkle; Experiments in Love and Revolution.」According to a press release the pavilion』s theme is 「an invitation to surrender to uncertainty and to embrace 『doubting well』 as a philosophy of our unstable times.」 Abela is a Los Angeles–based artist who studied architecture and civil engineering in Malta and Milan before receiving an MFA in sculpture at the University of California, Los Angeles. Cauchi is an interdisciplinary artist and filmmaker based in Malta. Vella is a professor of art education and socially engaged art at the University of Malta. The pavilion will be organized by Margerita Pulè, an independent curator and the founder-director of Malta』s Unfinished Art Space.

Venue: Arsenale

RojoNegro Collective, a Mexico City–based duo composed of María Sosa and Noé Martínez, will represent Mexico with a pavilion entitled 「Actos invisibles para sostener el universo」 (Invisible Acts to Sustain the Universe). Per its description, the pavilion will contend with topics such as 「ancestral memory, epistemic justice, decolonization, and relational ecology, drawing on indigenous, Afro-descendant, and peasant cosmogonies not as external references, but as living matrices of thought that shape their forms of creation, connection, and imagination.」 Jessica Berlanga Taylor will curate.

Venue: Arsenale

Pavel Brăila, an artist based between Chișinău and Berlin, will be the first artist to represent Moldova at the Biennale, with Bucharest-based Adelina Luft serving as curator. Taking the title 「On the Thousand and Second Night,」 his installation will present 「an ensemble of carpets hover[ing] between floor and vault, suspended by drones」 within an church, according to a release. As with several other pavilions, Brăila』s will respond to 「In Minor Keys,」 unfolding 「within a register of low frequencies: murmur, attention, and proximity,」 per the release.

Venue: Spazio Santa Veneranda, Chiesa dei Santi Geremia e Lucia 

Notions of togetherness and enmeshment will guide Mongolia』s pavilion this year, which will be called 「Entanglements: Connectivites Across Borders」 and curated by Uranchimeg Tsultem and Thomas Eller. Mining the relationship between humans and nonhumans and the earthly and spiritual realms, this pavilion 「reconsiders Mongolia not as a fixed geography but as a dynamic field of exchange,」 per its description. It will include work by Nomin Bold, Gerelkhuu Ganbold,Tuguldur Yondonjamts, and Dorjderem Davaa.

Venue: Squero Castello, Salizada Streta 368

For this pavilion, artist Siniša Radulović is debuting an installation called Out of the Blue, I』m Swept Away, which is loosely based on his own living space. With its glass flooring and its walls projected with abstract videos, the installation is meant to resemble 「a demonstrative micro-laboratory,」 per the pavilion』s description. At stake in the work, that description notes, is a fascination with image culture and all that it has wrought upon humanity. Svetlana Racanović will curate.

Venue: Artenova, Castello 5063

Morocco had plans to make its premiere at the Venice Biennale in 2024, though the pavilion ended up being disbanded amid what one of the country』s representatives called a 「nightmare」 situation behind the scenes. Now, Morocco is trying once more, this time with Amina Agueznay, an artist known for elegant weavings made with the assistance of local artisans. Meriem Berrada, artistic director of Marrakesh』s MACAAL museum, will curate the pavilion, entitled 「Asǝṭṭa,」 an Amazigh word for ritual weaving, according to a release.

Venue: Arsenale

The island republic of Nauru will present its first-ever pavilion at the Biennale this year. Titled 「AIM Inundated: Imagining Life After Land,」 the group presentation will present 「Nauru—the world』s smallest island nation—as an early and universal example of loss, adaptation, and resilience, a warning and guide for a shared future」 that is impacted by 「rising sea levels, environmental exhaustion, and the enduring legacies of colonial extractivism,」 per a release. 「AIM Inundate」 will feature the work of 10 artists working in a range of mediums, painting and installation to video and photography.

A centerpiece of the presentation will be a video work entitled We Are All Nauru by artist Stefano Cagol, who also serves as an associate curator of the project. The chief curator of the pavilion is Khaled Ramadan, who makes up one-half of the duo, CPS Chamber of Public Secrets, with Alfredo Cramerotti; they will show a selection of objects from their archive into ecological distress. (Camilla Boemio will also serves as associate curator of the pavilion.) The other participating artists are Kauw Tsitsi, Patricia Jacomella Bonola, Tedo Rekhviashvili, Sylvia Grace Borda, Ron Laboray, Dorian Batycka, Khaled Hafez, and Iv Toshain.

Venue: Spazio Castello 3683, Calle Bosello 3683, Castello 

The 2024 Biennale was a notable one for New Zealand in two ways. Ahead of the show, the country said it couldn』t host its pavilion that year after a report revealed that there were 「inadequate」 resources to do so. Then, at the exhibition itself, the Māori artists』 group Mataaho Collective took the top honors. With all that in the background, New Zealand has now officially plotted its return to the Biennale, and has even promised pavilions through the 2030 edition. In 2026, photographer Fiona Pardington (Kāi Tahu, Kāti Mamoe, Ngāti Kahungunu, Clan Cameron of Erracht) will do the New Zealand Pavilion, which takes the title 「Taharaki Skyside」 and is being billed as 「an atmospheric exhibition.」

Venue: Istituto Provinciale per I』Infanzia Santa Maria della Pietà di Venezia, Riva degli Schiavoni, Castello 3702

For the first time ever, performance art will fill the Dutch Pavilion, courtesy of artist Dries Verhoeven, who will work on the presentation in collaboration with curator Rieke Vos. On Verhoeven』s mind are some pretty bleak topics. 「Geopolitical tensions are grave, and that』s putting it mildly,」 he said in a statement about the project, titled The Fortress. 「It has been many years since our future felt this uncertain. I want to attempt to make this unease tangible, within the 『safe space』 of the Biennale.」

Venue: Giardini

The Nordic Countries Pavilion, a collaboration between Finland, Norway, and Sweden, has selected three artists for its 2026 Biennale presentation, which will be curated by Anna Mustonen, chief curator of the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki. They are Klara Kristalova, Benjamin Orlow, and Tori Wrånes. With the 「How Many Angels Can Dance on the Head of a Pin?,」 the exhibition, according to Mustonen, 「invites visitors to journey through a dynamic interplay of imagination and reality that bridges Nordic cultural heritage with broader global contexts.」

Venue: Giardini

For this pavilion, Velimir Zernovski will remake Michelangelo』s Pietà at one-third of its actual size, adorning its surfaces with the golden emergency blankets frequently used to safeguard refugees. The title of his pavilion is 「Pietà in the Emergency Blankets.」

Venue: Ex Cappella Buon Pastore, Castello 77

Serving as both artist and curator, Haitham Al Busafi represents Oman with 「Zinah,」 an immersive installation rooted in the practice of Al-zaanah, the traditional Omani silver adornment used for horses. A key element of Omani cultural heritage, Al-zaanah functions both as craft and as a visual language articulating the bond between rider and horse. For the Biennale, Al Busafi reimagines this symbolic system as a participatory environment in which silver forms are suspended above a sand-covered floor continually reshaped by visitors』 movement.

As Al Busafi explains in a statement, 「The Al-zaanah taught me that adornment is not about possession or display, it is about recognition. A culture that adorns its horses is a culture that refuses to treat any companion as mere instrument, but as an extension of the self.」 The pavilion is commissioned be Sayyd Saeed bin Sultan bin Yarub Al Busaidi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth for Culture.

Venue: Arsenale

Lahore-born artist Faiza Butt will represent Pakistan in 「PunjAB – A Sublime Terrain,」 marking the country』s second participation following its inaugural pavilion in 2019. Working across drawing, painting, and sculpture, Butt』s presentation surveys recent cultural memory in Pakistan while situating it within broader global conversations in contemporary art.

Pavilion curator Cifuentes Feliciano said in a statement: 「My curatorial approach foregrounds plural art histories, positioning contemporary art from Pakistan in dialogue with inherited traditions of making.」 The pavilion is commissioned by Yaqoob Khan Bangash, a historian of modern South Asia.

Venue: Ex Farmacia Solveni, Dorsoduro 993-994

Italy is one of the 11 EU countries that currently does not recognize Palestine as a nation-state, though as recently as September 2025, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said her country would recognize Palestine once all of the Israeli hostages had been released and Hamas was excluded from any government, according to Reuters. (The hostages were released in October 2025.) As such, Palestine does not have an official national participation at the Biennale.

To circumvent this reality, the Palestine Museum US, located in Woodbridge, Connecticut, has mounted a collateral event highlighting the work of Palestinian artists at the 2022 and 2024 Biennales. The museum will once again stage a collateral event for the 2026 edition, carrying the title: 「 _____________」 *: * Gaza – No Words – See the Exhibit. The pavilion will feature 100 pieces of Palestinian tatreez (hand embroidery) that document Israel』s genocide in Gaza. Several of the works were made by Palestinian women in refugee camps in Lebanon, Jordan, and the West Bank. Each piece measures 50 by 80 centimeters (about 20 by 31.5 inches) and has 55,000 stitches, totaling 5.5 million stitches, according to a release.

According to the release, the exhibition 「serves as an indelible record of the atrocities in Gaza, preserving evidence and bearing witness to the experiences of those affected. The exhibit aims to raise global awareness and urge the international community toward accountability and justice.」

Venue: Palazzo Mora, Strada Nova, Cannaregio 3659

Two years after showing in the main exhibition of the Venice Biennale, Antonio José Guzmán and Iva Jankovic, a duo who also go by the name Messengers of the Sun, are returning to the lagoon city, this time as the national representatives for Guzmán』s home country, Panama. (Jankovic was born in the former Yugoslavia.) Together, they will present a large-scale installation and performance that explores communities that were displaced—and largely scrubbed from the annals of history—during the construction of the Panama Canal. Titled 「Tropical Hyperstition,」 the artists』 project looks at Panama 「not only as a global place of passage, but as a territory deeply marked by imperial ambition, logistical power, and the social engineering of colonial modernity,」 according to release. Mónica Kúpfer and Ana Elizabeth González will curate the pavilion.

Venue: Tesa 42 Arsenale, Fondamenta Case Nuove, 2738c 

Sara Flores, a Shipibo artist whose abstractions have captured global attention and made her one of the few Indigenous artists with blue-chip gallery representation, will represent Peru. Her pavilion will feature more of her works on fabric, which she produces using dyes and feature patterns known kené. These patterns map Shipibo knowledge and immortalize it. Titled 「De otros mundos」 (From Other Worlds), her pavilion will be curated by Issela Ccoyllo and Matteo Norzi.

Venue: Arsenale

Jon Cuyson, an artist and filmmaker known for work that explores Filipino history via waterways and the labor involved in maintaining them as market byways, will represent the Philippines this time around. His pavilion will be curated by Mara Gladstone, who will work with Cuyson as he collaborates with mussel farmers, experts in aquaculture, and others based in the Philippines. Titled 「Sea of Love / Dagat ng Pag-ibig,」 the presentation will include painting, sculpture, and video, including his 「Kerel Triology,」 which focuses on a gay Filipino seafarer, and the debut of Sea of Echoes, drawing on what the artist classes 「mussel thinking,」 or how mussels are able to survive within even the most unstable of conditions.

Venue: Arsenale

Poland』s 2024 pavilion, a video installation about the war in Ukraine, was a searing statement about all that could and could not be communicated. The nation』s 2026 pavilion, by Bogna Burska and Daniel Kotowski, will take up a similar theme with a much different focus: the songs of humpback whales. The artists will work with Chór w Ruchu (Choir in Motion), composed of both hearing and Deaf participants, for a video installation that translates those songs into English and sign language. Ewa Chomicka and Jolanta Woszczenko will curate the pavilion, titled 「Liquid Tongues.」

Venue: Giardini

Alexandre Estrela, who recently showed a mind-bending installation at the Museum of Modern Art that featured video of printing plates with a trippy accompanying soundtrack, will stage Portugal』s 2026 pavilion. The exhibition will be curated by Ana Baliza and Ricardo Nicolau; Baliza previously designed Estrela』s MoMA installation. For his pavilion, titled 「RedSkyFalls,」 Estrela will present a new iteration of a 2019 work that is being billed as 「an operating system that integrates new digital beings.」 A release states that that the project was selected because its 「quieter registers」 resonate with Kouoh』s 「In Minor Keys.」

In a statement, Portuguese culture minister Margarida Balseiro Lopes said, 「At a time when the world seems to be living in a permanent state of urgency — between overlapping crises, technological accelerations, and political and environmental unrest — the International Art Exhibition reminds us that there is another way of being. A more attentive, more sensitive, more human way.」

Venue: Fondaco Marcello, Calle del Traghetto / Ca』 Garzoni, San Marco 3415

Thai artist Rirkrit Tiravanija has convened a group of musicians, poets, chefs, and artists from across the Arabic-speaking world for the Qatar National Pavilion. Titled 「Untitled (a gathering of remarkable people),」 the exhibition is co-curated by Tom Eccles, executive director of the Center for Curatorial Studies and the Hessel Museum of Art at Bard College, and Ruba Katrib, chief curator and director of curatorial affairs at MoMA PS1. The show will unfold in a tent in the Giardini, on the future site of the country』s permanent pavilion currently under construction by Lebanese-born architect Lina Ghotmeh.

Extending Tiravanija』s years-long practice of bringing collaborators together to share space and meals, the presentation features a film by Qatari American artist Sophia Al-Maria, performances organized by Lebanese artist Tarek Atoui, and a monumental sculpture by Kuwaiti Puerto Rican artist Alia Farid. These contributions are anchored by a culinary program developed by Palestinian chef Fadi Kattan, drawing on the diverse flavors of the SWANA region.

Venue: Giardini

Artist duo Anca Benera & Arnold Estefán will represent Romania at the Biennale this year, with an ambitious presentation that will extend beyond the country』s permanent structure in the Giardini to the Romanian Institute for Humanistic Research (Palazzo Correr) in Venice』s Cannaregio. Titled 「Black Seas—Scores for the Sonic Eye,」 the pavilion will take the form of a large-scale, audiovisual and sculptural installation that 「reimagines the Black Sea as a site of acoustic memory and geoecological fracture,」 per a release. Corina Oprea and Diana Marincu will serve as curators.

Venues: Giardini; New Gallery of the Romanian lnstitute for Culture and Humanistic Research Palazzo Correr, Campo Santa Fosca, Cannareggio 2214

Russia is participating in the Biennale for the first time since the nation』s invasion of Ukraine in 2022—a fact that has already generated intense controversy. As of late April, even as the EU threatened to defund the Biennale and national leaders said they wouldn』t come to the show, the Russian Pavilion was moving forward, anyway, with an exhibition titled 「The tree is rooted in the sky」 and curated by Anastasiia Karneeva, who also serves as commissioner. The exhibition will feature more than three musicians from Russia and abroad, per its organizers.

The full list of participants is as follows: Antonio Buonuario, DJ Diaki, Marco Dinelli, Timofey Dudarenko, Faina, Oleg Gudachev, Atosigado, Hérica, Jaijiu, JLZ, Tatiana Khalbaeva, Alexey Khovalyg, Roman Malyavkin, Petr Musoev, Valerie Oleynik, Alexey Retinsky, Mikhail Spasskii, Lukas Sukharev, Alexey Sysoev, Maria Vinogradova, Alexey Retinsky, Intrada Ensemble (Ekaterina Antonenko, Daria Khrisanova, Oksana Kuznetsova, Olga Talysheva, Veronika Okuneva, Serafim Chaikin, Artem Nikolaev, Bogdan Petrenko, Ilya Tatakov), Toloka Ensemble (Ekaterina Rostovtseva, Lizaveta Anshina, Antonina Sergeeva, Zhanna Gefling, Yaroslav Paradovsky, Vera Bazilevskikh, Sofya Ivanishkina), giorgino, Phurpa (Alexey Tegin, Nikita Korolev, Georgy Orlov-Davydovsky), Selfish 「S.r.l.」

Venue: Giardini

In a former timber and coal warehouse, Mark Francis will stage San Marino』s pavilion, which he』s titled 「Sea of Sound.」 The Northern Irish artist is best known for his abstract paintings about phenomenological concepts and natural matter, though in a statement about his pavilion, he teased a recent interest in film and video. His Venice pavilion, curated by Luca Tommasi, will feature a projection called Listening Field and a series of new paintings.

Venue: Tana Art Space, Fondamenta de la Tana 2111

Dana Awartani, a Saudi artist who is of Palestinian descent, was a star of the 2024 Venice Biennale, where she showed an installation featuring darned silk textiles that she intended as a homage to violence and healing in Gaza. Now, Awartani is back at Venice, this time as Saudi Arabia』s representative. Titled 「May your tears never dry, you who weep over stones,」 her pavilion is being billed as the artist』s 「most ambitious project to date.」 Antonia Carver, the director of Art Jameel since 2016, will serve as the pavilion』s curator, with Hafsa Alkhudairi as assistant curator.

Venue: Arsenale

After sitting out the 2024 due to funding concerns, Scotland, which participates via a collateral event, will return to Venice with a presentation by Burgarin + Castle, a duo composed of artists Davide Bugarin and Angel Cohn Castle. 「Drawing on queer histories, Scottish archives and Filipino cultural heritage, Bugarin + Castle』s project will examine how sound and costume shape social control,」 an announcement for the pavilion reads. The exhibition be organized by the curatorial team of the Mount Stuart Trust, which includes curator Morven Gregor.

Venue: Olivolo, Castello 59/C

Senegalese artist Caroline Gueye, who lives between Dakar and Europe, will take over her home country』s pavilion with a new installation, titled WURUS, which means 「gold」 in Wolof. Curated by critic Massamba Mbaye, who also organized the 2024 Senegalese Pavilion, Gueye』s presentation will bring together elements in brass, polymer bronze, mirrors, and light-based devices. 「Gold is a starting point, not a subject,」 Gueye said in a Q&A about the project. 「It opens up a reflection on value, but the project is about the conditions through which something becomes perceptible and acquires value. Value does not reside in objects, but emerges from conditions of perception.」

Venue: Palazzo Navagero Riva degli Schiavoni 4145

When Predrag Đaković was named as Serbia』s representative in 2025, his selection was treated by many members of the local art community as both a surprise and an offense. (Tomaš Koudela was named curator of his pavilion at the time.) The Prague-based artist has made work about the former Yugoslavia, the Holocaust, and other topics, but none of his art was well-known in Serbia, where artists have claimed that someone more famous than Đaković actually deserved the honor. More than 600 people subsequently called for the artist』s ejection, calling the process for his appointment 「unprofessional and non-transparent」 in a petition that is still circulating. Titled 「Through Golgotha to Resurrection,」 Đaković』s pavilion, however, seems to be proceeding.

Venue: Giardini

Echoing an emphasis on subdued art that runs through Koyo Kouoh』s main exhibition, this pavilion curated by Sandro Orlandi and Willy Montini brings together a range of artists under the name 「Worlds of Today.」 While it technically marks Sierra Leone』s Venice Biennale debut, it also includes artists from Italy, Mexico, Senegal, Togo, Benin, and Nigeria. Those artists are Hawa-Jane Bangura, Ayesha Feisal, Hickmatu Bintu Leigh, Abu Bakarr Mansaray, Eros Bonamini, Piergiorgio Colombara, Jacopo Di Cera, Fernando Garbellotto, Gianfranco Gentile, Margherita Levo Rosenberg, Alberto Salvetti, Seyni Awa Camara, Abdoul Ganiou Dermani, Eloy Lokossou, Móyòsóré Martins, and Armando Amaya Romero.

Venue: Liceo Guggenheim Sestiere Dorsoduro, 2613

Amanda Heng will represent Singapore at the Biennale. At 73, she is the oldest artist and only the second woman to take over the city-state』s pavilion, which this year will be titled 「A Pause.」 After a career as an income tax officer, Heng dedicated herself to art making in 1986. She cofounded the Artist』s Village, an art colony, and Women in the Arts, an artist-run women collective, in 1988 and 1999, respectively. She is best known for durational performances, like Walking The Stool (1999), a work that doubled as a performance and a protest against Singapore』s ban on art in that medium. The pavilion will be curated by Selene Yap, a curator at the Singapore Art Museum, which collaborates with the county』s National Arts Council, the pavilion』s commissioner.

Venue: Arsenale

「Soundtrack for an Invisible House,」 the title of the Slovenian Pavilion, turns to craftsmanship in an era shaped by rapidly evolving—and at times unsettling—forms of automation, from artificial intelligence to 3D printing and large-scale machine labor. Curator Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez has commissioned Nonument Group (Neja Tomšič, Martin Bricelj Baraga, Nika Grabar, Miloš Kosec) to consider how human agency might persist within a future increasingly defined by uniform systems. The exhibition will reportedly feature a series of totems symbolizing the knowledge, improvisation, and spirit carried forward by makers—whether or not machines are present. 

Venue: Arsenale

The inaugural Somali Pavilion, titled 「SADDEXLEEY」—a reference to a form of Somali poetry—is jointly curated by Mohamed Mire, a curator at the Fotografiska photography museum in Stockholm, and Venice-based project manager Fabio Scrivanti. Abdirahman Yusuf serves as the pavilion』s commissioner. 

However, the project has sparked controversy in the weeks leading up to its May opening, as the organizers did not include any artists currently based in Somalia. The three participating artists—Ayan Farah, Asmaa Jama, and Warsan Shire—all have ties to Somalia, but each works outside the country: Farah is based in Stockholm, Jama in Bristol, and Shire in Los Angeles. Farah and Jama were born in Somalia, while Shire, who is of Somali descent, was born in Kenya.

Earlier this month, four Somali art spaces—the Somali Arts Foundation, Arlo Artspace, Shaneema Banaadir, and Baciid Center—issued a critical statement, saying the organizers had 「neither meaningfully consulted nor included」 representatives of Somalia』s art scene. The statement described the pavilion as a 「private opportunity」 and raised questions about its funding source. 「This pavilion does not speak for us,」 it reads. The statement was signed by nine Somalia-based artists, including poet and photographer Bushra Mohamed, artist Shamso Mohamed Jeylaani, and writer and filmmaker Ifraax Aden, among others.

Venue: Palazzo Caboto, Via Giuseppe Garibaldi, 1645, Castello

Technically, this year, South Africa will not have an official pavilion at this year』s Biennale. Ahead of the deadline for countries to submit their pavilions to the Biennale in January, South African culture minister Gayton McKenzie rescinded the selection of artist Gabrielle Goliath, whose work had featured in the main exhibition of the 2024 Biennale. Goliath had planned to exhibit a work entitled Elegy, a multichannel video that the artist has described as 「a call to mourn.」

According to multiple reports, the work would feature sections about historical and contemporary moments of femicide and genocide in places like South Africa, Namibia, and Gaza. It was the reference to Gaza which McKenzie took issue with, calling it 「highly divisive in nature and relates to an ongoing international conflict that is widely polarizing」 in a letter to the pavilion』s selection committee ahead of the cancelation. McKenzie threatened to pull the pavilion if changes were not made. He eventually did so, which Goliath and the selection committee labeled as censorship.

McKenzie has denied this charge, claiming instead that he was informed that an unnamed foreign country was planning to buy the work after the Biennale, and that he believed 「South Africa』s platform was being used as a proxy by a foreign power to endorse a geopolitical message about the actions of Israel in Gaza.」 (The Israeli publication Ynetnews has reported that South African officials had reportedly named Qatar as the country in question.) Goliath took McKenzie to court, seeking to reinstate the pavilion, but South Africa』s highest court dismissed the matter.

Still, Goliath is determined to present Elegy in Venice, organizing an independent exhibition at the Chiesa di Sant』Antonin to do so. (This presentation is not an official collateral event of the Biennale.) The Bertha Foundation, a family foundation founded in Cape Town, with offices in Geneva and London, is providing major support for the exhibition, with other funding coming from Golitah』s gallery Galleria Raffaella Cortese; the Fondazione ICA Milano; the London-based arts charity Ibraaz; and a newly formed group called Friends of Elegy. (Following its run in Venice, Elegy will travel to Ibraaz in 2026 and the ICA Milano in 2027.)

A description for this iteration of Golitah』s presentation describes the work as 「[a]ddressing conditions that render Black, brown, feminine, and queer lives precarious.」 It will be accompanied by a publication, Elegy Reader, that will feature poetry and texts that respond to 「histories of displacement, colonialism, and genocide, the publication gathers voices from South Africa, Palestine, Lebanon, Iran, Sudan, Namibia, Haiti, and beyond,」 with a public reading taking place on May 7.

Venue: Arsenale (Empty)
Venue: Chiesa di Sant』Antonin, Salizada S. Antonin (Independent Exhibition)

Oriol Vilanova will represent Spain with a project called 「Los Restos」 that draws from the artist』s collection of postcards amassed over the past 20 years from flea markets and second-hand shops and now numbering in the tens of thousands. Carles Guerra, an artist, critic, and curator, will organize Vilanova』s pavilion. Per a release, 「The Spanish Pavilion will present this collection as an evolving 『anti-museum』, where modest yet sustained gestures of gathering become a powerful response to our present concerns about preservation, accumulation, and the economies associated to cultural value.」

Venue: Giardini

This time around, Switzerland will have not by one but six representatives: Gianmaria Andreetta, Luca Beeler, Nina Wakeford, Miriam Laura Leonardi, Lithic Alliance, and Yul Tomatala, all of whom will work collectively on a project called 「The Unfinished Building of Living Together.」 Per its description, that project will focus on a 1978 episode of the Swiss television program Telearena that featured queer people bitterly debating their sexual orientation with conservative audience members. The pavilion 「seeks to examine the conditions and possibilities of tolerance and belonging as well as forms of social division,」 per its description. Andreetta and Beeler, who are curators, and Wakeford, an artist, initiated the project together, and serve as its curators; together, they brought on the remaining three members. It』s the first time Switzerland』s pavilion was chosen through an open call.

Venue: Giardini

Curated by Yuko Hasegawa, 「The Tower Tomb of Palmyra」 marks Syria』s first national pavilion since the end of its civil war (2011–24), and explores the nation』s cultural heritage—frequently targeted by militant groups throughout the protracted conflict. Sara Shamma』s solo presentation centers on Palmyra, the archaeological site that has come to symbolize Syrian resilience. As the artist has stated, 「Palmyra』s towers, though destroyed, continue to speak to the strength and diversity of our history. This exhibition is not only a reflection on loss, but a message of hope, unity, and the importance of protecting and restoring our shared heritage.」 

The large-scale installation combines painting, architecture, light, sound, and scent to evoke the monumental family mausoleums that once rose above the desert landscape before their destruction. In the years of conflict, hundreds of funerary portraits were looted and trafficked out of Syria, positioning 「The Tower Tomb of Palmyra」 as both a lament for lost heritage and a declaration that such works may one day be recovered. 

Venue: Università IUAV Venezia, Cotonificio, Dorsoduro 2196

Officially a collateral event, Taiwan』s national presentation will be given over to Li Yi-Fan, an emerging artist who has gained acclaim in his home country over the past several years. He won the 8th Tung Chung Prize, given by the Taipei-based Hong Foundation, in 2024, which comes with 1 million NTD (around $31,000) and the opportunity to create a new work and support for a residency at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam. His 30-minute film What Is Your Favorite Primitive (2023), made for that year』s Taipei Biennial, takes the form of a parody of tech keynote speech in which the protagonist grapples with the ethical issues of the field, particularly when it comes to image-based software. Raphael Fonseca, curator at large at the Denver Art Museum and a cocurator of the 2027 Bienal de São Paulo, will organize the pavilion.

Venue: Palazzo delle Prigioni, Castello 4209

Following its debut at the 2024 Biennale, Timor-Leste is returning to Venice with an intergenerational trio of artists: Veronica Pereira Maia, Etson Caminha, and Juventino Madeira. Curator Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani is on tap to organize their pavilion, titled 「Across Words.」

Venue: Arsenale

Nilbar Güreş has gained a following in Turkey for painted textiles that are sometimes made with local artisans and often broach issues related to gender and sexuality in the country. Having recently held a show at Arter, one of the most highly esteemed contemporary art museums in Istanbul, Güreş will now represent her country in Venice in a pavilion titled 「A KISS ON THE EYES」 and organized by Başak Doğa Temür.

Venue: Arsenale

The Ugandan Pavilion brings together Joseph Ntensibe, Lilian Mary Nabulime, Ronex Ahimbisibwe, Lakwena Maciver, Sheila Nakitende, Stacey Gillian Abe, and Aloka Trevor in a presentation titled 「KAMPALA,」 after the capital city. It is dedicated to 「material culture, spirituality, and social memory」 across East African creative traditions, according to a statement.

Visitors can expect new work by Abe, continuing her long-running exploration of personal and social ancestry across painting, sculpture, and textile—often rendered in rich shades of indigo; research-driven sculpture by Nabulime, incorporating found materials tied to her ongoing engagement with women』s healthcare; and near-abstract multimedia paintings by Ahimbisibwe, among others. 

Venue: Palazzo Navagero Gallery, Riva degli Schiavoni 4147

Seven years after appearing in the main exhibition of the Venice Biennale, Zhanna Kadyrova will now represent her home country with a project called 「Security Guarantees.」 Featured in the pavilion will be a sculpture called Deer, which she originally installed in 2019 in Yuvileynyy Park in Pokrovsk and crafted from a dismantled Soviet military plane. When Pokrovsk was evacuated in 2024, Kadyrova had to deinstall the work. Leonid Marushchak, a cocurator of the pavilion alongside Kseniya Malykh, called the work 「a symbol of the modern tribulations of symbols of the past against the backdrop of contemporary challenges.」 Alongside the work itself, Kadyrova will show IDP, a film made with Natalka Dyachenko, who served as cinematographer, that documents the work』s removal.

Venue: Arsenale, Riva Ca』 di Dio

「Washwasha」—meaning 「whispering」 in Arabic—forms the basis of this year』s United Arab Emirates presentation. The six participating artists—Mays Albaik, Jawad Al Malhi, Farah Al Qasimi, Alaa Edris, Lamya Gargash, Taus Makhacheva—map the evolving soundscape of the Persian Gulf nation, one rapidly transformed in recent decades by migration and modernization. Drawing on both historical and contemporary sources, the works draw from animal calls, oral histories, and the metallic hum of machines. The exhibition is curated by Bana Kattan, curator and associate head of exhibitions at the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Project, with assistance from curator Tala Nassar. Together, they have shaped a series of sonic chambers that range from ghostly to fully immersive cacophony.

Venue: Arsenale