2026.05.09 — 2026.11.22 · Happening now
Venice Art Biennale 2026
The 61st Venice Art Biennale, In Minor Keys, comes from the curator Koyo Kouoh, who died in 2025; her team completed her concept. It runs across the Giardini and the Arsenale until 22 November. A first visit can follow two artists: in the Giardini’s Central Pavilion, Pio Abad traces taken objects in fine ink lines; in the Arsenale, Gala Porras-Kim uses drawing, sculpture and film to ask how conservation and restoration change them. The performance artist Laurie Anderson also shows in the Arsenale.
1897.76.36.18.6 (2023–2026) draws Benin bronzes held in the British Museum beside heaps of household objects of the same size.
The title reads like a museum number, and 1897 is the year British forces looted Benin City and took these bronzes. Up close it is line after fine ink line; step back and one side is only a number while the other is a life someone lived, and the history of the taking becomes concrete.
In the Arsenale’s Applied Arts Pavilion she works with two kinds of textile: pieces restored by the museum, and pieces a former employee stole from London’s V&A and remade.
Drawing, sculpture and film together ask: when the shape, the label and the history have all changed, do we still know it as the same thing? The pavilion itself is run with the V&A, which makes the question pointed.
Checked · 2026-09-20
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2019 · Armin Kleiner · Photo source · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Preview cropped; enlarge for full image. · Report image rights
General admission gives one entry each to the Giardini and the Arsenale, usable on two days; the 3-day and 7-day passes differ.
Most Mondays are closed; collateral exhibitions around the city have their own hours and tickets.
The works come with a lot of text; leave time to read if you want to follow Pio Abad and Gala Porras-Kim.
Beyond the Central Pavilion the Giardini hold dozens of national pavilions, and the Arsenale is a long run of old shipyard buildings; give each 4–6 hours rather than one crowded afternoon.
Official 2026 map: Giardini, Arsenale and water-transport overview. Overview of the two main sites and connections, not individual artwork positions.
2026-05-09–2026-11-22; consult the official calendar for individual operating dates and times.
Europe/RomeChoose vaporetto stops for Giardini or Arsenale; the main venues can be linked on foot.
Standard EUR30.50; multi-day EUR40.50–50.50. Includes EUR0.50 presale fee. Standard admission gives one entry to each main venue on possibly separate days;3-/7-day tickets have different access.
From EUR 30.50
Check current official accessible routes and companion policies.
Dates and entry details refer to this edition; individual sessions may differ.
Armin Kleiner · CC BY-SA 4.0 Image source
La Biennale di Venezia
Information checked on 2026-09-20
Suggest a correction ↗With Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu as curators and a title that simply says “Do Architecture”, six months of exhibits in the Giardini and the Arsenale are about how buildings are really made.
Italy · Venice
Boats parade on the canal, masked balls fill the squares and someone is making a mask in every other alley: a whole city, and for over a week nobody knows who you are.
Italy · Venice
Four walls and the floor become Hockney’s pictures: Yorkshire woods, Los Angeles pools and iPad springs, told in his own voice.
Singapore · Singapore
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