Art & Exhibitions
Russia Returns to the Venice Biennale After a Hiatus
Here's your up-to-the-minute list of all the national pavilions announced so far.
Jo Lawson-Tancred
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As the May opening of the 61st Venice Biennale approaches, national pavilions across the Giardini and the wider city are rolling out their artists lists and curatorial concepts.
A notable entry among the final list of participants announced on March 4 is Russia. The country is making a comeback after withdrawing its planned exhibition in 2022, shortly after the outbreak of war in Ukraine. In 2024, Russia lent its national pavilion to Bolivia. This year, it plans to stage “The Tree is Rooted in the Sky,” an exhibition of more than 50 young musicians, poets, and philosophers from Russia and other countries.
The biennale confirmed to ARTnews that it had never banned Russia from taking part, as it does not generally decide whether or not nations will participate. Mikhail Shvydkoy, Russia’s delegate for international cultural exchanges insisted that this is not a “return.” Rather, the Russia pavilion in the Giardini has always signaled the country’s “presence […] in Venice’s cultural space.” He added that the exhibition is “proof that Russian culture is not isolated, and that attempts to ‘cancel’ it—undertaken for the past four years by Western political elites—have not succeeded.”
As always, some national pavilion announcements have stirred controversy. An online petition has been launched by artists and cultural workers seeking to have painter Predrag Đaković removed as representative of Serbia, on the basis that he does not represent “the quality of contemporary artistic production” in the country. The artist-run activist group Art Not Genocide Alliance (ANGA) is calling on the biennale to exclude Israel from this year’s event until it is “brought to justice for its crimes.” The group warned that if Israel is not removed it will mobilize “a full artist and audience boycott.
South Africa will not host a pavilion at this year’s Venice Biennale, the culture ministry confirmed in February. The fate of the pavilion had been in limbo since the start of January after the culture minister abruptly canceled a planned exhibition of Gabrielle Goliath‘s work due to concerns about a piece that included references to a Palestinian poet who was killed in Gaza. Meanwhile, Australia has reinstated artist Khaled Sabsabi as its Venice representative after dropping him when his selection had became a political hot potato.
Some of the most exciting announcements in the lead up to Venice are often about countries exhibiting for the first time and El Salvador, Ecuador, and Morocco are among those making their debut.
Others are taking a pause: Nigeria is skipping this edition but has already announced its comeback at the 62nd biennale in 2028.
Curator Koyo Kouoh, director of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa in Cape Town, was named the first African woman to helm the biennial at the end of 2024. Tragically, Kouoh died in May 2025, but her chosen theme “In Minor Keys” will go ahead as planned, being realized by a curatorial team that Kouoh herself assembled. The exhibition will run from May 9 through November 22, 2026.
Here’s our regularly updated, up-to-the-minute list of all the national pavilions that have been announced so far.
Last updated on March 4.
Quickly jump to a country:
- Albania
- Argentina
- Armenia
- Australia
- Austria
- Azerbaijan
- The Bahamas
- Belgium
- Brazil
- Canada
- Chile
- Cyprus
- Czech Republic and Slovakia
- Denmark
- Ecuador
- El Salvador
- Estonia
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Great Britain
- Greece
- Hong Kong
- Hungary
- Iceland
- India
- Ireland
- Israel
- Japan
- Korea
- Kosovo
- Latvia
- Lebanon
- Lithuania
- Luxembourg
- Macao
- Malta
- Mexico
- Morocco
- Netherlands
- New Zealand
- Nordic Pavilion
- North Macedonia
- Pakistan
- Peru
- The Philippines
- Poland
- Portugal
- Russia
- San Marino
- Saudi Arabia
- Scotland
- Serbia
- Singapore
- Spain
- Syria
- Switzerland
- Taiwan
- Turkey
- Ukraine
- United States
- Uruguay
- Uzbekistan
- Wales
Albania
Genti Korini. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Artist: Genti Korini
Curator: Malgorzata Ludwisiak
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Tirana in 1979, Genti Korini works across painting, sculpture, and photography, blending fiction with cultural history. His exhibition “A Place in the Sun” is a reflection on collective memory and how it informs our national identity today. It will, Korini promises, be a timely premonition “reminding us that the absurdities of history are rarely confined to the past.”
Argentina
Artist: Matías Duville
Curator: Josefina Barcia
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Buenos Aires in 1974, Matías Duville is known for video and installation work that emerges out of the vividly imagined worlds that he draws. Many of his most successful works offer a fantastical lens on the natural world, and in Venice he is preparing to debut Monitor Yin Yang, a drawing on a monumental scale that will spread over the pavilion floor. Inevitably, the work will transform with time, incorporating the movements of visitors who walk across.
Armenia
Artist: Zadik Zadikian
Curator: Tony Shafrazi
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in Erevan, Soviet Armenia in 1948, but currently based in Los Angeles, Zadik Zadikian worked as a studio assistant for Richard Serra in the 1970s. Fittingly, he is known for his large, abstract sculptural installations, some of which are particularly eye-catching thanks to his generous use of gold and other metal leaf. Little has yet been revealed about Zadik’s project for Venice, titled “Ode to Lord Byron.”
Australia
Artist Khaled Sabsabi, right, with curator Michael Dagostino. Creative Australia removed the pair from its 2026 Venice Biennale line up. Photo: Anna Kucera
Artist: Khaled Sabsabi
Curator: Michael Dagostino
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Though Khaled Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino were first announced as Australia’s representatives in February, their project was soon cancelled to avoid controversy among right-wing critics. Several months later, after the Australian arts community rushed to the pair’s defence in a series of open letters and resignations, they have been reinstated by Creative Australia. Sabsabi is also exhibiting in the biennale’s main exhibition “In Minor Keys,” having been invited by curator Koyo Kouoh before her death in May 2025. Born in Lebanon in 1965 but now based in Sydney, Sabsabi’s work explicitly deals with Islamophobia, immigrant experiences, and Arab identity, and his exhibition at Venice will be no different.
Austria
Florentina Holzinger. Photo: Elsa Okazaki, @elsaokazaki.
Artist: Florentina Holzinger
Curator: Nora-Swantje Almes
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Vienna in 1986, Florentina Holzinger is known for performances that test the limits of what her audience can handle, in a practice that blends feminist body art with the tradition of Viennese Actionism. At the biennale, she will present “Seaworld Venice,” an underwater theme park and sewage treatment plant inhabited performers that reflects on our relationship water as a vital resource, a metaphor, and a commodity.
Azerbaijan
Artist: Faig Ahmed
Curator: Gwendolyn Collaço
Venue: Campo de la Tana, Castello 2124/A-2125
What to know: Born in Sumqayit in 1982, Faig Ahmed is known for his surrealist takes on traditional oriental rugs. For Venice, he has prepared “The Attention,” a textile and sound installation that pulls the viewer into a haven for slow, calm contemplation. The project is inspired by the poetry of the medieval, Azerbaijani philosopher Immadaddin Nasimi, mystic writings that connect humans to the cosmos. Here the carpet is a cultural symbol with meaning woven across its surface, inviting viewers into a tactile, embodied reading experience. Ahmed was part of a group show representing Azerbaijan for its inaugural national pavilion at the biennale in 2007.
The Bahamas
Artist John Beadle in his studio. Photo by Blair J. Meadows.
Artist: Lavar Munroe and the late John Beadle (1964-2024)
Curator: Krista Thompson
Venue: To be announced
What to know: The Bahamas is returning to the biennale after over a decade since its only previous participation in 2013. Artist John Beadle, who was born in Nassau in 1964 and died in 2024, had been slated to rep the country in 2015 but funding fell through. He will now have his chance in a posthumous exhibition alongside Lavar Munroe, born in Nassau in 1982. Thompson described Beadle as a “mentor to many” who “pushed the contemporary art scene in the Bahamas forward.” Beadle’s works explore the legacy of colonialism while Munroe’s work engages with the importance of local tradition.
Belgium
Artist: Miet Warlop
Curator: Caroline Dumalin
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Torhout in 1978 and now based between Ghent and Brussels, Miet Warlop’s actions and performances have been critically acclaimed on the international theater circuit. At Venice she will present IT NEVER SSST, will invite audiences to break out into dance, all collaborating to create a “living and musical sculpture that will be performed daily.” The lively, joyous project hopes to “project a zest for life into an increasingly lonely society.”
Brazil
Artist: Adriana Varejão and Rosana Paulino
Curator: Diane Lima
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Rosana Paulino, born in São Paulo in 1967, and Adriana Varejão, born in Rio de Janiero in 1964, have teamed up with curator Diane Lima to form the curatorial project Comigo ninguém pode – the Portuguese name for a plant and a saying that can be roughly translated as “nobody can handle me.” Both artists will channel what they term “colonial wounds,” as well as a lifetime of resilience, empathy, and sensitivity to imagine new forms of collectivity and liberation.
Canada
Abbas Akhavan. Photo: Alex de Brabant.
Artist: Abbas Akhavan
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Tehran in 1977, Abbas Akhavan emigrated to Canada with his family during conflict in the 1980s and now lives and works between Montreal and Berlin. Akhavan is interested in interrogating the history of place, and as such is known for site-specific installations that incorporate a wide variety of media like video, sculpture, drawing, and performance. No specific theme has yet been announced, but Akhavan is expected to respond directly to the Canada pavilion in Venice’s Giardini.
Chile
Norton Maza. Photo: Norton Maza.
Artist: Norton Maza
Curator: Marisa Caichiolo
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in Lautaro in 1971, Norton Maza is known for sweeping installations that are reminiscent of set design in their world-building detail. His project “Inter-Reality” promises to immerse visitors in an experience that feels at once monumental poetic. Of course, these realms of provocative illusion lead us back to the surreal tragedies of our current realities and the dissonance and uncertainty they produce.
Cyprus
Installation view of Marina Xenofontos’s “I don t sleep, I dream” at The Island Club, 2021. Photo: Mirka Koutsouri.
Artist: Marina Xenofontos
Curator: Kyle Dancewicz
Venue: Castello 3865
What to know: Born in Cyprus in 1988, Marina Xenofontos has spent over a decade accumulating data and metadata, whether ideas or objects, and built up archives that speak to our socio-political present. These will be exhibited in Venice in the form of spare and ambiguous sculpture, sound, and film works. In 2022, the artist won the prestigious Camden Art Center Emerging Artist Prize At Frieze. She presented new work at the institution the following year.
Czech Republic and Slovakia
Artist: Jakub Jansa and Selmeci Kocka Jusko
Curator: Peter Sit
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Czech artist Jakub Jansa is teaming up with Tomáš Kocka Jusko and Alex Selmeci, a Prague-based duo known as Selmeci Kocka Jusko, to represent the Czech Republic and Slovakia this year. Their project “The Silence of the Mole” will pull viewers into the world of its protagonist Mr. M., an actor who has tired of playing the Mole for decades. This farcical figure is at once politically neutral, diplomatic and anxiously confused, silenced. Ultimately, the work explores the Czech Republic and Slovakia’s relationship with each other and the world.
Denmark
Maja Malou Lyse. Photo: Lasse Lund.
Artist: Maja Malou Lyse
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in 1993, Maja Malou Lyse merges modern mediums like video, text, and performance with popular contemporary formats like television, billboards, and social media to explore the dynamics of desire and power that pervade our daily life. Though her practice deals predominantly with the digital realm, she has done in-person performances at the National Gallery of Denmark, Tate Modern in London, and Moderna Museet in Stockholm.
Ecuador
The Tawna Collective, artist Óscar Santillán, and curator Manuela Moscoso. Photo: Joffre Cruz, courtesy the Museum of Anthropology and Contemporary Art of Ecuador (MAAC).
Artist: Tawna Collective and Óscar Santillán
Curator: Manuela Moscoso
Venue: Castello 1636/A
What to know: Ecuador’s very first national pavilion at the biennale is a collaborative effort between the anti-colonial Tawna Collective—made up of Sápara, Kichwa, and mestizo artists from the Ecuadorian Amazon—and Óscar Santillán, a visual artist, cybernetician, and writer who lives between The Netherlands and Ecuador. Little has yet been revealed about the installation, but Santillán is currently making a splash on the international scene with works in Riyadh’s Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, until May 2, and Guggenheim Bilbao’s exhibition “Artes de la Tierra,” a look at the ways in which ecology informs artistic practices, until May 3.
El Salvador
J. Oscar Molina at his studio, 2024. Photo: © Walter E, 2024.
Artist: J. Oscar Molina
Curator: Alejandra Cabezas
Venue: Palazzo Mora
What to know: Born in the small Salvadorian village of Morazan in 1971, J. Oscar Molina moved with his family to the U.S. as a teenager. His work has since focused on themes of migration, diaspora, and identity, and the exhibition “Cartographies of the Displaced” will be no different. Its centerpiece will be an installation of the sculptural series Children of the World. Molina’s work reveals displacement as “a way of carrying one’s past, myths, and uncertainties into new terrains,” according to curator Alejandra Cabezas.
Estonia
Merike Estna. Photo: Marta Vaarik.
Artist: Merike Estna
Curator: Natalia Sielewicz
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in 1980 and now based between Tallinn and Mexico City, Merike Estna’s practice expands traditional notions of painting by introducing once-marginalized craft elements. Not only is this a formal inquiry, but Estna impressed the selection jury for how her work, despite its vividly fantastical, mostly abstract appearance, invokes political and socially urgent themes. With an inherent theatricality that is never limited by the canvas, her works have also been used as stage sets for performance art pieces, featuring everyday items like food and drink with a surprising, arty twist. For Venice, Estna has planned “The House of Leaking Sky,” an open studio in which she will invite viewers to watch her paint on a monumental canvas over the course of the biennale.
Finland
Jenna Sutela and Stefanie Hessler. Photo: Matteo de Mayda.
Artist: Jenna Sutela
Curator: Stefanie Hessler
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Turku in 1983 but now based in Berlin, Jenna Sutela’s varied practice incorporates scientific disciplines of all kinds, from biology to computation and astronomy to create unique sculptural installations. One of her best known works, Pond Brain (2023), is on display at Castello de Rivoli in Italy. At first glance the bronze bowl appears to be a fountain but visitors are invited to touch the work, turning into an instrument that harmonizes the deep reverberations of the water with an A.I. trained on polyphonic sounds from nature. The work debuted at the Helsinki Biennial in 2023.
France
Artist Yto Barrada in her installation, “Yto Barrada: Agadir” at The Curve Barbican Centre. Photo: by Tristan Fewings/Getty Images.
Artist: Yto Barrada
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: French-Moroccan artist Yto Barrada was born in Paris in 1971 but mostly grew up in Tangier, Morocco, a locale that has been the subject of her major photography series like “A Life Full of Holes” (1998), which studied the transitory existence of migrants attempting to flee to Europe, and Iris Tingitana Project (2007). She has worked in many mediums, but is best known for her abstract textiles and for her photography and film works, all of which become a means to address wider geopolitical issues like the climate crisis, immigration, and post-colonialism.
Germany
Henrike Naumann and Sung Tieu, and curator Kathleen Reinhardt. Photo: Victoria Tomaschko
Artist: Henrike Naumann and Sung Tieu
Curator: Kathleen Reinhardt
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Artists Sung Tieu and Henrike Naumann will represent Germany at the 2026 Venice Biennale, creating new site-specific works for the Giardini-based Pavilion. Both artists are known for examining political and historical systems through immersive, research-based installations, with Tieu, 38, exploring Cold War legacies, migration, and institutional power.
Naumann, who tragically died at the age of 41 in February 2026, was celebrated for her investigations into social ruptures and radicalization through furniture and design. The team behind the German pavilion said it was “deeply affected” by news of Naumann’s sudden death. “Over the past months, she developed the work conceptually and finalized it in recent weeks,” it said in a statement, promising to work with Henrike’s studio team “to realize her artistic vision” as planned this May.
Great Britain
Lubaina Himid will represent Great Britain at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Photo: Adama Jalloh, courtesy of the British Council.
Artist: Lubaina Himid
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Zanzibar in 1954, Preston-based Himid moved to Britain with her mother as a baby and became a founding member of the Black British Art Movement in the 1980s. She is also a curator, best known for boosting the visibility of Black women artists with landmark shows like “Five Black Women” at the Africa Center in London in 1983 and “The Thin Black Line” at the ICA in London in 1985. Despite this pioneering work, high profile recognition of Himid has been belated, as was the case for many members of the Black British Art Movement. In 2017, she won the Turner Prize, becoming the oldest artist to do so at the age of 63, and, in 2018, she was honored with a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) for her contributions to the arts. International institutional acclaim has followed.
Greece
Artist: Andreas Angelidakis
Curator: George Bekirakis
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Athens in 1968, Andreas Angelidakis is an architect who trained at the Southern California Institute of Architecture and Columbia University. His work explores the role of architecture in governing public spaces and as a motif for public memory. Though the idea of a “ruin”—whether classical or contemporary—is a particular focus, much of his work evolves out of digital simulation. His installation for Venice, Escape Room, uses Plato’s cave as inspiration for a thoroughly modern examination of how the virtual world muddies our relationship with the real.
Hong Kong
Artists Kingsley Ng (left) and Angel Hui (right) will represent Hong Kong at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Photo courtesy Hong Kong Arts Development Council.
Artist: Angel Hui and Kingsley Ng
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Campo della Tana
What to know: It was reported by South China Morning Post that the Hong Kong Museum of Art has taken over from M+ as the exhibition’s organizer for the 2026 Venice Biennale. This switch up means that Hong Kong will be represented by more than one artist as its representative for the first time since 2009. The chosen artists–Angel Hui, born 1991, and Kingsley Ng, born 1980– will not work on a joint project and have contrasting approaches. Hui was chosen for her use of traditional gongbi ink painting methods while Ng, amedia artist, represents a more futuristic outlook. As a special administrative region of the Peope’s Republic of china, not a country, Hong Kong does not have a national pavilion in Venice and its exhibition is classed as an official collateral event.
Hungary
Endre Koronczi. Photo courtesy of Luca Cserhalmi.
Artist: Endre Koronczi
Curator: Luca Cserhalmi
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Budapest in 1968, concept artist Endre Kornoczi has worked predominantly with the natural medium of wind for the past decade and, while not much is yet revealed about his exhibition “Pneuma Cosmic” for Venice, it will continue with this theme. Among his previous installations, video works, and open air projects is Extreme Sleep (2006-2020), for which the artist blended the banal and absurd by attempting to sleep by sheer force of will in various spots of open wilderness, such as slumped against a bumpy rock in the sun.
Iceland
Munnhola, obol ombla obla by Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir. Performance film 29 min.
Premiered at Sequences Festival, 2021. Courtesy of the artist and Iceland Pavilion
Artist: Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir
Curator:Margrét Áskelsdóttir and Unnar Örn
Venue:Docks Cantieri Cucchini
What to know: Reykjavík-based Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir was born in 1987 and is recognized for her multidisciplinary practice that fuses visual art mediums ranging from drawings to sculptures with sound, text, and moving image, to pull us out of our present moment and welcome us into a beguiling spiritual dimension. She is also an award-winning poet who has published five books and does regular live performances of her work, blurring distinctions between literature, theatre, and visual art.
India
Dr Amin Jaffer. Photo: © Joe Habben.
Artist: Alwar Balasubramaniam (Bala), Sumakshi Singh, Ranjani Shettar, Asim Waqif, and Skarma Sonam Tashi
Curator: Dr. Amin Jaffer
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: India will have a pavilion this year’s biennale for the first time since 2019. The country had its first pavilion in 2011, and the most recent was only its second, meaning the new exhibition will only be its third. Curator Dr. Amin Jaffer will work with five artists who all work with organic materials and traditional Indian methods. The news comes at a time when the Indian art market is thriving, and both contemporary and historical South Asian art is being widely exhibited at top international museums.
Ireland
Artist Isabel Nolan, curator Georgina Jackson, and producer Cian O’Brien at The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art, Dublin. Photo: Ste Murray.
Artist: Isabel Nolan
Curator: Georgina Jackson
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Dublin in 1974, Isabel Nolan has turned to the expanse of human history and the universe at large for inspiration in her art practice, counting among her references antiquities, literary figures, religious relics, and cosmological phenomena. She is no more limited by scale or medium either, with her output ranging from intimate, handmade objects or drawings to vast monumental structures. It is a busy time for the artist, who will also participate in the 13th Liverpool Biennial this summer.
Israel
Belu-Simion Fainaru. Photo: Roland Vaczi.
Artist: Belu-Simion Fainaru
Curator: Sorin Heller and Avital Bar-Shay
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Romanian-born, Haifa-based artist Belu-Simion Fainaru has lived in Israel since 1973. A previous iteration of his planned installation “Rose of Nothingness” was exhibited in the Romania Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale in 2019. The centerpiece of this meditative work will be a large pool of black water inspired by the poet Paul Celan’s concept of “black milk.” It will be topped up 16 dripping pipes, the number referring to the act of transformation in the Jewish tradition of Kabbalah. Last year, Israeli artist Ruth Patir’s installation remained closed by the artist, who said the show would open when a “ceasefire and a hostage release agreement” was reached. It never opened.
Japan
Ei Arakawa-Nash will represent Japan at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Photo: Ricardo Nagaoka.
Artist: Ei Arakawa-Nash
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Fukushima in 1977 but currently based in Los Angeles, Ei Arakawa-Nash is a Japanese-American performance artist whose practice reinterprets 20th century styles like happenings, Gutai, and Viennese Actionism. Most of his work is collaborative and participatory, including Mega Please Draw Freely, which was installed in the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern in London in 2021 and reinstalled at Haus der Kunst in Munich over the summer of 2025. So far, we know his performance at Venice will be inspired by his experience of queer parenthood.
Korea
Artist: Choi Geon and Hyeree Ro
Curator: Binna Choi
Venue: Giardini
What to know: The curator of Korea’s pavilion has a particularly distinguished pedigree, having co-curated the 2016 Gwangju Biennale, 2022 Singapore Biennale, and the Hawaii Triennial 2025. She has chosen to work with artists Choi Geon and Hyeree Ro to devise a project that will take as its starting point the spatial metaphors of “fortress” and “nest.” The trio certainly have big ambitions, which include converting the pavilion into “a monumental space designed to transform the state of social conflict and chaos into dynamic and inclusive kinetic energy.”
Kosovo
Artist: Brilant Milazimi
Curator: José Esparza Chong Cuy
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Gjilan in 1994 and currently based in Prishtina, Brilant Milazimi’s surreal, often nightmarish paintings are somehow as sinister as they are playful. According to curator José Esparza Chong Cuy, the exhibition “Strong Teeth” will confront viewers “with figures suspended in a quiet tension, embodying unresolved states of expectation, stability, and restraint.” At least obliquely, it is a response to the collective insecurity and crisis experienced by many across the globe in this present moment.
Latvia
Artist: Bruno Birmanis and Mareunrol
Curator: Inga Lāce and Adomas Narkevičius
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Alternative fashion designer Bruno Birmanis has teamed up with artist duo Mareunrol for an exhibition about the “Untamed Fashion Assemblies” avant-garde fashion events organized by Birmanis in Riga in the 1990s. They became transformative sites of artist self-expression as the country redefined itself in the post-Soviet era. As well as curating archival material relating to these happenings, the show will carry on their radical legacy with glimpse backstage, seeking out “a space of preparation, invisible labor, joy, improvisation, and human connection.”
Lebanon
Nabil Nahas will represent Lebanon at the Venice Biennale in 2026. Photo: Farzad Owrang, courtesy of the artist.
Artist: Nabil Nahas
Curator: Nada Ghandour
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Beirut in 1949, Nabil Nabas has lived between his home city and the U.S. since 1969. His large-scale paintings contain abstracted organic forms inspired by the patterns that naturally occur on trees native to Lebanon, including cedars, olives, and palms. Nahas represented Lebanon in the 25th Bienal de São Paulo in 2002.
Lithuania
Eglė Budvytytė, De sang chaud et de terre (Warm Blooded and Earthbound), 2024. © Eglė Budvytytė.
Artist: Eglé Budvytyté
Curator: Louise O’Kelly
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in Kaunas in 1982 and based between Vilnius and Amsterdam, Eglé Budvytyté uses various audio-visual media like video or radio to explore the blurry boundary between fiction and reality, creating scenarios that are partially staged and partially improvised. Much of her work is collaborative, and one recent film Warm Blooded and Earthbound, spotlights the sprawling landscapes of her native Lithuania.
Luxembourg
Aline Bouvy. Photo: © Aline Bouvy.
Artist: Aline Bouvy
Curator: Stilbé Schroeder
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Brussels in 1974, Aline Bouvy works between Luxembourg and Belgium and is known for her work in a mix of media. One particular focus of her practice is the embrace of the body as a medium through which we have sensory experiences, whether pleasurable or otherwise. What is the political status of the body in 2025? Are we more or less restricted than in the past? Bouvy’s presentation is likely to provoke these questions.
Malta
Margerita Pulè. Photo: Julian Vassallo.
Artist: Charlie Cauchi, Raphael Vella, and Adrian Abela
Curator: Margerita Pulè
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Charlie Cauchi, Raphael Vella, and Adrian Abela have teamed together to create “No Need to Sparkle,” which they describe as “an invitation to surrender to uncertainty and to embrace ‘doubting well’ as a philosophy of our unstable times.” In a world where everyone is ready to hop on their sandbox with a polarized opinion, the exhibition will contain works that resist black-and-white thinking, instead “present layered fictions and shifting realities, leading us down unanticipated paths.”
Macao
Rendering of Jacone’s Polyphony, exhibited in the Macao pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Image: Eric Fok.
Artist: Fok Hoi Seng, O Chi Wai, and Lei Fung leng
Curator: Feng Yan and Ng Sio Ieng
Venue: To be announced
What to know: A group of three artists have been chosen to represent Macao, China as part of an official collateral event at this year’s biennale. Their project Jacone’s Polyphony is a tribute to the creative journey and legacy of the early Qing Dynasty artist Wu Li, also known as Jacone in Portuguese, forging a connection between his ideas and our contemporary, globalized world.
Mexico
RojoNegro (María Sosa and Noé Martínez), 2025. Image: Alberto Rubi, courtesy of Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (INBAL).
Artist: RojoNegro Collective
Curator: Jessica Berlanga Taylor
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Artist duo María Sosa and Noé Martínez, also know as RojoNegro Collective, bring ancestral tradition into the contemporary era through installation and performance work. At Venice they will present Actos invisibles para sostener el universo, “invisible actions to sustain the universe,” which they say will use Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and peasant wisdom as a prism to look at urgent issues like epistemic justice, relational ecology and decolonization.
Morocco
Amina Agueznay. Photo: © Ayoub El Bardii.
Artist: Amina Agueznay
Curator: Meriem Berrada
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: The inaugural Morocco pavilion is finally here after a planned exhibition failed to go ahead in 2024. Born in Casablanca in 1963, Amina Agueznay is a trained architect-turned-artist who works across installation and design. She is working on “Asǝṭṭa,” a project that centers women artisans in its celebration of Moroccan craft as a living and collaborative art form.
Netherlands
Dries Verhoeven and Rieke Vos. Photo: Robin de Puy.
Artist: Dries Verhoeven
Curator: Rieke Vos
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in 1976 in Oosterhout, Dries Verhoeven is an installation, video, and performance artist and theatre-maker based between Amsterdam and Berlin. Verhoeven has often worked with marginalized communities like sex workers, migrant workers, and the homeless and he produces works that directly tackle societal taboos and create discomfort and friction within capitalist power structures. Verhoeven has planned a performance and architectural intervention titled “The Fortress,” will explores the instinct to protect ourselves from uncertainty during increasingly uncertain times.
New Zealand
Fiona Pardington stands between two portraits from a series of life casts at the Royal Academy, London. Photo by Jonathan Brady/PA Images via Getty Images.
Artist: Fiona Pardington
Curators: Felicity Milburn and Chloe Cull
Venue: Istituto Provinciale per l’Infanzia Santa Maria della Pietà di Venezia
What to know: The New Zealand pavilion is back in 2026 after taking a hiatus in 2024, citing “inadequate” resources. Its comeback will be fronted by the artist Fiona Pardington, of Kāi Tahu, Kāti Mamoe, Ngāti Kahungunu, and Clan Cameron of Erracht, who was born in Devonport, Auckland in 1961. She will present “Taharaki Skyside,” a new series of photographs of native, taxidermied birds that explores evolving approaches to scientific classification as well as the spiritual significance of some avian species to Māori.
Nordic Pavilion
Benjamin Orlow, Tori Wrånes, Klara Kristalova. Photo: Pirje Mykkänen, courtesy of Finnish National Gallery.
Artist: Klara Kristalova, Benjamin Orlow, and Tori Wrånes
Curator: Anna Mustonen
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Sweden, Finland, and Norway each take their turn commissioning this joint pavilion, and this year Finland’s leading contemporary art museum, Kiasma, is at the steering wheel. Each member of its chosen trio–London-based, Finnish artist Benjamin Orlow, Sweden-based, Czech artist Klara Kristalova, and Norwegian artist Tori Wrånes–brings something different to the table, but they broadly work in overlapping mediums of sculpture, installation, and performance. Their presentation, “How Many Angels Can Dance on the Head of a Pin?” is a series of installations inspired by Nordic folklore, which becomes a language natural cycles of decay and renewal.
North Macedonia
Artist: Velimir Zernovski
Curator: To be announced
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in Skopje in 1981, Velimir Zhernovski’s work principally explores sexuality and gender identity through the mediums of drawing, video art, and installation. His exhibition for Venice, “Pieta Under the Covers of Urgency,” was inspired by Michelangelo’s Pietà. Though little else is yet known about the work, the selection committee described it in vague but intriguing terms as “an original and compact project, beyond the stereotypes and standards of visual practice.”
Pakistan
Beatriz Cifuentes Feliciano and Faiza Butt. Photo: Mateusz Kozłowski.
Artist: Faiza Butt
Curator: Beatriz Cifuentes Feliciano
Venue: Ex Farmacia Solveni
What to know: Born in Lahore in 1973 but currently based in London, Faiza Butt has made her name for richly detailed, sensitive drawings that are notable for their humanity. Her exhibition “Punj-AB–A Sublime Terrain” will take as its subject the region of Punjab, exploring the ongoing cultural legacy of its split between India and Pakistan by foregrounding women’s voice, textiles, and spirituality.
The Philippines
Jon Cuyson. Photo: Ivan Sarenas.
Artist: Jon Cuyson
Curator: Mara Gladstone
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Manila in 1969, Jon Cuyson is known for a practice that spans, painting, installation, books, and film. The exhibition “Sea of Love / Dagat ng Pag-ibig” brings his fascination with the history of seafaring from the islands of his homeland to the canals of Venice. It is based on a conceptual framework he calls “Mussel Thinking,” derived from the habits of the humble mussel, which he uses as a “motif and metaphor for understanding kinship across land and sea.”
Peru
Sara Flores. Photo: Theor Christelis, © White Cube.
Artist: Sara Flores
Curator: Issela Ccoyllo and Matteo Norzi
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in the native community of Tambomayo in the Peruvian Amazon in 1950, Sara Flores’s practice continues the matrilineal, ancient tradition of Kené, the making of intricate, geometric patterns that are imbued with spirituality. As such, Flores is informed by the Amazonian ecosystem in which she was raised, and which provides the natural dyes with which she brings her creations to life. Her project is titled “Sara Flores: De otros mundos.”
Poland
Left to right: Ewa Chomicka, Bogna Burska, Jolanta Woszczenko, Daniel Kotowski. Photo: Filip Preis / Zachęta Archive.
Artist: Bogna Burska and Daniel Kotowski
Curator: Ewa Chomicka and Jolanta Woszczenko
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Two artists–Bogna Burska, born in Warsaw in 1974, and Daniel Kotowski, born in Łomża in 1993–have teamed up Choir in Motion, a group of hearing and Deaf performers, to create the audio-video installation Liquid Tongues. The project, inspired by Kotowski’s own Deaf experience, is a novel interpretation of whale song in both English and International Sign language. Burska and Kotowski hope to bring attention to diverse modes of communication and the importance of restoring lost and marginalized languages. For example, sound will be come a physical sensation inspired by the whales use of echolocation, with the choir choreographed according to the movement of schools of fish.
Portugal
Alexandre Estrela, representing Portugal at the Venice Biennale in 2026. Photo: Alexandre Estrela.
Artist: Alexandre Estrela
Curator: Ana Baliza and Ricardo Nicolau
Venue: Fondaco Marcello, Calle del Traghetto / Ca’ Garzoni
What to know: Born in Lisbon in 1971, Alexandre Estrela predominantly works in moving image, and his project for the biennale is no different. RedSkyFalls is an operating system and artificial ecosystem just as filled with autonomous beings and vulnerable to tectonic ruptures as our own. Using ancient, encoded intuitions, they respond to disturbances in our environment, so encouraging the viewer to hone in on the subtle ways in which species quietly adapt, co-exist, and survive amid seismic events. Estrela’s work has been shown at leading international museums, including MoMA in 2023 and Madrid’s Reina Sofia in 2015.
Russia
Artist: 50 practitioners from Russia and other countries
Curator: To be announced
Venue: Giardini
What to know: For its surprise comeback after a two year absence from the biennale, Russia has planned “The tree is rooted in the sky,” a musical show featuring some 50 poets, musicians and philosophers. Russia’s delegate for international cultural exchanges, Mikhail Shvydkoy, told ARTnews that the exhibition will demonstrate how “politics exist within temporary dimensions, whereas cultures communicate in eternity.” Most of the participants hail from Russia, but they will be joined by musicians from Argentina, Brazil, Mali, and Mexico. It will also spotlight “experimental approaches that emerge far from major cultural centers,” its organizers have promised.
San Marino
Artist: Mark Francis
Curator: Luca Tommasi
Venue: Tana Art Space
What to know: Born in Newtonards, Northern Ireland in 1962, Mark Francis for abstract paintings that feel alive with pulsing forms and, fittingly, are often inspired by either the vastness of outer space or the minute molecular happenings in a petri dish. His project “Sea of Sound” goes further in exploring the poetic relationship between art and science.
Saudi Arabia
Dana Awartani, Come, Let Me Heal Your Wounds. Let Me Mend Your Broken Bones (2024) at the 60th Venice Biennale, 2024. Photo: Ben Davis.
Artist: Dana Awartani
Curator: Antonia Carver and Hafsa Al-Khudairi
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in 1987, Dana Awartani is based between her native Jeddah and New York City. She’s known for her material-focused work that explores craft, cultural heritage, and memory. Her gauzy fabric installations, like Let me mend your broken bones (2023), which featured in the main exhibition of the 2024 biennale, often delicately map sites of architectural damage due to conflict. The artist has not yet revealed details for her pavilion installation, which will be curated by Art Jameel director Antonia Carver and assistant curator Hafsa Al-Khudairi.
Scotland
Davide Bugarin, Angel Cohn Castle and Morven Gregor at Mount Stuart. Photo: Charlotte Cullen, courtesy Scotland + Venice.
Artists: Burgain + Castle
Curator: Mount Stuart Trust
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Artists Davide Bugarin and Angel Cohn Castle use drag performance, interactive installation, and film to explore their queer and Filipino identities. The pair met while performing in queer cabaret in Edinburgh and though not much has yet been revealed about their plans for Venice, they have promised to “transform the venue with spatial and drag-inflected interventions that confront questions of gendered performance and colonial control, rooted in our living experience. We aim to trouble easy narratives on the contested ground of identity.”
Serbia
Artists: Predrag Daković
Curator: Tomaš Koudela
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Derventa, ex-Yugoslavia in 1964, Predrag Daković is a painter who is planning the project “Across Golgotha to Resurrection” for Venice. His selection has proven extremely controversial, with critics launching an online petition signed by hundreds of artists and cultural workers that are calling to have him removed. The letter’s authors believe that he is not representative of “the quality of contemporary artistic production in Serbia.”
Singapore
Selene Yap and Amanda Heng. Photo courtesy of Singapore Art Museum.
Artists: Amanda Heng
Curator: Selene Yap
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Singapore in 1951, Amanda Heng has been a leading artist on the Singapore art scene since the 1980s and received one of the country’s highest honors, the Cultural Medallion, in 2010. She has worked in installation, photography, performance and participatory work but, in every case, Heng’s principal medium is her body, which she uses to examine socially constructed rituals and habits that have become second nature.
Spain
Oriol Vilanova. Photo: Ingrid Sala.
Artists: Oriol Vilanova
Curator: Carles Guerra
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Catalonia in 1980, Oriol Vilanova’s exhibition at Venice will build on his two-decade project of collecting postcards from markets and second-hand shops. These discarded fragments of everyday personal correspondence form a bank of insight into the ways that we communicate and create memories, and the fragility of this process. How to organize such a wealth of material? Do these small tokens of past human experience deserve to be preserved? “Los Restos” is a response to these questions.
Switzerland
Artists: Gianmaria Andreetta, Luca Beeler, Nina Wakeford, Miriam Laura Leonardi, Lithic Alliance and Yul Tomatala
Curator: N/A
Venue: Giardini
What to know: A group of six creative practitioners have teamed up to represent Switzerland at Venice in 2026, beating out 140 rivals in the country’s first open competition for the privilege. Fittingly for such a large group, their project The Unfinished Business of Living Together will explore the state of coexistence, and our human capacities and limitations when it comes to social cohesion and tolerance. The diverse group represent different generations and different language speaking regions of Switzerland.
Syria
Sara Shamma. Photo: Mohammad Azaat.
Artists: Sara Shamma
Curator: Yuko Hasegawa
Venue: National Pavilion of Syria, Università IUAV di Venezia
What to know: Born in Damascus in 1975, Sara Shamma is known for colorful, stylized paintings of people. Her presentation “The Tower Tomb of Palmyra” will be a multi-sensory experience that brings to life the lost cultural heritage of Palmyra and calls for the restitution of antiquities that were looted during the Syrian War. Built between the 1st and 3rd centuries C.E., the tower tombs were monumental mausoleums that were destroyed during the war, and Shamma hopes her tribute to these treasures will reflect on loss with “a message of hope.”
Taiwan
Li Yi-fan. Photo courtesy the artist and Taipei Fine Arts Museum.
Artist: Li Yi-fan
Curator: Raphael Fonseca
Venue: Palazzo delle Prigioni
What to know: The Taiwan 2025 exhibition has been an official collateral event of the Venice Biennale since 2003 after it lost its national pavilion status following protests from China. Born in 1989, Taipei-based Li Yan-fan works with digital media, often creating surreal and humorous narratives with the use of game engines that he develops. In 2023, he debuted the video What Is Your Favorite Primitive at the Taipei Biennial, a parody of a Big Tech keynote speech that skewered the ethical ambiguities of the industry.
Turkey
Nilbar Güreş. Photo: Luca Gioacchino Di Bernardo.
Artist: Nilbar Güres
Curator: Basak Doga Temür
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Istanbul in 1977, Güres is known for sensitive studies of gender and identity in a wide variety of media, from painting and photography to performance and video. The jury said they chose the artist because her practice is “eloquent both in creating a poetic universe, and in staying faithful to a rigorous narrative that challenges dominant perspectives and gives visibility to marginalized communities, remaining deeply rooted in Turkey’s complex social fabric.”
Ukraine
Artists: Zhanna Kadyrova
Curator: Kseniia Malykh and Leonid Marushchak
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Born in Brovary in 1981 and now based in Kiev, Zhanna Kadyrova works in a wide variety of media, including video, mosaic, and performance to make projects relating to themes of urban space, industry, and consumption, and their relationship to the socio-economic history of Ukraine. At Venice she will present the project “Security Guarantees,” the title of which refers to the security assurances from Russia, the U.S., the U.K., France, and China for which Ukraine gave up its nuclear arsenal by signing the Budapest Memorandum in 1994. It was violated by Russia with its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea in 2014.
In February, it was reported in the Art Newspaper that the central sculpture for the show, Origami Deer, had previously been installed in the eastern city of of Pokrovsk. It had to be evacuated as the Russian frontline approached the region in 2024, and this history of displacement will be referenced by the work’s installation in Venice, suspended from a crane on a truck parked beside the banks of the lagoon.
United States
Alma Allen. Photo: Sam Kahn.
Artist: Alma Allen
Curator: Jeffrey Uslip
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Utah in 1970, Alma Allen is a self-taught sculptor known for expressively gestural, biomorphic sculptures produced in wood, metal, and stone. These idiosyncratic pieces play with the border between figuration and abstraction ,and a media bulletin issued by the State Department promised that Allen’s wacky “alchemical transformation of matter” will be on full display in both existing and new site-specific works conceived for an installation titled “Call Me the Breeze.” The announcement further claimed that the works, conceived in response to the concept “elevation,” will fulfill “the Trump Administration’s focus on showcasing American excellence.” Curated by Jeffrey Uslip, former Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis curator, it is organized by commissioner Jenni Parido, founder of the American Arts Conservancy, an organization just founded earlier this year.
Uruguay
Margaret Whyte, 2025. Photo: Sabrina Srur.
Artists: Margaret Whyte
Curators: Patricia Bentancur
Venue: Giardini
What to know: Born in Montevideo in 1940, Margaret Whyte’s has worked in painting, assemblage, and performance over her five decade career. Her “Antifragil” installation in Venice was inspired by the Lebanese-American statistician and writer Nassim Taleb’s notion of “antifragility,” or systems that become stronger in the face of disorder. She explores how we can embrace and work with chaos rather than attempting to eliminate or control the unpredictable. Uncertainty takes on a poetic power in her work, expanding our notions of resistance through a complex array of found objects, debris, and textiles.
Uzbekistan
The Uzbekistan national pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale curators. From left to right: Aziza Izamova, Thái Hà, Sophie Mayuko Arni, Nico Sun and Kamila Mukhitdinova. Image courtesy ACDF.
Artists: Jahongir Bobokulov, Zi Kakhramonova, Aygul Sarsen, Zulfiya Spowart, Xin Liu, A.A. Murakami, and Nguyen Phuong Linh
Curators: Aziza Izamova, Thái Hà, Sophie Mayuko Arni, Nico Sun and Kamila Mukhitdinov
Venue: Arsenale
What to know: Uzbekistan’s pavilion is being taken over by a team of curators formed through the Bukhara Biennial Curatorial School. Their project “Aural Sea” explores the folkloric traditions that have long surrounded the Aral Sea, a landscape that has changed dramatically over the centuries. The act of storytelling is positioned not as a fictional means of escape but as a tool for navigating ecological emergencies of our time.
Wales
Manon Awst and Dylan Huw in the studio in Caernarfon. Photo: Dewi Tannatt Lloyd.
Artists: Manon Awst
Curator: Dylan Huw
Venue: To be announced
What to know: Born in 1983 and raised in Anglesey, Manon Awst researches the role of material in identity and landscape via sculpture, installation, and performance. So far, we know her exhibition will “invite audiences into a dynamic, evolving space,” that champions sustainability, collaboration, and the Welsh traditions of ‘liveness’ and cynghanedd, meaning “concinnity” or “harmony.”
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