Biennial 2026

In Venice Pavilions between live action and curatorial vision

Performance, works in images, sound and installations challenge collecting

by Maria Adelaide Marchesoni

4 May 2026

«Nightfal» 2024-2025, di Merike Estna, acrilico, olio e pastelli su tela, 390 x 290 cm (Estonia); «Vermi Cell», 2023 di Jenna Sutela

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Key points

Performance countries
South Africa: ccensorship at the Biennale

4' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

The 61st International Art Exhibition of Venice (9 May - 22 November 2026) revolves around the curatorial vision ofKoyo Kouoh, who passed away in May 2025, whom the Biennale has chosen to honour by entrusting the international exhibition "In Minor Keys" to the team she appointed. Conceived as a musical metaphor, "In Minor Keys" invites attention to the subtler frequencies of the present - silent resistance, vulnerability, listening - privileging artistic practices based on improvisation, relationship and time. In this context, performance emerges as one of the most emblematic languages of this edition.

Performance remains, however, one of the most complex media to place on the market: for many artists immateriality is an indispensable condition, while others accept its translation into derivative forms such as video, photography, sound or object.

The pavilions that adopt performative practices at the 61st edition of the Biennale translate "In Minor Keys" into corporeal and temporal experiences, in which the work manifests itself as process, relationship and situated act. This approach is particularly evident in some of the Northern European pavilions, where the centrality of the body, time and live action emerges as one of the most significant novelties of this edition of the Biennale.

The Performance Countries

In many cases, the selected artists are not represented by galleries, as they come from the theatre or are in the early stages of their careers. This is the case ofMaja Malou Lyse (1993), the youngest artist to represent Denmark, whose practice investigates forms of presence, voice and corporeity that escape the fixity of the object, situating herself in an intermediate zone between installation, action and environment (the 3-1AP edition photographs are on sale at around EUR 4,700). Intimate and processual is the proposal of the Estonian Pavilion, hosted at the Church of the Patronato Salesiano Don Bosco in the Castello district. Merike Estna (1980) integrates performative elements in the form of an open studio: the artist will create 11 large-scale paintings live throughout the Biennial (represented by Temnikova & Kasela from Tallinn).

For the first time, the Netherlands and Belgium chose to entrust their respective pavilions to artists whose practice is predominantly performative. The Netherlands Pavilion will present 'The Fortress', a project that transforms architectural space into a performative action by artist and theatre author Dries Verhoeven (1976). His practice fuses theatre, installation and audience participation, resulting in interventions that are often site-specific and difficult to relate to traditional object works such as paintings or collectible sculptures.

Performance understood as activated sculpture is, instead, at the centre of the Belgian Pavilion, entrusted to Miet Warlop (1978), already known at the Theatre Biennale with works such as "After All Springvill" (2024). The work "It never SSST" in collaboration with the musical duo DEEWEE takes the form of a living, musical sculpture, animated by everyday actions involving performers and audience.

Austria also chooses a figure from the world of performance and contemporary dance: choreographer Florentina Holzinger (1986), who presents 'Seaworld Venice', a project that interweaves live performance, music and extreme choreography. The work reaffirms the body as a field of political and symbolic tension and develops beyond the canonical spaces of the Giardini, spreading into site-specific actions scattered throughout the lagoon city. The project is part of the cycle of experimental performances that Holzinger has been carrying out since 2020 under the title 'Études'. Emblematic in this sense is "Harbour Étude" (2024), commissioned by the Kunsthall in Bergen, Norway, and realised in the space of the city harbour with the involvement of a crane and a helicopter.

Finally, the Finnish Pavilion nominated artist Jenna Sutela (1983) whose practice combines living sculptures, images and sounds, often based on random elements and evolving structures, both living and animated. Represented by the Max Goelitz Gallery in Munich, Sutela presents photographs as one-off works with a price range of between EUR 25 and 30,000; for editions of five, the price falls between EUR 5 and 6,000, while large performance installations are in the EUR 50 to 70,000 range. In this panorama, the performance pavilions of the 61st Venice Biennale return an edition in which the work is not offered as a completed form, but as a shared, temporary experience.

South Africa: ccensorship at the Biennale

South Africa's unresolved issues at the 61st Venice Biennale ignite a debate that goes far beyond the boundaries of contemporary art. Culture Minister Gayton McKenzie's request to exclude the work 'Elegy' by Gabrielle Goliath - unanimously selected to represent the country - has brought a crucial question back to the centre: to what extent can political authority intervene in the freedom of artistic expression? The artist and the curator are now asking South African President Cyril Ramaphosa to intervene. At the centre of the controversy is the updated version of the performance project that interweaves historical violence and contemporary conflicts, from South Africa's colonial past to the deaths of women and children in Gaza. It is precisely the reference to the Middle East conflict that is said to have motivated the intervention of the minister, who deemed the work politically inappropriate to represent the country. 'Elegy' was presented in Italia in 2024 by Raffaella Cortese, who represents the artist (drawings and photographs between USD 5 and 50,000, video installations between USD 60 and 150,000).