Venice Biennale 2026: How to Experience the World's Biggest Art Event

The Venice Biennale 2026 opens on 9 May under the title In Minor Keys, and it carries a weight that no previous edition has. Koyo Kouoh, the first African woman to curate the central exhibition, passed away before her vision could be realised. Her team is now bringing it to life across the Giardini, the Arsenale, and a new extension at Forte Marghera, with 111 invited artists and 99 national pavilions spread across the city.

This is not a preview of everything happening in Venice. It is an editorial guide for people who want to understand what In Minor Keys is about, which pavilions are worth prioritising, and how to build a trip that feels considered rather than overwhelming. Explore the Venice Biennale 2026 on Outhere and discover more art events and cultural experiences happening across Italy and beyond.

The exhibition runs through 22 November, which means there is time to plan properly. Here is how to do it.

Kouoh's curatorial text describes the exhibition as "sequences of exhilarating journeys that address the sensate and the affective, inviting visitors to marvel, meditate, dream, revel, reflect, and commune." The title borrows from music: minor keys as sonic metaphors for intimacy, resistance, and beauty in the face of difficulty.

The exhibition is structured around six thematic sections: Enchantment, Procession and Invocation, Schools, Sanctuaries, Thresholds, and Gardens. Each section creates what Kouoh called "oases," spaces punctuating the exhibition route that are dedicated to memory, contemplation, and the recreation of studios and living spaces belonging to major artists of the past.

This is a deliberate rejection of spectacle. Where recent biennales have leaned into scale and urgency, In Minor Keys asks visitors to slow down. The oases are not decorative rest stops. They are integral to the exhibition's argument: that art can create pockets of care in a world that does not prioritise it.

Koyo Kouoh was executive director of Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa in Cape Town and one of the most influential curators working in contemporary art. Born in Cameroon, based between Dakar and Cape Town, she built a career defined by rigour, institutional transformation, and an insistence that African and diasporic art practices belong at the centre of global conversation.

Her appointment as curator of the 61st Venice Biennale made her the first African woman to hold the role. She passed away in 2024, and her curatorial team, including close collaborators who had worked with her for years, took on the responsibility of realising her vision.

The result is an exhibition shaped by grief and purpose in equal measure. Kouoh's framework was largely complete before her death. The team's task has been to honour her intellectual architecture while navigating the practical realities of producing the most closely watched art exhibition in the world. The emotional weight of this context is inseparable from the work itself.

With 99 national pavilions, no visitor can see everything. Here are four worth building your itinerary around, chosen for artistic ambition and cultural relevance.

descent whose work moves between archaeology, education, and play. Her installations often involve constructed environments that invite physical interaction. The French pavilion at the Giardini tends to attract heavy foot traffic, but Barrada's spatial approach rewards the visitor who lingers rather than passes through.

Alexandre Estrela works with video and installation to produce perceptual experiences that destabilise what you think you are seeing. His recent installation at MoMA drew attention for its ability to make familiar visual phenomena feel genuinely disorienting. Portugal's pavilion is consistently one of the more experimental national presentations, and Estrela's selection signals a commitment to sensory difficulty over easy legibility.

Born in Fukushima and based in Los Angeles, Ei Arakawa-Nash is a performance artist whose collaborative practice interrogates subjectivity and collective identity. His work often blurs the boundary between performer and audience, making the exhibition itself a live event. The Japanese pavilion at the Giardini is architecturally distinctive, and Arakawa-Nash's performative approach should make it one of the more unpredictable visits.

Hong Kong's pavilion pairs two artists with contrasting practices: Angel Hui, who works in traditional gongbi ink painting, and Kingsley Ng, a media artist. The tension between handcraft and technology, between slow accumulation and digital immediacy, gives this pavilion a conceptual edge. It is worth seeing how the two approaches coexist in a shared space.

Note: The Netherlands pavilion artist has not yet been announced at the time of writing.

One of the most significant additions to this edition is the extension at Forte Marghera, a former military complex on the Venetian mainland. Three artists have been commissioned to create site-specific projects there.

Temitayo Ogunbiyi is building an undulating sculpture designed for wandering, play, and interaction. Uriel Orlow is presenting botanical maps that trace the colonial histories embedded in plant life. Fabrice Aragno, who collaborated with Jean-Luc Godard on The Image Book, is creating a reinterpretation of that work. Together, these projects invite visitors to step outside the density of the Giardini and Arsenale and into a different register of attention.

Beyond Forte Marghera, 31 collateral events are scattered across Venice's historic centre. These are independently organised exhibitions and projects that run parallel to the main show. They are where discoveries tend to happen, particularly for visitors willing to wander beyond the official route. The Biennale website lists all collateral events with locations and dates.

Ogunbiyi's work connects to broader conversations about public sculpture and play that are happening across Europe. Discover more about similar projects and art events on Outhere.

Watch

Biennale Arte 2026 - Presentation

What is the Venice Biennale and why should we care?

MC Art Matters with Koyo Kouoh

Enter the Mothership: artist Yto Barrada's Tangier garden | Tate

Ei Arakawa | The Tanks

A single day is possible but tight. The Giardini and the Arsenale each require a minimum of two to three hours if you want to engage with the work rather than survey it. A one-day visit means choosing one venue as your primary focus and treating the other as a quick pass-through.

Two days is the better option. Day one at the Giardini, with time for the national pavilions and the central exhibition. Day two at the Arsenale, with a detour to Forte Marghera if the mainland extension interests you. This structure also leaves room for collateral events in the evening.

Weekdays are significantly less crowded than weekends. The opening weeks in May draw the largest crowds, as do the final weeks before closing in November. The quietest period is typically mid-September through early October, when summer tourism ebbs but the exhibition is still running full hours.

Use the oases. They are designed as contemplation and rest spaces, and they work. The exhibition route is long, the venues are not air-conditioned, and Venice in summer is hot. Build in time to sit.

For more on the artists shaping this edition, explore Koyo Kouoh, Yto Barrada, and Nick Cave on Outhere. Discover what else is happening in Venice this season, or browse art events across Italy and beyond.

Outhere is a platform that helps you discover arts, culture, and experiences worldwide. Whether you are planning a trip around a single exhibition or building a full cultural itinerary, we bring you closer to what matters.

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