Page 4 - The 61.Venice Biennial issue of WOA Contemporary Art magazine

Biennale Arte 2026 LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA
61ST INTERNATIONAL ART EXHIBITION
IN MINOR KEYS

A CRISIS OF VISION:
THE VENICE BIENNALE
HAS BECOME A DIGITAL
SCREENSAVER
THE VENICE BIENNALE HAS LONG STOOD AS THE MOST
REVERED ARENA OF CONTEMPORARY ARTISTIC THOUGHT,
A PLACE WHERE NATIONS ARTICULATE CULTURAL IDENTITY,
WHERE ARTISTS STRETCH THE BOUNDARIES OF IMAGINATION,
PAVILION OF LEBANON. DON’T GET ME WRONG. PHOTO LUCA ZAMBELLI BAIS
AND WHERE CURATORS ONCE SHAPED THE INTELLECTUAL 61ST INTERNATIONAL ART EXHIBITION – LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA, IN MINOR
HORIZON OF THE GLOBAL ART WORLD. FOR MORE THAN A KEYS. COURTESY LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA.
CENTURY, IT HAS FUNCTIONED AS A CULTURAL SEISMOGRAPH,
REGISTERING THE SHOCKS OF AESTHETIC, POLITICAL, AND
TECHNOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION. IT HAS BEEN A SITE
WHERE HISTORY IS WRITTEN, CONTESTED, AND REINVENTED.
YET AS WE ENTER ITS 61ST EDITION, THE BIENNALE FINDS
ITSELF IN A MOMENT OF PROFOUND CRISIS: A CRISIS OF
VISION, OF PROFESSIONALISM, AND, MOST PERILOUSLY, OF
RELEVANCE.

The institution’s magnificent archive promises an awareness
of its own legacy. But the contrast between the gravity of that
archive and the superficiality of recent editions is startling. The
Biennale guards its past with devotion while treating its present
with indifference. The archive is a cathedral of memory; the COLLECTION OF PRUDENCE LOPP, UNTITLED (MINIATURE ARCHITECTURAL
CONSTRUCTION), C. 1983 TERRACOTTA, ENAMEL 12.1×20.3×16.5 CM. PHOTO
exhibition has devolved into a carnival of distraction. ANDREA AVEZZÙ. 61ST INTERNATIONAL ART EXHIBITION – LA BIENNALE DI
VENEZIA, IN MINOR KEYS. COURTESY LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA.
The 61st edition, In Minor Keys, claims to explore intimacy,
memory, and repair. Many participating artists, Pio Abad, works that indulge in kitsch, installations assembled from piles
Kader Attia, Carolina Caycedo, Daniel Lind-Ramos, Guadalupe of debris, rusted mechanisms, decayed textiles, soil, refuse,
Maravilla, Ebony G. Patterson, Torkwase Dyson, Nicholas Hlobo, and compost, objects gesturing vaguely toward arte povera
Issa Samb, among others—offer works of depth, intelligence, but stripped of its poetic force, historical consciousness, or
and conceptual clarity. Their contributions demonstrate that conceptual rigor. This is not radical experimentation; it is
contemporary art remains vital, urgent, and capable of profound improvisation without purpose.
insight. Yet the curatorial framework meant to support them is
collapsing under its own weight. The root of the problem lies in the selection of curators, a
process now guided more by institutional politics than by
The Biennale has become a labyrinth of video projections, artistic expertise. Too often, those appointed lack a deep
technically weak, conceptually thin, aesthetically exhausted. understanding of contemporary art, its genealogies, its
Screens flicker everywhere, producing moving images that intellectual traditions, and its global contexts.
resemble digital wallpaper rather than artistic propositions.
The results are predictable: exhibitions that resemble mood
Motion is mistaken for meaning. The exhibition increasingly boards rather than curatorial statements; installations that
resembles a global digital fair dominated by video works evoke student projects rather than professional artworks; a
lacking both technical mastery and ideological substance. To Biennale that feels improvised rather than curated. Clichés
this, one must add the proliferation of amateurish gestures: proliferate. Digital spectacle replaces artistic substance. The

2 WORLD of ART