Aline Bouvy on Representing Luxembourg at the 61st Venice Biennale

Aline Bouvy, representing Luxembourg at the 61st Venice Biennale, will present an audiovisual essay titled *La Merde* in the Arsenale. The work explores the symbolic, political, and affective power of waste, using humor and abjection to reflect on contemporary conditions. Bouvy discusses the project's connection to the Biennale's theme, "In Minor Keys," and its focus on bodily processes, circulation, and societal repression. She also recalls the 1995 pavilion *Potemkin Lock* by Bert Theis, which marked Luxembourg's first Biennale participation.

Antonio José Guzmán and Iva Jankovic on Representing Panama at the 61st Venice Biennale

Antonio José Guzmán and Iva Jankovic, working as the duo Messengers of the Sun, will represent Panama at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Their project, titled *Tropical Hyperstition*, is an installation and performance piece that explores the forced displacement and segregation of Panamanians and immigrants during and after the construction of the Panama Canal. The work features a 20-meter-long handwoven indigo-dyed hammock and patchwork textiles combining archival photographs with genetic and geometric motifs, all housed in the Panama Pavilion at the Arsenale. The artists draw on personal and collective experiences of structural injustice rooted in Panama’s Canal Zone history, addressing colonial legacies, racialized progress, and imperial extractive logics.

À la Biennale de Venise, le pavillon de l’Ouzbékistan fait revivre la mer d’Aral

The Uzbekistan Pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale, curated around the figure of author Allayar Darmenov, brings together artists including Vyacheslav Akhunov, Zi Kakhramonova, A. A. Murakami, Zulfiya Spowart, and Nguyen Phuong Linh to explore the ecological disaster of the Aral Sea. Once the world's fourth-largest lake, it was drained by Soviet irrigation projects for cotton farming; the pavilion's installations—such as Kakhramonova's participatory salt-fish molding piece and Spowart's cradle-like sculpture—imaginatively revive the vanished sea and its endemic species.

JUNKANOO IN VENICE ART MEMORY AND POSTHUMOUS COLLABORATION AT THE BAHAMAS PAVILION

The Bahamas Pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennale presents "In Another Man's Yard," an intergenerational exhibition curated by Dr. Krista Thompson featuring works by the late John Beadle (1964–2024) and Lavar Munroe. The show explores Junkanoo, the biannual Bahamian festival, through collaborative artmaking, discarded materials, and posthumous collaboration—including Munroe's monumental 11-panel painting based on photographs by Jackson Petit and works incorporating materials from Beadle's studio.

JUNKANOO EN VENECIA ARTE MEMORIA Y COLABORACION POSTUMA EN EL PABELLON DE BAHAMAS

The Bahamas presents its second pavilion at the Venice Biennale after a 13-year hiatus, featuring the exhibition "In Another Man's Yard" curated by Dr. Krista Thompson. The show brings together the late John Beadle (1964–2024) and Lavar Munroe in an intergenerational dialogue rooted in the Junkanoo festival tradition, exploring themes of collaboration, commemoration, and material transformation through discarded materials like cardboard and salvaged objects.

At the 2026 Biennale, the Bulgarian Pavilion Transforms into a Political Laboratory to Explore the Present

Alla Biennale 2026 il Padiglione della Bulgaria si trasforma in laboratorio politico per esplorare il presente

The Bulgarian Pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennale, housed in the Sala Tiziano of the Centro Culturale Don Orione Artigianelli, has been transformed into a speculative political laboratory by The Federation of Minor Practices. Curated by Martina Yordanova, the project features an all-female group of artists—Veneta Androva, Gery Georgieva, Maria Nalbantova, and Rayna Teneva—whose four films serve as "signals" exploring tensions around ecology, media systems, disinformation, and collective responsibility. The pavilion is conceived as a research headquarters from the near future, open until November 22, 2026.

A MENTAL GARDEN HAITI AT THE VENICE BIENNALE 2026

Haiti presents Yelena’s Garden, an installation by artist Enock Placide, at the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Curated by Mario Savini and commissioned by Ambassador Gandy Thomas, the work combines canvases, a double-sided panel, a glass sphere, and a video within an open hexagonal structure, exploring themes of perception, time, and space. Placide, a Haitian-born artist with a background in physics and mathematics, uses the installation to create a mental garden that invites viewers to generate ever-changing configurations.

Venice Biennale 2026: controversy in contemporary art

The 2026 Venice Biennale has been overshadowed by controversy rather than its art. The main curator, Cameroon-born Koyo Kouoh, died unexpectedly in May. Russia, absent since 2022, returned to the exhibition, prompting the biennale jury to resign in protest after declaring it would not award prizes to countries accused of war crimes, with protests also targeting Israel.