The National Portrait Gallery in London is hosting "Catherine Opie: To Be Seen," the first major UK museum exhibition dedicated to the American photographer. The show brings together over 80 photographs spanning 30 years of Opie's career, exploring themes of social, political, and individual identity through studio portraiture, environmental studies, and documentary images.
The 2026 Venice Biennale, curated by the late Koyo Kouoh under the theme "In Minor Keys," has been plagued by months of turmoil including countries withdrawing, artists being fired, exhibitions cancelled, funding pulled, and protests during the preview. A five-person curatorial team took over after Kouoh's death, resulting in what the critic describes as a disjointed, committee-driven exhibition that prioritizes quiet contemplation and healing over direct political engagement. The central shows in the Giardini and Arsenale feature a vast, poorly explained array of art from the global south, with installations of ceramics, textiles, slide projectors, and serene natural scenes that the critic finds anachronistic and dull.
The 2026 Venice Biennale is embroiled in controversy, with the US Pavilion at the center of a political storm. The Trump administration's State Department overhauled the selection process, bypassing the usual NEA panel and commissioning a nonprofit, the American Arts Conservancy, to organize the pavilion. Artist Alma Allen, who accepted the invitation despite threats from galleries and curators, presents a show that critics find politically muted. The Biennale's jury resigned days before the opening, and annual prizes were canceled, adding to the turmoil.
New York City is hosting a packed week of art fairs in May 2025, including Frieze at The Shed, Independent Art Fair at Pier 36, TEFAF New York at the Park Avenue Armory, and NADA New York at the Starrett-Lehigh Building. The fairs feature hundreds of international galleries, with Frieze emphasizing Central and South American exhibitors, Independent exploring a dystopian theme, TEFAF offering antiquities and fine art, and NADA celebrating its 12th edition with 121 galleries. The article also notes recent major exhibitions at the New Museum, Whitney Biennial, MoMA PS1, The Met, and MoMA, and includes a guide to Upstate New York art destinations.
The article reviews the best booths at Frieze New York 2026, held at the Shed in Hudson Yards. It highlights eight standout presentations, including Hauser & Wirth's debut of new Cindy Sherman photographs, Andrew Edlin Gallery's themed booth featuring artists like Paulina Peavy and Melvin Way who explore extraterrestrial themes, and Carlos/Ishikawa's display of Evelyn Taocheng Wang's monumental paintings that engage with Agnes Martin and Georgia O'Keeffe. The author notes that while art fairs prioritize commerce, some galleries successfully balance good art with monetization.
A long-delayed loan of Paul Klee's painting *Angelus Novus* (1920) has finally arrived at the Jewish Museum in New York, completing the exhibition "Paul Klee: Other Possible Worlds." The work, on loan from the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, was stuck in Israel due to the ongoing war in Iran, which began with joint US-Israeli bombardments on February 28. Until its arrival, the painting was represented by an authorized facsimile with a note citing transport delays. The exhibition, which opened March 20, focuses on Klee's final decade and runs through July 26.
The 59th Carnegie International, titled "If the word we," has opened at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, marking North America's longest-running exhibition of international art. Featuring 61 artists and collectives from countries including Brazil, Benin, China, Indonesia, Lebanon, Peru, Taiwan, and South Africa, the exhibition explores the theme of "we" as an evolving proposition. It includes nearly 40 newly commissioned projects—the largest number in the International's history—spanning painting, photography, sculpture, installation, video, and theater. Notable works include Jonathan González's performance "The Strikebreakers" and Georges Adéagbo's installation "Le Socialism Africain," which uses discarded objects to examine Western power and colonial legacies in Africa.
The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery in Toronto is hosting 'Colourful Parachutes: Imagining Alternative Futures Through the Power of Play,' a group exhibition that centers children as active participants rather than passive observers. Curated by Frances Loeffler, the show features interactive works by artists including Temitayo Ogunbiyi, Leisure (Meredith Carruthers and Susannah Wesley), Claire Greenshaw, Rivane Neuenschwander, Harold Offeh, Sassa Linklater, Tobias Linklater, and Robin Rhode, with installations that invite climbing, drawing, playing, and touching. The exhibition draws inspiration from a 1968 show at Moderna Museet in Stockholm that transformed the museum into an adventure playground.
The article highlights five standout pavilions and installations at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Florentina Holzinger's Austrian pavilion features extreme, nude performances including a woman submerged in a urine-purified tank, drawing police attention. Sanya Kantarovsky presents eerie paintings and a Murano glass sculpture in a historic palazzo. Gabrielle Goliath's 'Elegy'—a hypnotic mourning performance for women killed in violence—was banned by South Africa but staged with London's Ibraaz. Carrie Schneider's 1.5km photographic curl in the Arsenale references Chris Marker's 'La Jetée'. Lydia Ourahmane's delicate sculptural show uses materials sourced from Venice, including a bead curtain made by inmates.
Dozens of artists participating in the 2026 Venice Biennale have withdrawn from consideration for the newly created Visitor Lion awards, replacing the traditional Gold and Silver Lion prizes. A total of 57 artists from the main exhibition and 22 national pavilions signed a statement published on e-flux on May 9, acting in solidarity with the five-person prize jury that resigned on April 30 over the continued participation of Russia and Israel. The jury had objected to awarding prizes to artists from countries whose leaders face International Criminal Court charges, including Russian president Vladimir Putin and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In response, the Biennale organizers postponed the awards ceremony to November 22 and introduced visitor voting, a move they described as consistent with openness and dialogue. Meanwhile, the Russian Pavilion, which returned after lending its space to Bolivia in 2024, faced protests, closure after previews, and a €2 million funding pull by the European Union for the 2028 Biennale.
The 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair in New York (May 13–17, 2026) will debut a curated section titled '1-54 Presents: Brazil Beyond Brazil,' focusing exclusively on Afro-Brazilian art and artists. Organized by Brazilian curator Igor Simões, the section features works by ten Black Brazilian artists—including Ana Claudia Almeida, Rebeca Carapiá, and Rommulo Vieira Conceição—presented by leading Brazilian galleries such as Almeida & Dale, Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, Nara Roesler, and Aura. The initiative draws on archival research, reinterprets modernist legacies, and challenges narrow narratives around Afro-Brazilian art, highlighting the cultural links between Africa and Latin America.
The article recounts a journalist's 72-hour visit to the Venice Biennale, beginning with a protest by Pussy Riot and Femen at the Russian Pavilion. The action features pink smoke, chants of "Blood is Russia's art," and a guerrilla performance of the song "Disobey," set against a backdrop of internal Biennale strife—including juror resignations over countries whose leaders face ICC arrest warrants (Netanyahu and Putin). The narrative also notes the presence of alt-right figures like Ryan Coyne and sculptor Alma Allen's troubled U.S. pavilion representation.
On May 8, 2026, artists and cultural workers staged the first strike in the 131-year history of the Venice Biennale, disrupting the pre-opening of the international exhibition. At least 27 of the 100 national pavilions were partially or fully shut down, and thousands marched through Venice to the Arsenale, which was barricaded by Italian riot police. The strike, organized by the Art Not Genocide Alliance (ANGA) and local activist groups, was a 24-hour action for Palestine and workers' rights, with some artists altering or draping their works in the main exhibition, "In Minor Keys."
The article profiles Pietrasanta, a small town in Tuscany, Italy, that has evolved into a thriving international sculpture hub. It traces the town's artistic lineage back to Michelangelo, who sourced marble from local quarries in 1518, and highlights how today a dense network of workshops, foundries, and craftspeople attracts artists from around the world. The local government has established the Fondazione Centro Arti Visive di Pietrasanta to promote the town as a year-round art center, not just a seasonal destination. The piece features the Armenian-born artist Mikayel Ohanjanyan, who has seven sculptures on display in the town.
Consonni Radziszewski inaugurates its Milan space with "uYana umhlaba," the first solo exhibition in Italy by South African artist Buhlebezwe Siwani. The show presents a new body of work that expands on research begun in 2020 with the Inkanyamba series, first exhibited at the Galeria Municipal de Almada in Portugal.
The 61st Venice Biennale opened under heavy protest as Russia returns to the event for the first time since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Ukrainian feminist collective Femen and Russian punk band Pussy Riot demonstrated outside the Russian pavilion, with activists accusing Russia of using art as a weapon in a hybrid war. Meanwhile, pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside Israel's pavilion, holding banners reading 'No artwashing genocide' and demanding Israel's exclusion over the war in Gaza. The Biennale's international jury resigned last month, refusing to award prizes to countries led by figures subject to ICC arrest warrants, namely Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas called Russia's participation 'morally wrong' and threatened to cut €2 million in funding, while culture ministers from 22 European countries urged organizers to reconsider.
A group of artists has announced a strike to protest Israel's participation in the upcoming Venice Biennale. The action is intended to draw attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to pressure the Biennale organizers to exclude Israel from the event, reflecting growing tensions around cultural boycotts in the art world.