The Japan Pavilion at the Venice Art Biennale 2026 features an immersive, interactive exhibition titled "Grass Babies, Moon Babies" by Japanese-American artist Ei Arakawa-Nash. Visitors are invited to care for one of 200 dolls, each with a QR code that provides a "diaper poem" linked to the doll's symbolic birth date—reflecting the artist's personal experience of becoming a father in 2024 and broader social dynamics in Japan. The pavilion, curated by Lisa Horikawa and Mizuki Takahashi, evolves over the seven months of the Biennale as a platform for shared care and participation.
This project matters because it redefines the national pavilion as a space for collaboration and multiplicity rather than singular representation, drawing on the artist's diasporic and queer perspective. By turning care—often invisible and gendered labor—into a public, performative act, Arakawa-Nash challenges traditional boundaries between private life and public exhibition, linking his work to historical movements like Gutai, Fluxus, and Viennese Actionism. The pavilion also engages institutions such as the Getty Museum and Ca' Foscari University, expanding the role of the national pavilion into a networked, participatory platform.