Koyo Kouoh's exhibition 'In Minor Keys' at the 2026 Venice Biennale centers on the practices of two deceased artists, Issa Samb and Beverly Buchanan, whose ways of thinking animate the show through dedicated 'Shrines' in the Central Pavilion. The exhibition also draws on Marcel Duchamp's legacy, featuring works by over a dozen contemporary artists including Akinbode Akinbiyi, Guadalupe Rosales, Natalia Lassalle-Morillo, Guadalupe Maravilla, Sofía Gallisá Muriente, and Avi Mograbi, whose installation 'Between a River and a Sea' contrasts pre-1948 business directories with a 2023 Gaza Yellow Pages. A section called 'The Schools' highlights artist-run spaces such as Denniston Hill, Guest Artists Space (G.A.S.) Foundation, blaxTARLINES, and the Nairobi Contemporary Art Institute.
This exhibition matters because it reframes the Biennale's narrative around overlooked figures and collective, community-based art practices, elevating underrecognized contributions to Land Art and postcolonial discourse. By foregrounding Samb and Buchanan alongside Duchamp, Kouoh challenges canonical art history and emphasizes the importance of artist-run spaces and archival gaps, making a powerful statement about resilience, migration, and the political stakes of visibility in contemporary art.