At the heart of the Biennale, the national pavilions continue to serve as powerful sites of experimentation and cultural expression, where artists respond to both local histories and global conditions. This year, many presentations move beyond traditional formats, embracing sound, performance, archival material, and participatory environments. Across these pavilions, themes of fragility and resilience, communication and misinterpretation, and the shifting nature of identity emerge with striking clarity—inviting visitors into deeply personal yet universally relevant encounters.
Icelandic Pavilion
Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir: “Pocket Universe”
Curated by Margrét Áskelsdóttir and Unnar Örn
Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir, “Hero Form,” 2026.
Photo Sandijs Ruluks
Courtesy of the artist ©Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir.
At the Icelandic Pavilion, Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir presents “Pocket Universe,” a multidisciplinary installation unfolding across a former shipyard in Venice. Moving fluidly between sound, performance, moving image, and sculpture, the exhibition creates a dreamlike environment where narratives emerge, dissolve, and reconfigure. Blending mythology, intuition, and speculative storytelling, the work explores how imagination and belief can reshape perception in moments of uncertainty. Objects, gestures, and live actions appear as fragments within an evolving constellation, inviting visitors to navigate their own path through layered timelines and meanings. Centered on themes of hope, chance, and transformation, “Pocket Universe” proposes a quiet, participatory mode of engagement—one that embraces instability as a space for possibility and reimagining.
What we love: The poetic sense of openness, where meaning is never fixed but constantly in motion—encouraging visitors to surrender to ambiguity and discover their own intuitive pathways through a richly layered, ever-shifting environment.
Ásta Fanney Sigurðardóttir: “Pocket Universe”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Spanish Pavilion
Oriol Vilanova: “Los restos”
Curated by Carles Guerra
Oriol Vilanova, “Reproductions,” Courtesy of the artist.
At the Spanish Pavilion, Oriol Vilanova presents “Los restos,” a project built from an extensive archive of postcards collected over two decades. Sourced from flea markets and secondhand shops, these fragments of personal correspondence become the foundation for an installation that reflects on memory, accumulation, and the cultural value of what endures. Transforming the pavilion into an “anti-museum,” Vilanova repositions these overlooked objects as carriers of lived experience and historical residue. Rather than monumental narratives, the work foregrounds modest acts of collecting and preservation, questioning how meaning is assigned to cultural artifacts. In doing so, “Los restos” offers a quiet yet incisive meditation on loss, remembrance, and the systems through which history is constructed and maintained.
What we love: The elevation of everyday fragments into a quietly powerful meditation on memory and value, where the accumulation of seemingly minor objects reveals the emotional weight and cultural resonance embedded within personal histories.
Oriol Vilanova: “Los restos”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Uruguayan Pavilion
Margaret Whyte: “ANTIFRAGIL”
Curated by Patricia Bentancur
Margaret Whyte, “Tiempo de escuchar (installation view),” 2024,
Textiles and Mixed materials.
Photographer Pablo Bielli
© Pablo Bielli
Courtesy of the artist.
At the Uruguayan Pavilion, Margaret Whyte presents “ANTIFRAGIL,” an installation that embraces instability, tension, and vulnerability as generative forces. Drawing on the concept of antifragility, the work explores how systems can grow stronger through disruption, using fragments of material culture to construct a layered, evolving environment. Textiles, found objects, and obsolete technologies—ranging from machinery to discarded debris—are brought together in assemblages that gain meaning through their interactions. Positioned between craft and contemporary art, these materials carry traces of use and history, forming a sculptural language rooted in resistance and transformation. Through acts of weaving and assembling, the project proposes alternative ways of understanding connection, suggesting that fragility itself can become a site of strength, adaptation, and collective possibility.
What we love: The tactile, layered approach to fragility as a source of resilience and reinvention, where materials marked by time and use are transformed into a powerful visual language of endurance, adaptation, and collective memory.
Margaret Whyte: “ANTIFRAGIL”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Holy See Pavilion
“The Ear is the Eye of the Soul”
Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Ben Vickers
Giardino Mistico dei Carmelitani Scalzi, 2025,
Photo: Ermanno Barucco; Courtesy Provincia veneta
dell’Ordine dei Carmelitani Scalzi
Complesso di Santa Maria Ausiliatrice, 2025,
Courtesy Dicastero per la Cultura e l’Educazione.
At the Holy See Pavilion, “The Ear is the Eye of the Soul” unfolds as a contemplative, sound-based exhibition set within the Giardino Mistico dei Carmelitani Scalzi. Responding to a call to slow down and listen, the project brings together newly commissioned works by musicians, poets, and artists inspired by the writings and chants of Saint Hildegard of Bingen. Within the garden, a site-specific instrument translates the environment’s natural rhythms into an evolving composition, inviting visitors into a space of reflection and sensory attunement. Extending beyond the garden into a parallel research and archival site, across the city in Castello within the Santa Maria Ausiliatrice Complex, the exhibition positions listening as both a spiritual and collective act—bridging past and present through sound, ecology, and shared experience.
What we love: The profound emphasis on listening as a form of connection, contemplation, and collective awareness—transforming sound into a deeply immersive medium that slows perception and invites a more attentive, almost meditative engagement with the world.
“The Ear is the Eye of the Soul”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Moroccan Pavilion
Amina Agueznay: “Asǝṭṭa”
Curated by Meriem Berrada
“Asǝṭṭa,” 2026. Detail. Created by artist Amina Agueznay. Courtesy Moroccan Ministry of Youth, Culture and Communication ©️ Ayoub El Bardii.
At the Moroccan Pavilion, Amina Agueznay presents “Asǝṭṭa,” a monumental installation conceived for the Arsenale’s Artiglierie that centers on the transmission of craft, memory, and embodied knowledge. Drawing on the Amazigh concept of ritual weaving, the work reflects the gestures, materials, and voices that sustain Morocco’s artisanal traditions across generations. Structured around the idea of the threshold, or âatba, the installation explores spaces of transition—between interior and exterior, private and communal, sacred and everyday—rooted in Moroccan vernacular architecture. Through its material language and spatial rhythm, “Asǝṭṭa” foregrounds quiet, cumulative practices, aligning with the Biennale’s theme by emphasizing subtle narratives and forms of knowledge passed from hand to hand.
What we love: The reverence for craft as a living, intergenerational language of knowledge and care, where each gesture and material carries the weight of tradition while remaining open to reinterpretation and renewal.
Amina Agueznay: “Asǝṭṭa”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Polish Pavilion
Bogna Burska and Daniel Kotowski: “Liquid Tongues”
Curated by Ewa Chomicka and Jolanta Woszczenko
Bogna Burska, Daniel Kotowski, “Liquid Tongues,” 2026, video, courtesy of Zachęta – National Gallery of Art.
At the Polish Pavilion, Bogna Burska and Daniel Kotowski present “Liquid Tongues,” a multidisciplinary project that rethinks communication through the lenses of Deaf culture, ecology, and collective expression. Developed with performers from Choir in Motion (Chór w Ruchu), the work draws on whale communication systems, translating their codes into spoken English and International Sign. Bringing together hearing and Deaf perspectives, the project explores language as an embodied and relational process shaped by environment and power. A key component filmed underwater shifts the hierarchy of communication, rendering spoken language ineffective while elevating sign as the primary mode of expression. Through this inversion, “Liquid Tongues” invites reflection on marginalized languages and more-than-human forms of connection, asking how meaning is created, shared, and understood across difference.
Bogna Burska and Daniel Kotowski: “Liquid Tongues”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Korean Pavilion
Goen Choi and Hyeree Ro: “Liberation Space: Fortress/Nest”
Curated by Binna Choi
Binna Choi, Hyeree Ro, and Goen Choi, 2026, Donghwan Kam.
At the Korean Pavilion, Goen Choi and Hyeree Ro present “Liberation Space: Fortress/Nest,” a layered installation that transforms the pavilion into a “living monument” shaped by tension, renewal, and collective imagination. Drawing on Korea’s post-liberation history and its ongoing geopolitical complexities, the project positions liberation not as a fixed moment, but as a continuous, unfinished process. Through contrasting sculptural approaches, Choi’s intervention pierces and activates the architecture with industrial materials, evoking a defensive “fortress,” while Ro creates a soft, immersive “nest” that invites reflection, care, and movement. Expanded through a fellowship of artists and cultural practitioners, the pavilion becomes a dynamic space of exchange—exploring how nations, identities, and futures are continually shaped through conflict, memory, and the possibility of transformation.
Goen Choi and Hyeree Ro: “Liberation Space: Fortress/Nest”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Kosovo Pavilion
Brilant Milazimi: “Hard Teeth (Dhëmbë të Fortë)”
Curated by José Esparza Chong Cuy
Brilant Milazimi, “Hard Teeth (detail),” 2026. Oil and pen on canvas. Photo by Majlinda Hoxha. Courtesy of the Artist and the Pavilion of the Republic of Kosovo at the 61st Venice Biennale.
At the Kosovo Pavilion, Brilant Milazimi presents “Hard Teeth (Dhëmbë të Fortë),” an immersive painting installation centered on a monumental 17-meter-wide landscape. Installed within the historic Chiesa di Santa Maria del Pianto, the work depicts a line of figures stretching across a mountainous terrain, suspended in a state of waiting. Drawing on Kosovo’s political history and broader global experiences of displacement, the installation reflects on waiting as both condition and structure—shaped by borders, bureaucracy, and uncertain futures. Milazimi’s psychologically charged imagery, marked by recurring motifs of clenched teeth, evokes resilience amid tension, collapse, and persistence. Positioned between dream and unease, “Hard Teeth” offers a poignant meditation on endurance, where movement is stalled yet survival continues.
Brilant Milazimi: “Hard Teeth (Dhëmbë të Fortë)”
May 9–November 22, 2026
Swiss Pavilion
“The Unfinished Business of Living Together”
Curated by Gianmaria Andreetta, Luca Beeler, and Nina Wakeford
Telearena, “Homosexualität,” 1978, still image, produced by SRF (Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen), Courtesy SRG SSR.
At the Swiss Pavilion, “The Unfinished Business of Living Together” examines coexistence as both aspiration and ongoing conflict. The exhibition is conceived by curators Gianmaria Andreetta, Luca Beeler, together with artist Nina Wakeford, and developed in collaboration with artists Miriam Laura Leonardi, Lithic Alliance, and Yul Tomatala. Drawing on archival material—including historic Swiss television debates on homosexuality—the exhibition revisits moments when marginalized voices entered public discourse, using them as a lens to consider how societies negotiate difference. Through a spatial installation combining video, sound, and scenography, the project reactivates the archive as a living, contested space. Extending into the pavilion’s garden, it explores intimacy, memory, and the politics of visibility, questioning who is heard and who remains excluded. Collaborative and multi-vocal, the exhibition positions “living together” as an unfinished process—one shaped by negotiation, friction, and the continual reimagining of shared space.
What we love: Its nuanced, collaborative approach to coexistence as an ongoing and necessary negotiation, revealing how shared life is continually shaped through dialogue, tension, and the courage to remain open to difference.
“The Unfinished Business of Living Together”
May 9–November 22, 2026
