10 Must-See Venice Exhibitions, from Galleries to Foundations

As the 61st Venice Biennale cascades across the city, its energy spills far beyond the Giardini and Arsenale into a parade of remarkable institutional and independent exhibitions. This season, Venice becomes a blooming archive of artistic inquiry—where performance meets painting, sculpture dissolves into participation, and history is reexamined through urgent contemporary lenses. Below, we spotlight ten standout exhibitions shaping the cultural landscape of the Biennale’s opening months.

Gallerie dell’Accademia di Venezia

“Marina Abramović: Transforming Energy”

Dorsoduro

Opening during the 61st Venice Biennale, this landmark presentation marks Marina Abramović as the first living woman artist to receive a major exhibition at the Gallerie dell’Accademia—an institution long defined by its Renaissance holdings. Spanning both permanent and temporary galleries, the show places Abramović’s pioneering performance practice in direct dialogue with Venetian art history. Visitors encounter interactive “Transitory Objects”—crystal-embedded structures designed to activate what the artist calls “energy transmission”—alongside restagings and projections of seminal works like Imponderabilia and Rhythm 0. A standout moment pairs Pietà (with Ulay) (1983) with Titian’s final painting, reframing enduring themes of grief and transcendence across centuries. Grounded in presence and participation, the exhibition transforms the museum into a site of bodily awareness, where past and present converge through the viewer’s own experience.

What we love: How Abramović’s work doesn’t just sit within history—it charges it, turning centuries-old masterpieces into active participants in a living, bodily exchange.

“Marina Abramović: Transforming Energy” at Gallerie dell’Accademia di Venezia
May 6 – October 19, 2026

Fondazione Giorgio Cini

“Eroi d’Oro” by Georg Baselitz

San Giorgio Maggiore

Presented on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore during the Venice Biennale, Georg Baselitz’s latest series unfolds as both a continuation and summation of a six-decade career. Featuring monumental new canvases, the exhibition centers on luminous gold grounds that flatten space while amplifying the physical presence of the painted figure. Suspended across these reflective surfaces, Baselitz’s signature inverted bodies—often self-portraits or depictions of his wife, Elke—appear fragile, spectral, and deeply introspective. Delicate linework, reminiscent of drawing or calligraphy, is punctuated by bursts of impasto color, creating a tension between restraint and gesture. At this scale, the gold becomes immersive, enveloping the viewer in a shifting field of light. Reflecting on time, mortality, and artistic legacy, Eroi d’Oro positions Baselitz’s late work as both intimate and monumental—an unflinching meditation on the human condition.

What we love: The way gold becomes less a background than an atmosphere—one that flickers between reverence and vulnerability as the figures hover within it.

“Eroi d’Oro” by Georg Baselitz at Fondazione Giorgio Cini
May 6–September 27, 2026

Palazzo Cini Gallery

“Painting in the Present Tense” by David Salle

San Vio / Dorsoduro

Marking his first solo exhibition in Venice, David Salle’s presentation at Palazzo Cini arrives as a timely meditation on painting in the age of artificial intelligence. Building on his earlier Tapestry Paintings, Salle employs a custom-trained AI model to reprocess historical imagery—already filtered through centuries of translation—into newly destabilized compositions. These digitally generated grounds are then printed onto canvas and reworked by hand, where gestural brushstrokes, saturated color, and sharply defined figures reassert the artist’s presence. The result is a layered visual field in which Renaissance references, fashion imagery, and fragmented narratives collide. Installed within a palazzo that itself bridges historic and contemporary art, the exhibition underscores painting’s enduring elasticity. Rather than replacing authorship, Salle’s use of AI becomes a tool for disruption—testing how meaning, image-making, and human expression persist in an increasingly mediated world.

What we love: Salle’s refusal to surrender authorship, instead bending AI into something unruly, where fracture and gesture coexist in a state of productive tension.

“Painting in the Present Tense” by David Salle at Palazzo Cini Gallery
May 6 – September 27, 2026

Museo Fortuny

“Dreamers” by Erwin Wurm

San Marco

Set within the richly atmospheric interiors of the Museo Fortuny, this major exhibition presents works by Austrian artist Erwin Wurm, featuring both new sculptures shown for the first time and works retracing some of his most celebrated series. Known for radically expanding the definition of sculpture, Wurm transforms the palazzo into a space where the boundaries between object, body, and viewer dissolve. Central to the exhibition are his iconic One Minute Sculptures, in which visitors are invited to follow simple instructions—posing with everyday items to momentarily become the artwork themselves. Elsewhere, anthropomorphic objects, distorted forms, and works that manipulate volume and weight underscore his ongoing fascination with the body as a mutable, sculptural entity. Balancing humor with sharp social critique, Wurm’s practice interrogates contemporary pressures and the absurdity of daily life, inviting viewers to reconsider the ordinary through a lens of paradox and participation.

What we love: That disarming moment when you realize the sculpture isn’t in front of you—you are the sculpture, caught in Wurm’s quietly subversive choreography.

“Dreamers” by Erwin Wurm at Museo Fortuny
May 6 – November 22, 2026

Pinault Collection Palazzo Grassi

“The Promise of Change” by Michael Armitage

San Marco

Occupying the grand enfilade of Palazzo Grassi, Michael Armitage’s largest European exhibition to date brings together more than a decade of painting alongside an expansive selection of drawings. Known for his luminous, layered compositions on Lubugo bark cloth, Armitage draws from personal memory, East African histories, and global current events to construct scenes that feel both intimate and politically charged. Myth, migration, and social unrest intertwine across canvases that balance delicacy with urgency. Installed at a monumental scale, the works unfold as a fluid narrative, where figuration slips into abstraction and time feels suspended. Anchored in Venice during the Biennale, the exhibition positions Armitage as a defining voice of his generation—one whose work resonates across geographies while remaining deeply rooted in place.

What we love: The way Armitage builds images that feel both fragile and insistent, as if history itself were surfacing through the weave of the bark cloth.

“The Promise of Change” by Michael Armitage at Pinault Collection Palazzo Grassi
March 29, 2026—January 10, 2027

Pinault Collection Palazzo Grassi

“Co-travellers” by Amar Kanwar

San Samuele / San Marco

On the second floor of Palazzo Grassi, Amar Kanwar presents a contemplative pairing of two major multimedia installations that span two decades of his practice. Known for merging film, archival material, and poetic narration, Kanwar creates immersive environments that sit at the intersection of art, activism, and documentation. The Torn First Pages (2004–08) examines resistance in Myanmar through collected testimonies, printed matter, and moving image, foregrounding acts of quiet defiance against authoritarian power. In contrast, The Peacock’s Graveyard (2023) unfolds in near-total darkness, where floating sequences of text and abstract imagery form a meditative, almost hypnotic experience shaped by sound. Together, the works invite viewers into a layered reflection on violence, memory, and moral responsibility—offering a quietly powerful lens on the complexities of the present.

What we love: A rare stillness that demands attention—where silence, darkness, and image slow perception to a near meditative state.

“Co-travellers” by Amar Kanwar at Pinault Collection Palazzo Grassi
March 29, 2026—January 10, 2027

Pinault Collection Punta della Dogana

“Algebra” by Paulo Nazareth

Dorsoduro

Spanning the upper floor of Punta della Dogana, Paulo Nazareth’s Algebra transforms the former customs house into a deeply charged meditation on history, movement, and repair. Bringing together over two decades of work—including new and previously unseen pieces—the exhibition unfolds as a non-linear journey shaped by the artist’s ongoing “art-life” practice. Known for his long-distance walks across continents, Nazareth traces the enduring impact of colonialism and migration through photographs, text, and found objects. A line of salt runs through the galleries, subtly mapping the ghostly outline of a slave ship, its presence surfacing across the installation as both material and metaphor. Anchored by works like Notícias de América, the exhibition resists fixed narratives, instead proposing a form of knowledge rooted in lived experience, ancestral memory, and what escapes official records.

What we love: That a single, unassuming material—salt—can carry the weight of erased histories, quietly threading the entire exhibition together.

“Algebra” by Paulo Nazareth at Pinault Collection Punta della Dogana
March 29—November 22, 2026

Pinault Collection Punta della Dogana

“Third Person” by Lorna Simpson

Dorsoduro

At Punta della Dogana, supported exclusively by Bottega Veneta, Lorna Simpson presents a powerful suite of recent paintings and multimedia works that expand her decades-long investigation into identity, memory, and representation. Large-scale compositions, often featuring isolated female figures rendered in ink, acrylic, and collage, hover between clarity and ambiguity, resisting fixed narratives. Drawing on archival imagery from publications like Jet and Ebony, alongside found photographs and recurring motifs such as ice and natural elements, Simpson constructs layered visual fields where past and present converge. Text fragments and poetic associations deepen the emotional register, leaving space for what remains unsaid. Installed within Tadao Ando’s stark architecture, the works take on an immersive quality, inviting viewers into a contemplative space where image, history, and perception continuously shift.

What we love: Simpson’s ability to leave meaning suspended, allowing image and text to hover in a space where interpretation never quite settles.

“Third Person” by Lorna Simpson at Pinault Collection Punta della Dogana
March 29—November 22, 2026

Fondazione Dries Van Noten

“The Only True Protest Is Beauty” (Group Presentation)

San Polo

Unfolding across the storied rooms of Palazzo Pisani Moretta, the inaugural presentation of the Fondazione Dries Van Noten positions beauty as both question and provocation. Curated by Dries Van Noten with Geert Bruloot, the presentation brings together more than 200 works spanning fashion, art, design, jewelry, and material experimentation, dissolving traditional boundaries between disciplines. Rather than a linear narrative, the presentation moves intuitively through a sequence of richly layered environments, where couture silhouettes, archival pieces, and contemporary works enter into dialogue with the palazzo’s ornate interiors. Moments of harmony are deliberately interrupted by unexpected juxtapositions, underscoring beauty’s capacity to unsettle as much as it delights. Rooted in craftsmanship and the human act of making, the exhibition ultimately frames beauty as an active, even resistant force—one that invites deeper reflection in an increasingly complex world.

What we love: Beauty here feels unruly—seductive one moment, disruptive the next—never allowing the eye to rest too comfortably.

“The Only True Protest Is Beauty” (Group Presentation) at Fondazione Dries Van Noten
April 25 – October 4, 2026

Palazzo Manfrin

“Anish Kapoor”

Cannaregio

Opening the historic Palazzo Manfrin to the public for only the second time, Anish Kapoor presents an expansive survey that traces five decades of sculptural and architectural thinking. Bringing together around 100 models—spanning both realized and unrealized projects—the exhibition reveals the artist’s process as a space of experimentation, where ideas around scale, form, and perception take shape. These studies are set in dialogue with monumental installations, including a suspended black-pigment iteration of At the Edge of the World and the immersive void of Descent into Limbo. Throughout, Kapoor’s signature materials—mirror-polished steel, saturated pigment, silicone, and Vantablack—reshape the viewer’s relationship to space, alternately reflecting, absorbing, and dissolving it. Installed within the palazzo’s historic architecture, the exhibition underscores Kapoor’s enduring pursuit of the “non-object,” where sculpture becomes an experience that destabilizes perception and opens onto something immeasurable.

What we love: Kapoor’s uncanny talent for making space itself feel unstable, as if the architecture might dissolve under the pressure of perception.

“Anish Kapoor” at Palazzo Manfrin
May 6 – August 9, 2026