The 61^st International Art Exhibition of LaBiennale di Venezia , In Minor Keys by Koyo Kouoh , – which will run from Saturday 9 May to Sunday 22 November 2026 at the Giardini, the Arsenale and in various locations around Venice. The pre-opening will take place on May 6, 7, and 8 , while the awards ceremony and inauguration will be held on Saturday, May 9, 2026 .

The Exhibition by Koyo Kouoh Artists . The 111 invited participants of this exhibition – among them, individual artists, collaborative duos, collectives, and artist-led organisations – hail from many geographies and regions selected by Koyo with particular attention to resonances, affinity, and and possible convergences between practices, even when far apart. In looking to artists working in Salvador, Dakar, San Juan, Beirut, Paris, or Nashville, for example, Koyo sought to envision how their ingenuity, breadth of material experimentation, and visionary ideas bear connections to other artists and movements in simultaneity. In this spirit,  In Minor Keys expands upon Koyo’s relational geography of encounters with artists over her lifetime .

Motifs . Koyo saw several conceptual motifs guiding the exhibition. These were not abstractly determined but rather sifted from a reservoir of art that acts deeply on the soul and mind. They brought into focus a compositional method for the exhibition, which is not organised according to sections but rather in respect of undercurrent priorities. Among these are "Shrines" – in which prominence is given to the practices of two lodestar artists while exceeding a retrospective impulse; processional assemblies; enchantment in the face of cynicism about what art can do; spiritual and physical rest opened up by the oases – the keys or small islands of artists’ universes; and finally, Koyo’s commitment to artist-centred institution building or "Schools", in which energy and resource is directed towards a social purpose.

Literary references. These strands leap from practice to practice, snaking an intergenerational path to build across the sites ofIn Minor Keys. During the curatorial work, many ideas resonated with the literary references shared by Koyo as sources of inspiration, among them, Beloved by Toni Morrison and One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, texts that connect in their evocation of thresholds between lifeworlds and temporalities and by a magical realism which deepens rather than distracts from an emotional register.

Shrines . Sala Chini, which leads visitors to the core of the Central Pavilion, announces the vocabulary of the "Shrines”, which Koyo envisaged as tributes to two incandescent worldmakers: Issa Samb (1945–2017) and Beverly Buchanan (1940–2015). An artist, poet, playwright, and co-founder of the revolutionary collective Laboratoire Agit’Art in Dakar, Samb was an enduring presence, mentor, and inspiration for Koyo, who honoured his practice and life philosophy in international projects. Buchanan ’s artmaking, which Koyo encountered more recently, encompassed subtle and confronting readings of locations and communities through anti-monumental approaches to Land Art and public sculpture, which she often placed in sites of charged memory. Both artists recognised the significance of art as generative, surpassing mere objecthood, and evading conventional preservation.

Procession . The procession’s motif, inspired by carnival choreographies and Afro-Atlantic gatherings, expresses a dynamic spacial language in which joining the crowd, rather than observing, is requisite and implied. In this carnivalesque dimension, capable of suspending and subverting hierarchies, many artistic practices challenge archives and canons, reinterpret established symbols, and demystify dominant narratives through transhistorical, speculative, or rigorous approaches.

Schools . The "Schools" emerge as ecosystems rooted in their local territories and, at the same time, transnational: spaces of learning and regeneration founded on encounter, shared knowledge, and autonomy from market forces. Integrated into the constellation of the exhibition, they reflect a shared ethic and a collaborative practice that intertwines art and social responsibility.

Rest . Themes such as the plantation, colonial settlement, environmental disaster, and geological memory traverse other works, which confront seismic events and their traces through radical and liberatory methods. At the same time, the Creole garden and the courtyard — spaces of self-sufficiency born under conditions of constraint — become both real and metaphorical places of rest, reconnection, and engagement with non-human forms of life. The Exhibition ultimately reflects on the possibility of stepping back from the encyclopedic impulse to make room for rest, contemplation, and deep listening . Multisensory installations encourage rêverie and enchantment, inviting visitors to slow down and allow themselves to be transformed by the experience. Through oases that evoke studios, courtyards, and learning spaces,In Minor Keys conveys the spirit of a project that weaves together collaboration, generosity, and trust in the multiple dimensions of our shared humanity.

Performances. The program of performances centres the body as a site of knowledge and memory, as well as a political vessel for collective resistance and healing.
A procession of poets will take place in the Giardini della Biennale, inspired by Koyo’s Poetry Caravan, a voyage she undertook with nine African poets from Dakar to Timbuktu in 1999. The performance honours her memory and opens a space for poetry and storytelling. It pays homage to the griots those who seek the source human dream to spread the wings of knowledge and power. In the Giardini of La Biennale, poets will assemble to form a chorus vested with the power of the word, the groundswell of recital and spiritual healing.