Venice Biennale Reveals Curator for 2026 Edition
By Annabel Preston
Portrait of KOYO KOUOH. Courtesy La Biennale di Venezia.
Koyo Kouoh has been selected as the curator of the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026. Recommended by La Biennale’s president, Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, the Cameroonian-Swiss curator will be the first African-born woman to helm the art world’s longest-running mega event.
Since 2019, Kouoh has been the executive director and chief curator of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa in Cape Town. Previously, she was the founding artistic director of RAW Material Company in Dakar, Senegal, and worked on the curatorial teams for Documenta 12 in 2007 and Documenta 13 in 2012.
Describing the Venice Biennale as “the center of gravity for art for over a century,” Kouoh said in a statement: “It is a once-in-a-lifetime honor and privilege to follow in the footsteps of luminary predecessors . . . to compose an exhibition that I hope will carry meaning for the world we currently live in—and for the world we want to make.” Highlighting her inclination to create a show guided by conversations with the show’s exhibitors, she emphasized the fundamental role of artists as “visionaries and social scientists who allow us to reflect and project in ways afforded only to this line of work.”
Kouoh’s selection for the position disrupts the assumption that the biennale would take a more nationalistic turn under prime minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing government, of which Buttafuoco is an open supporter. In a statement on Tuesday, Buttafuoco described Kouoh’s appointment as “the acknowledgement of a broad horizon of vision at the dawn of a day rich with new words and eyes.”
The 61st Venice Biennale is set to take place from April to November, 2026.
Annabel Preston is assistant editor at ArtAsiaPacific.
