For the Biennale Arte 2026, Otobong Nkanga has wrapped the four columns supporting the façade of the Central Pavilion in the Giardini with locally made brick. Ceramic pots attached to the cladding contain plants that steadily extend their roots and vines, eventually obscuring the columns. Murano glass objects, their forms inspired by a pumpkin that grows in West Africa, pulsate with light, like the beating heart of a translucent organism. As in many of her past projects, Nkanga generates her works as sites where people and nature encounter one another to the soundtrack of the world’s “minor keys”.
Nkanga has transformed Carlo Scarpa’s Sculpture Garden into an inviting space that beckons visitors to pause. Here, various types and sizes of rocks, quarried from nearby regions of Italy, are placed directly on the floor. Their layers reveal unfathomable spans of time. The cavities of some are filled with rainwater, while others cradle aromatic plants.
For Nkanga, storytelling is not only the gift of human beings. Rather, every element that constitutes this world is capable of speaking. Her art manifests the implicit relationships between the earth and ourselves, gently transcending national borders, cultural differences, and language barriers to bring us into connection with one another.
—Kimihiko Nakamura
