The International Jury of the Biennale Arte 2026

The International Jury of the 61^st  International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia is made up of Solange Oliveira Farkas (president), founder and artistic director of Associação Cultural Videobrasil; Zoe Butt, curator, writer and educator, founder of “in-tangible institute” and artistic director of “deCentral”, Thailand; Elvira Dyangani Ose, curator and artistic director of the Public Art Abu Dhabi Biennial; Marta Kuzma, curator, contemporary art theorist and Professor at the Yale School of Art; Giovanna Zapperi, art historian, critic and Professor at the University of Geneva.

The appointment of the Jury has been deliberated by the Board of Directors of La Biennale di Venezia upon selection by Koyo Kouoh, the Curator of the 61^st Exhibition titled In Minor Keys, that will be held in Venice (Giardini and Arsenale) from May 9 to November 22, 2026.

Solange Oliveira Farkas – President – is the founder and artistic director of Associação Cultural Videobrasil. She has led the Videobrasil Biennial as artistic director (1983–2024) and has served as director and chief curator of the Museu de Arte Moderna da Bahia (Brazil, 2007–2010). Her curatorial career extends to major international events, including FUSO (Portugal), Dak’Art (Senegal), the Jakarta International Video Festival (Indonesia) and Sharjah Biennial (UAE).

Zoe Butt is a curator and writer engaged with critically thinking artistic communities, fostering dialogue among cultures in the globalizing souths. In 2022, she founded ‘in-tangible institute’, a curatorial platform nurturing locally responsive infrastructure for the arts across Southeast Asia. In 2025, she was appointed artistic director of “deCentral”, a forthcoming social enterprise for the arts, opening in Thailand in 2027.

Elvira Dyangani Ose is artistic director of the 2nd Public Art Abu Dhabi Biennial 2026-2027. She was director of MACBA, Barcelona, from 2021 to 2026. Previously, she was director and chief curator at The Showroom in London. She has served as curator of the 8^th Gothenburg International Biennial for Contemporary Art, senior curator at Creative Time, and curator of International Art at Tate Modern.

Marta Kuzma is Professor of Art at the Yale School of Art, where she served as Dean (2016–2021), the first woman appointed to its institutional leadership within the school’s 150-year history. She was artistic director & chief curator of Faktura 10 (Ribbon International) throughout Ukraine (2025), a member of the curatorial team of Documenta 13, and co-curator of Manifesta 5 in San Sebastian; Chancellor of the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm, director of the Office for Contemporary Art (OCA) Norway, and founding director of the Soros Center for Contemporary Art in Kyiv.

Giovanna Zapperi is Full Professor of Contemporary Art History at the University of Geneva. Her research focuses in particular on feminist epistemologies and practices in the visual arts, as well as on the relationship between gender, the body, and visual culture in modernity. As an art historian and critic, she has published numerous essays in international journals and exhibition catalogues. She is the author of L’artiste est une femme. La modernité de Marcel Duchamp (Paris, PUF, 2012). In addition, she has received several awards for her research.

The International Jury will award the following official prizes:

Golden Lion for best National Participation
Golden Lion for best participant in the International Exhibition In Minor Keys
Silver Lion for a promising young participant in the International Exhibition In Minor Keys

The Jury may also award:

a maximum of one special mention to National Participations
a maximum of two special mentions to the participants in the International Exhibition In Minor Keys

The Awards Ceremony will take place in Venice on Saturday, 9 May 2026.

Solange Oliveira Farkas – president – is the founder and artistic director of Associação Cultural Videobrasil. With over four decades of curatorial practice, she led the Videobrasil Biennial as artistic director (1983–2024) and served as director and chief curator of the Museu de Arte Moderna da Bahia (Brazil, 2007–2010). Her curatorial career extends to major international events, including FUSO (Portugal), Dak’Art (Senegal), the Jakarta International Video Festival (Indonesia) and Sharjah Biennial (UAE). She has curated landmark exhibitions such as Videobrasil: Needs No Translation (GES-2, Moscow), Dear Amazon (Ilmin Museum of Art, South Korea), and the Pan-African Exhibition of Contemporary Art (MAM-BA, Brazil), as well as solo exhibitions by artists such as Isaac Julien, Joseph Beuys and Sophie Calle. Farkas frequently serves on international juries and advisory boards, including the Nam June Paik Prize, Sharjah Biennial, Rencontres de Bamako – The African Biennial of Photography and the advisory board of the EYE Art & Film Prize. In 2017 she received the Montblanc Arts Patronage Award. She is currently a board member of the International Biennial Association and part of the Research Committee of AWARE. Through lectures and seminars worldwide, she contributes to the international dissemination of contemporary art from the Global South.

Zoe Butt is a curator, writer and educator focusing on critically thinking and historically conscious artistic communities, fostering dialogue among cultures of the globalizing souths. In 2022, she founded “in-tangible institute”, a curatorial platform nurturing locally responsive infrastructure for the arts across Southeast Asia. In 2025, she was appointed artistic director of ‘deCentral’, a forthcoming social enterprise for the arts, opening in Thailand in 2027. Butt holds a PhD by Published Works, Center for Research and Education in Art and Media, University of Westminster, London. Previously she was artistic director, Factory Contemporary Arts Centre, Ho Chi Minh City (2017-2021); Executive Director, Sàn Art, Ho Chi Minh City (2009–2016); Director, International Programs, Long March Project, Beijing (2007–2009); assistant curator, Contemporary Asian Art, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane (2001–2007). Notable endeavors include Cultivate (2024-) Pollination (2018-); Sharjah Biennial 14: Leaving the Echo Chamber - Journey Beyond the Arrow, (2019); Conscious Realities (2013-2016) and San Art Laboratory (2012-2015). Possessing an extensive exhibition, publishing, advisory and public-speaking history globally, she has been published by Hatje Cantz; JRP-Ringier; Routledge; Sternberg Press, among others. Zoe currently lives in Chiang Mai (Thailand). 

Elvira Dyangani Ose is artistic director of the 2nd Public Art Abu Dhabi Biennial 2026-2027. She was director of MACBA, Barcelona, from 2021 to 2026. Previously, she was director and chief curator at The Showroom in London. Among other initiatives, she has served as curator of the eighth Gothenburg International Biennial for Contemporary Art, senior curator at Creative Time, and curator of International Art at Tate Modern. She sat on the Advisory Council of Tate Modern and at the Thought Council of Fondazione Prada, for whom she has curated numerous exhibitions. She also sits on the recently appointed Board of CIMAM – International Committee for Museums and Collections of Modern Art. Her curatorial projects, multidisciplinary in nature, reflect critically on the narration of history as a participatory experience, the traces of collective representation in public space, and the recovery of non-Western narratives and epistemologies. Her recent projects include Project a Black Planet – The Art and Culture of Panafrica (co-curated, 2024 – 2027), Coco Fusco. I Learned to Swim On Dry Land (2025) and Goshka Macuga’s Miu Miu Tales and Tellers (convenor, 2024 - 2025). Dyangani Ose holds a degree in Art History from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. She is a doctoral candidate in Visual Studies at Cornell University in New York, where she earned a Master of Arts. She has a Diploma of Advanced Studies in Theory and History of Architecture from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. She taught at Goldsmiths College as a specialist in Museology, Curating, Black Studies, and Contemporary African Art.

Marta Kuzma is Professor of Art at Yale School of Art, where she served as Dean (2016-2021), the first woman appointed to institutional leadership within a 150-year history. Previously, Professor Kuzma had been Chancellor of the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm, director of Office for Contemporary Art (OCA) Norway and founding director of Soros Center for Contemporary Art in Kyiv. A member of the curatorial team for Documenta 13 and Co-Curator of Manifesta 5, Kuzma has curated extensive exhibitions/research initiatives and authored many publications to include History of An Art School and Whatever Happened to Sex in Scandinavia. Recently, Kuzma served as Chief Curator and Artistic Director for Faktura 10, a multi-platform project inspired by Paul Celan’s writings on disruption and dysfluency as the condition of a life interrupted by war. Faktura 10, realized in Ukraine and internationally throughout 2025, was a core initiative of Ribbon International. In Venice, Kuzma has been visiting Professor in Art Theory at Università Iuav di Venezia (2005–2011); Nordic Pavilion commissioner with the exhibition Collectors at the Biennale Arte 2009; and among the curators for Norway’s participation with the exhibitions The State of Things (Biennale Arte 2011) and Beware of the Holy Whore: Edvard Munch, Lene Berg and the Dilemma of Emancipation (Biennale Arte 2013). She holds postgraduate degrees in aesthetics and art theory from the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy/London, from Yale University (MA privatum), and from Barnard College/NYC (BFA).

Giovanna Zapperi is Full Professor of Contemporary Art History at the University of Geneva. Her research adressess specifically feminist epistemologies and practices in visual arts, as well as on the relationship between gender, body and visual culture in modernity. As an art historian and critic, she has published numerous essays in international journals and exhibition catalogues: she is the author of L’artiste est une femme. La modernité de Marcel Duchamp (Paris, PUF, 2012); Carla Lonzi. Un’arte della vita (Rome, DeriveApprodi, 2017); Art and Feminism in Postwar Italy. The Legacy of Carla Lonzi (London, Bloomsbury, 2021, with Francesco Ventrella). She co-curated together with Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez the exhibition Defiant Muses. Delphine Seyrig and Feminist Video Collectives in France, 1970s–1980s (Museo Reina Sofía, 2019–2020). She has received several recognitions for her research activity, in particular she was a fellow of the French Academy-Villa Medici (2013–2014) and “Rudolf Wittkower Professor” at the Bibliotheca Hertziana, Max Planck Institute (2020–2021).