Venice’s art fair and twist
The Venice International Art Fair 2026 will run alongside the Biennale, turning the city into an expanded exhibition hub for the season. (veniceinsiderguide.com) One profile focuses on Andreas Angelidakis, whose Venice work questions the idea of a national pavilion and reframes how countries present themselves at the Biennale. (observer.com)
Venice is stacking two art circuits into one spring season: the Venice International Art Fair opens on April 17, 2026, three weeks before the Venice Biennale begins on May 9. (veniceinsiderguide.com) The fair’s 24th edition is scheduled for April 17 to April 30 at Palazzo Albrizzi-Capello in Cannaregio, according to the organizer’s ticket listing and local guide coverage. The Biennale’s 61st International Art Exhibition then runs from May 9 to November 22, with preview days on May 6, 7 and 8. (eventbrite.it) (labiennale.org) La Biennale di Venezia said the 2026 exhibition, titled *In Minor Keys*, will be held at the Giardini, the Arsenale and “various locations around Venice.” That citywide footprint leaves room for private fairs, collateral shows and national pavilions to overlap in the same visitor calendar. (labiennale.org) (veniceinsiderguide.com) One of those national presentations is Greece’s pavilion, where Andreas Angelidakis will show *Escape Room* from May 9 to November 22, 2026. Greek arts coverage describes the project as turning the pavilion into a “contemporary Platonic cave.” (daysofart.gr) (athens24.com) In an interview published on April 11, 2026, Angelidakis told *Observer* he is using the Venice project to question the national pavilion itself. The profile says his installation “queers the idea of a national pavilion” by treating the country display less as a fixed identity and more as a staged, unstable set. (observer.com) That lands in a format the Biennale has used for decades: countries mount separate exhibitions in their own pavilions, especially in the Giardini, alongside the central curated show. The Art Newspaper’s March 5 roundup counted a growing list of countries already naming artists and curators for 2026. (theartnewspaper.com) (labiennale.org) The Biennale is also arriving under changed circumstances after curator Koyo Kouoh’s death in 2025. La Biennale said it will proceed with *In Minor Keys* “with the full support of Koyo Kouoh’s family.” (labiennale.org) So the 2026 Venice season is taking shape on two tracks at once: a commercial fair in late April and the Biennale’s national-and-curated exhibitions from May through November. Angelidakis’s pavilion adds a pointed question inside that larger machine by asking what, exactly, a country is showing when it stages itself in Venice. (veniceinsiderguide.com) (observer.com)
