Venice Biennale opens to public May 9

The Venice Biennale is open to the public on Saturday, May 9. That sounds routine. It isn’t. This year’s edition — the 61st, titled *In Minor Keys* — arrives after one of the messiest preview weeks the exhibition has seen in years, with war, protest, withdrawals, and a jury walkout all crowding the art itself. (labiennale.org) ### What is actually opening? The main international exhibition is *In Minor Keys*, the show conceived by curator Koyo Kouoh and now being carried out by her team. It runs from May 9 to November 22 across the Giardini, the Arsenale, and other Venice sites. The scale is still huge — 110 invited participants in the central exhibition, alongside 100 national participations and 31 collateral events. (labiennale.org) Because the whole framing pushes away from spectacle. The Biennale’s own introduction says the “minor keys” reject bombast and military marching rhythms and lean instead toward quieter tones, emotion, improvisation, and forms of listening. Basically, the curatorial pitch is not “big heroic statement” but something more intimate, fractured, and attentive — which helps explain why so much of the wor(labiennale.org 1) (labiennale.org 2) ### Why has the preview week felt so political? Because geopolitics didn’t stay in the background. Coverage from Venice describes a preview dominated by responses to the Russia-Ukraine war and the wars in the Middle East, both in the central exhibition and in national pavilions. The mood was already heavy, but the surrounding controversies made it impossible to treat the Biennale as a sealed-off art world event. (bloomberg.com) ### What happened with Russia? Russia returned to the Biennale’s international art exhibition for the first time since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. That immediately turned the Russian pavilion into a flashpoint. Preview-week protests followed, and Biennale president Pietrangelo Buttafuoco defended allowing Russia to participate, arguing that the pavilion has long-standing status inside the event. In other words, a question that might once have been procedural became the story. (deadline.com) ### And Iran? Iran pulled out just days before the opening. La Biennale announced on May 4 that the Islamic Republic of Iran would not participate after all. Organizers did not give a public explanation in that statement, but the timing mattered — it reinforced the sense that this edition was being reshaped in real time by regional tensions rather than simply curated around them. (labiennale.org) ### Why did the jury resign? The five-member international jury resigned on April 30. La Biennale confirmed the resignations and named the jurors — Solange Farkas, Zoe Butt, Elvira Dyangani Ose, Marta Kuzma, and Giovanna Zapperi. Reporting tied the walkout to the dispute over the participation of Russia and Israel. The practical result is striking: the usual awards structure was disrupted, and the ceremony was moved from opening day to November 22, the final day of the show. (labiennale.org) ### So is the art getting drowned out? Not exactly. But it is being filtered through the crisis around it. Even the official programming emphasizes performance, listening, and shared space rather than a single triumphal statement. That means the politics are not just external noise — they are interacting with the curatorial logic of the exhibition itself. (labiennale.o([labiennale.org)understand going in? This is still the biggest recurring event in contemporary art. But this year it opens less like a polished global showcase and more like a stressed public forum. The art is there. The infrastructure is there. The catch is that the argument around who gets to appear, who withdraws, and what neutrality even means has become part of the exhibition’s meaning. (labiennale.org) ### Bottom line The public opening on May 9 matters because it turns a tense insiders’ preview into a mass audience event. From here on, the 2026 Venice Biennale will be judged not just on what it shows, but on whether *In Minor Keys* can hold together as an exhibition when the world outside keeps barging in. (labiennale.org)