Türkiye pavilion highlight
Türkiye will present Nilbar Güreş’s exhibition A Kiss on the Eyes at its national pavilion for the full Biennale run, and the show is curated by Başak Doğa Temür, making it a named highlight in the national lineup. (e-flux.com) That specific artist/curator pairing gives you a clear target if you want to prioritize Türkiye’s offering on a Biennale itinerary. (e-flux.com)
One of the easier Venice Biennale decisions this year is already made: Türkiye’s national pavilion has a single named exhibition, “A Kiss on the Eyes,” by Nilbar Güreş, with Başak Doğa Temür as curator, and it will run from May 9 to November 22, 2026. That matters at Venice because the Biennale is not one show in one building; it is a citywide event of national pavilions, big curated exhibitions, and collateral shows spread across Venice, with the Arsenale as one of its main sites. Türkiye’s pavilion is coordinated by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts, known as İKSV, and the 2026 edition will be installed at the Sale d’Armi in the Arsenale in Venice. Nilbar Güreş is not arriving with one medium or one signature format; her practice moves across sculpture, installation, painting, photography, video, performance, and works on paper and fabric. Her work is usually described as poetic and witty, but the subjects are hard-edged: cultural symbols, social inequality, identity, gender, and the lives of marginalized communities inside Türkiye’s social landscape. The 2026 pavilion will mix new commissions made for Venice with earlier works from Güreş’s career, so visitors are not getting a single fresh project in isolation but a compact survey built around one argument. Başak Doğa Temür is part of why the pavilion stands out on an itinerary, because she is not a generic organizer dropped in at the last minute; she previously worked as a curator and artistic program board member at Arter and also served on the advisory board for Türkiye’s pavilion from 2017 to 2019. The artist-curator pairing also fits the Biennale’s 2026 frame, “In Minor Keys,” a theme developed by the late Koyo Kouoh, with Güreş selected by Türkiye’s advisory board in part because her work matched that tone of subtle but pointed expression. So if you are planning Venice like a crowded film festival schedule, Türkiye is one of the stops you can lock in early: one artist, one curator, one pavilion, one main venue, and a full six-month run in the Arsenale rather than a short fair-style presentation.
