Mardi Gras Indian at Venice

Big Chief Demond Melancon, a New Orleans bead artist and leader of the Young Seminole Hunters, has been named the first Black Masking Indian in the Venice Biennale’s main art exhibition. (nola.com) Melancon is one of two New Orleans artists invited to the 61st International Art Exhibition, “In Minor Keys,” which runs from May 9 to November 22, 2026, with preview days on May 6, 7 and 8. The Biennale said the show includes 111 invited participants. (neworleans.com) (labiennale.org) New Orleans & Company said Melancon and Dawn DeDeaux are the first artists from New Orleans selected for the Biennale’s international exhibition since 2015. It also said Melancon is the only artist from the American Gulf South in this year’s invited group alongside DeDeaux. (neworleans.com) Black Masking Indians are New Orleans cultural groups whose members appear on Mardi Gras and other key dates in hand-sewn suits covered with beadwork, feathers and rhinestones. New Orleans & Company says the practice is centuries old, and the city’s tourism office counts more than 40 tribes across New Orleans. (neworleans.com) The tradition grew in Black neighborhoods after African Americans were shut out of white Mardi Gras krewes, according to New Orleans & Company. The same guide traces the practice to the 1800s and links it to ties between Black New Orleanians and Native Americans who offered refuge to people escaping slavery. (neworleans.com) Smithsonian Magazine reported in 2023 that the exact origins are still debated because much of the history was passed down orally. The magazine said the most common account is that Black New Orleanians dressed as Native Americans in the late 19th century to honor Indigenous people who helped them survive and escape bondage. (smithsonianmag.com) Melancon’s selection moves that neighborhood-based tradition into one of the art world’s biggest recurring exhibitions. The Venice Biennale’s official site calls it the 61st International Art Exhibition and says this edition was conceived by curator Koyo Kouoh before her death, with the organization carrying out the project as she defined it. (labiennale.org) In New Orleans, Melancon is known not only as an exhibiting artist but as a Big Chief whose role sits inside a living social structure with positions such as Spy Boy, Flag Boy, Big Queen and Big Chief. That is part of why his invitation reads as recognition for both an individual artist and a street tradition built tribe by tribe. (neworleans.com 1) (neworleans.com 2) The Biennale opens in less than a month, and Melancon’s beadwork will arrive in Venice carrying a New Orleans practice usually seen on neighborhood routes, not inside the Giardini or the Arsenale. (labiennale.org) (nola.com)