African Art in Venice Forum 2026

26 Feb 2026

The Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, African Art Dialogues and Strauss & Co announce a special collaboration at the 2026 edition of the African Art in Venice Forum (AAVF), hosted during the opening week of the 61st Venice Biennale. 

The opening breakfast, on Tuesday 5 May 2026, at Hotel Monaco & Grand Canal, Venice will be co-hosted by Strauss & Co and the Smithsonian and will bring together artists, curators, scholars, collectors, and institutional representatives. This will be followed by the African Art in Venice Forum, a day of talks and moments of encounter and exchange. 

“The Forum recognises the lack of African country pavilion representation at the Biennale and therefore creates a space of coming-together for artists, curators and art enthusiasts from Africa and its diasporas dedicated to dialogue and shared inquiry” says Kate Fellens, Head of International Business Development at Strauss & Co. 

The 2026 edition is themed around Beyond Visibility: A Method of Inquiry. 

While visibility remains a necessary condition—particularly in contexts shaped by histories of marginalization, erasure, or exclusion—the Forum approaches it as a point of departure rather than an endpoint. The shared inquiry asks what visibility makes possible: who authors narratives, how meaning is framed, how histories are positioned in time, and how institutions understand and exercise responsibility.

“Through this collaboration, we are affirming a shared commitment to dialogue, critical exchange, and long-term engagement,” said Kevin Dumouchelle, curator at Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art.

“African art is approached not as a closed or segmented field, but as a living and evolving one, shaped by overlapping temporalities, multiple cultural affiliations, and practices that often resist fixed categorisation” continued Neri Torcello, founder and co-head of African Art in Venice Forum. 

Working alongside exhibitions and curatorial research, the African Art in Venice Forum extends the conversations initiated within institutional contexts into a broader discursive space. 

“In doing so, it affirms Beyond Visibility as a method of inquiry—one that values collaboration, sustained dialogue, and mutual listening as essential tools for engaging African art in the present”, continues Neri Torcello.

Further details on the Forum’s program will be announced shortly. Details of previous Forum talks and speakers can be found on https://www.aavforum.com/