Austria’s leading international art fair invites you to discover established galleries, exciting newcomers, and curated special exhibitions at the magnificent Kursalon Vienna from 7–10 September 2023.

Like no other fair, viennacontemporary bridges the contemporary art worlds of Western and Eastern Europe and is therefore widely considered a place for surprising positions and discoveries. The curated special exhibition ZONE1 is an annual highlight dedicated to emerging young Austrian talent, while the special program STATEMENT: Political Homelessness and Contemporary Citizenship explores the concept of belonging in contemporary Europe.

With its unique selection of contemporary art, a dense supporting program, talks, and guided tours, viennacontemporary places Vienna at the center of the international art calendar and invites you to an exciting week in the name of the visual arts.

text source: viennacontemporary.at/en

A cornerstone of New York’s cultural landscape since its founding in 1994, The Armory Show brings the world’s leading international contemporary and modern art galleries to New York each year.

The fair plays a leading role in the city’s position as an important cultural capital through elevated presentations, thoughtful programming, curatorial leadership, meaningful institutional partnerships, and engaging public art activations.

text source: thearmoryshow.com

Zürichs new art fair Art Salon Zürich will primarily focus on the needs of art galleries, art dealers and their respective artists.The aim is to reach and cater to a national and also international audience and collector base. Art Salon Zürich is your prime destination for discovering emerging talents as well as established artists of all art genres.

This boutique fair is regionally rooted and internationally connected.

text source: artsalonzurich.com/welcome

The 13th Berlin Biennale takes place in summer 2025 and is curated by Zasha Colah.

Since its founding in 1996, the Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art has become one of the most important international forums for contemporary art. Each edition brings together the most influential current positions of artists, theorists, and practitioners from a variety of fields in one of the most culturally progressive cities in Europe.

The Berlin Biennale takes place every two years at varying locations in Berlin and is defined by the differing concepts of its renowned curators. It promotes experimental formats and provides the appointed curators the space and freedom to present the latest relevant and challenging positions independent of the art market and collection interests. Participation in the exhibition has contributed to numerous young artists achieving international status.

The first Berlin Biennale was founded on the initiative of Eberhard Mayntz and Klaus Biesenbach – founding director of the Kunst-Werke Berlin. The Berlin Biennale is organized by KUNST-WERKE BERLIN e. V.

Since 2004, it has been funded by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (German Federal Cultural Foundation) as one of its “cultural institutions of excellence,” recognizing its nation-wide importance and international reputation and thus awarding it a top-quality designation in the field of public funding. The support of the German Federal Cultural Foundation gives the Berlin Biennale a high degree of autonomy, and thus great potential for development.

The Berlin Biennale has viewed itself as a “glocal” event since its first edition. The artistic and curatorial positions articulate cultural issues and trends that are prominent and significant internationally at the respective point in time. How these tendencies and developments impact Berlin serves as an important focus of the investigations. Accordingly, the Berlin Biennale appeals to Berliners and international audiences alike, providing the city a cultural highlight every two years.

HISTORY OF THE BERLIN BIENNALE

The berlin biennale für zeitgenössische kunst e. V. was founded on March 26, 1996 by Klaus Biesenbach, founding director of KW Institute for Contemporary Art, and a group of collectors and patrons of the arts such as Eberhard Mayntz. Eberhard Mayntz has since then been chairman of the association’s board.

The idea of establishing a biennale in Germany was inspired by the Venice Biennale in 1995. Following the demise of aperto - the forum for young contemporary art founded in 1981 - there was much discussion about the need to heighten the profile of contemporary art in Berlin, a fact which undoubtedly accelerated the project’s progress.

The aim of the association is to organise a representative, international exhibition of contemporary art in berlin every two years and to attract attention to less established younger artists. In parallel with its 20-year anniversary the Berlin Biennale has been restructured. Up until this point Gabriele Horn was both the director of the Berlin Biennale and KW Institute for Contemporary Art. As of July 2016 the two institutions are now operating as separate business units under the umbrella of the KUNST-WERKE BERLIN e. V. and Gabriele Horn is now director solely of the Berlin Biennale.

In 1998, Klaus Biesenbach took the artistic helm of the 1st Berlin Biennale in cooperation with Nancy Spector and Hans Ulrich Obrist. For the 2nd Berlin Biennale in 2001, the baton was passed to Saskia Bos, who is in turn followed by Ute Meta Bauer for the 2004 exhibition. The 4th Berlin Biennale in 2006 was curated by Maurizio Cattelan, Massimiliano Gioni and Ali Subotnick. Adam Szymczyk was chosen for the 5th Berlin Biennale in 2008 who then appointed Elena Filipovic as co-curator. Kathrin Rhomberg curated the 6th Berlin Biennale in 2010. The 7th Berlin Biennale was curated by Artur Zmijewski together with associate curators Voina and Joanna Warsza in 2012. Juan A. Gaitán curated the 8th Berlin Biennale in 2014 and invited Tarek Atoui, Natasha Ginwala, Catalina Lozano, Mariana Munguía, Olaf Nicolai, and Danh Vo to collaborate with him as core members and advisors in his artistic team. DIS (Lauren Boyle, Solomon Chase, Marco Roso, and David Toro) curated the 9th Berlin Biennale in 2016. The 10th Berlin Biennale took place in summer 2018. It was curated by Gabi Ngcobo, who invited Nomaduma Rosa Masilela (New York, US), Serubiri Moses (Kampala, UG), Yvette Mutumba (Berlin, DE), and Thiago de Paula Souza (São Paulo, BR) to collaborate with her as the curatorial team. The 11th Berlin Biennale started about a year prior to the opening. The last part was postponed from summer to fall 2020 due to the pandemic. It was curated by María Berríos, Renata Cervetto, Lisette Lagnado, and Agustín Pérez Rubio. The 12th Berlin Biennale took place from June 11 to September 18, 2022. It was curated by Kader Attia. His artistic team included Ana Teixeira Pinto (Berlin, DE), Đỗ Tường Linh (Hanoi, VN), Marie Helene Pereira (Dakar, SN), Noam Segal (Brooklyn, New York, US), and Rasha Salti (Beirut, LB, and Berlin).

The Berlin Biennale has established itself as an “open space” that experiments, identifies and critically examines the latest trends in the art world. The innovative character of this “art lab”, which tries and tests the greenest shoots in the art world is to be expanded, with the particular aim of giving young artists the opportunity to introduce themselves to broad sections of the public.

Although the exhibition has an essentially public character, it also has an inner forum in which event organisers, artists, curators, selected critics, cooperation partners, sponsors and promotors committed to the advancement of this association work at shaping the exhibition and its seismographic interpretation of current cultural and social developments.

Since 2008 the Berlin Biennale is part of the International Biennial Association and since 2018, the Berlin Biennale takes part in the project The Perennial Biennial.

text source: berlinbiennale.de/en/1362/about-us

The Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV) has been organising the Istanbul Biennial since 1987. The biennial aims to create a meeting point in Istanbul, in the field of visual arts between artists from diverse cultures and the audience. The sixteen biennials İKSV has organised up to now have enabled the formation of an international cultural network between local and international art circles, artists, curators and art critics by bringing together new trends in contemporary art every two years.

Considered one of the most thought-provoking art events, the Istanbul Biennial embraces an exhibition model which encourages a dialogue between artists and the audience through the work of the artists instead of a national representation model. The curator, appointed by consulting to an international advisory board, develops a conceptual framework according to which a variety of artists and projects are invited to the exhibition.

text source: bienal.iksv.org/en/biennial/history

The Gwangju Biennale Foundation (President Park Yang-woo) and 15th Gwangju Biennale Artistic Director Nicolas Bourriaud are pleased to announce the title and theme of the 15th Gwangju Biennale, Pansori - a soundscape of the 21st century. The title pays tribute to pansori, a musical form which originated in south-west Korea in the 17th century to accompany shamanistic rituals. Its literal meaning being “the sound of the public place,” in other words, the voice of the common people. The Biennale will be built as a narrative about the spaces we live in, the same way pansori singers practice storytelling with a lyrical or epic style, accompanied by a drumming for which different beats are connected to specific regions of Korea. Proposing a journey into contemporary space, the Biennale will gather artists whose works reflect our new spatial conditions and the upheavals of the Anthropocene. To draw this topology of our times, the exhibition will take an operatic shape, structured by musical metaphors. As both images and sounds are nothing but vibrations, Pansori - a soundscape of the 21st century presents itself as a visual symphony composed by international artists.

text source: gwangjubiennale.org/en/Board/11524/detailView.do

Manifesta 15 Barcelona aims to reshape the relations between art, culture and society by investigating and catalysing socio-ecological change whilst being in continuous dialogue with both local communities and international cultural producers.

The power of Manifesta 15 is to revitalise, rethink and reclaim previously closed or unknown striking locations in which to present an innovative programme of performances, workshops, screenings, exhibitions, urban interventions and other activities.

For its 15th edition, in 2024, Manifesta will open for the first time in 12 cities in Barcelona’s metropolitan region for a period of 12 weeks.

text source: manifesta15.org/about-manifesta-15-barcelona

Human relations will be at the heart of the 17th Lyon Biennale—the contemporary issues that underlie them, their many facets, their scope and their rituals—in order to explore and extend hospitality practices.

Artistic director: Isabelle Bertolotti

Guest curator: Alexia Fabre

This edition, devoted to welcoming the other, is rooted in the natural and human geography of its vast home region, as defined by the rivers that wash against Lyon’s embankments, making it possible to ship and trade goods, to transport people and generate human connections, before they finally merge and become stronger. Rivers convey tales of journeys and discoveries, of influence and confluence—each a current that carries us towards the question of hospitality.

In 2024, Les Grandes Locos will become one of the main Biennale venues. From the mid-19th century until 2019, this huge site was devoted to maintaining and repairing the fleets of freight trains engines that ran all over France. It is now being redesigned and refurbished as an events venue and a hub for arts, cultural, citizen-led and collective activities. By moving in here, and through the artists’ projects, the Lyon Biennale wishes to perpetuate the history of this place—its stories and the care and repair practices that make up its identity.

Artists from multiple backgrounds, and at different points in their career, are being invited to offer their interpretation and vision of relations—ways of being choral, singular and plural all at once. In a present where respect for difference, contradictory ideas and debate are at stake, dialogue has become a relational and existential issue. It now seems vital, by combining artistic practices, to consider the different ways of revisiting the authority and silences of history with a view to polyphonic expression, attentiveness to and respect for others, and private or collective repair.

Welcoming and hospitality are relations with the world that are carried out through choices, actions, gestures, words, desire, and ways of being with others and self. They are personal decisions but also collective ones—for building alliances and the polyphonic strength of a collective that makes it possible to co-exist, come together, and rise up.

In a desire to collaborate and to expand the creative process, the artists are inviting audiences to take part in their works: they are creating for, but also with, everyone. In featuring existing works as well as inviting artists to make new ones, the Lyon Biennale wishes to open up a spacetime for thinking that can yield shared, vibrant experiences. The event, which has long championed creators, also sees itself as a moment in time for reflecting together on the role artists play, and the power they have, to reveal the world and intervene in it.

At stake today is the trust we place in others but also in the creative act, our hope being that society shares this trust and desire, and expects and welcomes the role artists play.

text source: labiennaledelyon.com/en/art-contemporain/17e-biennale-de-lyon