Abbas Akhavan will represent Canada at the Venice Biennale in 2026

Multidisciplinary artist Abbas Akhavan will represent Canada at the world's largest and most prestigious contemporary art exhibition for its next edition in 2026. The National Gallery of Canada, which commissions the Canada Pavilion in Venice, announced its official selection for the 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia on Thursday.

Akhavan, 46, is best known for his site-responsive artworks, which take the form of installation, drawing, video, sculpture and performance. The artist was born in Tehran and has been based in Canada for the last 30 years. He currently lives and works in Montreal and Berlin.

His art has been presented at notable venues such as the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Palais de Tokyo in Paris and the Power Plant. In 2015, Akhavan won the Sobey Art Award, which is considered one of the nation's top honours in contemporary art.  

In a media release, National Gallery of Canada Director and CEO Jean-François Bélisle said: "We are thrilled to announce that Abbas Akhavan has been nominated to represent Canada at the 61st International Art Exhibition—La Biennale di Venezia. Abbas' work is shaped by the unique characteristics of the sites he works on, including the architectures, surrounding economies, and individuals who frequent them. We look forward to supporting him in bringing this vision to life at the Canada Pavilion."

The artist was selected by a committee of art professionals from across the country. In a statement, the group said: "The committee was drawn to the interdisciplinary practice of Abbas Akhavan, a meticulous artist and thinker for whom the site of an exhibition becomes both a proposal and provocation involving the staging of relations between materials, memory, and place. Whether invoking the ruins of ancient statues destroyed during geopolitical conflicts or exploring the stated idealism of gardens and other domesticated spaces, Akhavan's sculptural environments set the natural world in uneasy balance with the valorization, exploitations, or indeed indifferences of contexts, systems, and projections all too human in origin. We look forward to seeing Akhavan turn his attention to the space and architecture of the Canada Pavilion within the historic Giardini della Biennale in Venice."

For more than 60 years, the Canada Pavilion has hosted some of the nation's most celebrated artists, including Jean-Paul Riopelle, Michael Snow, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, Rebecca Belmore and Stan Douglas. Kapwani Kiwanga: Trinket, Canada's official entry for Biennale Arte 2024, can still be viewed until November 24. 

The 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia will run from April to November 2026.