Venice Biennale opens under protest

What's happened

The 61st Venice Biennale has opened with protests, strikes and the international jury's resignation over the organisers' decision to allow Russia and Israel to participate. Dozens of pavilions have closed temporarily, the jury has quit, and visitors will vote for awards after organisers cancelled jury prizes.

What's behind the headline?

What is happening now

• The Venice Biennale is opening while protests and labour walkouts are disrupting national pavilions and preview events.
• The five-member international jury has resigned, and organisers have said they will defer jury awards and let visitors pick winners at the close of the exhibition.

Why this matters

• The Biennale's nation-based structure is being contested: countries are using participation as political signalling and artists and workers are using closures and protests to force choices about inclusion.
• The organisers are defending universal artistic access; critics are arguing that allowing states with leaders under ICC scrutiny is normalising them.

Who is driving the story

• Artists, activist coalitions (notably Art Not Genocide Alliance), and cultural workers are driving visible disruption through strikes and demonstrations.
• Biennale leadership is driving the institutional response by prioritising inclusion and keeping Russia and Israel on the official list.

Likely consequences

• The Biennale will become a sustained site of protest for the run of the exhibition, not just preview week. That will increase pressure on funders and partner governments and will keep coverage focused on politics rather than artworks.
• Visitor-selected awards will shift the festival's authority from curatorial peers to public opinion and will change how winners are perceived historically.
• National pavilions will increasingly be evaluated for their diplomatic signals as much as for their art, which will push curators and ministries to treat Biennale shows as part of foreign policy.

What readers should watch

• Whether EU and national funders (already signalling concern) will withhold or restore support.
• Whether further strikes or artist-led actions will force additional pavilion closures or programme changes.
• How the visitor voting process will be administered and whether it will be treated as legitimate by the art world.

How we got here

The Biennale has long staged national pavilions alongside a curated show. Curator Koyo Kouoh, who died last year, assembled 'In Minor Keys' to spotlight overlooked voices. The jury resigned after saying it would not award works from countries whose leaders face ICC charges, prompting protests over Russia and Israel's inclusion.

Our analysis

The Guardian (Alex Needham, Angela Giuffrida) has reported that the Biennale has drawn 99–100 participating countries and that preview week has been punctuated by politics, including Pussy Riot protests and a strike that forced some pavilions to close. Giuffrida noted that "the jury of the Venice Biennale has quit" after objections to Russia's reintroduction and that the Biennale defended its decision as "a place of truce in the name of art, culture, and artistic freedom." The Times of Israel (TOI staff) described a strike called by the Art Not Genocide Alliance that led to multiple pavilion closures and reported the jury's mass resignation after it said it would exclude countries whose leaders face ICC charges. TOI quoted artist Belu‑Simion Fainaru saying the divisions are "destroying the meaning of art… to unite people." AP, the New York Times (Alex Marshall) and The Independent (Colleen Barry) have given on-the-ground detail: AP described Ukrainian, Russian and Palestinian participants staging competing gestures in the Giardini; the New York Times reported signs saying "We stand with Palestine" outside shuttered pavilions and noted that some closures were due to internal team strikes; The Independent outlined highlights of the curated show 'In Minor Keys' assembled by the late Koyo Kouoh and noted contentious selection processes for some national commissions. Together the coverage shows a consistent factual thread — jury resignation, pavilion closures and contested participation — while voices diverge on interpretation: organisers (quoted in The Guardian) stress inclusion and artistic freedom, while artists and curators quoted in TOI and AP stress that participation by states linked to alleged crimes is a political choice that is harming the festival's mission.

Go deeper

• Will funders such as the EU change financial support to the Biennale during its run?
• How will visitor voting be organised and will the art world accept those results as legitimate?

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