What Biennials Reveal About the Art World

We talk a lot about biennials. Art is in some ways a very local, in-person thing. Yet artists and creators and writers are also part of a global conversation, looking at and thinking about each other across borders, and these big, recurring art festivals can serve as an opportunity or a prompt to think about what that bigger conversation. One of the biggest, the Venice Biennale, is coming up next month. It’s centered around a show called “In Minor Keys,” curated by the late curator Koyo Kouoh. My colleague Jo Lawson-Tancred recently had an article looking at the artists in that show, comparing where they were from and how old they were to the last several editions, to see how the art conversation was evolving. Meanwhile, Ben Davis just published a big project this week, looking at the last four years of art biennials around the world, from the big ones in places like Istanbul, Gwangju, São Paulo, Sharjah, and Venice, to smaller or more experimental ones. He gathered all the names of artists to find out who has shown the most around the world since the 2022 Venice Biennale four years ago. Some are familiar names, some were total surprises. With Venice soon to open, Ben speaks with Jo to talk about what we’ve learned from our different projects about where the global art conversation has been and where it might be headed.