The Routledge Companion to Art Biennials

1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-1-041-15531-7
Verlag: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Buch, Englisch, 574 Seiten, Format (B × H): 174 mm x 246 mm

Reihe: Routledge Art History and Visual Studies Companions

The Routledge Companion to Art Biennials assembles forty-five chapters that explore art biennials as expanded sites of artistic display, cultural policy, economic value, soft power, urban development and political struggle. The volume traces biennials from their 19th-century origins to their explosive post-Cold War growth, critically engaging with debates on globalization, institutional critique, identity, inclusion and resistance.

Structured in eight parts, it maps biennial histories from Venice to São Paulo and beyond, alongside their geopolitical and institutional entanglements. Bringing together contributors from diverse disciplinary backgrounds, the volume offers a comprehensive account of art biennials in their complexity and ambiguity, while outlining the main orientations and state of research in the field of biennial studies.

The volume will appeal to scholars and students in art history, museum and curatorial studies, as well as cultural geography, cultural sociology, critical theory, public sphere studies, media and communication studies, postcolonial theory, anthropology, and cultural and creative industries, making it essential for examining contemporary art and visual culture’s institutional ecosystems.

Zielgruppe

Postgraduate and Undergraduate Advanced

Autoren/Hrsg.

Kompatsiaris, Panos

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunstgeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunst, allgemein Kunstsammlung, Museen, Ausstellungen
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunst, allgemein Ausstellungskataloge, Museumsführer

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Figures

List of Contributors

Acknowledgements

1. Art Biennials: An Introduction

Panos Kompatsiaris

PART I: HISTORIES AND SHIFTS

2. Art is not an Innocent Field: Reflection on the borders of the Venice Biennal. Vittoria Martini

3. Turning the Biennale into the BBC: The Reform of the Venice Biennale in the Post-War Period (1945–1973)

Elisa Bassetto

4. Defining Geographies Through International Art Exhibitions in Cold War Divided Europe (1955-1959) Matteo Bertelé

5. An informal offensive: the battle of abstract art in the 5th São Paulo Biennial in 1959 Ana Avelar and Marcella Imparato

6. The 1st Quito Biennial: isolation and power struggles in the Ecuadorian modern art scene during the late sixties Anamaría Garzón Mantilla

7. Redefining the biennial aims and model: Venice and São Paulo in a shared debate after the outbreak of the crisis (1968-1969) Anita Orzes

PART II: NATION AND POLICY

8. Exhibiting the nation: framing post-Empire British identity at the Venice Art Biennale Claudia Di Tosto

9. Art and politics during the cold war: Spain at the São Paulo biennial Genoveva Tusell

10. The Biennial experience in Mexico: from a nationalist effort to contemporary globalism Marco Polo Juarez Cruz

11. Between Cultural Diplomacy and Propaganda: Unveiling Saudi Arabia's National Participation at the Venice Biennales Anastasia Shanaah

12. “Maybe a Biennial Would Come to Town”: Non-Istanbulite Biennials in Turkey Erdem Çolak

PART III: THE BURGEONING FORMAT

13.  Early-Boom Biennials in a Pacified World Paloma Checa-Gismero

14.  Late Soviet Tallinn Print Triennial: International in Form, Regional in Content Kädi Talvoja

15.  Japanese Biennials and Triennials as Art Festivals Embracing Chiiki ato: A Case Study of Setouchi Triennale Mengfei Pan

16. Biennials of the Arab World: Trans-Arabism as an Attempt at Emancipation from Nationalist Hegemony Riccardo Legena

17.  From Lagoon to Coast: A Critical Analysis of Venice and Dakar Biennials' Organizational Structures and Curatorial Exchanges. Amarildo Ajasse  18. The Johannesburg Biennales: Chasing a fleeing Shadow Tabea Maria Brinkmann

PART IV: FORMATS AND INFRASTRUCTURES

19. The Celebrated International Curator: A Key Figure for the Art Biennial Guillaume Sirois & Samuel Bonneville

20. And every two years, we do it all again…Reflecting on the discursivity and archives of biennials Gabriela Saenger Silva

21.  Assembling assemblies or how public programs do matter in large-scale exhibitions: The case of the Parliament of Bodies during documenta 14 Jasmin Kolkwitz

22. Periodical Mania and Agricultural Models of Publishing in Art Biennials Camilla Salvaneschi

23. World-Making as a Matter of Scales: A Conversation on the 13th Taipei Biennial Ting Tsou and Barbara Lutz

PART V: ACTIVISM AND COUNTER-BIENNIALS

24. Istanbul Biennial and the Contested Cultural Sphere in Turkey Tijen Tunali

25. Cohabitations between biennials and commoning The case of Athens Biennale 5-6, OMONOIA (2015-2017) Sevie Tsampalla

26. Entangled biennials as tactical (trans)instituting: Connecting art ecosystems to make new worlds thrive Chiara De Cesari, Yazan Khalili & Eszter Szakács (IMAGINART)

27.  #00Bienal de La Habana: From "Biennials of Resistance" to Biennial Resistivity Amy Bruce

28. Biennials of Resistance – A View from Kosovo and Some Questions Left Unanswered Giulia Menegale

29. The First Bienal do Mercosul: Re-Writing the History of Art from the Margins Camilla Querin

PART VI: PUBLIC SPHERES

30.  Documenta, Democracy & the Crisis of Liberalism Sarah E. James

31. The “global” in biennial discourse Kerstin Winking

32.  Trauma, Memory, and Art: Preserving the Spirit of Gwangju through the Biennale Raymond Rohne

33.  Syrcas at Africus: On Maud Sulter, the Johannesburg Biennale and Cultural Extravagance Nomusa Makhubu and Lucy Steeds

34.  An Elephant under the Microscope. The case of the Riga International Biennial of Contemporary Art (RIBOCA) Sebastian Mühl and Mara Traumane

PART VII: IDENTITY AND POWER

35.  From Transition to Extraction: Manifesta’s Nomadic Exhibitions in the Post-socialist Balkans Dimitra Gkitsa

36. First Class Experience? Art Biennials and Classism Alessa K. Paluch

37. Magiciens de la Terre: A Biennial That Never Happened Vesna Madžoski

38.  A national pavilion “everywhere”: The female italian pavilion at the 1999 Venice Art Biennale Greta Boldorini

39. The Politics of Local and Global in Biennials. The Case Study of Manifesta and its 12th Edition Giulia Pollicita

40.  Complicit Cartographies: The Global Biennial Cycle and the Syrian Refugee Crisis, 2015-2018 Eileen P. McKiernan González

PART VIII: EPISTEMOLOGY AND THEORY

41. Documenta fifteen: continuities and ruptures in the epistemic impasse of an art biennial Giulia Bellinetti

42. The Sociology of Art Biennials and Globalization: Biennials as Symptom, Driving Force, World Event Aleksandra Barjaktarevic and Paul Buckermann

43. Biennials as administrative hubs of contemporaneity Clarissa Ricci

44. ‘Out of thin air’: Technology, Liberation, and Absent Labour in New Materialist Biennial Exhibitions of Contemporary Art Natassa Philimonos

45. The Art Biennial as a Hyper Object Zoran Poposki

46. The exhibition that no one will ever see: the rise (and fall?) of the mega-exhibition format Bill Balaskas

Über Autor(innen)

Panos Kompatsiaris is associate professor of media cultures at HSE, Moscow. He holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh (2015) and has guest-lectured at IULM University of Milan, Franklin University Switzerland and the Athens School of Fine Arts, among others. His latest monograph is Curation in the Age of Platform Capitalism (2024)