Minister Catherine Martin announces Irish representation at 61st Venice Art Biennale in 2026: artist Isabel Nolan
- Published on: 6 November 2024
- Last updated on: 6 November 2024
The Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media, Catherine Martin has announced the selection of artist, Isabel Nolan, with Georgina Jackson and The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art as the curator, to represent Ireland at the 61st Venice Art Biennale in 2026.
The Venice Biennale is one of the most important international platforms for visual arts, attracting over half a million visitors, including global curators, gallerists, art critics, and artists. The selection of the team to represent Ireland was made following an open, competitive process, with international jury members.
Minister Martin said:
“I would like to congratulate Isabel Nolan, Georgina Jackson and The Douglas Hyde Gallery on being selected to represent Ireland at the 2026 Venice Art Biennale. Isabel Nolan is recognised to be at the forefront of Irish visual arts practice. Participation at the Venice Art Biennale increases awareness of Ireland’s strong visual arts sector; it is also an important moment in an artist’s career. My department, through Culture Ireland, commissions Ireland at Venice in partnership with the Arts Council.”
Artist Isabel Nolan’s exhibitions are rooted in big subjects: cosmology and deep history; religion and mythology; mortality and love. Working across sculpture, textiles, paintings, drawings, photography and writing, Nolan responds to the fundamental question of how humans bring the world into meaning. Her work has a remarkable capacity to speak to audiences, looking for ways to like, or even love, the complex world we’ve made. In 2027, this work will return to Ireland on a national tour, supported by the Arts Council, in a variety of venues across the island.
The selected artist, Isabel Nolan said:
“To represent Ireland in any sphere of cultural activity is a great privilege. To have my work in congregation with so many other artists is a rare opportunity; as is the occasion to reach such large audiences there, and at home with the national tour.
"Venice is an extraordinary city and to have the great fortune to realise this ambitious project with curator Georgina Jackson of The Douglas Hyde and producer Cian O’Brien is very exciting. Art has a strange and special capacity to make and test powerful kinds of community with shared knowledge and beauty, however temporary. The Venice Biennial is a stage like no other.”
Curator Georgina Jackson said:
“Artist Isabel Nolan is a leading light of contemporary Irish visual art. The Venice Biennale is an incredible platform to spotlight both her work and the vibrancy of Irish contemporary visual art, and connect to far reaching audiences. Showing Isabel’s work in Venice is a powerful proposition; motifs that recur in her work include arches, fallen chandeliers, surging waves and dying suns– imagery which will resonate dramatically in the Arsenale. I am honoured and excited to work with Isabel, producer Cian O’Brien, the team at The Douglas Hyde, Culture Ireland and The Arts Council to deliver Ireland at Venice 2026, and build on the legacy of successful previous pavilions."
Notes
Ireland is currently (to end-November 2024) represented at the Venice Biennale by Eimear Walshe (2024) and previously by Niamh O’Malley (2022), Eva Rothschild (2019), Jesse Jones (2017), Sean Lynch (2015), Richard Mosse (2013).
Isabel Nolan is one of Ireland’s most important artists having had significant solo exhibitions in Ireland and internationally in spaces including: Château La Coste, Aix-en-Provence, France; London Mithraeum Bloomberg SPACE, London; Grazer Kunstverein, Graz; Mercer Union, Toronto and CAG, Vancouver; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin: and Musée d’art moderne de Saint Etienne. Her work has been exhibited at Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Artspace, Sydney; Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh; Daejeon Museum of Art, South Korea; and Beijing Art Museum of the Imperial City, Beijing. She has participated in international group exhibitions and biennales including Lofoten International Arts Festival, Glasgow International and EVA International, Limerick. She is a participating artist in the upcoming 13th edition of the Liverpool Biennial. The Biennial festival, titled ‘BEDROCK’, will take place 7 June – 14 September 2025, curated by Marie-Anne McQuay. She lives in Dublin, and works in Temple Bar Gallery + Studios. Isabel is represented by the Kerlin Gallery, Dublin.
Dr Georgina Jackson is the Director of The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art at Trinity College, Dublin. There she has commissioned groundbreaking new work by artists including Abbas Akhavan, Bassam Issa Al-Sabah, Gabriel Kuri, Jumana Manna and Deirdre O’Mahony. Prior to this she was Director of Exhibitions & Programmes at Mercer Union, Toronto, and has held curatorial roles at The Hugh Lane, IMMA and Pittsburgh’s The Mattress Factory Art Museum. She has collaborated on exhibitions with Tate Liverpool, Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, the Toronto International Film Festival, and the Form Foundation. She completed her PhD through GRADCAM, Dublin, has taught at the University of Toronto, IADT and NCAD, and was a member of the Steering Committee of the National Campaign for the Arts from 2018-2022.
The Douglas Hyde is a leading platform for contemporary art in Ireland, bringing the best of international contemporary art to Ireland and the best of Irish contemporary art to the world. Located in the heart of Dublin city, it was founded in 1978 by Trinity College Dublin and the Arts Council of Ireland, making history as Ireland’s first public gallery dedicated to contemporary art and first university gallery. The Douglas Hyde commissions emerging and established Irish and international artists, presenting these new artworks in the gallery and beyond its walls to produce extraordinary and inspiring experiences. We support artists to make bold new work and we care deeply about bringing that work to a diverse and expanding audience. For over 45 years it has shaped generations of artists and audiences.
COBA: Cian O’Brien Arts is a production house and touring company led by Cian O’Brien, the producer of Ireland at Venice 2026. COBA supports the production of large-scale cultural projects and cooperations and works strategically with cultural organisations on policy, recruitment, strategy and communications. O’Brien left Project Arts Centre in June 2024 after 13 years as Artistic Director, having led the organisation through a number of large-scale cultural projects including Ireland at Venice (2017 & 2024) and The Casement Project (ART: 2016 & 14-18 NOW). He was Deputy Chair of the Steering Committee of NCFA from 2016-2022.
Since 2005, national representation at the Venice Biennale has been a government initiative led by Culture Ireland in partnership with The Arts Council. Both partners consider the Venice Biennale to be a remarkable opportunity for artists' development and for Irish curators to work in an international context. Following their presentation, the Ireland at Venice exhibition will return for a National Irish Tour.
The Arts Council is excited to be in a position to continue to support the Irish presentation of the Ireland at Venice National Tour, as part of our commitment to the ten-year strategy: 'Making Great Art Work' which supports artists to create ambitious, innovative work and to engaging work.
An open call is issued biennially by Culture Ireland in partnership with The Arts Council to invite expressions of interest for the appointment of the Curator and Artist of Ireland’s National representation at Venice. The selection of the team to represent Ireland is made following an open, competitive process with international jury members, in a partnership of Culture Ireland with The Arts Council.