Walid Raad is among the participants in the 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, which runs at the Central Pavilion in the Giardini and at the Arsenale until 22 November 2026. Born in 1967 in Chbaniyeh, Lebanon, the artist is showing work at both venues.
In the Giardini, "Far from quieting" (1969–2026) brings together paintings and drawings of beds in which the PLO leader Yasser Arafat may have slept while evading more than 40 assassination attempts; the installation is made up of eleven archival inkjet prints worked with mixed media on wood. At the Arsenale, "Postscript to the Arabic Edition" is an installation of portraits by Middle Eastern artists said to have been discovered beneath shipping pallets.
The Biennale presents Raad's participation through a text by Almut Sh. Bruckstein, who describes his work as a set of manuals for rescue operations – for lost or missing paintings, damaged figures, wrongly reassembled sculptures and architectural models, and even for missing people, including dictators and political leaders. In her reading, the dense web of names, titles, shifting dates and documents in Raad's work acts as a protective shield, offering safe passage to artworks endangered by war. According to the text, Raad holds that conflict can harm artworks not only through direct damage but through occupation, which turns them into trophies, so that colours, shapes and motifs go into hiding and resurface in unexpected places, such as shipping pallets, business cards, footnotes or the backs of paintings left too long in storage.
Raad's participation is supported by Moderna Galerija, Ljubljana; Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Hamburg and Beirut; Paula Cooper Gallery, New York; the Museum of Mortal Guilt, Beirut; and O.K.VIR, Ljubljana.
