Venice Biennale 2026: Vatican Pavilion Brings FKA Twigs, Brian Eno, and Dev Hynes Into a Sound-Driven Exhibition
The Vatican has revealed new details for its Pavilion of the Holy See at the 2026 Venice Biennale, and the project is unusually expansive in both scale and ambition. Titled “The Ear is the Eye of the Soul,” the presentation will span two Venetian sites and gather 24 artists, poets, musicians, architects, and filmmakers for newly commissioned work shaped by the legacy of Saint Hildegard of Bingen.
Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Ben Vickers, the pavilion will unfold at The Mystical Garden of the Discalced Carmelites in Cannaregio and the Complesso di Santa Maria Ausiliatrice in Castello. The exhibition is conceived in response to the Biennale’s main show, “In Minor Keys,” planned by the late curator Koyo Kouoh, and it places sound, text, image, and architecture in close conversation.
At the Mystic Garden, composers, musicians, poets, and visual artists including Brian Eno, FKA Twigs, and filmmaker Jim Jarmusch will create new sound works responding to Hildegard’s chants, writings, and visionary imagery. Produced in partnership with Soundwalk Collective, the pieces will incorporate voice, instrumentation, and silence, and will be presented through headphones. A site-specific instrument by Soundwalk Collective will also be installed to “listen” to the gardens of the 17th-century monastic convent.
Across Venice, the Complesso di Santa Maria Ausiliatrice will be transformed into a contemporary scriptorium, evoking the medieval rooms where manuscripts were copied and illuminated. There, German filmmaker and author Alexander Kluge’s final work — a twelve-station film and image piece spread across three rooms — will be shown. The work was completed before Kluge’s death in March. The site will also include a living archive of multilingual texts and new monastery architecture by Tatiana Bilbao, extending the Vatican’s 2025 architectural biennale presentation at the same location.
The full roster also includes Otobong Nkanga, Ilda David, Caterina Barbieri, Kali Malone, Kazu Makino, Laraaji, Meredith Monk, Moor Mother, Suzanne Ciani, Terry Riley, Carminho, Bhanu Kapil, Raúl Zurita, Holly Herndon, Mat Dryhurst, Patti Smith, Precious Okoyomon, and the Benedictine Nuns of the Abbey of St. Hildegard Eibingen. In Venice, the pavilion is shaping up as less a conventional national display than a meditation on listening itself — and on how medieval thought can still reverberate through contemporary art.
