Venice Biennale 2024: admission, opening times and info

The Venice Biennale is one of the most famous and probably one of the most important international exhibitions of contemporary art. It attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors every year and takes place approximately every two years.

Open from 20 April 2024 to 24 November 2024

Tickets for the Venice Biennale

Everything you need to know about the tickets can be found on the provider’s website.

Notes and important information:

• The ticket entitles the holder to visit each exhibition once and can also be used on non-consecutive days.
• The ticket is valid until the end of the exhibition on 24 November 2024.
• Art lovers can also book interesting combination tickets in conjunction with the famous Peggy Guggenheim Museum or Palazzo Grassi and Punta Della Dogana (see at the end of the text).

Opening hours of the Venice Biennale

The exhibition is open from 20 April to 24 November 2024 and takes place at two different locations (10 minutes’ walk from each other). The opening hours apply to both venues.

Giardini: Viale Trento 1260 und Sant’Elena (Viale IV novembre)
Arsenale: Campo della Tana 2169/F und Ponte dei Pensieri (Salizada Streta)

Motto of this year’s Venice Biennale

The motto of the 2024 Venice Biennale is: Foreigners Everywhere – Stranieri Ovunque.

The title was chosen by the Biennale management after a series of works by the artist collective Claire Fontaine, which it began in 2004. Claire Fontaine is originally from Paris and currently works in Palermo. The series of works shows different coloured neon sculptures. Each one of them reads Foreigners Everywhere in its own language. This term was originally created after 2000 by the Turin-based artists’ collective Stranieri Ovunque, which campaigned against xenophobia and racism in Italy. Today, the term stands for a world full of crises that can be traced back to an individual’s language and ethnicity.

People are different not only in terms of their origin, but also in terms of their freedom and social status. At the same time, they are strangers everywhere except in their own immediate homeland. Accordingly, numerous contributions to the 2024 Venice Biennale take up the themes of identity, origin and colonial history. The curator is the Brazilian Adriano Pedrosa, full-time director of the art museum in São Paulo. This year, the traditional culture of discussion at the Venice Biennale has led to controversy: several thousand signatories have called for Israel to be excluded.

Venice Biennale: organisation and experience factor

The central pavilion (Giardini) and the Arsenale are hosting two sections at this year’s international exhibition:

• Nucleo Contemporaneo = Contemporary nucleus
• Nucleo Storico = Historical Core

A total of 331 artists from 87 countries are showing their work at the Venice Biennale. The urban area will also be included. The focus of the Biennale Arte in Venice in 2024 will be on artists who consider themselves foreigners because they are refugees, immigrants or expats. Of these, those who are part of the South-North migration will have the most say.

Where are the exhibition venues in Venice?

There are many side events, concerts, music, theatre and other exhibitions throughout the city during the Biennale. However, as mentioned above, the centrepiece of the Biennale is the Giardini and the Arsenale. The two events are about 10 minutes’ walk from each other.

Giardini della Biennale

The Giardini of the Venice Biennale are gardens renowned for their art and architecture, located around 2 kilometres to the west of St Mark’s Square in the Castello district. This is where the numerous pavilions dedicated to the participating nations are located. The walk here takes about 25 minutes. The gardens were laid out at the beginning of the 19th century at the request of Napoleon Bonaparte and are not to be confused with the Giardini Reali, also small gardens and places of tranquillity, not far from the hustle and bustle of nearby Piazza San Marco with its unique sights, above all St Mark’s Basilica and the Doge’s Palace.

Arsenale

In addition to the event in the Giardini in Castello, you can also see a themed exhibition in the Arsenale, which has been put together by the respective curators. The tickets are valid for both venues of the Biennale.

How to get to the exhibition venues?

Here are the directions:

From Piazzale Roma / Santa Lucia station – Vaporetto ACTV line 1 and 4.1 – Giardini Biennale or Arsenale landing stage

From St Mark’s Square – Vaporetto ACTV line 1 and 4.1 – Giardini Biennale or Arsenale landing stage

From Punta Sabbioni – Vaporetto ACTV line 14 to the San Zaccaria landing stage and then continue with line 1 or 4.1

All information about the legendary water buses in Venice can be found in Vaporetto and Public transport. Tickets can also be purchased directly in advance via this link.

Special works at the Biennale

Each of the exhibited works deserves a visit, but there is probably not enough time for day visitors. Some of the pavilions at the Venice Biennale deserve a special mention. They are these:

Australian Pavilion

Archie Moore, a First Nations artist, painted the walls of this pavilion with his pedigree kith and kin. He received the Golden Lion for his work. The genealogical table spans 65,000 years and thus became a monumental family tree of Australia’s indigenous people (First Nations). The Biennale jury justified the award with the strong aesthetics of the installation, its lyricism and its awareness of the shared loss of the suppressed past. The many thousands of names in the inventory are intended to inspire hope for reparation.

Swiss Pavilion

Guerreiro do Divino Amor is a Swiss-Brazilian artist. In the Swiss Pavilion, he plays with the cliché of Switzerland as a paradise on earth in a colourful, loud and refreshingly self-deprecating way. This is how the Alpine country appears to many people who do not live there. To the outside world, the Swiss like to present an image of their country with a perfect balance of nature and technology, down-to-earthness and sophistication as well as capitalism and democracy. Of course, this is deceptive. The work Super Superior Civilisation presents this misconception as an immersive and highly entertaining experience.

German Pavilion

The air in the German pavilion is heavy with dust. Gloomy sounds underline the rough wall structures. The artist Ersan Mondtag uses this atmosphere to introduce a story about his grandfather. Visitors are immersed deep into his private sphere. Formally, the artist has created an impressive room-within-a-room installation that resonates with video installations by Yael Bartanas. There is a second German contribution at the Venice Biennale. This consists of four sound installations between woods, meadows and ruins on the island of La Certosa.

USA Pavilion

Jeffrey Gibson designed the US pavilion with his contribution The space in which to place me. He painted the outside of the pavilion with bold colours and patterns. Inside, he exhibits his colourful works, which tell the story of the coming together of American, indigenous and queer history. This conveys a surprising lightness.

Why is it worth visiting the 2024 Venice Biennale?

As every year, the world elite of contemporary art meets in Venice and keeps its promise to take up and exaggerate the burning issues of our time. This has met with a steadily growing response. For this reason, the organisers have already extended the duration to a good seven months in 2022. In 2024, the previous edition already attracted a sensational number of visitors: over 800,000 tickets were sold, a new record. Together, the Partecipazioni nazionali (national pavilions), the Eventi collaterali (collateral exhibitions) and the unofficial parallel exhibitions present the world’s largest collection of contemporary art.

These facts promise a sensational experience in Venice for everyone. Visitors who like to immerse themselves very deeply in an artistic theme will be very interested in the connection between exile and migration, and thus foreignness, with related themes. These come from

• Queer artists who wander between different genders and sexualities, which exposes them to ostracism and persecution in many places.
• Outsider artists from the margins of society and the art world, autodidacts and folk artists.

The latter include indigenous artists in particular, who are often treated like foreigners in their own country. Most of them come from Africa, Latin America, Asia and the Middle East. As they have never exhibited at a Biennale in Venice or in the global North in general, they are incredibly interesting for European visitors. However, the curator Adriano Pedrosa also allowed some modern classics to be shown. These include Frida Kahlo, Wifredo Lam, Diego Rivera, Tarsila do Amaral and Gino Severini. Video art at the interface between art and activism can be seen in the Disobedience Archive section. Among others, the two celebrities Hito Steyerl and Zanele Muholi will be exhibiting there.

Combination tickets with Biennale

Both museums offer exhibitions of contemporary art and are among the most important collections in Venice. The addresses and opening times can be found on the provider’s website. More information on the Peggy Guggenheim Collection can also be found in a separate article.

Palazzo Grassi is a palace on the banks of the Grand Canal in Venice and a masterpiece in a style between late Baroque and Classicism (see photo above). It was commissioned by the Grassi family in the 18th century.

Tickets for both museums can also be booked separately, directly at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection or Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana.

Practical tips for visiting the Biennale

Buy your tickets in advance to avoid long queues at the entrance.

Plan an itinerary with the artists and pavilions you would like to see. Divide your visit over the whole day with breaks. The Venice Biennale is extensive and it is difficult to see everything in one day, or you may decide to visit on another day.

Think comfortable shoes – there is a lot of walking. Drinks for the hot days and a few snacks for the road, as bars and restaurants can be crowded.

Anyone wishing to take photos should pay attention to the respective exhibition regulations. In some cases, photography is prohibited.

Special areas for children and their families have been set up in the Giardini and Arsenale exhibition venues. A cloakroom service offers the hire of pushchairs and baby carriers – while stocks last. Changing tables and bottle warmers are available for use. The catering facilities are also equipped for children.

Image sources:

Biennale

Tiqets

Jean-Pierre Dalbéra from Paris, France (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Le_Palazzo_Grassi_(Venise)_(10233671884).jpg), „Le Palazzo Grassi (Venise) (10233671884)“, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode