The 18th Istanbul Biennial kicks off in September 2025 – this time, with a bold three-year format (2025–2027).
Breaking from the traditional two-month sprint, it will unfold in stages. This gives artists space to experiment and allows audiences to return, reflect, and watch the work grow over time.
What is the Istanbul Biennial?
Since its inception in 1987, the Istanbul Biennial has evolved into one of the most influential contemporary art exhibitions globally.
What sets the Istanbul Biennial apart is its unique approach to exhibition spaces. Rather than confining art to museum and galleries, it transforms sites across Istanbul into immersive experiences.
From the grand domes of historical buildings to the intimate courtyards of old inns, each venue offers a distinct backdrop that enhances the artworks on display. Visitors engage with both the art and the city’s layered history.
The Biennial’s curatorial approach is equally innovative. Each edition brings a new perspective, with a curator framing the program around the urgent question and ideas of today. This keeps Istanbul Biennial fresh, relevant and thought-provoking on the international art stage.
What’s New in the 18th Edition?
The 18th Istanbul Biennial is planting a garden – stretching across 2025, 2026, and 2027 – where art will take root, grow, and bloom across the city.
In 2025, the Biennial introduces the first sprout: 47 artists and collectives from more than 30 countries. In 2026, the focus shifts to the roots – workshops, academies, and community projects that nurture creative growth. Finally, in 2027, full bloom arrives with citywide exhibitions and large-scale events, completing a three-year season of evolution.
This phased rhythm allows artworks to develop over time, conversations to deepen, and connections to endure.
What’s the Theme?
In Istanbul, three-legged cats slip through alleyways with a kind of stubborn grace. They’ve lost something, yet they move – crooked, steady, unbothered.
The Biennial takes its theme, “Üç Ayaklı Kedi” (The Three-Legged Cat), from these resilient creatures. It is a metaphor for fragility, survival, and the art of adaptation.
Across installations, films, performances, and community projects, the 18th Istanbul Biennial explores how people and communities endure, respond to challenges, and imagine new possibilities.
What’s in the Programme?
The first phase brings together diverse practices that explore survival, adaptation, and memory.
Performance highlights include Alex Baczyński-Jenkins’ Untitled (Holding Horizon), a choreography examining intimacy and queer temporality, and Ahmad Ghossein’s So your heart aches, huh? / The Pit, a monologue reflecting daily life amid Lebanon’s collapse.
Installation and film works feature Selma Selman’s Motherboards, which links technology and labor through recycled computer parts, alongside screenings like Maxime Hourani’s Stones Never Lie and Suneil Sanzgiri’s An Impossible Address, exploring fractured geographies and histories.
Beyond the artworks, venues such as Zihni Han offer libraries, workshops, and reading spaces for visitors to pause and engage. Talks, DJ sets, and live performances continue throughout the opening week and beyond.
Admission is free for all visitors, except for preview days before 20 September, which require a Biennial Plus ticket.
Where Are the Venues?
Eight venues, concentrated along the Beyoğlu–Karaköy axis, are close enough for visitors to walk between them. Along the way, each site reveals its own story: historic walls, hidden corners, and everyday life blending with the artworks on display. Learn more about the 18th Istanbul Biennial venues.
For a first-hand account of what it’s like to walk this route, see Istanbul Biennial 2025: Walking the City Through Art.
Who is the Curator?
Lebanese curator Christine Tohmé leads the Biennial. She is recognized for her socially engaged, process-driven approach and for founding Ashkal Alwan, the Lebanese Association for Plastic Arts.
Her initiatives – including Home Works and the Home Workspace Program – have nurtured experimental practices and critical discourse across the Arab world.
In 2021, Tohmé was honoured with the Chevalier rank of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture, recognising her significant contributions to the arts.
Tohmé’s philosophy aligns perfectly with the Biennial’s decision to slow down. She emphasizes the creative process itself, creating space for artists, audiences, and communities to connect over time.
As she puts it, “Art is most transformative not only in its final presentation but, importantly, in its production – the creative exchanges, studio visits, and reading groups.”
Under Tohmé’s guidance, the Istanbul Biennial evolves into a three-year laboratory for shared imagination.
Why Does This Biennial Matter?
The three-year format marks a turning point for international biennials, which are often criticized for being too fast, too spectacular, and disconnected from local contexts.
The 18th Istanbul Biennial responds to that critique by slowing the pace. It gives artists time to research and collaborate, and it invites audiences to follow a sustained process rather than consume a temporary event.
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