Artist Isabel Nolan and Douglas Hyde Gallery set for 61st Venice Art Biennale
Posted on: 06 November 2024
The selection of the team to represent Ireland was made following an open, competitive process, with international jury members.
The Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media, Catherine Martin T.D. 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 Catherine 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.
Isabel Nolan (third from right above and below on left) 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 (centre above with Cian O'Brien on right)) 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."
Main image by Ste Murray shows (l to r) (L to R) Emma Moore, Curator Georgina Jackson, Artist Isabel Nolan, Producer Cian O’Brien, Niamh Darling and Rachel McIntyre at The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art, Dublin, 2024.
Media Contact:
Catherine O’Mahony | Media Relations | catherine.omahony@tcd.ie