![\"'do](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/in-minor-keys-venice-art-biennale-2026-theme-late-curator-koyo-kouoh-designboom-06.jpg\")
Padiglione Centrale Giardini | image by Andrea Avezzu, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia<\/p>\n
Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu announce venice biennale 2027 theme<\/p>\n
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Curators Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu unveil Do Architecture: The Possibility of Coexistence in the Face of Real Reality as the theme of the 20th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. Running from May 8th to November 21st, 2027, the exhibition positions architecture as a direct response to an increasingly unstable world shaped by ecological crisis, accelerated urbanization, technological abstraction, and the erosion of cultural memory.<\/p>\n
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Announced at the Biennale headquarters in Venice, the theme marks a notable shift from the technologically driven discourse of recent editions toward a more grounded architectural approach centered on materiality, local participation, craftsmanship, and lived experience. Through the deliberately direct title Do Architecture, the curators call for architecture to move beyond excessive conceptualization and reconnect with the physical realities of building, inhabitation, and coexistence.<\/p>\n
Padiglione Centrale Giardini | image by Andrea Avezzu, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia<\/p>\n
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architecture must confront \u2018real reality\u2019<\/p>\n
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In their presentation, Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu describe today\u2019s global condition as one of uncertainty, instability, and detachment from reality, arguing that contemporary architecture has often become disconnected from the places and communities it serves. \u2018Overly conceptual experiments are often detached from reality,\u2019 the curators noted, warning against forms of architectural production driven by commercialization, speed, and image-making.<\/p>\n
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Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu frame architecture itself as deeply implicated in the environmental and cultural crises of the present. \u2018Architecture must recognize the depth of the crisis in which it finds itself,\u2019 the duo shares, pointing to the destructive impact of large-scale construction on both natural ecosystems and historic urban environments. The exhibition proposes a slower and more tactile practice rooted in continuity, memory, and repair.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n reclaiming craft, memory, and local knowledge<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Central to the Biennale\u2019s curatorial vision is the work of Amateur Architecture Studio, founded by Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu, whose practice has long explored reclaimed materials, vernacular building traditions, and the coexistence of old and new forms of construction. The curators emphasized the importance of recovering not only materials, but also local cultural memory and craftsmanship, arguing that architecture should preserve the diversity and specificity of places.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The exhibition will address a series of questions surrounding architecture\u2019s relationship to climate change, artificial intelligence, rural and urban development, and collective participation. Among the central themes introduced during the announcement was the question: \u2018Can artificial intelligence coexist with the tactility of human architecture?\u2019 The Biennale will also investigate how passive and active environmental strategies, traditional building knowledge, and contemporary technologies might coexist without erasing local identities and lived experience.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n venice as a living site of architectural intervention<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Beyond the Giardini and the Arsenale, the 2027 Biennale will extend directly into Venice itself through architectural interventions across the city. Referencing the legacy of the 1964 Venice Charter on heritage conservation, Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu described Venice as an active participant in the exhibition. \u2018We should not ignore the city in which the exhibition is taking place, Venice,\u2019\u00a0 the curatorial duo states, adding that the city must not become \u2018an invisible city,\u2019 invoking the writing of Italo Calvino.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The curators also stressed the role of education and collective exchange within the Biennale, proposing workshops, dialogues, and forms of direct participation that move beyond discussion toward physical engagement and construction. \u2018We should not only discuss, we should do,\u2019 they conclude.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The 2027 edition marks the 20th International Architecture Exhibition since architecture first became an independent department of the Biennale in 1980 under the direction of Paolo Portoghesi. With Do Architecture, Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu position this anniversary edition as a call to rethink architecture as a material and ethical practice grounded in coexistence, continuity, and reality.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n project info:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n event:\u00a020th International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia<\/p>\n theme: Do Architecture: The Possibility of Coexistence in the Face of Real Reality<\/p>\n curators:\u00a0Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu (Amateur Architecture Studio)<\/p>\n organizer:\u00a0La Biennale di Venezia<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0@labiennale<\/a><\/p>\n location:\u00a0Giardini and Arsenale, Venice, Italy<\/p>\n dates:\u00a0May 8 \u2013 November 21, 2027\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"intelligens.](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/foreigners-everywhere-venice-biennale-theme-2024-art-exhibition-designboom-00.jpg\")
image by Francesco Galli, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia<\/a><\/p>\n![\"'do](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wang-shu-lu-wenyu-venice-architecture-biennale-2027-curators-amateur-architecture-studio-designboom-.jpeg\")
Weng Shu and Lu Wenyu | all images \u00a9 La Biennale di Venezia by ASAC- Matteo Losurdo<\/p>\n![\"'do](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/in-minor-keys-venice-art-biennale-2026-theme-late-curator-koyo-kouoh-designboom-04.jpg\")
Gaggiandre | image by Andrea Avezzu, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia<\/p>\n![\"'do](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779195853_673_wang-shu-lu-wenyu-venice-architecture-biennale-2027-curators-amateur-architecture-studio-designboom-.jpeg\")
Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu have spent nearly three decades challenging dominant architectural narratives<\/p>\n