Curators & Artists
The 24th Biennale of Sydney brings together 88 artists and collectives from 47 countries, representing diverse practices in painting, sculpture, video, performance, digital media, and installation. This diverse roster reflects the curatorial vision of Cosmin Costinaș and Inti Guerrero: joy, celebration, and artistic resistance across global contexts.
Curatorial Vision: Cosmin Costinaș & Inti Guerrero
Cosmin Costinaș
Cosmin Costinaș is a renowned curator based in Berlin and Bucharest, known for championing global contemporary art beyond Western institutional frameworks. His curatorial practice emphasizes South-South artistic exchange, institutional critique, and the decolonization of exhibition-making. He has curated major exhibitions internationally and served as artistic director of the Bucharest Biennial, where he developed models for curatorial collaboration grounded in regional artistic communities.
For the Sydney Biennale, Costinaș brings rigorous attention to geopolitical contexts, institutional power structures, and the capacity of contemporary art to articulate alternative social imaginaries. His co-curation emphasizes joy and celebration as deliberate curatorial strategies—counter-programming institutional fatigue and economic anxiety through affirming artistic vitality.
Inti Guerrero
Inti Guerrero is a curator and theorist based in Mexico City and Manila, whose practice centers Pacific and Latin American artistic networks. His work emphasizes indigenous knowledge systems, postcolonial sovereignty, and artistic exchange outside Western institutional mediation. He has curated extensively throughout Asia-Pacific and Latin America, fostering sustained relationships with artist communities and regional institutions.
Guerrero brings to the Sydney Biennale deep commitment to Pacific regional agency, Indigenous curatorial authority, and the creative networks flourishing throughout Asia-Pacific. His research examines how biennales can decolonize their institutional structures while amplifying regional artistic voices on global platforms.
Notable Artists & Practices
While all 88 featured artists merit serious attention, several practices exemplify the curatorial direction and thematic preoccupations of "Ten Thousand Suns." The following highlights offer entry points for encountering the exhibition's diverse artistic voices.
Asia-Pacific Artistic Leadership
The 24th Biennale features substantial representation from Southeast Asian, East Asian, and Pacific artists whose practices articulate regional concerns around climate, postcolonial sovereignty, and spiritual traditions. These artists bring distinct artistic vocabularies and knowledge systems that enrich global contemporary art discourse while challenging Western-centric critical frameworks.
Featured practices include experimental video from Vietnam, participatory installation from Indonesia, performance art from Philippines, multimedia practices from South Korea, and oceanic perspectives from Pacific island nations. Their work collectively asserts Asia-Pacific artistic agency and refuses subordination to Western institutional mediation.
Indigenous Australian Artists
Substantial exhibition space goes to Indigenous Australian artists whose practices engage land dispossession, cultural persistence, climate catastrophe, and artistic sovereignty. Their work articulates complex negotiations between traditional knowledge systems and contemporary art contexts, refusing both romantic essentialism and Western institutional appropriation.
Featured Indigenous practices range from abstract painting informed by Country connection to video works addressing climate migration, from sculptural installations engaging materials sourced from Country to performance practices rooted in ceremony and ritual. These artists assert Indigenous artistic authority over representation and curatorial framing.
Participatory & Community-Engaged Practice
Multiple featured artists prioritize participatory engagement and community collaboration over commodity art objects. These practices include public installations inviting audience participation, workshops facilitating skill-sharing, performance works creating collective gathering spaces, and social practice addressing local concerns through artistic intervention.
This emphasis reflects the curatorial commitment to joy and celebration as modes of artistic practice—privileging collective experience over individual consumption, affirming art's capacity to build community and articulate shared futures.
Ecological & Environmental Art
Climate catastrophe animates numerous featured practices. Artists engage environmental crisis through site-specific installation remediating damaged ecosystems, video documentation of disappearing landscapes, abstract works evoking atmospheric turbulence, and activist art mobilizing community response to ecological urgency.
Rather than offering false solutions or aestheticizing crisis, these artists grapple with complicity and artistic responsibility in contexts of planetary transformation. Their work asserts that aesthetic experience and ecological consciousness are inseparable.
Experimental & Ephemeral Practices
Performance, sound art, video, and ephemeral installation form significant portion of the exhibition. These practices privilege lived experience and momentary encounter over permanent art objects. Performances may occur at specific moments; sound installations create immersive acoustic environments; video works unfold temporal narratives; ephemeral installations transform and disappear.
This formal diversity reflects contemporary art's expanded field and the curatorial commitment to joy and celebration manifest through bodily experience, sensory immersion, and temporal encounter rather than contemplative viewing.
Artistic Directors in Biennale History
The Sydney Biennale has long attracted exceptional curatorial leadership. The following figures have shaped the institution's artistic vision across multiple decades, establishing curatorial precedents that influence the 24th edition.
Nick Waterlow
Nick Waterlow remains the most frequently appointed artistic director, shaping the Biennale's identity across three editions spanning the 1980s. His curatorial vision emphasized international artistic exchange, institutional development, and Sydney's emerging position as regional art hub. Waterlow's editions established patterns of global inclusion while maintaining curatorial coherence.
Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev
Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev brought international curatorial prestige and ambitious thematic framing to the 2008 edition. Her practice emphasizes artistic research, institutional critique, and expanded exhibition formats. Her tenure influenced subsequent editions' investment in sophisticated curatorial narratives and artistic integrity.
Broader Artist Statistics
Since founding in 1973: The Biennale has presented work by more than 2,400 artists from over 130 countries. This vast historical archive represents decades of contemporary art innovation, regional artistic networks, and the evolution of global contemporary art discourse. The archive demonstrates the Biennale's evolving engagement with global art communities, from early Euro-American focus toward contemporary commitment to Asia-Pacific, Indigenous, and non-aligned artistic voices.
24th Edition Statistics: The current edition's 88 artists from 47 countries represents substantial regional representation—with particular emphasis on Asia-Pacific, Indigenous Australian, and non-Western artistic communities. This distribution reflects curatorial commitment to challenging global art world hierarchies while amplifying voices historically marginalized by Western institutional gatekeeping.
Emerging & Established Practices
The 24th Biennale balances established artists with sustained international recognition alongside emerging practitioners at early career stages. This curatorial strategy refreshes artistic discourse while honoring institutional memory. Established artists bring historical perspective and refined practices; emerging artists introduce novel formal languages, contemporary concerns, and fresh institutional critique.
This balance acknowledges that contemporary art vitality depends on both generational continuity and emergent disruption—on artists building on previous legacies while young practitioners challenge and transform artistic possibilities.
Discovering Featured Artists
The official Biennale website presents comprehensive artist profiles, biosographies, artwork descriptions, and curatorial contexts for all 88 featured practitioners. Each artist page includes exhibition locations, venue hours, and relevant public programs. Use the venue guides to plan encounters with specific artists' work, or let spontaneous gallery wandering introduce you to unexpected artistic discoveries. The Biennale's thematic coherence—"Ten Thousand Suns"—connects these diverse practices; follow emerging connections across venues and artistic mediums. Talk with gallery staff about artists' work; join guided tours featuring artist talks; attend public programs where many featured artists discuss their practices and curatorial contexts. Let the Biennale surprise you with artistic visions you didn't anticipate encountering.