The time for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 launch in spring is almost upon us - and excitement has been ramping up in the architecture circles. This year's appointed curator, architect Carlo Ratti, and the team behind the world's largest architecture festival have been working non-stop towards the public opening on the 10th of May. As per past years, the main show's content specifics are under embargo, leading to much speculation in the architecture world as to its overall mood and narratives.
'The role of the biennale is to look at different challenges. Lesley's was a very important one,' said Ratti at the first global press conference around the event, acknowledging the 2023 Venice Architecture Biennale's influential theme by 2024 RIBA Gold Medal winner Lesley Lokko – and hinting at the future and the next steps in the grand exhibition's global explorations.
Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 curator Carlo Ratti
Venice Architecture Biennale 2025: what we know on the theme, ‘Intelligence’
La Biennale di Venezia 2025 will focus on the topic of 'Intelligens: Natural. Artificial. Collective.' Ratti said of his theme: 'The title of the International Architecture Exhibition is usually announced both in English and in Italian. In 2025 it will be condensed into a single word for both languages via the common Latin precedent: intelligens. The title “Intelligens” is linked to the modern term “intelligence”, but it also evokes a wider set of associated meanings. In fact, the final syllable “gens” is Latin for “people”. A new, fictional root emerges, suggesting a future of intelligence that is inclusive, multiple, and imaginative beyond today’s limiting focus on AI.'
Exploring his topic through four sections, Ratti announced the sub-themes of Transdisciplinarity, Living Lab, Space For Ideas, and Circularity Protocol as key pillars in the way he conceived the main show.
Crowd of people at a past Venice Biennale: In preparation for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025, we revisit the US Pavilion's celebrations at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection museum during the 2008 festival, as reported in Wallpaper's December issue of the same year
Venice Architecture Biennale 2025: manifesto and participants
Last year, Ratti also launched a circular economy manifesto for this Venice Architecture Biennale - inviting participants to tackle core challenges in exhibition design, in order to produce a truly circular festival. This goal is outlined in the manifesto, which was developed with guidance from Arup and input from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. The team wrote at the time: 'Our goal is to demonstrate that architecture and the built environment can coexist harmoniously with our planet, by eliminating waste, circulating materials and regenerating natural systems. We commit to creating pavilions and spaces that are not just temporary showcases but offer examples of bold circular thinking and create lasting legacies.'
With all this in mind, the curator put an open call for proposals, for the first time ever in the festival's long history, 'no matter how audacious,' from both architects and non-architects. In fact, trans-disciplinarity seems to be the name of the game, with Ratti inviting the global community of practitioners, scientists, scholars, activists, and others to help him create a diverse, creative biennale.
More is due to be revealed in the next few weeks, along with a list of the main show's participants and a hint of the projects involved. Watch this space, as we will be updating this guide as information becomes available.
Visitors flock at the Arsenale exhibition grounds
The basics: places, dates and tickets
The Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 will be open to the public between 10 May and 23 November 2025, including two vernissage days on the 8 and 9 May. The shows will be, as always, split between Venice's famed Arsenale and Giardini locations, with the former focused on Ratti's main showcase and the latter containing the always-rich and layered national participations in their respective, dedicated pavilions. Tickets for the main sites are available at the entrance and opening hours are 11 am - 7 pm (last admission 6:45 pm), with the venue closed on Mondays (except 12 May and 17 November).
As always more events are spread across Venice - including both independent programmes and collateral events, and national participations who may not be accommodated in the Giardini site.
The Biennale College Architettura, which launched in 2023, is also returning in 2025 for its second iteration as part of the festival's education arm. Ratti has invited students, graduate students and emerging practitioners under the age of 30 to take part and 'submit projects that employ natural, artificial, and collective intelligence to combat the climate crisis'.
The 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale will run 10 May till 23 November 2025
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