36th Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts. The Oracle: On Fantasy and Freedom

The 36th Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts—The Oracle: On Fantasy and Freedom—will take place from June 6 to October 12, 2025. Its 36th edition is curated by renowned curator, lecturer, researcher, and TBA21 Associate Curator Chus Martínez as its Artistic Director.

The Ljubljana Biennale of Graphic Arts is celebrating its 70th anniversary in 2025. Since its beginning in 1955, the Biennale has showcased the works of around 9,000 artists from 122 countries. Throughout its history, it positioned Ljubljana and Slovenian art into a global context and helped shape the international discourse in the fields of printmaking and contemporary art. In 2001, marking a significant shift from national selections to a curated exhibition format, the Biennale began commissioning new works, resulting in 245 new art pieces to date. This period also saw the involvement of 30 curators and the utilisation of 53 exhibition venues, reflecting the Biennale’s ongoing evolution as a space for experimentation, critical reflection, and inter-institutional collaboration.

The Oracle names and honours the symbolic place where all beings wonder about the course of life. Because we care about tomorrow, we should assume we care about staying alive, about a world in peaceful coexistence. Art—all arts—assumes the existence of a tiny but meaningful spot from where to be free and dream and demand freedom and peace. Peace is only possible if we love the world we live in, which is a very difficult task today. This exhibition is about learning to do so.

TBA21 is delighted to act as one of the Biennale's partners, along with the Ljubljana Castle, National Museum of Contemporary History of Slovenia, Ljubljana Puppet Theatre and Museum of Puppetry, and Schering Stiftung, reiterating its commitment to amplify the vision of contemporary artists and their engagement with global networks. 

As part of this partnership, the Ljubljana Graphic Biennale will be premiering three new commissions. Island in the Sun is an immersive installation by Derek Kumala that conjures a psychological landscape shaped by delirium, searing heat, and the disorientation brought on by a climate crisis that is both global in scale and deeply unequal in impact. The video installation Open World by Yarema Malashchuk and Roman Khimei blurs the boundaries between surveillance and intimacy through themes of displacement, exile, and technological mediation. Through Sweet Blood in Stagnant Waters, Gabi Dao merges experimental cinema, fantasy, and science fiction with puppetry to reflect on the entangled crises of disease, ecology, and state control. Through symbolic layering, technological subversion, and speculative storytelling, these works hone in on the oracular nature of the Biennale, foreseeing a version of the future and opening up a possibility of imagining life otherwise.