GOTHENBURG.- Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art (GIBCA) 2025, a hand that is all our hands combined, is under way, presenting works by 24 artists across four main venues and in temporary locations. A third of the artworks on view are newly commissioned works, shown for the first time in Göteborg.  

The opening days of the biennial, 20–21 September, were marked by performances and conversations with artists and writers across the region, taking place at Röda Sten Konsthall, the Gothenburg City Library and Skövde Art Museum.

This edition of the biennial, curated by Christina Lehnert, intentionally departs from a singular thematic framework. Instead, it unfolds as a platform for polyphonic responses to the injustices, polarizations, and reactionary currents shaping our present. The project emerges in a moment when solidarity—a foundational principle of the European welfare state—is increasingly corroded by discriminatory practices and rhetoric that promote monoculture. Against this backdrop, the biennial insists on multiplicity, dissent, and the generative potential of collective resistance. Developed in close dialogue with the artists in multiple sites, the project resists narrowing and embraces complexity.

At The Gothenburg Museum of Art, the biennial engages in dialogue with the museum’s permanent collection of 19th and 20th century art, responding to its historical textures and institutional history. The presentation at the City Library foregrounds its role as a civic forum—a space for public discourse and knowledge production. At Skövde Art Museum, the exhibition traces affinities with the site-specific works of Siri Derkert and Vera Nilsson, who anchor feminist and socially engaged practices in Swedish art history. The collaboration with Göteborgs Konsthall explores the modalities of an institution operating beyond its physical venue, emphasizing presence and hosting as an instiutional structure. Lastly, the presentation at Röda Sten Konsthall is grounded in the central concerns of the biennial: freedom of speech for artists and those in minoritised positions, solidarity, and eventually resistance.

The biennial‘s title, a hand that is all our hands combined, is borrowed from the poem Personal Effects by Solmaz Sharif. An elegy, the poem explores the intergenerational impact of war on individual and collective biographies, and the inherited responsibility we all carry for the present. The work of Solmaz Sharif will be explored through a series of public conversations within the biennial programme. 

Participating artists and venues

Gothenburg City Library: Simnikiwe Buhlungu, Christian Nyampeta

The Gothenburg Museum of Art: Basma al-Sharif, Moki Cherry, Jonelle Twum, and at the invitation of Black Archives Sweden – Kiluanji Kia Henda & Tiago Mena Abrantes, and Pamela Z

Röda Sten Konsthall: Noor Abed, Raven Chacon, Hans Haacke, Hanni Kamaly, Thuy-Han Nguyen-Chi & Dalena Tran & Andrew Yong Hoon Lee, Rosalind Nashashibi, Lydia Ourahmane, Puppies Puppies (Jade Guanaro Kuriki-Olivo), Georgia Sagri, Helena Uambembe

Slakthuset and Gamlestaden, in collaboration with Göteborgs Konsthall: Simnikiwe Buhlungu

Skövde Art Museum: Patricia L. Boyd, Siri Derkert, Olivia Plender, Lala Rukh, Georgia Sagri

The biennial exhibition is accompanied by a public programme for youth and children and complemented by artist conversations, performances, film screenings and literary events.