VENICE.- RedSkyFalls by Alexandre Estrela will represent Portugal at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Curated by Ana Baliza and Ricardo Nicolau, it will be held from May 9 to November 22, 2026.
The artist presents a new installation that expands the logic of a homonymous 2019 work, now working as an operating system that integrates new digital beings. The project was selected for the Biennale Arte 2026, structured “In Minor Keys,” as it resonates with the piece’s quieter registers.
When the red sky falls, paradigms shift between divine providence, science as credo, data as oracle, and new obscurantist myths. Seismographs register these sideways movements, as humanity inscribes environmental and social fracture lines into the Earth’s crust. Tectonic manifestations open fissures, not only in the ground but also in thought.
RedSkyFalls proposes another way of reading—and responding to—these ruptures, grounded in the observation of an artificial ecosystem that responds in real time to near and distant events of a geophysical scale.
At the core of the system, a colony of small luminous organisms, nestled in the grooves of aluminium plates, inhabits the landscape of a computer screensaver. These prescient sensory units, the Replicas, approach disturbance through an animal, perhaps digital, ancient intuition. Just like catfish snap their tails in Japan before an earthquake, the Replicas react to underground infra-small signs and threshold vibrations so synchronously that, in a slip in perception, they collapse cause and effect.
Built from a calibrated mix of animal parts drawn from a dark cauldron, each Replica borrows its vital pulse from the beat of a heart in a fly’s leg, the wave of a fish larva’s tail, or the quiver of a rat’s whisker. A patchwork of digital animal movement engraves metal with a linear fossil. Along this pathway, light generates figures that continuously fulfill their hollow-graphic fate.
Through the study of fur, fin, and heart responses to seismic changes, RedSkyFalls proposes an artistic model for a science of particulars. Attention shifts away from grand narratives to the observation of a quiet game of life, played by beings—both natural and artificial—that survive extreme conditions through the laws of interdependence and cooperation.
The project extends the portuguese pavilion to distant seismic geographies through a network of exhibitions featuring replicas of the Replicas. Through the same principle of seismic reaction, Venice is connected to Mexico City, Lisbon, San Francisco, Lima, and Los Angeles—where tectonic events and the work’s responses synchronize in a state of near-zero latency.
During the Biennale Arte 2026, Survey on an S Wave, organized by Marco Bene, expands RedSkyFalls through performative visits, conversations, concerts, happenings, and screenings in Venice. Like Duchamp’s Boîte-en-valise, Bene brings a Portable Seismic Archive that temporarily introduces works and artists into the exhibition, opening and bridging gaps to complement the installation.
Across all its forms, RedSkyFalls proposes a poetic method of survival through the construction of a synchronized relational infrastructure.
Alexandre Estrela, visual artist, explores the perception of still and moving images through the manipulation of objects and projections, in search of a poetic language. Official Portuguese representation at the Biennale Arte 2026, presenting the multimedia installation RedSkyFalls.
Recent solo exhibitions include A Natureza Aborrece o Monstro, Culturgest, Lisbon (2024); Flat Bells, MoMA, New York (2023); All and Everything, Museo Rufino Tamayo (2020); Lua Cão (with João Maria Gusmão + Pedro Paiva), Galeria Zé dos Bois, Lisbon; Kunstverein, Munich; La Casa Encendida, Madrid (2018); Roda Lume, MuHKA, Antwerp (2016); Pockets of Silence, Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid (2015); and Meio Concreto, Museu de Serralves, Porto (2013). His work is held in the collections of MoMA, Centre Pompidou, Museo Reina Sofía, Fundación La Caixa, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Fundação de Serralves, and Coleção Galeria Zé dos Bois.
Ana Baliza, curator, designer, and editor. Curator of the portuguese pavilion at the Biennale Arte 2026.
Co-directs farO (since 2022), formerly known as Oporto (2012–2020), an arts programme focused on artistic dissemination and research at the intersection of various art forms. For the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, curated the first exhibition of designer Robin Fior (2019); provided artistic direction for the exhibition dança não dança (2024), and designed its catalogue (DGLAB Prize, 2025). Founder of “Amigos de”, a society for the preservation of rare species of artists, presenting the work of Anne Lefebvre (Kubik Gallery, 2025) and a retrospective of Artur Varela (ZDB, 2023).Has worked with artists in institutional and independent settings, designing publications such as A Third Reason (Alexandre Estrela, DGLAB Prize 2022), Massa Confusa (João Maria Gusmão, Stiftung Buchkunst shortlist), Rat Attack (Daragh Reeves), unpublished writings by Henry Flynt, and graphic novels by Pati Hill.
Ricardo Nicolau, curator and editor. Curator of the portuguese pavilion at the Biennale Arte 2026.
Since 2006, Deputy Director of the Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Serralves. Director and editor of the magazine Pangloss (2000–2003). Curator at Chiado 8, Lisbon (2005–2009), organizing exhibitions by Alexandre Estrela, Leonor Antunes, Luísa Cunha, and Ana Jotta. Has curated solo exhibitions at the Serralves Museum by Francisco Tropa, Pedro Barateiro, Charlotte Moth, Patricia Dauder, Ana Manso, Nora Turato, Von Calhau!, Mariana Caló, and Francisco Queimadela. Organized the exhibition and catalogue Que sais-je?: Livros e edições de artista (CAPC Bordeaux, 2015; Serralves, 2016). Has curated exhibitions drawn from the Serralves collection, such as Zéro de Conduite (2018) and Auto-edição no Porto, 1999–2019 (2019). Collaborated with Ana Jotta on the publications Jotta Dossier (2009), Entrevista Perpétua (2017), and Ana Ana Ana (2024). Since 2015, he has co-curated (with Cristina Grande and Pedro Rocha) the annual Serralves program O Museu como Performance, at the intersection of visual arts, dance, performance, and music.
