The Peru Pavilion at the 61st International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia will present Sara Flores. From Other Worlds, a solo exhibition dedicated to Peruvian artist Sara Flores (Tambo Mayo, 1950), a member of the Shipibo-Konibo people of the Peruvian Amazon. The exhibition, which will be on display at the Arsenale, will be open to the public from 9 May to 22 November 2026 as part of the international exhibition entitled In Minor Keys.
This participation marks a significant moment in the country’s cultural history, as it will be the first time that Peru is represented at the Venice Biennale by an indigenous artist. The project is supervised by Armando Andrade de Lucio as national curator, while the curatorship has been developed by Issela Ccoyllo and Matteo Norzi.
The exhibition will bring together new large-format paintings on tocuyo canvas, textile sculptures in the shape of mosquito nets made from the same material and painted by hand, as well as the film Non Nete (A Flag for the Shipibo Nation), created in 2025. This audiovisual work presents a hand-painted flag waving in the wind accompanied by a sound composition that introduces visitors to a sensory experience inspired by Amazonian spiritual tradition.
The common thread running through the exhibition is kené, the Shipibo-Konibo people’s unique geometric design system, which articulates a complex visual language associated with the Amazonian worldview. Through this system, Flores constructs compositions that establish connections between ancestral knowledge, nature and contemporary forms of creation, proposing a dialogue between tradition and artistic experimentation.
In her work, geometric patterns function as structures that evoke the interrelationship between the human world and the natural environment. This approach places the artist’s work in a space where ancestral cultural practices and contemporary discourses on identity, territory and sustainability converge.
Sara Flores’ artistic practice stems from a tradition passed down through the female line within her community. She began working as a teenager under her mother’s guidance and, over time, has established a career that is recognised both locally and on the international contemporary art scene.
Throughout his career, he has presented solo exhibitions at institutions such as the Lima Art Museum and international galleries such as White Cube in Paris and Bermondsey, as well as participating in group exhibitions at museums and art centres in Europe, America and Asia.
His work forms part of collections at institutions such as the Guggenheim Museum, Tate, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Hammer Museum, among others. In 2024, his artistic career also extended to the field of fashion through a collaboration with the French fashion house Christian Dior.
With From Other Worlds, the Peru Pavilion offers a contemporary interpretation of Amazonian visual heritage, placing the aesthetic language of the Shipibo-Konibo people in the global context of contemporary art and broadening the dialogue between cultures, territories and forms of knowledge.
