Koyo Kouoh, Curator of 2026 Venice Biennale, Dead At 57
Koyo Kouoh, Trailblazing Curator Of 2026 Venice Biennale, Dies Suddenly at 57
South African curator Koyo Kouoh has died at the age of 57, according to BBC News. The Cameroon-born art legend was set to become the first African woman to lead the 2026 Venice Biennale, an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. The icon passed away in Switzerland, according to reports.
On May 11, Kouoh’s sudden death was announced via the Venice Biennale Instagram page. The art event said that she passed away between the “9th to 10th of May,” but did not provide a cause of death for the prestigious curator, who was an advocate for African artists. However, the New York Times noted that Kouoh passed away on Saturday, May 10, in a hospital in Basel, Switzerland. Her husband, Philippe Mall, revealed that she had only recently been diagnosed with cancer.
Kouoh served as the executive director and chief curator of Zeitz MOCAA in Cape Town, South Africa, where she resided.
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According to a statement published on the Venice Biennale website, the Board of Directors of La Biennale announced Kouoh’s appointment in December 2024 as the Curator of the 61st International Art Exhibition, set to open May 9, 2026. The Board commended her for bringing passion, intellectual rigor, and visionary leadership to the conception and development of Biennale Arte 2026. The official unveiling of the exhibition’s title and theme was scheduled to take place in Venice on May 20.
“Her passing leaves an immense void in the world of contemporary art and in the international community of artists, curators, and scholars who had the privilege of knowing and admiring her extraordinary human and intellectual commitment,” the statement added.
Koyo Kouoh’s magnificent life
Kouoh devoted her life to championing African women and artists, though her path to becoming one of the continent’s leading curators was anything but linear. Born and raised in Douala, Cameroon, she moved to Switzerland at the age of 13, where she initially studied business administration and banking, according to the BBC. Uninterested in finance, she ultimately chose not to pursue it.
Instead, Kouoh found herself drawn to social work, supporting migrant women while gradually immersing herself in the world of contemporary art. During the 1990s, she gave birth to her son in Switzerland—an experience she later described as “profoundly transformative”—and went on to adopt three more children.
She eventually returned to Africa in 1996, settling in Dakar, Senegal. There, she established herself as a curator and later founded Raw Material Company, a dynamic and independent center for art, knowledge, and society.
Per Arts Asia Pacific, Kouoh rose to international prominence through her co-curation of the 2001 and 2003 editions of Bamako Encounters – The African Biennial of Photography in Mali, a platform that significantly elevated contemporary African photography on the global stage.
Her curatorial expertise was later sought for major art events, including Documenta 12 (2007) and Documenta 13 (2012), where she contributed to shaping some of the most influential exhibitions of the early 21st century.
In 2013, she became the founding curator of the educational and artistic program for the 1- 54 Contemporary African Art Fair, and later, in 2016, joined the curatorial team of EVA International, the Irish Biennial of Contemporary Art.
In 2019, Kouoh was appointed Director and Chief Curator of Zeitz MOCAA in Cape Town, marking a significant milestone in her career. She envisioned the museum as a truly Pan-African institution—one rooted in critical dialogue, care, and the complex layers of African histories and futures. Among her most celebrated achievements at Zeitz MOCAA was the groundbreaking 2022 exhibition and publication When We See Us: A Century of Black Figuration in Painting, according to Artnet. As noted by Jo Lawson-Tancred, the project was a landmark moment: the most expansive exploration to date of Black self-representation, featuring a century’s worth of work by artists from across Africa and the global African diaspora.
Candice Breitz told the BBC that she will remember the art leader for always being “magnificently intelligent, endlessly energetic and formidably elegant.”
Zeitz MOCAA also honored Kouoh, calling her passing a “profound” loss. The museum will be closed until May 13 to pay respect to the inimitable curator.
“Our thoughts are with Koyo’s family at this time,” Zeitz MOCAA added in their Instagram statement.
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