IT NEVER SSST
May 9–November 22, 2026
Venice
Italy
IT NEVER SSST, a performative exhibition by artist Miet Warlop, represents Belgium at the 61st Venice Biennale.
Miet Warlop transforms the Belgian pavilion into an arena where language and music collide, exploring the struggles of human connection in an increasingly disorienting world. Words cast in plaster circulate through the space: carried, passed along, dragged, and broken. Performers interpret these lyrical fragments, coalescing into the emotional score of IT NEVER SSST. This is a spiralling world in which words themselves lose stability. Scattered across stands that line the walls, they appear abandoned and lost to time—like remnants of an ancient karaoke machine, lifelessly awaiting the breath of a new arrangement. The performance echoes this poetics of chaos and collective disorientation.
In the performance arena, a monumental wooden wall with plaster-cast words is activated by performers with physical and musical acts at regular intervals throughout the Biennale Arte. Staging a series of acts ranging from the soulful to the absurd, the performers waver between despair and the urge to transcend it. Their voices and bodies work through waves of emotions in a musical ritual shaped by recurring tension and release. Words are sung in parlando and staccato—fired up, tempered or tinged with sorrow. The entire installation is played and amplified like an instrument. The walls are clad in towels, catching the resonance of drumbeats and singing.
Plaster functions as a potent metaphor—malleable yet brittle, it evokes parallels of repetition and decay. At first fluid, it is eventually trapped in a hardened form, it can be cast and repaired time and again, yet always remains fragile. Plaster casts of ‘ssst’ (the equivalent of ‘shhh’ in English) fill the wall of words. Ssst (calls for stillness), ssst (lingers, unresolved), ssst (never stops). This representation of silence is gradually replaced by the performers with new words in many languages, as their movements and voices swell in tandem.
Over its seven-month duration, a series of wall reliefs will be added to the exhibition, produced on site by students from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia in the altorilievo technique. The sculptors’ live presence persists throughout, ensuring a continuous line of activity and creation in the space. The reliefs capture the stilled acts of this choral constellation, merging performance and visual art. Interweaving music, dance, and sculpture, IT NEVER SSST traces a perpetual circular movement that unfolds like an endless concert, a rhythmic recurrence that is never the same, turned towards a future that remains out of sight.
The project has been commissioned by the Flemish Community of Belgium under Commissioner Caroline Gennez, Flemish Minister for Welfare and Poverty Reduction, Culture and Equal Opportunities. It is curated by Caroline Dumalin and co-organized by MORPHO, Kanal-Centre Pompidou and Miet Warlop/Irene Wool. Miet Warlop is a performance artist based in Brussels whose work involves an unruly blend of disciplines, from the visual arts to the world of theatre. Through animated sculptures, tableaux vivants and performative actions, she creates plastic experimentations with a strong scenographic approach.
“With IT NEVER SSST, Miet Warlop exemplifies the international impact of Belgian contemporary art. By placing performance at the centre of the Belgian Pavilion for the first time and bringing together multiple disciplines, we showcase how Flemish and Belgian artists are shaping today’s cultural conversation with boldness, craftsmanship and imagination.” —Caroline Gennez, Flemish Minister for Welfare and Poverty Reduction, Culture and Equal Opportunities
The project will travel to Kanal-Centre Pompidou, Brussels (BE) in March 2027.
Venue and date
61st Venice Biennale
Belgian Pavilion, Giardini, Venice
May 9–November 22, 2026
Performance times
Tuesday–Wednesday & Friday–Saturday, throughout the day
May: 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19, 20, 22, 23
June: 16, 17, 19, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27
July: 21, 22, 24, 25
August: 18, 19, 21, 22
September: 8, 9, 11, 12, 15, 16, 18, 19
October: 13, 14, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, 24
November: 10, 11, 13, 14, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22
Credits
Commissioner: Caroline Gennez, Flemish Minister for Welfare and Poverty Reduction, Culture and Equal Opportunities
Exhibitor: Miet Warlop
Curator: Caroline Dumalin (MORPHO)
Project Manager and Artistic Consultant: Guy Gypens (Kanal)
Presentation production: Kwinten Lavigne
Sculptural production: Barbara Vackier
Music production: Micha Volders
Costume design and production: Carol Piron (TOMBOY®)
Performers: Alice Marchiori, Giulia Longoni, Lisa Sieni, Melvin Slabbinck, Oscar Claus, Rahmat Emonds, Rita Brancato, Thybaud Monterisi, Wietse Tanghe
Sculptors: Riccardo Barichella, Martina Barresi, Giulio Bertacchini, Andrea Bortolotto, Leonardo Costerman, Riccardo Feltrin, Desirè Marcato, Francesco Mazzolin, Nicole Racchi, Anna Velludo, Filippo Zussa
Supporters
Institutional partners: MORPHO, Kanal-Centre Pompidou, Miet Warlop/Irene Wool, KASK & ArBA-EsA (Young Curators Programme)
Main partners: National Lottery, Proximus Art Collection, ING Art Collection
Partners: Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia, Bodies in Space, Delegation of Flanders—Embassy of Belgium in Italy, Live Arts Cultures, MANIERA, TheMerode
Press enquiries
For the national press: Sarah-Claire Vermeulen at Serenai, sarah-claire@serenai.eu / T +32 474 853 637
For the international press: Alicia Lethbridge at Sam Talbot, alicia@sam-talbot.com / T +44 7837 534999
For Kanal-Centre Pompidou: David Salomonowicz, dsalomonowicz@kanal.brussels / T +32 476 307 554
