Koyo Kouoh, Curator of 2026 Venice Biennale, Dies at 57

Summary

• Cameroonian curator Koyo Kouoh has passed away after a recent cancer diagnosis.
• Announcement comes just five months following her appointing and days before presenting of next year’s theme.
• She is leaving a legacy of elevating African voices in a global artistic dialogue.

Koyo Kouoh, the renowned curator celebrated for reshaping global perspectives on African contemporary art, has died unexpectedly at the age of 57 following a recent cancer diagnosis.

In December 2024, Kouoh was named curator of the 2026 Venice Biennale, poised to become the first African woman to lead the exhibition. Her death comes just months after the historic announcement. “Her passing leaves an immense void in the world of contemporary art,” the Biennale’s organizers said in tribute.

Born in Douala, Cameroon in 1967, Kouoh’s journey into the art world began in anything but. After moving to Switzerland as a teenager, she studied business and banking before transitioning to social work, where she began assisting migrant women – a path that deepened her commitment to cultural expression and social change, eventually leading her to working in the arts.

Kouoh later left Europe, making Dakar, Senegal her new home. In 2008, she launched Raw Material Company, an independent artist residency, exhibition space and art academy focused on West African creativity and a region-first approach. In a recent statement, RAW team described Kouoh as “a real force, a source of warmth, generosity and intelligence [who] always affirmed that people were more important than things.”

Kouoh’s impact was deeply felt across the continent and beyond. In 2019, she took the helm of Zeitz MOCAA in Cape Town as executive director and chief curator, revitalizing the museum’s direction; and throughout her career, she has also contributed to major international art platforms including Documenta, the Carnegie International and the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair. Her landmark 2022 exhibition, When We See Us: A Century of Black Figuration in Painting, is currently on view in Brussels.

Tireless in her mission of nurturing the institutions she built and elevating African voices in a global dialogue, her legacy is deeply felt within the artistic fabric of the past, present and future.