Queer Rituals and Identities at Venice Biennale 2026: Bugarin + Castle's Project for Scotland

Scotland will be represented at the 2026 Venice Art Biennale by Bugarin + Castle, whose project Shame Parade is an exhibition designed to foster dialogue between history, popular culture, and queer and trans imaginaries. This is achieved through a diverse array of installations, video art, and sculptural interventions. The exhibition is scheduled to open to the public from May 9 to November 22, 2026, at the Scotland + Venice space in Castello, located in the Olivolo district.

Curated by Mount Stuart Trust and commissioned by Scotland + Venice, the project unfolds as a journey across various eras and geographies. The artists' research delves into a series of historical European public humiliation rituals—such as rough music, charivari, and scampanate—practices prevalent from the Middle Ages to the early modern period, used to sanction behaviors deemed deviant within a community.

Bugarin and Castle recontextualize these symbolic devices, transforming them into a contemporary language. The outcome is a visual procession, almost carnival-like, where diverse registers and materials coexist: 14th-century trial transcripts, 18th-century satirical engravings, medieval armor, karaoke ballads, and Filipino vehicle decorations. From these reinterpreted secular European rituals of shame emerges a stratified space where historical narratives and contemporary culture intertwine.

Among the works featured at the Biennale will be At Certayne Tymes, a sculpture that integrates mechanical, anatomical, and vocal elements. Submit to Sound is a video piece developed around voice feminization exercises and musical tracks created with the Manila-based band Kalye Teresa. Connecting the various exhibition spaces is Nocturnal Amusements, a sculptural device that poses the question «Are You Discreet?» to the audience, thereby transforming the act of viewing into a moment of direct involvement. Within the project, shame is redefined, becoming a field of tension where irony, vulnerability, and forms of resistance coexist. Through this semantic shift, Shame Parade constructs a potent political and emotional landscape.

Based between Glasgow and international contexts, Bugarin + Castle frequently employ participatory devices and the language of performance. Their recent interactive film, Sore Throat, produced between Edinburgh and Manila, explores the presence of colonial "monsters" and the sonic dimension within queer Filipino spaces. This work has been exhibited in a solo show at Fruitmarket, Tate Modern, and other international institutions. Utilizing specially designed software, visitors' voices were recorded and subsequently reinserted into the film unbeknownst to them, thereby transforming the spectators into antagonistic presences within the narrative.

Following its Venice presentation, Shame Parade is scheduled to return to Mount Stuart on the Isle of Bute in 2027, before embarking on a tour of various venues across Scotland and the United Kingdom, supported by Art Fund.