“Artists should allow the cat to get out of the bag”: Lubiana Hyde to represent Britain in 2026 Venice Biennial | Lubiana Hyde

Lubaina Himid, the artist known for her great facilities, was chosen as the theater that attracts attention to the characters that history ignored, by the British Council to represent the United Kingdom in the Venice Biennials 2026.

The artist said about the challenge of filling the British wing work in the “Olympics of Art”. “I was ready to do this when I was 30 years old – the British Council was not ready for me,” she added.

Himid, 70, is only the second black woman representing the UK in Venice. Sonia Boyce was the first, in 2022, and won the Golden Assad’s upper prize for its multimedia installation She feels her wayCelebrate the black music that inspired them. In 2024, Britain was represented by John Akumfra.

All the three artists are pioneers of Black British art, for example participants in the first national black art conference, which was held at Wolverhampton Polytechnic in 1982. Their work was often ignored or marginalized by the prevailing white art Foundation, a experience that says himid It will affect her approach in the suite.

“We have perfectly thought about ourselves as artists, but we were often in places that were not devoted to art show,” Hyde said, citing the spaces of multidisciplinary arts such as the Africa Center and ICA in London. “You may come to get a cup of tea, or lined up in cinema ticket queues, and you will look at our work on the wall. We have realized that these were the types of environments in which we could talk to the people we wanted to talk to, because they were welcome.”

Himid is sure it can rise to the task of representing Britain. “Why not?” I told the guardian. “I am British. I have lived here since I was four months old.” I was born in Zanzibar and is now based in Briston, where she is studying at Central Lancashire University.

The artist believes that people whose national identity is asked because of their race often has sharp antennas for the public mood. “I do not live here with consent. I have watched what is happening forever. What is the political situation? How do people feel? What is missing from the museum collections? Sometimes, those of us who feel that we do not belong Time. I have all kinds of things to say about the history of Britain and the wing itself.

Some Himid works, such as its 2007 statue Swallowingly: Lancaster dinner serviceAnd its paintings Lu RudorHe drew attention to the UK’s participation in the slave trade. In recent years, there has been a right -wing decline in the “awakening” of the disclosure of such novels, by artists and bodies such as national trust, which has been intensified since Donald Trump was elected.

Hyde said: “The truth always tries to reveal things.” “But the goal of artists is to open things, let the cat come out of the bag, and to hang the milk. Either it opens good conversations, or everyone should deal with them. It was the seventies, when I was in the school of art, in difficult times. So it was the eighties. But I kept doing With the work I wanted to do – there is nothing else I can do.

The artist’s choice can be a confusing country. Khaled Sabasabi was scheduled to represent Australia in Venice next year, but he was sacked after the Minister of Shadow Arts complained about the 2007 video, which included pictures of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Hyde said: “Artists must say what we want to say, and sometimes people do not want to say that.” “No one asked me to reduce my work. They allowed me to show it and then take the person.”

This year, Himid will return a visit in 1985 art by black women, which she forced to organize in a corridor in ICA, which ran from the bar to the toilet – away from the British British wing halls. Himid will spend the rest of the year working for Venice before the opening of next April.

What kind of work do you plan to accomplish? “I always paint, so there will be a coating,” the artist revealed, hinting: “I am interested in how surrealism meets every day, and the space between the question and the answer. I have a lot of work to do it. It is my disobedience, but it is exciting. I will not do it if I am not I think I have something interesting to say. “