The Jury of the 60th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia awarded Karimah Ashadu (London, UK, 1985. Lives in Hamburg, Germany and Lagos, Nigeria) with the Silver Lion for her work in Foreigners Everywhere curated by Adriano Pedroso. The Silver Lion is awarded to a Promising Young Artist in the International Exhibition. 

The jury consisting of Julia Bryan-Wilson (USA), President of the Jury, Alia Swastika (Indonesia), Chika Okeke-Agulu (Nigeria), Elena Crippa (Italy), and María Inés Rodríguez (France/Colombia) explained their motivation: “Karimah Ashadu with her video Machine Boys and related brass sculpture, Wreath, upends gendered assumptions about the gaze and what is considered proper to commemorate. With a searing intimacy, she captures the vulnerability of young men from the agrarian north of Nigeria who have migrated to Lagos and end up riding illegal motorbike taxis. Her feminist camera lens is extraordinarily sensitive and intimate, capturing the bikers’ subcultural experience as well as their economic precarity. Masterfully edited to draw out yet subtly critique the performance of masculinity on display, her sensual attention to surfaces of machine, flesh, and cloth reveals the rider’s marginal existence.”

The Golden Lion for the Best Participant in the International Exhibition goes to Mataaho Collective (founded in Aotearoa, New Zealand in 2012. Based in Aotearoa, New Zealand).

The Golden Lion for Best National Participation goes to Australia, with a Special Mention for the National Pavilion of Republic of Kosovo. Silver Lion for a Promising Young Participant in the International Exhibition:
Karimah Ashadu.

The Jury has decided to award two Special Mentions to the following participants: Samia Halaby (Jerusalem, Palestine, 1936. Lives in New York City, USA) and La Chola Poblete (Mendoza, Argentina, 1989. Lives Buenos Aires, Argentina).

Upon recommendation of the Curator of the 60th Exhibition Adriano Pedrosa two Golden Lions for Lifetime Achievement go to Italian-born Brazilian artist Anna Maria Maiolino and to the Paris-based Turkish artist Nil Yalter.