Singapore Biennale 2025
October 31, 2025–March 29, 2026
Singapore Art Museum (SAM) announces the Singapore Biennale’s (SB2025) return from October 31, 2025 to March 29, 2026.
The Singapore Biennale is a premier international platform that celebrates the vibrant and diverse contemporary art scene of Southeast Asia, fostering meaningful local and international dialogue that charts artistic evolution in the region and beyond.
Anchored by the concept of pure intention, SB2025 will unpack and examine Singapore’s multifaceted identity and evolving cityscape within broader, global artistic narratives around urban development, historical contradictions, and speculative realities. Expanding on this framework, the Biennale also hopes to explore the notion of pure intentions within disciplines ranging from science and humanities to contemporary art.
Inviting alternative interpretations of pure intention, curators Duncan Bass, Hsu Fang-Tze, Ong Puay Khim and Selene Yap have invited contributions from independent organisations and curatorial collectives around the world, including Hyphen— (Indonesia), Asian Film Archive (Singapore), Hothouse (Singapore) and The Packet (Sri Lanka). This complementary curatorial network acts as a challenge to singular authorship and an opportunity for polyvocal interpretations of pure intention. Together, they will bring new and existing projects by local and international artists, as well as artist-run initiatives, into public spaces around Singapore, including a strong representation of artists and content from Singapore and the region.
In a joint statement, the curators shared that, “Pure intention facilitates deep engagement with Singapore’s rapidly changing social and urban environment, inviting reflection on the intersection of tradition and modernity. This Biennale explores how art can act as a lens through which we better understand the complexities of space, identity, and transformation. Artists engage with the city’s evolving landscape—architecturally, socially, and culturally—offering fresh perspectives on what it means to navigate and shape urban life in a time of flux. Through their works, we are encouraged to reconsider our relationship to place, history, and each other, fostering dialogue that is both timely and timeless in its resonance. We are excited to invite curatorial contributions in hopes that they might challenge our own pure intentions.”
For the first time in its history, the Biennale will engage with a broader typology of spaces ranging from pre-colonial and colonial landmarks transformed into public sites, green areas repurposed for recreation, residential neighbourhoods and lived spaces, to shopping centres that have evolved into social spaces for Singapore’s diverse communities. Drawing out the inherent contradictions between outcome and intent, SB2025 mines actual and speculative realities through artworks that locate the profound in processes that often border on the absurd, futile, or obsolete. Presented on the occasion of Singapore’s 60th year of independence, the Biennale will invite artists and audiences to collectively reflect on the historic milestones and collective aspirations that have shaped Singapore’s trajectory.
More information on the participating artists, venues and programmes will be released later in 2025.
The eighth edition of the Singapore Biennale is organised by SAM, commissioned by the National Arts Council, Singapore, and supported by the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth.
Media queries: Leck Choon Ling (Tate Anzur) and Gwyneth Liew (SAM)
