Aline Bouvy will represent Luxembourg at the 61st Venice Biennale with La Merde, a new project combining film, sculpture, and sound. The work will be on view from May 9 to November 22, 2026, at the Luxembourg Pavilion in the Arsenale. Curated by Stilbé Schroeder of Casino Luxembourg – Forum d’art contemporain, the project marks Bouvy’s first film and centers on the idea of shame as a social construct.
At the center of La Merde is an anthropomorphic figure—a stylized turd—used to examine how bodies are regulated and categorized. The work looks at the limits of tolerance within social systems: how certain forms are accepted, while others are excluded, repressed, or rendered invisible. The figure operates less as provocation than as a device. By pushing the body into a state associated with waste and loss of control, the film addresses how norms around cleanliness, gender, and propriety are constructed and enforced. The project extends beyond the film itself. Bouvy combines moving image with sculptural elements and sound to create an immersive environment within the pavilion. Her practice has often focused on formal systems and material precision, paired with an offbeat, sometimes confrontational humor. In La Merde, these elements are used to structure an experience that moves between discomfort and recognition, without settling into a single narrative.
The Luxembourg Pavilion is organized by Kultur | lx – Arts Council Luxembourg, with production led by Casino Luxembourg. A press event will take place on May 7 during the Biennale’s preview days, ahead of the official opening later that day. Positioned within the Arsenale’s Sale d’Armi, the project joins a wider international exhibition that continues to foreground questions of identity, embodiment, and social systems.
Aline Bouvy La Merde
May 9–November 22, 2026
Luxembourg Pavilion, Venice Biennale
ArsenaleSale d’Armi 1st floor, Sestiere Castello,
Campo Della Tana 2169/F
Venice 30122
Italy