INDEX – Biennial of Artwork and Know-how has returned to Braga for its 2026 version, bringing collectively artists, theorists and musicians exploring the connection between expertise and modern methods of energy. Operating by means of 17 Could, the biennial spans exhibitions, performances and talks throughout the Portuguese metropolis, with this 12 months’s central exhibition curated by Joel Valabrega.
Valabrega’s exhibition approaches the theme of energy with out decreasing it into generalised narratives: authority appears staged, management is represented in monstrous figures or encoded within the hum of drone recordings. The programme options work by artists together with Hito Steyerl, Gabriel Abrantes, Cemile Sahin and P. Employees, alongside a serious presentation by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Raven Chacon, whose work examines drone surveillance inside Native American communities. The exhibition avoids offering mounted solutions, prioritising rapidly circulating symbolism and continually shifting that means.
The broader biennial programme expands these concepts by means of newly commissioned performances, stay occasions and discussions, together with collaborations involving Forensic Structure, Lawrence Abu Hamdan and McKenzie Wark. Positioned on the intersection of up to date artwork and technological inquiry, INDEX continues to construct a platform for artists participating with the political and psychological situations of right this moment’s digital tradition.
