Pakistan’s Ministry of National Heritage and Culture has announced that Faiza Butt will represent the country at the 61st Venice Biennale, marking its second participation following the inaugural pavilion in 2019.
Born in Lahore and now based in London, Butt is a contemporary artist whose practice spans drawings, paintings, and sculptures. Taking inspiration from cultural iconography and traditional formal techniques such as South Asian miniature painting, she employs provocative visual narratives to destabilize gendered stereotypes, center marginalized voices, and, in her own words, “disarm and challenge knee-jerk cultural associations.” Butt’s work has been exhibited internationally and is held in major public and private collections, including London’s British Museum and New Delhi’s Kiran Nadar Museum of Art.
