More is Less

The 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale, curated by MIT professor Carlo Ratti under the theme Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective., set out to explore how multiple forms of intelligence—human, artificial, and collective—might shape solutions to the crises of our time. Ambitious and wide-ranging, the exhibition dazzled in scope but faltered in coherence, often leaving visitors overwhelmed by sheer volume and technological spectacle rather than grounded insight.

For the first time in the Biennale’s history, Ratti issued a global open call for proposals, an inclusive gesture that yielded 760 contributions—several times more than in past years. This democratic approach surfaced fresh and unexpected voices from across the globe, many from outside traditional architecture circles. Ratti also published a circular-economy manifesto for this year’s event, with the intent of showcasing the possibility of a harmonious coexistence between architecture and the planet, “by eliminating waste, circulating materials, and regenerating natural systems.”

On the one hand, this type of transdisciplinary thinking is crucial when tackling wicked problems at scale. On the other, the volume of contributions made the event unwieldy. Adding to this, the Central Pavilion was closed for restoration, pushing even more exhibitions into already dense venues. The Biennale sprawled across the Arsenale, outdoor spaces of the Giardini, and venues scattered throughout Venice. And while this “Living Laboratory” approach, as Ratti termed it, was exhilarating in spirit—much like Austin’s SXSW or the Edinburgh Fringe—it was often exhausting in execution. In the Arsenale, navigating the endless rooms of AI-generated curatorial text, visitors often had too little time to engage with individual projects. ArtReview critic Phineas Harper aptly dubbed the experience a “tech-bro fever dream.”

The Arsenale’s primary exhibition was divided into three thematic sections—Natural, Artificial, and Collective—with a fourth satellite grouping, Out, located in the adjacent Artiglierie. Together, these sections attempted to map architecture’s potential responses to climate crises, technological change, and shifting social dynamics. The Natural section emphasized ecological strategies and material experimentation. The Artificial galleries leaned heavily on robotics, algorithms, and AI-driven design speculation—where the line between provocation and gimmick often blurred. The Collective section sought to demonstrate community-driven intelligence, yet its impact was dulled by the density of contributions. In contrast, Out functioned as a looser fringe zone for experimental voices, reinforcing the Biennale’s ambition to democratize authorship—even if it lacked a clear editorial throughline.

The Biennale’s reliance on artificial intelligence both enabled and undercut its curatorial aspirations. While AI was enlisted to draft exhibition texts, its presence frequently underscored the tension between human creativity and machine automation. In one installation, Bhutanese artisans carved wood as a robotic arm designed by Bjarke Ingels Group swept their sawdust away. Notably, the crowd gravitated toward the craftspeople, largely ignoring the robot. Similarly, a drumming robot mimicking human percussionists left visitors far more engaged with the humans driving the rhythm than with the machine reproducing it. As technotheorist Kevin Kelly puts it, “just because a machine can do a job doesn’t mean it should.” Such moments unintentionally reinforced the central question: Do we want technology to augment our humanity, or to replace it?

Still, individual installations rose above the noise. Immediately upon entering the Arsenale, visitors encountered a monumental installation titled Terms and Conditions and designed by Transsolar, Bilge Kobas, Daniel A. Barber, and Sonia Seneviratne. The work filled a darkened gallery with oppressive heat and suspended air-conditioning units—intended to demonstrate the immense heat generated by HVAC systems used to cool the exhibition rooms. Transsolar’s website notes that “80 of the 92 air conditioning units were sourced from Italian scrapyards, and 12 of these are fully functional, pumping waste heat into the entrance hall while cooling the main exhibition hall.” The result was a visceral reminder of climate change’s tangible consequences. While this curatorial sleight of hand proved somewhat disappointing, the overall impression was memorable. If only more of the exhibition had sustained this kind of clarity and force.

Where the Arsenale roared with technological cacophony, the national pavilions at the Giardini offered clarity and restraint, and several stood out for their ability to blend concept with craft. The Hungarian Pavilion—commissioned by Julia Fabényi and curated by Márton Pintér in academic partnership with the Marcel Breuer Doctoral School of Architecture at the University of Pécs, Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology and sponsored by Möbelkunst—staged a witty reimagining of the architecture studio, highlighting how architectural training equips practitioners to succeed in fields beyond building design. With mannequins seated at anachronistic drafting tables, the exhibition evoked nostalgia for an earlier studio culture while making a pointed claim: “There is nothing more sustainable than not building.” The pavilion showcased architecture graduates thriving in other creative domains, underscoring the discipline’s reach well beyond traditional firm-based practice.

A personal favorite of the Biennale was Unraveling, in the Serbian Pavilion. Conceived by architects Davor Ereš, Jelena Mitrović, and Igor Pantić, in collaboration with designers Ivana Najdanović and Sonja Krstić, this woven fabric installation slowly disassembles over the six months of the Biennale, powered by solar-driven motors. Petar Laušević, an engineer specializing in renewable energy systems, contributed to the project’s solar integration. The result merged craft traditions with algorithmic choreography, creating a tactile meditation on impermanence and regeneration. Bathed in shifting light, the pavilion’s translucent gradients offered a new experience with every visit—an elegant balance of fragility and resilience.

Finally, I would be remiss not to mention highlights from our own backyard. The US Pavilion’s Porch: An Architecture of Generosity embraced the timelessness of the American porch as a social, democratic, and architectural space. Inside were contributions by 54 exhibitors, all centered on the thematic idea of the porch, curated by Peter MacKeith (dean, Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design, University of Arkansas), Susan Chin, FAIA (DesignConnects), and Rod Bigelow (Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art). The exterior installation, designed by a team that included, among others, Marlon Blackwell, FAIA (Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design and Marlon Blackwell Architects), Stephen Burks (Man Made), Julie Bargmann (D.I.R.T. Studio), and Maura Rockcastle (TEN x TEN Studio), featured a newly built porch that became a hub of bluegrass music and casual conversation—embodying its thesis more powerfully than any wall text could. It was, simply, what we needed: a place to be human together.

A noteworthy contribution outside the Arsenale and Giardini came from one of Texas’s own. At Palazzo Mora, Juan José Castellón, an assistant professor at Rice University and co-founder of the architectural firm xmade GmbH, presented Building Ecologies | Impluvium Redux as part of the Time Space Existence exhibition. Combining ceramic structures with a folding membrane roof, the installation offers a prototypical flexible module for harvesting rainwater while creating shaded social space. Developed in collaboration with Catalonian manufacturers, the umbrella-like structure addresses ecological urgency through material and structural intelligence—an example of design where poetic form and pragmatic function aligned seamlessly.

The 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale was as expansive as it was uneven. While the open call unearthed new voices, it also buried them in noise. The reliance on AI sharpened debates but rarely enriched them. And yet, in the quieter national pavilions and in projects like Building Ecologies | Impluvium Redux, the Biennale reminded us that architecture’s enduring intelligence lies not in data or algorithms but in its capacity to protect, connect, and humanize. At its best, Venice 2025 asked us not how machines might think for us but how architecture might help us think—and live—together.