Things Fall Apart: Allison Glenn, Curator: Toronto Biennial of Art 2026

Things Fall Apart: In Conversation with Allison Glenn, Curator, Toronto Biennial of Art 2026

Join us!

September 16, 2026
7:00pm
100 McCaul Street, Auditorium (Room 190)
OCAD University 

FREE: Get your ticket here 
 

The fourth edition of the Toronto Biennial of Art, Things Fall Apart, curated by Allison Glenn, unfolds through a set of propositions anchored by the question: What can we learn from artists who explore rupture as an ontological tool or a way of understanding?

Relying on the shared geographies of the Great Lakes as a place of departure, this Biennial traces relationships between the expansive but interconnected waters of the Great Lakes region and over sixteen global waterways that span five continents.Things Fall Apart considers ideas of syncopation and disruption through the lens of shared thematics that emerged from artists’ voices: diaspora through movement and migration, syncretic traditions, notions of borders, water networks, maritime histories of empire, corporeality, calls to action, global climate justice, genocides, speculative and science fictions, material memory, the transformation of knowledge, and both water and land as conceptual links. 

Things Fall Apart is organized in three parts: a central exhibition that grounds itself in methodologies of collectivity, sovereignty, reflection, and refusal; a series of performances and artist-led programming that invites embodied engagement with these practices; and a collaboratively curated gathering. Join this year's curator to learn about the process of leading to Things Fall Apart.

Allison Glenn:

Allison Glenn is a New York-based curator and writer focusing on the intersection of art and public space, through biennials, special projects, public art, & major new commissions. For seventeen years, Glenn has been devoted to realizing ambitious and experimental exhibitions with a wide range of contemporary artists working across the globe. She is Curator of the 2026 Toronto Biennial of Art, titled Things Fall Apart, opening September 26, 2026, and Curator of Espacio Central, as part of the CARA Platform.