Biennale of Contemporary Keramics

Biennale of Contemporary Keramics 2nd Biennale of Contemporary Keramics
6 June - 31 October 2026
Location: Rhodes

Big Blue Dot - Contemporary Ceramics Biennale, a non-profit organization based in Greece dedicated to promoting and supporting contemporary ceramics as an evolving art form. Mainly driven by the need to promote and highlight Greek ceramic art and ceramists at a global level, the Big Blue Dot Contemporary Ceramics Biennale aspires to be an important cultural event that will be held biannually in Gr

eece as an initiative where artists can meet and enrich their knowledge and present a new way of reading the cultural heritage of Greece through contemporary art. The Big Blue Dot Contemporary Ceramics Biennale is always wandering and decentralized. Like a traveling blue dot, it is not based in the Athenian metropolis; instead, it takes place each time on a different island, taking inspiration from each place, its archaeological past, its myths, and its history, presenting a large-scale exhibition and a parallel program of performances, projects, and workshops for both artists and the local community.

25/04/2026

Save the date! The Biennale of Contemporary Keramics (BCK) is delighted to announce that its 2026 edition, “Where the Day Starts,” will open in June.

The Biennale brings together 43 artists, creating a shared space for practices, reflections, and perspectives.

This year's parallel programme brings together artists’ residencies, lectures, workshops, and educational initiatives.

Join us for an immersive encounter with the world of ceramics.

05.06.2026 - VIP Preview (by invitation only)
�06.06 – 31.10.2026 - Exhibition open to the public

“Where the Day Starts”�Rhodes, Greece�June - October 2026

One midday in 1929, fishermen off the coast of Rhodes hauled up their heavy nets, thinking they had made a rich catch. W...
08/04/2026

One midday in 1929, fishermen off the coast of Rhodes hauled up their heavy nets, thinking they had made a rich catch. What they brought up instead was a marble statue of Aphrodite, hidden for centuries beneath the sea. Half-kneeling, slightly turned, her hands lifting the hair from her face, as if trying to see what was happening around her.

From June to October 2026, ceramic works by 43 international artists will be presented around the Crouching Venus at the Archaeological Museum, as well as in other locations across the medieval city of Rhodes. In the presence of the goddess, once risen from the Aegean, these works emerge as traces of a world shaped between sea, light and time.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June - October 2026

We are pleased to announce the artists invited by the curators of the second edition of the Biennale of Contemporary Ker...
03/04/2026

We are pleased to announce the artists invited by the curators of the second edition of the Biennale of Contemporary Keramics in Rhodes, Anissa Touati, Stamatia Dimitrakopoulos, and Loukia Thomopoulou:

Etel Adnan
Elina Belou
Robert Brambora
Jorge Cabieses-Valdes
Meriem Chabani x Gorbon Ceramics
Malek Gnaoui
Kyriaki Goni .goni.studio
Luke Edward Hall
Dionisis Kavallieratos
Vassiliki Kyriaki
Lillian Lykiardopoulou
Atalanti Martinou
Asunción Molinos Gordo
Claudine Monchaussé
Kostas Neofytou
Ben Wolf Noam
Menandros Papadopoulos
Zoë Paul
David Scanavino
Lucille Uhlrich
Elif Uras
George Vavatsis
Vuslat

Bringing together historical works alongside new commissions created specifically for the Biennale and its sites, the exhibition unfolds through a dialogue between past and present, place and practice.
Titled “Where the Day Starts,” BCK 2026 looks toward the Mediterranean as a space of exchange and ever-evolving narratives.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June - October 2026

In Lindos, Iznik wares from Anatolia became so embedded in local life that they were long mistaken for part of Rhodes’ o...
26/03/2026

In Lindos, Iznik wares from Anatolia became so embedded in local life that they were long mistaken for part of Rhodes’ own tradition, as seen in the Decorative Arts Collection. Their forms and motifs later resurfaced in Greece through refugee knowledge after 1922 and through the ICARO factory, founded in Rhodes in 1928.

This is one of the histories BCK continues to revisit through a contemporary lens.

Photo credits: (1) ICARO Exhibition, Benaki Museum

Elafos and Elafina, a stag and a doe, stand at the edge of Mandraki, where arrivals have long become part of the island’...
20/03/2026

Elafos and Elafina, a stag and a doe, stand at the edge of Mandraki, where arrivals have long become part of the island’s story.

In Rhodes, symbols are never simply symbols. They gather time around them.

As BCK moves from island to island, it looks for those moments when figures, myths, and fragments begin to speak for a place.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June - October 2026

Photo credits: Magdalene Kourti

With less than 100 days to go until BCK 2026 opens in Rhodes, the curators and the team are on the island this week: wal...
13/03/2026

With less than 100 days to go until BCK 2026 opens in Rhodes, the curators and the team are on the island this week: walking, researching, and learning from the place and its stories, as we shape our own.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June – October 2026

Among dozens of submissions through our open call, BCK is pleased to announce the artists selected to participate in our...
06/03/2026

Among dozens of submissions through our open call, BCK is pleased to announce the artists selected to participate in our second edition, taking place in Rhodes, Greece:

Myrsini Alexandridi
Darien Arikoski-Johnson .a.j
Elysia Athanatos
Leonardo Bartolini
Emmanouil Bonis .com_
Katya Desnenko .desnenko
Chous Ceramics
Mauro Fariñas .farinas
Lynn Kodeih
Tülay Kulbay
Anne Kwasner
Lucile Littot
Fatima Mohisen .5art
GianMarco Porru
Mirsini Roumelioti .roumelioti
Terpsichore Savvala
Ayla Tavares
Natalia Triantafylli
Alban Turquois
Zoe Williams

The jury that selected the participants is composed of the Biennale’s curators, Anissa Touati, Stamatia Dimitrakopoulos, and Loukia Thomopoulou, together with esteemed professionals in the fields of Contemporary Art and Ceramics: Christina Anglada, Florian Daguet Bresson, Theodora Chorafas, Stefano Collicelli Cagol, Karina El Helou, Orhan Gorbon, Katerina Gregos, and Nikos Liaros.

Stay tuned as we will soon be announcing the invited artists, selected by the curators.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June–October 2026

Rhodes carries layers of history; an amalgam of ancient, medieval, and contemporary exchanges.As a nomadic biennale, BCK...
26/02/2026

Rhodes carries layers of history; an amalgam of ancient, medieval, and contemporary exchanges.

As a nomadic biennale, BCK draws inspiration from the places it temporarily calls home and the histories it encounters. In Rhodes, that dialogue unfolds within a landscape marked by crossings, where past and present meet and new chapters begin.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June–October 2026

Presenting the visual identity for the 2026 Biennale of Contemporary Keramics in Rhodes, drawing inspiration from the ri...
19/02/2026

Presenting the visual identity for the 2026 Biennale of Contemporary Keramics in Rhodes, drawing inspiration from the rich palimpsest of the island.

Art direction and design:

IN THE BEGINNING the light And the first hourwhen the lips still in claytaste the things of the world— Odysseus Elytis, ...
11/02/2026

IN THE BEGINNING the light And the first hour
when the lips still in clay
taste the things of the world

— Odysseus Elytis, Axion Esti (trans. Carson & Sarris), The Collected Poems of Odysseus Elytis (Johns Hopkins UP)

From ancient seals to modern poems and posters, artists continue to return to light, finding meaning and imagining new possibilities.
This year, the Biennale of Contemporary Keramics follows the light to Rhodes, the island where the day starts, where we can learn to look again.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June – October 2026

🌞 Image credit: N. Katzourakis, Σύνθεση με ήλιο & σφραγιδόλιθο (1960–62), GNTO/EOT Archive.

And then, there was the first light.Rhodes is said to have risen from the sea for Helios: named after Rhodos, his belove...
04/02/2026

And then, there was the first light.
Rhodes is said to have risen from the sea for Helios: named after Rhodos, his beloved, so it could greet his radiance before any other land.

In the Mediterranean, the sun has always been a language of connection, represented across cultures. BCK takes this myth as a compass; nomadic by nature, it arrives on the island for a new beginning.

“Where the Day Starts”
Rhodes Island, Greece
June - October 2026

🏺Image credits:
1. Sol oder Helios, Museum August Kestner (Hannover, Germany), CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.
2. Terracotta lekythos (Greek, Attic, ca. 500 BCE), The Metropolitan Museum of Art (41.162.29), Public Domain.
3. Terracotta oil lamp (Roman, Cypriot, ca. 75–125 CE), The Metropolitan Museum of Art (74.51.1840), Public Domain.

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