Tag Archives: art

Biennale Time — still.

With 89 participating nations, 37 collateral venues, the Venice 54th Biennale International Art Exhibition is diverse, expansive…
and still around til November 27.

The frenzied, fervent opening of ILLUMInations, the 54th Biennale seems far away now. During that week in late June, more than 51,000 visitors were estimated to have strolled among, perused, scrutinized, and analyzed the artistic offerings in the Giardini, Arsenale and the numerous collateral exhibitions strewn across the city. It’s unthinkable that anyone who doesn’t have months here could ever view all the works on display in the main and para-pavillions and city-wide venues, not to mention all the concurrent exhibits not officially associated with the Biennale itself. What’s a time-limited traveller to do?

TO THE GARDENS

You could choose to start in the still slightly leafy Giardini and immerse yourself in MIKE NELSON’s mesmerizing, alternate time-and-space sculptural installation, whose creation involved a complete restructuring of the Great Britain pavilion (the advice you receive as you enter is “Watch your head, and your step”). Afterward, head down the hill to compare it with the intriguing Francia (France) installation by , and with Czech Republic, where you’ll meander through DOMINIK LANG’s captivating intro-retrospective featuring his own contemporary installation of his father’s “sleeping witnesses” from the 1950s.

Don’t miss the Central Pavilion that, unlike dedicated national pavilions, hosts works by a wide assortment of artists. As startling today as it likely was in its own time, TINTORETTO’s “The Last Supper” traveled across the lagoon from its home for the last 420 years at San Giorgio Maggiore to form the centerpiece there along with two other monumental works; MAURIZIO CATTELAN’s Others, stuffed pigeons pervasively perched outside the pavilion and in, perhaps recalling their prevalence in Piazza San Marco, keep watch overhead. They contrast markedly with the “invisible painting” of Swiss/New York artist BRUNO JACOB, created with, among other things, water and steam.

Cross the canal bridge to reach the Austrian pavilion. It’s not necessary to understand the precise intention of MARKUS SCHINWALD’s intriguing yet subtly disturbing juxtapositions of time, subject matter, and artistic medium to be drawn in by them; the labyrinth of corridors that presents each work contributes significantly to their effect.

The Greek pavilion offers DOHANDI’s profound, minimalist respite at the opposite end of the park, Poland’s YAEL BARTANA has expertly crafted the tongue-in-cheek  …and Europe will be Stunned, a three-video presentation; 30 days of Running in the Space is EGYPT’s tribute to beloved artist and activist AHMED BASIONY, who was downed by snipers in Tahrir Square on the Friday of Wrath.

ARSENALE

If you instead choose to tour the Arsenale which features a number of emerging countries this year, you may choose to turn the corner at the end of the Corderie and take in a bit of “The Clock,” Swiss-American CHRISTIAN MARCLAY’s 24-hour film in which every clip refers to the actual time of day. It’s a masterfully edited piece relating past to present that will engross you for as long as you choose to stay and watch.

IT’S EVERYWHERE YOU ARE

The Biennale extends far beyond the confines of the garden pavilions and Arsenale, installed in some of the most evocative and rarely accessible venues in the city. Take vaporetto Line 62 from the Giardini Biennale stop to Spirito Santo on the Zattere; you’ll be deposited directly in front of the Emporio die Sali, the old salt warehouses (themselves worthy of a visit even without the art). There you’ll find “The Future of a Promise,” a pan-Arab collateral exhibition featuring 22 artists and presenting an extraordinary range of refined works that soar through the expansive warehouse space. Across town at the Scuola della Misericordia is Jan FABRE’s striking Pietas, an installation consisting of marble sculpture reflected in golden flooring — an impressive building in its own right that could not have been put to much more impressive use.

BEYOND the BIENNALE

Finally, TRA: The Edge of Becoming is not a part of the 54th Biennale — but could easily be (they even have the same closing dates). The impeccable renovation of the Palazzo Fortuny  makes it an extraordinary exhibition structure, and one of the few that could display TRA’s over 300 works in any coherent way. Artists represented include notables Rodin, Duchamp, Fontana, Kapoor, and Lèger to name a few, with many contemporary artists’ works commissioned specifically for the exhibition.

There are few visitors who wouldn’t enjoy adding this edition of the Biennale to their itinerary anytime before November 27th. For the frequent visitor, it adds a present day dimension to an already beloved destination.

54th Biennale Venice International Art Exhibition

thru Nov 27th, 2011
10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Closed Mondays (except  August 15th, October 31st and November 21st, 2011)

€20 (full), discounts for students and seniors.

Entrance fees for collateral exhibitions vary (many are free)

Giardini

Giardini Biennale (Lines 41/42, Lines 51/52, Lines 61/62)
Giardini (Line 1)

Arsenale

Entrance, Calle della Tana
Arsenale (Line 1, 41/42)

There is a Biennale Navetta transfer from the Giardini to the Arsenale; and also a shortcut between the back of the Giardini and and top of the Arsenale.

private fish painting in sottoportego

My Own Private Biennale

private fish painting in sottoportegoI’d heard or read somewhere that, perhaps inspired by the arrival of the Biennale, temporary paintings had begun springing up around town, created on paper canvas applied to walls, washing away easily with the rain. I hadn’t run into any though, until one appeared on my doorstep — literally.

Whoever painted this big, red, spotted fish was quite furbo, applying this canvas underneath the sottoportego so that it would remain protected and thus last longer. The paper has shredded and dissolved a bit at the bottom as motor boat waves at high tide slosh the lagoon water over the border, but if you ask me that just contributes to the overall effect that this fish monster is surging right up from the rio. Red spots sling off the fish’s nose onto the canvas above him. I think it’s divine.

I’m greeted by this ichthyic apparition every time I leave the house. È fantastico, and one of those unexpected things, the fact of which makes you become even more attached to this absurd city. And that this clever artist chose my sottoportego? What a coup…

 

UPDATE: Yvonne from Australia pointed out that this is the work of the same Papiers Peintres that create the papery frames around town (there’s one along the fondamente San Felice and another down from the Madonna dell’Orto). If you stand in the middle, have someone snap your photo, then send it to them — the address is on the frame — they’ll post it on their site. Explore their site, there are images, youtube videos, and more.

Biennale Bites – Preview Day 1

A glorious day; even if it did threaten to be a bit drippy, it never quite followed though. Between the ground that must be covered to get your press pass, the many square kilometers of the Giardini, the expansive Arsenale, and seemingly endless number of exhibitions that take place there, composed of and constructed from every conceivable form of medium imaginable — a day is barely enough to get started. I love the corderie (where all the ropes for Venetian vessels were once hewn and wound), a soaring space, which as you walk it presents you with once concept after another: some massive, some grouped, some walk through, some painted, some constructed, some inscrutable, some in your face. “It’s a photograph,” comments one onlooker. “I did one of these at university. Everything old is new again.” Contrast the ancient Corderie with a bright, blooming Giardini, dotted with pavilions large and small, each devoted to a single country, each proudly hosting this year’s representative exhibition.

But expression will not be confined, and neither will the Biennale. It’s as if exhibitions have rained down over the city, searching for a suitable space — and if there was one, it now hosts some irrepressible form of contemporary expression: palaces like the Prada-restored Corner, the Scuola della Misericordia, the Palazzo Grassi, the Fortuny; others like the Punto della Dogana, and more, and more. Sure, some are renovated for hotels, some hold regular concerts for tourists. But it seems the Biennale knew that these spaces were also ideal for something a bit more — vibrant — and has managed to bring the point home.

Whether the works are new or revived, comprehensible or less so, it’s a joyous thing for lots of reasons, this Biennale, not the least of which is being a catalyst in bringing old structures back to life and filling them with enough contemporary expression and vitality to the degree that every journalist who had the mean, the commission and who could spell the word “art” is here to see just what emerging artists from almost every country in the world have to say.

The former queen of Cyprus would be quite proud, I’d imagine. Do you think she’s keeping an eye out?

 

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