Making Worlds

SUE PIRNIE reports from the most famous of the major international visual arts institutions

WHILE MANY will argue that the notion of national presentations of contemporary art is an outdated model, this year the 53rd Venice Biennale has more than ever; 77 national presentations, on and off-site, and a further 44 ‘collateral events’ – including Scotland, Wales, Ireland, N Ireland, and several newcomers such as the Union of Comoros, Indian Ocean (perhaps affiliated to Venice through their common concern with rising water levels!).

Now competing with over 100 biennials worldwide, at least 25 of which have strong curatorial ambitions, Venice holds its own in terms of world attention from curators, artists and media. This year over 4,770 tickets were sold in the first days and over 3,770 global press representatives covered the three-day preview – and you have until 22 November to catch it!

Making the rounds is a marathon commitment, one which becomes slightly easier as the season passes, since several shows are only on for a month or two; check the website for dates/times before trekking around! This article can only hope to provide a general introduction and some recommendations from the main curated shows, national presentations, and collateral events.

The main curated exhibition, Making Worlds, has over 90 artists, and was pulled together by Sweden’s Daniel Birnbaum in only 14 months; a remarkably short time since he stepped in to replace American Robert Storr, who left over budget issues. The youngest Biennale Director yet, Birnbaum already has a formidable international reputation as a teacher, writer and curator and co-curator of other biennials.

He explains his concept in these terms: ‘A work of art is more than a commodity. It represents a vision of the world, and if taken seriously must be seen as a way of making a world…. It is only through the plurality of languages that the theme of this year’s International Exhibition emerges…. It is an exhibition driven by the aspiration to examine worlds around us as well as the worlds ahead’. The exhibition uses the largest venues over the two main sites; the former Italian pavilion in the Giardinni and the Arsenale.

The flow of the show works particularly well in the linear buildings of the old naval dockyards of the Arsenale, where dark and light, noise and calm, showy and self-contained presentations interplay through the venue. Most of the works are new commissions, though some works have been selected which have not been very visible before, often rendered and installed differently.

The first rooms move you from blackout to blazing light and mirrors; from the ethereal to the human – reflected. The next, large, space holds many works vying for attention. A stack of cardboard boxes with take-away postcards, ‘Venezia (all places contain all others)’, by Aleksandra Mir, born in Poland, is a collectors dream; a million postcards of one hundred places characterised by the presence of water, each one labelled ‘Venezia’ in kitsch style.

The images bring the world into Venice with images such as Spanish beaches, Indian rivers and Yosemite; however the work is realised through the visitor who takes an active role in dispersing the work by posting the cards worldwide.

The black and white video work by German Ulla von Brandenburg creates a quiet drama as the viewer enters through a succession of sheeted ‘rooms’, distancing you from the bustle of the main area. Shot in black and white in Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, the camera travels through the sparse house encountering individuals engaged in formally staged mundane activities before observing them joined for a meal (a wake?), and later ending with a performance in the garden (a resurrection?).

Brandenburg’s visual investigation of the mechanics of theatre and the use of gesture to suggest unexpressed psychological states is complemented by the sound track, which moves between silence and a plaintive melody on flute, later two female voices – which eventually sync to the ‘actors’ in the final drama.

In complete contrast the noise and visual chaos of ‘The Eternal Return’ by African Paccale Martine Tayou’s was great fun. A riot of strange and wonderful sculptural works from recycled domestic utensils, fabrics and detritus, including stuffed ‘chickens’ in African prints with naive human faces, are ranged around huts rough timber huts on stilts; evoking the architecture and activity of a small African village. Videos projected in and on the huts and walls move beyond the local to show everyday life events from around the world.

Ceal Floyer’s (UK) Overgrowth forms a quiet and statuesque end-piece to the first long arm of the Arsennale building. She has projected an image of a Bonsai tree to the large scale of other trees, ‘rescuing’ it from excessive care and returning it to a more ‘natural’ dimension.

The Arsennale site also includes site specific installations – Serbian Tamara Grcic’s ‘Gaggiandre’ of brightly coloured life rafts floating within the old docks, with an audio composition not directly related to the objects, but adding another dimension. Several more national pavilions are also housed within the buildings, including the Italian Pavilion and one of two presentations by another new entry, the United Arab Emigrates.

The original garden site – the Giardinni – continues Making Worlds in the renamed Palizionne delle Exposizioni. This contains some large scale installations, but one of the best works is Scottish artist Simon Starling’s ‘Wilhelm Noack oHG’, which reflects a general interest in process-led work in the exhibition. This title of this film projection is a company of metal fabricators in Berlin – the work was made both with and about them. They manufactured the elegant spiral sculpture that the film runs through, and the film in turn documents the making of the sculpture.

 

The Giardini also hosts some of the best national shows. My recommendation would be Nederlands’ Fiona Tan - allow time to see these video installations. The new work ‘Disorient’, based on Marco Polo’s narrative of his great trip as the sound track, is particularly engrossing. One screen explores artefacts in museum stores while the other screen reflects current daily life in the countries and cities of the narrative; Baghdad in warfare resonates with Marco Polo’s simultaneous references to historical battles, but other images of garbage creepers in sordid city dumps contrast with his descriptions of great wealth and beauty.

 

Elmgreen and Dragset transform the two adjacent pavilions of Denmark and the Nordic Countries into fictional domestic environments in The Collectors. They include the work of 24 artists, designers and collectives in a comment on the impulse to own objects and question the interface of public and private access, emphasised by a naked ‘collector’ quietly browsing his art books. Their fresh curatorial concept breaks out of the traditional nationalist structure of the Biennale and contributes to their success in winning one of the Biennale awards.

The USA pavilion is one of three venues showing work by Bruce Nauman; the two off-site venues are more interesting and worth trekking to. This impressive body of work sets the context of his development as one of the best artists of our time, and includes new commissions - some made in the spaces.

More disappointing are France, Germany – even though it’s UK’s Liam Gillik – and Australia, unless you like Bikers! Poland and Greece are more interesting than usual and Japan is a wild contrast to the nation’s restrained image.

One of the best collateral shows is Scotland in Venice, which presents Martin Boyce; commissioned by the Scottish Arts Council in partnership with the National Galleries of Scotland, and curated by DCA, Dundee. Martin was able to select the venue from a shortlist available and this ability to take command of the space is a great strength of the show where six interconnected rooms in the 15th Century Palazzo Pisani have been transformed by a series of new works.

 

The previous hard edged sculptural forms of metal and light are here, but the flow of works between the rooms transforms them into a softer and more lyrical presentation than we may have seen before. The main room engages you directly with the work as you make your way over ‘broken fragments’ of concrete as stepping stones between drifts of brown wax paper leaves of a forgotten garden. Black gloss lighting sculptures developed from designs for concrete trees by Joel and Jan Martel in 1927 replace the original Venetian glass chandeliers, and carefully placed objects suggesting street furniture continue the sense of displacement.

Among the other off-site shows around the main Island, those definitely worth seeing include John Cale’s 5 screen video presentation (45 mins) for Wales on the Guidecca, a harsh work based on the deprived areas of his childhood.

 

Also worthwhile are New Zealand’s show by Francis Upritchard, where her entrancingly abject and awkward figures interact with their surroundings of faded venetian glamour displayed over exquisite purpose made ‘tables’. Singapore and Iceland are next door and amongst the best.

Mexico’s Teresa Margolles’ shocking installation presents Mexican ‘cleaners’ washing the terrazzo floor of the Palazzo Rota-Ivancich with the diluted blood of their relatives who suffered violent death in Mexico, with wall hangings bearing slogans which appeared by their bodies. Tube by Lithuania’s Zilvinus Kempinas is a visually and physically disorientating walk-through structure made from his trademark video tape.

Taiwan’s group show is worth seeing, just off San Marco, and Cyprus, Luxembourg and Slovenia form an interesting group of shows easily accessible from the central Accademia Bridge / Campo san Stefano route.

In reading this article it does not reflect the presence of painting and drawing in the Biennale, and this would be inaccurate as these media are well represented, including delicate drawings by Miha Trukelj in the Slovenian off-site pavilion and the work downstairs in the group show in the Giardinni Russian Pavilion.

Many approaches to painting and drawing are shown, often drawing from cartoon or advertising influences, such as in the Thailand off-site pavilion near the bus station and the work of Jan Håfström in the Arsenale. It is noticeable how so many painters push the traditional physical boundaries - very often not confined to the ubiquitous rectangle of ‘domestic scale’ which we see so much of in work presented in and around Inverness!

If you have mental room for a change in your art viewing then here are 3 recommendations should you visit Venice:

1. The exquisite Carpaccio murals of everyday Venice at Scuola di Giovinni

2. Punta della Dogana – the new €20m conversion of the grand Custom’s House opposite San Marco’s, holding part of Pinault’s collection of very showy art. (The rest is at Palazzo Grassi – over 300 works by 60 artists on show altogether)

3. Not art, but a visual feast and total contrast from Venice main Island; Burano, a small island of traditional fishermen’s homes painted amazing colours, with good fish restaurants!

© Sue Pirnie, June 2009

Links

• Venice Biennale