The 2009edition of the Venice Biennale can neither be called a success, nor afailure. Unquestionably, there have been better biennales, but again, thisyear, Venice proved that it remained the venue parexcellence to follow a curator’s vision and discover the varioustrends in the world of contemporary art. The Biennale kept its format: acurator bringing together the artists of his choice in the Palazzo delleEsposizioni (formerly called the Padiglione Italia) and in the Arsenale, withthe participating countries and their ‘ambassadors’ in the national pavilionslocated in the Giardini and across the city, as well as with some collateralevents which this year reached a record number.
The opening of the Biennale was also marked by the inauguration of theexpansion of the Pinault Museum at the Punta della Dogana, which has beenturned into a museum by the Japanese architect Tadao Ando. Keeping the originalstructure of the building, Tadao Ando has been the mastermind of a brilliantmetamorphosis creating a venue with large rooms, and taking advantage of thenatural light. The inaugural exhibition, Mappingthe Studio: artists from the François Pinault Collection, featuredamongst others, several artists from Asia, with Takashi Murakami (Japan), HuangYong Ping (China) and Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japan).
Coming back to the Venice Biennale, the event was curatedthis year by Daniel Birnbaum (b. 1963 in Sweden), Rector of the Städelschule inFrankfurt/Main, Germany. Back in 2007, it had been decided that the curator ofthe 2007 edition, then Robert Storr, would also coordinate the event for 2009.However, following a clash with the management of the Biennale, Mr. Storrdecided to step down and not pursue this collaboration. As a result, DanielBirnbaum set up the Biennale in a relatively short period of time under thetitle ‘Making Worlds’, pointing towards the plurality of existing languages.Contrary to some of his predecessors, Mr. Birnbaum did not shy away fromincluding a great number of deceased artists who had, according to him, beenoverlooked, and had not achieved the recognition that they deserved, as well asthose that had an influence on a younger generation of artists.
The exhibitions at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni and theArsenale, both under the leadership of Daniel Birnbaum, featured an interestingselection of Asian artists. Instead of the fashionable and trendy names thatpresently dominate the market, Mr. Birnbaum has opted for some artists who nolonger need any introduction (Rirkrit Tiravanija, Yoko Ono) together withartists who are completely unknown to a larger audience (Xu Tan, Koo Jeong A.,Att Poomtangon). Represented by a magnificent piece was the Indian artist SunilGawde (b. 1960). Aliteration,made out of painted steel, it displays a black universe with planets thatalternatively appear and disappear following a motorised mechanism in the backof the ‘painting’. The ever-changing constellation based on an arrangement ofform, line, and colour could quietly be observed by sitting on the bench placedin front of the painting. With the 40th anniversary of the landing on the moon,Aliteration was coincidentally timely chosen. Sheela Gowda (b. 1957), anotherartist from India, presented a very different type of work to that ofSunil Gawde. As opposed to the solid, mechanically oriented piece by SunilGawde, Sheela Gowda primarily works with found materials. The installation Behold (2009) includessteel bumpers and hair collected from the shavings at a temple in India. Thepiece may certainly be seen as a critique of our society, which has become amodel for discarding everything. However, with a certain sense of creativity,these materials can be recuperated and easily reused.
The wall devoted to the work of Tian Tian Wang (b. 1980 inChina) shows approximately 20 small and mid-size paintings that share thecommon theme of fire with houses, volcanoes, and forests in the process ofbeing burned down. If the artist – as she has stated herself – wanted tounderline the surreal aspect of the fire rather than the sensation of theburning flames, her paintings (that also depict smoke from factories andnuclear plants) do not feel as powerful and striking as the artist may havewanted them to be. This is unfortunate as Tian Tian Wang was dealing with aninteresting subject matter (pollution, ecology, etc).
The Korean artist Haegue Yang (b. 1971) benefited fromexcellent exposure within the Biennale as she was not only featured in theArsenale, but was also selected to represent her country in the Korean pavilion.Looking at her sculptures and installations, Haegue Yang seems like a modernupdated version of the American artist Jessica Stockholder. Using found objectslike wire, light bulbs or blinds, she creates pieces that she accurately calls‘vulnerable arrangements’. A different perspective on the usage of electronicdevices is highlighted by Chu Yun (b. 1977), a young artist from China, whopresented an installation entitled Constellation.Instead of putting his installation under the spotlight, he opted for a darkroom that featured the different electrical appliances that are found in amodern household: hifi, dvd player, computer, printer, microwave, fridge,television, telephone, answering machine, modem, etc. The ‘twist’ was that ChuYun kept the room dark, with no other source of light than the variousflickering lights from these devices that were on ‘stand-by’. Before one’s eyesgot used to the darkness, and could identify the light sources, the sightresembled a colourful starry night.
A most positive encounter in the Biennale was the Tibetanartist Gonkar Gyatso (b. 1961), who lives in London. In his over-sizeddrawings, in which he includes stickers and other labels depicting famouscharacters, brands or excerpt sentences taken from newspapers, he reinterpretsTibetan traditional motifs and art often found in thangkas. In the piece Reclining Buddha, he offers a timeline of therelationship between China and Tibet by drawing curves and adding chronologicalcomments.
The most prominent Asian artists in the Palazzo delleEsposizioni and the Arsenale were Yoko Ono, who needs no further introduction,Gutai, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and Huang Yong Ping. Yoko Ono (b. 1933) wasrepresented with an ‘instruction piece’ from the Sixties (a simple directive bythe artist requiring the participation of the viewer), but had a convincingexhibition at the Fondazione Bevilacqua that also included more recent worksand coincided with her being awarded the Golden Lion for life-time achievement.This section also included several works by Gutai, a group formed in theSixties in Japan whose influence and importance remains under-appreciated tothis day.
Huang Yong Ping’s piece was one from 2006 that had beenpreviously seen, but is very representative of the artist’s work in general. Buddha’s Hands (2006) is anover-sized replica of a specific type of cedar found in Southern China thatresembles the hand of a Buddha, and is often brought to temples as offerings.In this piece, Huang Yong Ping refers to very traditional subjects from China,but taken out of their context, they become enigmatic biomorphic sculptures.Another gigantic sculpture was the one by Chen Zhen (1955-2000) that wasstrategically placed at the entrance of the Giardini. His Back to Fullness, Face to Emptiness(1997) is an accurate representation of the way the world functions: in theory,most nations belonging to the United Nations should speak with one voice, butin practical terms, they still do not get along and do not make the necessaryefforts to communicate. That explains why Chen Zhen decided to take as thesculpture’s central piece an excerpt from the United Nations’ preoccupationssurrounded by chairs representative of the different member states.Understandably, the shape of the sculpture is the one of a globe, and itsstatement is as valid today as it was as Chen Zhen completed the sculpture in1997.
Anju Dodiya (b. 1964 in India), had her work shown in anentire room with several pieces from the series AllNight I Shall Gallop. With a background in watercolours, the artisthas slowly evolved toward screenprints incorporating elements from Japaneseprints or European tapestries. Her works are primarily autobiographical, andoffer a strong content in terms of narrative.
One of the characteristics of the Venice Biennale is thatit remains built around the concept of national representations with anincreasing number of participating countries. Initially, the various pavilionswere concentrated in the Giardini, a site that has outgrown itself and now newparticipating countries have to rent a space in the city itself. Returning tothe Biennale for the second time was Macau with a most positive presentation.Bonnie Leong Mou Cheng and Kitty Leung Mou Kit showed two pieces from theseries Space in Flux,one depicting a network of cubes illustrating the internet connection densityin Europe, and the other one depicting a landscape using beads as a ‘painting’device. The installation TimelessTunnel by Lee Yee Kee(b. 1970) stands (if a human is trapped inside) for agitation, fear,contradictions, a feeling of loss mirroring the reigning chaos andunpredictability in today’s society. The billboard placed at the entrance ofthe pavilion by Joao O Bruno Soares (b. 1977) advertising cheap flights toMacau for 19.99 euros referred humorously to the hand-over date of Macau backto China in 1999.
Taiwan kept its convenient location in the Palazzo dellePrigioni as in past editions and alternated interesting with disappointingpresentations. This year, however, the pavilion felt more balanced andeven than in previous editions. Chen Chieh-Jen (b. 1960) completed a film basedon true stories experienced by many Tainwanese woman. When applying for atourist visa to the United States, applicants must submit themselves to aninterview at the American Bureau in Taiwan that generally denies a visa toyoung Taiwanese women that are suspected to be preparing to immigrateillegally. There is no possible appeal for what the artist presents asarbitrary discrimination, complaining that Americans wishing to enter Taiwan donot have to go through any bureaucratic hassles. Also dealing with thesubject of immigration, but from a different angle, was Chien-Chi Chang (b.1961), who for the past 17 years has been photographing migrating families fromFuzhou, China, to New York. The life of these families in Fuzhou may have beensimple and far below the material opulence of New York, however, the lives ofthese families seemed happier than before one of their members ventured to NewYork carrying with them mountains of hope for a better life. Without anyfurther comment, Chien-Chi Chang questions the meaning of important conceptslike happiness, sacrifice, or family. Hsieh Ying-Chun’s (b. 1954) contributiondealt with architectural projects he developed for affordable, and ecologicalhousing, here with the example of Sichuan that was hit by a severe earthquakein 2008.
For its first participation at the Venice Biennale, therewere high expectations for Iran, all the more so as Iranian contemporary art isconsidered as promising as Chinese or Indian contemporary art used to be. Theartists selected to represent Iran, Iraj Eskandari, Sedaghat Jabbari, and HamidReza Avishi were clearly technically speaking good artists, but they were thewrong artists for a biennale focusing on the latest developments incontemporary art. It is unfortunate that some artists from Iran who havealready gained international recognition were not seen worthy of representingtheir country in Venice.
For this year’s edition of the Biennale, Singapore optedfor one single artist for its pavilion. Ming Wong (b. 1971) transformed thesecond floor of the building into a movie theatre, echoing Singapore’s richcinema tradition from the Fifties that collapsed and disappeared in the Sixtiesafter the split between Singapore and Malaya. Besides playing old movies, theartist also included the items gathered by a private collector referring to theglorious years of Singapore’s movie industry. Ming Wong’s presentation was verysuccessful and brought to the attention of the audience Singapore’s diversefilm industry.
The Thai pavilion, located close to the railway station,was transformed into a travel agency by its artists Michael Shaowanasai,Sakarin Krue-on, Sudsiri Pui-ock, Suporn Shoosongdej, and WantaneeSiripattananuntakul. By setting up a travel agency with special arrangementsout of Venice, the artists have humorously exposed the ‘plague’ Thailand has todeal with: sex tourism. For once, a country has decided within its selection toaddress a major problem of its economy instead of deciding upon artists thatwould share an ‘official’ policy.
Hong Kong is represented by the young artist PakSheung-Chuen (b. 1977), who certainly had the ideas upon which to base his work,but were sadly not reflected inhis pieces. His works required the viewer to be given too many directions inorder to make sense of what was presented visually. A similar conclusionapplies to Miwa Yanagi (b. 1967), who filled the Japanese pavilion with herover-sized and almost surreal black and white photographs showing a girl or awoman whose body brings together young and old body parts. The artist statesthat the main topic of these works is death, but actually many otherinterpretations and questions come to mind before considering the one offeredby the artist. Although Haegue Yang (see above), who represented the Koreanpavilion is not necessarily an artist whose art is immediately embraced, itnevertheless gives the feeling that the artist had a concept and found a way toillustrate it visually through her art.
For its third participation at the Venice Biennale, Chinahad (in comparison to the other countries) a solid presentation. With sevenselected artists: Fang Lijun, He Jinwei, He Sen, Liu Ding, Qiu Zhijie, ZengFanzhi, Zeng Hao. The pavilion had a strong emphasis on installation andsculpture rather than painting. Fang Lijun (b. 1963) was showing his latestsculptures, approximately 40 very small figures referring to the human livingcondition in conjunction with the environment. Qiu Zhijie (b. 1969) completedin the Giardino delle Vergini a gigantic domino piece entitled Wood with the shapereminiscent of the ramifications of a leaf. The piece was set up in a way thatone slight push on the first wooden piece would trigger the fall of all theother ones. Zeng Hao (b. 1963) set up an oversized Plexiglass cube with objectsof daily use floating in the air. Seeing these objects out of their ordinarycontext puts them in a different perspective, and having them float in the airprovides a feeling of weightlessness.
The Central Asia Pavilion that included Kazakhstan,Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan was worth seeing as these countries arebasically never featured in any museum exhibition. Artists represented areOksana Shatalova, Yelena Vorobyeva & Viktor Vorobyev, Ermek Jaenisch,Jamshed Kholikov, and Anzor Salidjanov. Jamshed Kholikov’s Bus Stops – aphotographic series of bus stops taken in all four central Asian countriesbetween 2005-2008 is very successful.
Armenia and Syria were both disappointing, and especiallyfor Armenia, the artist Gayané Khachaturian (b. 1942) probably had notbeen exposed to art from the Sixties to today as his pieces – technically wellexecuted – seemed to date from the Fifties, sharing a certain affinitywith Chagall.
The 2009 edition of the Venice Biennale was also marked bythe large amount of collateral events, several of which involve Asian artists. A Gift to Marco Polo (on the Island of SanServolo), showcased some of the most famous Chinese contemporary artists: FangLijun, Wang Guangyi, Zhang Peili, Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Mijun as well as ZhouChunya, He Duoling, Wu Shanzhuan, Inga Svala Thorsdottir and Ye Fang. Followingthe numerous exhibitions devoted to Chinese contemporary art in recent years, AGift to Marco Polo stood out for bringing together works of art that had notbeen seen in previous biennales around the world and that in some casesrepresented a shift in the artist’s practice. Another artist from China, LiuZhong (b. 1969) had a solo show of his most recent works. His Praise of Nature depictinganimals by using ink represented a different take on the use of traditionalChinese screens. Bearing a certain affinity with Walton Ford, his animals allstood for a quality, the crocodile for happiness, the cow for abundance, therhinoceros for protection or the elephant for direction. Lee Sun-Don (b. 1959in Taiwan) had a large solo exhibition Create& Change: Internal = External. Painter, composer, and a writer,his works felt somehow decorative, and it seemed surprising that Achille BonitoOliva would be associated with this project as curator of the exhibition.
A marvellous venue atthe Scuola Grande della Misericordia is East-West Divan: contemporary art from Afghanistan,Iran, and Pakistan. Thisexhibition was all the more relevant as the Iranian pavilion remained belowexpectations, and Afghanistan, and Pakistan are not represented at all in theBiennale. Furthermore, as highlighted by the curator of the exhibition, thesethree countries shared a common heritage as 1,000 years ago, they were part ofthe Persian empire. Besides the recent political headlines that focus onterrorism, the development of contemporary art in Iran, Pakistan, and Aghanistanis nevertheless carried on by such artists as Khadim Ali, Farzana Wahidy,Zolaykha Sherzad, Khosrow Hassanzadeh, Bahman Jalali, Monir Shahroudy,Farmanfarmaian, Shezad Dawood, Nusra Latif Qureshi, Muhammed Imran Qureshi orAisha Khalid. This exhibition featured among the best works in this biennale,and it was obvious that the curator had given considerable thought to puttingit together. If one had to single out one artist, it would be Monir Shahroudiwhose Maquette for Zahra’s Image is entirely made with mirrors and mosaics. A full installation of thispiece will be on view this December at the Asia Pacific Triennial inQueensland, Australia. Another exhibition definitely worth seeking out in the2009 Biennale is one featuring the work of Atta Kim (b. 1956 in Korea). Hiseight-hour exposure photographs of major cities are most inspiring and hiswhole body of work is rich in possible interpretations, reflections, and was atrue highlight among the Asian artists viewed in this Biennale.
Looking at the 2009 edition of the Biennale, it wasunfortunate that India was facing internal disagreements, and as a result, hadno presence in Venice, not even through a philantropist or a non-profitorganisation. As a whole, the works and ideas of Making Worlds may not necessarilymatch most viewer’s tastes. However, in order to be fair to Daniel Birnbaum,his choices can be defended, explained, and understood – and the biennale was avenue of quality even though it followed a very personal concept.
OLIVIA SAND
The Venice Biennale runs until 22 November, www.labiennale.org. Venice Film Festival runs from 2 to 22 September
