Venice Biennale takes shapes - Front Page

The title and guiding theme of the 50th Venice Biennale [June 15-Nov. 2] were formally announced in December by visual arts director Francesco Bonami: "Dreams and Conflicts: The Dictatorship of the Viewer." The 63 participating countries will include two making their Venice debuts, Iran and China.

In the sort of elliptically worded explanation familiar to readers of past Biennale press releases, Bonami seemed to promise a more democratically conceived international show, one that will acknowledge the multiple and sometimes contentious voices and visions of curators, artists and viewers alike. That said, it is virtually impossible to interpret the subtitle--with its echo of the Marxist-Leninist "dictatorship of the proletariat"--but easy to comprehend Bonami's other significant decision, which is to share curatorial power. He has assembled a team that will organize a series of autonomous exhibitions for the Biennale's two principal sites, the Giardini, where the national pavilions stand, and the Arsenale, the vast former shipbuilding structure used for group exhibitions. Bonami will confine himself to overseeing two of these endeavors: a series of projects by younger artists, "Clandestines," to be installed throughout the Arsenale, and a large, cross-generational group show in the Italian pavilion, "Delays and Revolutions," organized with Daniel Birnbaum, the Swedish critic and director of that country's international art studio program, IAPSlS.

On an as yet unspecified site in the Giardini, the Italian architectural collaborative Gruppo A12 will create a temporary structure (permanent construction has been prohibited in the crowded park since the opening of the South Korean pavilion in 1995) for "The Zone," a show of young Italian artists to be selected by Massimiliano Gioni. Recently appointed head of Milan's Nicola Trussardi Foundation and one of the three curators of next fall's Manifesta 5, Gioni has worked with Bonami on several occasions at the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Turin, where the latter serves as artistic director. The remaining exhibitions--to be housed in the Arsenale--and their organizers are "Z.O.U. Zone of Urgency" (Hou Hanru), "Individual Systems" (Igor Zabel), "The Structure of Survival" (Carlos Basualdo), "Utopia Station" (Molly Nesbit, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Rirkrit Tiravanija), "Conflict" (Catherine David), "The Everyday Altered" (Gabriel Orozco) and "Fault Lines" (Gilane Tawadros, in collaboration with the Forum for African Arts).

Curators, critics, scholars and visual artists, the members of Bonami's team are all well-known on the global exhibition and conference circuit. Indeed, one could play a lively artworld version of the game "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon," sussing out their multiple professional encounters from Ljubljana to Johannesburg and beyond. While the director-as-mogul may be the standard image of the Venice chief (one thinks of Jean Clair and Harald Szeemann), delegation has a precedent. In 1993, Achille Bonito Oliva, director of the 45th edition, turned over the sprawling "Aperto" exhibition of younger artists to 13 individuals and teams. One of those constituent shows was organized by Bonami in what would be the first of his many engagements with the Venice Biennale. Among the 11 artists he selected on that occasion was his current curatorial collaborator, Gabriel Orozco.

Bonami shared more information than was contained in the December press release in a talk about the Biennale delivered at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 15. On that occasion, he suggested that the independent exhibitions might travel after the Biennale closes. Video will be curtailed in duration if not number, as Bonami vowed to seek works of more modest running times compared to those in the last Biennale. He also elaborated on some of the exhibition topics, disclosing that "Conflict" will feature material from Middle Eastern and Arab countries, "Individual Systems" is concerned with newly developing systems of language, "The Structure of Survival" will consider the art emerging in the shantytowns of South American metropolises, "Z.O.U. Zone of Urgency" will look at new art and architecture in South Asia and China, and "The Everyday Altered" will focus on art from Mexico.

"Fault Lines"--which Bonami did not mention in October--may have been the last show added to the roster. It may well prove to be one of the most significant, too. The director of the Institute of International Visual Arts in London, Tawadros is also a board member of the Ithaca-based Forum for African Arts and contributed to the catalogue of "Authentic/Ex-Centric: Africa In and Out of Africa," the acclaimed satellite show sponsored by the Forum during the 2001 Venice Biennale. Tawadros might deliver something utterly new in 2003: the first coherent and informed presentation of contemporary African art within the main body of the Biennale.

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