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The Venice Biennal’s thousand facets
The art breeze breathes on the most famous lagoon in the world: as always in odd years, this year is the time of the Venice
Biennale - International Art Exhibition, now in its 58th edition. The exhibition curation at the Arsenale was entrusted
to Ralph Rugoff who asks (to himself, to the artists and perhaps also to the users) if we are experiencing “interesting
times”. “May You Live In Interesting Times” is in fact the starting point and the common thread that links the works on
display, including the arsenal, the gardens and the collateral exhibitions. A starting point that obliges us to compare our
times with those of the past and to imagine them in relation to the future, but also an invitation to play, as stated by Rugoff
himself in various interviews. Punctual comments, applause and criticism arrive: this year more than in past years the
opinions regarding the selected works have been particularly discordant. Some have shouted to the masterpiece in the
case of the Korea Pavilion which, with the title “History Failed Us, but No Matter”, presented the works (sharp, raw,
poetic) of Hwayeon Nam, siren eun young jung and Jane Jin Kaisen. Some have enjoyed the dreamlike journey in the
“liquid modernity” of Laure Pouvost, to the French Pavilion with the work “Deep See Blue Surrounding You”. But there
are also those who considered the barge’s exposure, sunk in the storm on April 18, 2015 between the Libyan coasts and
those of Lampedusa and which cost the lives of a thousand migrants, as a useless spectacle of the human tragedy; and
those who snorted in the presence of Lorenzo Quinn’s work, which is repeated exposing (again) his giant hands. If it is
not remembered as the most intense Biennale, this of the 58th edition will surely be counted among the most discussed,
among the most irreverent and ironic, among the most “playful” (on the same admission of the curator). A Biennial of
extremes and contradictions, with a thousand facets and continuous mutations. If not an intense Biennial it is certainly
a Biennale that has made the center, faithfully reflecting the strong sense of instability that represents, after all, the
leitmotiv of our age.
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