{"id":21191,"date":"2015-05-07T12:20:18","date_gmt":"2015-05-07T10:20:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/?p=21191"},"modified":"2015-05-07T12:20:18","modified_gmt":"2015-05-07T10:20:18","slug":"56th-venice-biennale-no-funny-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/article\/56th-venice-biennale-no-funny-business\/","title":{"rendered":"56th Venice Biennale First Impressions: No Funny Business"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"size--small\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-21197\" alt=\"Photo by Will Furtado\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/P1050109.jpg\" width=\"716\" height=\"478\" \/> Photo by Will Furtado<\/p>\n<p>La Biennale di Venezia &#8211; the mother of all art biennales; the Olympic Games of art &#8211; is back for its 56th run. Curated by Okwui Enwezor, with \u201cAll of the World\u2019s Futures\u201d as a theme, it promises to be political; and it gets there right from the outset with Oscar Murillo\u2019s long black drapes hanging in front the Central Pavilion at Giardini (\u201csignalling devices in now bastard territory,\u201d 2015).\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Once inside, the feeling remains demure and profound; no funny business here. The immense space is populated by mostly old works (Christian Boltanski\u2019s &#8220;L\u2019Homme qui toussse,\u201d 1969, or Marcel Broodthaers with \u201cThe Winter Garden II\u201d, 1974), that Mr Enwezor carefully selected to represent the various perspectives our world has to offer on the history of art, capital and humanity. There are really affecting works like Senegalese Fatou Kande Senghor\u2019s doc \u201cGiving Birth,\u201d 2015, about an elderly female sculptor in an African village who fears her art will die with her. However, the prevalent thread is society\u2019s relationship with money, epitomised by Isaac Julien\u2019s video installation \u201cKAPITAL\u201d, 2013, that points out \u201cyou can\u2019t talk about capital without mentioning passion, morality, desire\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"size--small\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-21200\" alt=\"Jeremy Deller, 56th Venice Biennale. Photo by Will Furtado\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/P1050160.jpg\" width=\"716\" height=\"475\" \/> Jeremy Deller, 56th Venice Biennale. Photo by Will Furtado<\/p>\n<p>At the end of the pavilion I stumble upon the lovely Jeremy Deller and his large banner that reads \u201cHello, today you have a day off.\u201d It would \u00a0make anyone chuckle but the 2014 piece with the same title, which is accompanied a the larger installation, actually makes reference to \u201cZero Hour contracts,\u201d a type of underemployment in Britain. A serious topic, but as always Deller manages to lace the social with the humorous (which lightens up the overall mood).\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Off to the national pavilions and in the midst of disappointments it\u2019s Canada that provides a surprisingly entertaining and critical pavilion. The \u201cCanadassimo\u201d, 2015, a three-part installation framed in scaffolding by collective BGL, replicates a typical Quebecois convenience store: a space crowded with shelves fully stocked with tins and household essentials, many of which have blurred text on their labels, alluding to blind consumerism. It takes you to a different world, some sort of suburban wonderland. Through the door (or down the rabbit hole), we enter a new room which feels like a workshop packed to the ceiling with used items from the store and banal dross; that familiar accumulation rife in a \u201cfirst world\u201d country near you.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"size--small\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-21204\" alt=\"BGL Canadassimo, 2015.  Work in progress for the Canada Pavilion for the 56th International Art Exhibition \u2013 la Biennale di Venezia, 2014.  Photo \u00a9 Ivan Binet Courtesy of BGL, Parisian Laundry, Montreal, and Diaz Contemporary, Toronto\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/3.jpg\" width=\"716\" height=\"477\" \/> BGL,\u00a0Canadassimo, 2015.\u00a0Work in progress for the Canada Pavilion for the 56th International Art Exhibition \u2013 la Biennale di Venezia, 2014.\u00a0Photo copyright Ivan Binet\u00a0Courtesy of BGL, Parisian Laundry, Montreal, and Diaz Contemporary, Toronto<\/p>\n<p>A nice surprise is the Greek pavilion, where there\u2019s also a replica of a shop that sells animal hides and leather (Agrimik\u00e1) together with a movie about the owner. In Maria Papadimitriou\u2019s \u201cWhy Look at Animals? AGRIMIK\u00c1,\u201d 2015, the candid and critical speaker explains the fluctuations of the business while taking us through a great part of the history of modern Greece. Her enthralling and honest presentation sparks concerns about traditions, politics and history to economics and ethics &#8211; an original and effortless take on the Biennale\u2019s theme.<\/p>\n<p class=\"size--small\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-21198\" alt=\"Outside the British Pavilion. Photo by Will Furtado\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/P1050262.jpg\" width=\"395\" height=\"546\" \/> Outside the British Pavilion. Photo by Will Furtado<\/p>\n<p>As I\u2019m almost mesmerised into slumber by the floating pine trees outside the French pavilion I am suddenly revived by a metal band playing conspicuously at the top of the main artery of the pavilions area. One girl on drums, another on guitar, both looking fierce in golden dresses and heavy face make up. \u201cToo much drugs,\u201d they sing and they don\u2019t just draw the crowds, they steal the whole show. The Brits have arrived and rock the Biennale like it\u2019s 1999 (when Pulp played a live gig). In fact, they&#8217;re jamming so hard that even the visitors inside the neighbouring German pavilion stop to stare out of the window at the electrifying performance which kickstarts Sarah Lucas\u2019s majestic and phallic exhibition. One artgoer sighs: \u201cThat\u2019s how it used to be in the UK&#8230;\u201d<\/p>\n\n<p><strong>Text von <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/tag\/will-furtado\/\">Will Furtado<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Check back for more coverage of the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/tag\/56th-venice-biennale\/\"> 56th Venice Biennale<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><b>Sarah Lucas\u2019 British Council commission is at la Biennale di Venezia\u00a0<\/b><a href=\"x-apple-msg-load:\/\/FF4D0597-F4EA-4BF8-8066-E5355E26F6B9\/UrlBlockedError.aspx\"><b>from 9 May until 22 November 2015<\/b><\/a><b>.\u00a0<\/b><a href=\"http:\/\/www.britishcouncil.org\/visualarts\"><b>www.britishcouncil.org\/visualarts<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mehr: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/showroom\/2015\/04\/looks-at-ica\/\">&#8220;Looks&#8221; at the ICA <\/a>considers identity in a posthuman world<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>More: In Turin, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/showroom\/2015\/04\/ian-cheng-emissary-in-the-squat-of-gods\/\">Ian Cheng<\/a> is teaching his avatars to sing<\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Photo by Will Furtado La Biennale di Venezia &#8211; the mother of all art biennales; the Olympic Games of art &#8211; is back for its 56th run. Curated by Okwui Enwezor, with \u201cAll of the World\u2019s Futures\u201d as a theme, it promises to be political; and it gets there right from the outset with Oscar&#8230;<\/p>","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":21194,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11856,139],"tags":[2688,2689,2690,2691,1238,2379],"class_list":["post-21191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sleek-art","category-art","tag-56th-venice-biennale","tag-bgl","tag-jeremy-deller","tag-sarah-lucas","tag-venice-biennale","tag-will-furtado"],"acf":{"main_category":null,"legacy":"1","exclude_from_ads":null,"hero_title":null,"subtitle":null,"hero":null,"teasers":null,"facebook_image":null,"related_articles":null,"next_article":null,"sleek_card_focus":null,"content":null},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>56th Venice Biennale First Impressions: No Funny Business 56th Venice Biennale First Impressions: No Funny Business<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sleek-mag.com\/de\/article\/56th-venice-biennale-no-funny-business\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"de_DE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"56th Venice Biennale First Impressions: No Funny Business 56th Venice Biennale First Impressions: No Funny Business\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Photo by Will Furtado La Biennale di Venezia &#8211; the mother of all art biennales; the Olympic Games of art &#8211; is back for its 56th run. 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