54th Venice Biennial Highlights (VIDEO, PHOTOS)

The Venice Biennial is the Olympics of the art contemporary art world. This year's International Art Exhibition is ILLUMINazioni (ILLUMINations) and is open to the public from June 4th to November 27th.

Artists from Haiti, Bangladesh and Saudi Arabia are represented for the first time at the festival. Also notable is Iraq and Zimbabwe's return after a 21 year absence and India coming back after 29 years. Overall, the number of pavilions in the Biennial has increased from 77 at last year's festival to a record-high of 89 this year. A total of 83 artists are showing work, including 32 young artists born after 1975, as well as 32 women artists. Each nation's pavilion is a fascinating way to see how a country is viewed, by itself and others, through art.

Some highlights include "The Black Arch" in Saudi Arabi's pavilion, by sisters Shadia Alem and Raja Alem, an installation of chrome forms with projections of Islamic and Christian mosaics with rustic folk music.

Christian Marclay’s 24-hour video, “The Clock,” which is composed of fragments of over a thousand films, is close to the entrance and encourages visitors to stop, sit on the provided couches and watch time pass.

Also worth a look is Thomas Houseago's large scale sculpture "L'Homme Pressé" strides along side the Grand Canal, looming over the water. The piece is part of an exhibition called "The World Belongs to You" which consists of selections from French billionaire François Pinault's permanent collection.

Also of interest are the pavilions of Britain (Mike Nelson), Germany (Christoph Schlingensief), France (Christian Boltanski), Switzerland (Thomas Hirshhorn) and the Czech Republic (Dominik Lang).

Below are images and a video of some of the works on display at the 54th Venice Biennial.

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LLUMInazioni - ILLUMInations is the title of the Biennale di Venezia 2011, the 54th International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy. This time, the curator of the international exhibition is Bice Curiger. She has chosen 83 artists. In this video we have a look at the artists presented in the Arsenale, among them Yto Barrada, Monica Bonvicini, Song Dong, Urs Fischer, Nicholas Hlobo, Christian Marclay, Roman Ondak, Monika Sosnowska, and others.

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Erika Iris Simmons' Sheet Music Collages (PHOTOS)

LLUMInazioni - ILLUMInations is the title of the Biennale di Venezia 2011, the 54th International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy. This time, the curator of the international exhibition is Bice Curiger. She has chosen 83 artists. In this video we have a look at the artists presented in the Arsenale, among them Yto Barrada, Monica Bonvicini, Song Dong, Urs Fischer, Nicholas Hlobo, Christian Marclay, Roman Ondak, Monika Sosnowska, and others.

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Comments

[Henry Brown]

01:36 PM on 06/09/2011

Why there is nothing about The Krasnals, I was at Biennale and they were everywhere spreading pink love. I have their button and flag which read Make Love Not Art and Art is expensive, love is priceless.
this is their blog http://the-krasnals.blogspot.com/
they have also published a new art magazine ART POLICE GAZETTE!

[Cyrus Trance]

12:55 PM on 06/06/2011

A few interesting pieces but mostly junk.

[Dogma]

12:39 PM on 06/06/2011

Currently underwhelmed.

[Chemicalogic]

12:31 AM on 06/06/2011

If you did nothing but read the comment section, you'd think that there was a giant swastika in every single picture.

[andycan]

11:45 PM on 06/04/2011

Kevorkian's work is way more interesting than all the imitative stuff at the Venice biennale.

[Chrystal Ji Davey]

05:57 PM on 06/04/2011

I love Venice!!!

[lNSCOUT]

05:52 PM on 06/04/2011

Can't wait to go in Sept!

[General Public]

05:43 PM on 06/04/2011

OK what is with the giant swastika by Serbian Dragoljub Rasa Todosijevic (picture 31 of 37)? And why is that the image on the front page of this site, and voted up to #2? That is the symbol of Nazi Germany, for crying out loud! Yes I know the Nazis had a clockwise swastika and this one is counterclockwise, but that's still no excuse.

[DrivinMrDaisy]

07:22 PM on 06/04/2011

That "swastika" is the sign for Peace in the Navajo Nation. Also used in Tibet.
What's the problem?

[Anybodyseenthepopos]

07:33 PM on 06/03/2011

TIME: 7:30PM EST.
DATE: JUNE 03/2011.

At the moment #31 (The "art" with the big blood red Swastickah) is Favorite # 2.
Let's see if it changes, and let's see if and how long it takes this post to go up.

The Jew baiting has gone a bit too far methinks. To whomever chose to lead with that pic,
Go F" Yerself. (That'll probably get me banned)
And if the "editorial staff has any response to this post they better do it here in public.

[fratricide08]

04:51 PM on 06/04/2011

The artist is Serbian and the Swastika is inverted rather than the way the NAZI's used to display it. Given Serbia's history I wonder what is meant by the artist. Serb's did not have it easy it WII to say the least -- around 390,000 Serbs were killed in Croatia and Bosnia and around 90% of Serbian Jews were killed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_persecution_of_Serbs

I'm not saying whoever is voting the image high isn't doing as you say -- they may be but I do wonder what the artist is saying with his piece.

[Anybodyseenthepopos]

11:51 AM on 06/05/2011

NO disagreement with the content of your post, except to clarify that my "issue" is with whichever genius amongst the HuffPO editorial staff chose to LEAD with this pic as opposed to 36 other possibilities.

I am also aware that the "recent" Balkan war was a direct result of the Muslim's populace allying themselves with the Third Reich, and do personally have very mixed feelings on the payback they received.

[fratricide08]

04:56 PM on 06/04/2011

*WWII - And I notice now there looks to be a washtub under the symbol. Perhaps, the artist is asking us to clean up a bloody stain on humanity's soul/history?

[wesley kimler]

09:47 PM on 06/04/2011

fraticide I think you are giving this piece of 'craft' far too much credit. I say craft (as opposed to art), as it fits the very definition of what craft is i.e. the doing or making to perform a specific, preordained function -in this case, as the context is The Venice Biennial conflated with an increasingly shallow -insipid art world, the goal is to shock -or create controversy -nothing less or, unfortunately more.

[wesley kimler]

12:29 AM on 06/05/2011

I see the wash tub as merely an Anslem Kiefer ripoff -actually, the whole thing (schtick) blatantly is!

[ViktorN]

03:41 PM on 06/03/2011

Much of this stuff communicates "what?" or "huh?" If those aren't the questions the artists are asking then either they're failing to clearly communicate what they want to say, or, they aren't interested in communicating with most people.

[dandan1]

03:30 PM on 06/03/2011

seems like the work at this VB event is really cool and interesting or stupid and pretensions. Not much middle ground,

[wim kleijn]

03:28 PM on 06/03/2011

Danish artist Han Hoogerbrugge?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Hoogerbrugge

[Jarrett Davis]

03:22 PM on 06/03/2011

ugh. You can't experience a lot of these pieces by ONE photograph, people. Many of these are installations in that have to be walked through. I'm tired of people calling work trash or rubbish when they haven't followed what is going on in contemporary art since the 60's. The appreciation of art comes from experience and seeing. A lot of this work follows and builds on work done in the 70's and early 90's. The story of art is a long chain that is appreciated when you read the entire story, not just the Cliff notes. Or in this case ONE photograph.

[thebigbike]

03:50 PM on 06/03/2011

well, that' s nice, dear.

[wesley kimler]

10:25 PM on 06/03/2011

In general, its pretty thin stuff -or as Jerry Saltz calls it, 'festivalism'.....essentially comprised of one line neo conceptualism incubated in the institutions of contemporary art education. Make no mistake, the lions share of what is on view at Venice is institutional, conformist work, brought to us by, the usual suspects. I'm in the art world, and have seen several decades worth of what is on exhibition. Its all looking rather tired, overblown and overdone. Going to delete this too?

[sleepytoad]

03:20 PM on 06/03/2011

It seems like Duchamp has been recycled over and over again.

[OneEarthling]

02:55 PM on 06/03/2011

Dragoljub Raša Todosijević has used the symbol of the swastika in other works. If you'd like to know why, study his bio here -- http://www.pavilionserbia.org/index.php?option=com_content

[pdxist]

03:18 PM on 06/03/2011

"Through a cycle of installations, drawings, and sculpture he entitled “Gott liebt die Serben”, which started in 1989, Todosijević ironized nationalistic kitsch, pushing it to the extreme, as he did in Belgrade and Čačak, in 1998, when he served Serbian national specialties- bean broth, bread and beer at tables set up to form the shape of a swastika. From the year 2000 he continues to undertake actions titled “A Mother For Sale” in urban environments- on billboards, buses, trams etc."

Not sure if that helps. The swastika is nationalistic kitsch?

[OneEarthling]

04:32 PM on 06/03/2011

art. who knows?

[J Trent Morgan]

06:38 PM on 06/03/2011

Yeah, it's called "Jew-baiting." It sells art. And the HP.

[DrivinMrDaisy]

07:25 PM on 06/04/2011

The Nazi Swastika, is a reverse of this one.
It's Jew-baiting, because you wish it to be.
I don't have a problem with it.