Page 109 - ARTE!Brasileiros #49

IT’S ENOUGH ENGLISH VERSION
CONTEMPORARY SOCIOPOLITICAL CONFLICTS EMERGE at this 14th Curitiba Biennial, inaugurated WHAT CAN MAKE A BIENNIAL RELEVANT? It cannot be seen only as a great exibition and,
on September 21. The works range from contemporary Russian art and its shrapnel especially by the efforts and values that it usually involves, should go beyond that.
in the system to those denouncing diasporas forced by conflicts, racism, persecution. Among the differences that a biennial can and should make are, and that I have
Under the theme Open Borders this edition also brings poetic intersections with purely perceived as marks that make a difference: to deal with current issues in order to help
artistic suggestions and interests, but attention is drawn to the proposals engaged at to understand the present time; have a relationship with the local scene that provokes
the saying: “to create is resist”. The general theme is inspired by the celebrations of dialogue and deepening; involve the city where it occurs beyond conventional spaces;
the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall that reconfigured part of the world, encompass works and debates that do not restrict themselves to contemporary art
in particular Eastern Europe. and also make it possible to deal with culture in general.
The volume of works reaches 400, executed by about 100 artists, and testifies to the In a way, these issues are often present in the editions of the Istanbul Biennale to a
mutation of contemporary art that transforms the space into a place of traces, clues to greater or lesser extent, which also occurred in its 16th edition, in charge of the French
be deciphered. This time the Curitiba Biennial, whose central axis is the Oscar Niemeyer curator Nicolas Bourriaud.
Museum, expands its edges and reaches other cities and countries. In the circuit of contemporary art, Bourriaud is one of the few voices that assumes
The porosity of art is sensitive to the changes of society and contemporary issues a denser discourse, from a conceptual point of view, being responsible for texts and
of all kinds. Tereza de Arruda, a Brazilian who lives in Germany, and Spaniard Adolfo reference books, such as that dedicated to “relational aesthetics”, which guided
Montejo Navas sign the general curatorship and understand the border as an element intense debate at the beginning of the 20th century. Having organized several other
far beyond geographic space. A group of foreign curators join them: Massimo Scaringella biennials before, such as Lyon and Moscow - both in 2005 - his choice posed little risk.
(Italy/Argentina), Gabriela Urtiaga (Argentina), Ernestine White (South Africa), Esebjia “The seventh continent”, name of the edition performed between September 14 and
Bannan (Russia) and Julie Dumont (Belgium). November 10 this year, addressed a theme that, in a clever strategy, escaped the
More than twenty years after apartheid, South African Sethembile Msezane became difficult local political context to address a universal problem: the immense amount
a militant through her denouncing performances of the black woman’s unviability in of garbage produced by humans, so large that it becomes an area five times larger
her country. Her performances merge ritualism, activism and usually occupy public than Turkey, and can be considered a new continent.
spaces with a lot of audience. Sitting on the floor of her tent covered by transparent The background of this debate is precisely the concept of Anthropocene, that is, the
red cloths, she individually welcomed visitors to the Biennale who wanted to think about era that represents the transformation of nature so drastically by humanity that its
the moment we are living. Certainly Sethembile was horrified by what he heard about action now poses a threat to the sustainability of the planet itself.
Brazil. By becoming an artist, she became a militant against racism, oppression and the For the relief of those who already live a nightmare, especially in the country of fires,
lack of opportunity for blacks. “Having lived in Cape Town for about five years, I felt a oil and the catastrophes of mining companies, it is not a biennial that looks at the
profound sense of displacement and invisibility.” Her conversations with the audience topic in an illustrative or militant way, as one might imagine. Jonathas de Andrade’s
were accompanied by an African musician who performed songs typical of his region. ubiquitous “O peixe”,(The fish) who has participated in the 32nd Bienal de São Paulo
Imagine a restless eye that wants to denounce the ills of the world through intercropped in 2016, has been seen in dozens of museums and cultural spaces around the world
scenes of cyber space. This is how works Hito Steyerl’s retina, a german filmmaker, and now seen in Istanbul, is a good example of this metaphorical character of the
cultural critic and cyber artist, one of the special names of this 14th Biennial. The striking collapse of nature. Just remember that the work presents fishermen caressing the
aspect of Factory of the Sun is the focus on the privileged of the system, which she fish after killing them, a paradox that allows different readings about human violence.
calls “people of the world” and in the human beings forced to the diaspora. The video Jonathas was at the Museum of Painting and Sculpture of the University of Fine Arts
is actually a game temperate with complaints and humor in which the main character, Mimar Sinan, one of the three venues of the 16th Istanbul Biennial, chosen, incidentally,
Yulia, a cyborg type, makes the narration in which she discusses, among other topics, a few months before the opening, as the space originally chosen, the Istanbul Shipyard,
the forced exile of her Jewish family to Russia. One of the strengths of discourse is the had to be discarded at the last minute, since toxic elements were discovered in it that
way she simulates the infiltration and influence of money in the world of art. Hito became made its use unfeasible. It is there that was also “Circa” (2006), by the Brazilian artist
known for taking a political stance without fear of defying market power. The artist has Anna Bella Geiger, a very complex installation, which starts from a book that shows
exhibited in several countries and represented Germany at the Venice Biennale 2015. models from the pyramids of Egypt, that she reconstructs in space with sand and has
Russia, India, China and South Africa are gathered in the Brics segment, curated by in the background a projection with images that address the idea of representation.
Ernestine White-Mifetu, Esenija Bannan, Lu Zhengyuan and Tereza de Arruda. Humor The new space, which before the renovation served other editions of the Biennial
and criticism of the system move the Russian collective AES + F that provokes the like Antrepo 5, is now a museum with exhibition space of 11,000 m2, scheduled to be
intersection of photography, video and digital technology. With the multimedia work opened in 2020, but basically divided into small rooms.
Inverse World the group dramatizes criticism among these media, some non sense, This itinerant character of the Istanbul Biennale, where each edition new locations
diving into art history and social issues limits of the current world. AES + F became serve as headquarters, in a city so rich from a historical and architectural point of
known after representing the Russian pavilion at the 2007 Venice Biennale with the view, has always been an important element in its configuration. The new museum,
provocative Last Riot. however, composed of these small rooms, took part of the impact of the Biennial,
Biennials are heterogeneous territories with fragmentation in ways of producing. In which is the confrontation between works, since each artist is seen individually. For
these large shows there are no dimensions limits to present a work, nor scales. Cruzeiro works such as “O peixe”, it was the ideal situation, but the lack of dialogue between
do Sul, 1969/1970, the sculpture of Cildo Meirelles, a tiny wooden block that can be the works definitely took away the power of the exibition.
enjoyed at the tip of an index finger, grows under a spotlight while taking the center of Therefore, the two other headquarters, the Pera Museum and the island of Buyukada
the room. The artist demarcates a territory, in a political sense, and connects with the gained relevance. The private museum, which is dedicated to the history of Turkish
points of the constellation of the same name. This work, since its creation has provoked culture, has three floors assigned to the Biennial, and much of what is seen there
numerous interpretations and remains open. In the Entremundos segment, among is dedicated to reflecting issues around the institutionalization of art. Among the
others of the show, several Brazilians are presented, among them Arthur Omar with highlights are the drawings of the German scientist Ernst Haeckel (1834 – 1919), a
five paintings and a fragment of the video Os Cavalos de Goya (The Horses of Goya) detailed and microscopic observation of nature, carried out in the 19th century, of
made with images of a hockey game in which the ball is an animal carcass. Working impressive aesthetic sophistication. It is this type of relationship that makes a biennial
boundaries, Regina Vater presents Bordas, 2019, a long and delicate sculpture that more complex, since it returns to the past to point out relationships with the present.
seems to shape territorial designs born by borders, instruments of territorial regulation. Another work in this sense is by the American educator Norman Daly (1911 – 2008), who over
On earth nothing is permanent. Territorial contours fall apart, move according to decades created a fictional museum of a civilization called Llhuros from materials discarded
conflicts, political arrangements, geographic accidents. The idea of constant movement as kitchen appliances that, creatively reassembled, looked like pre-Columbian objects.
led the 14th Curitiba Biennial to hitchhike on all municipal buses, where until March 1 It is in Pera that is also the painting of the Brazilian artist Glauco Rodrigues (1929 –
projects a series of videos during the trips, presenting a new audience, different from 2004), “Visão da Terra”, 1977, held during the military dictatorship, which presents a
those that normally pass through the fairs and Biennials. white man as a populist leader.
But it is in Buyukada that another of the highlights of the show is revealed, because
it deals with a true history of local culture, the presence of american gay black writer
BIENNIALS ISTANBUL | PAGES 18 TO 21 James Baldwin (1924 – 1987) in Turkey, in the installation of Gleen Ligon.
Suffering prejudice in his country, Baldwin left the United States in the late 1940s and,
ISTANBUL AIMS TO in the 1960s, spent much of his time in Istanbul, then a welcoming place to cultural
diversity. At the installation, Ligon exhibits Sedat Pakay’s 1970 film “From another
COLLAPSE OF NATURE place”, with testimonials from Baldwin, who is first seen there with Turkish subtitles.
In Buyukuda, four other works, including the installation of the collective Monster
Chetwynd, in one of the island’s abandoned mansions, which looks like Halloween
CURATED BY NICOLAS BOURRIAUD, “THE SEVENTH CONTINENT” ornaments, but is somewhat adapted to the island’s decadent style. It was there that
Trotsky lived exiled and his house, like so many others, seems in ruins.
MAPS PRODUCTIONS AROUND THE ANTHROPOCENO “The seventh continent” is not the brightest edition of Istanbul, but by bringing a current
and important theme, maintaining relationships with local history and occupying spaces
BY FABIO CYPRIANO beyond traditional ones, continues to remain as the most original events of the circuit.

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