Seasons Greetings everyone!
It may seem unusual to be posting the last of three blogs about the Venice Biennale instead of something more Christmassy. Then again, maybe not.
The biennale is one of the world’s longest-running cultural festivals, the best place in the world to get a snapshot of the state of contemporary art, a reflection of how artists see the world. How do they see it? Boldly, with moments of brilliance. Thoughtfully, with glimpses of heartbreaking insight. And spiritually, a fine accompaniment to the season.
“Shifting Sands: A Battle Song,” Manal Aldowayan, Saudi Arabia, Giardini
What does it mean to be a Saudi woman today? Here’s how Manal describes her attempt to answer that question.
Within the realm of Saudi Arabian Folkloric music, the history of women’s dance and song remains scantily documented. So I chose to take inspiration from the structure of two prominent national dances, the Ardah and AlDaha…The dances usually consist of two rows of men who sing, grunt or clap together creating unified sounds meant to intimidate the enemy or to raise the spirit of the celebrations. At the center of the dance is usually the motivating element, either a poet or a dancer…
The center of the dance will take the form of a Desert Rose. A soft sculpture that resembles a crystal found in my hometown of Dhahran…The body of the desert rose will have dark edges hand painted like charcoal smears. On the surface of the “petals” I will silkscreen a collage of texts, book covers and news clippings, both local and global, that address or are written about the Saudi woman. Drawing attention to the absence of her voice in this cacophony of media that has no intention of centering her voice…
On the walls flanking the sculpture the sound of the battle song will be heard…a humming sound that will be performed by hundreds of women, through participatory workshops, across Saudi Arabia…”
(Until 2017, in Saudi Arabia, female entertainers were banned from singing.)
I will conclude this artwork with an attempt to bring my voice and the voice of women to the heart of this artwork. I will collect the words and drawings of the women who will sing the battle song and overlay them on top of the petals covering and obscuring the media collage.
Wearing headphones, participants read aloud a selection of the quotes on how the women defined themselves (“Two women equal one man.” “Thanks love, we don’t want to be saved.”) and while listening, harmonizing with the eerie humming sounds made by sand dunes. “A very spiritual moment,” says Maal.
In 2019 Manal was named as one of the BBC 100 Women, a compilation of inspiring and influential women from around the world. Her work has been exhibited at the British Museum, LACMA in Los Angeles and New York’s Guggenheim Museum.
“Hollow and Broken: A State of the World.” Gulsun Karamustafa, Turkish Pavilion
Confession: we spent little time in this pavilion. I think it was David who said, “Look up” and pointed out three striking chandeliers suspended from the ceiling, each crafted from discarded shards of Venetian glass and shrouded in a tangle of barbed wire.
Each medusa-shaped chandelier represents a monotheistic faith: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. While shining brightly, the broken pieces of Murano Venetian glass are meant to convey how the frictions among these three religions are also responsible for breaking down and hollowing out our world.
Throughout the space, warfare, propaganda and repression are represented by hollow plastic moulds depicting concrete columns, dismantled wheeled carts with their ends cut off and loaded with discarded remnants of glass, and a film showing migration, war and demonstrations around the globe.
Gülsün is considered Turkey’s most influential and outspoken artist with a career that has spanned more than fifty years. She has participated in many biennales worldwide and her work is in the Tate Modern in London, the Guggenheim in New York and the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris.
“Pret-a-Patria,” 2021, Bárbara Sanchez-Kane, Mexico, Arsenale
Bárbara’s irreverent design for a new uniform for the Mexican military had us laughing out loud.
Hung from the ceiling on a golden flagpole are three impaled mannequins (emasculated front and back!) dressed in provocatively designed uniforms, Barbara’s attempt to deflate the country’s macho clichés.
Faceless, the men wear elongated service caps resembling phalluses. Their open-back uniforms expose red lace lingerie, teddies with rose-studded garter belts. We got a kick out of their leather boots, which wouldn’t be very effective given they’re stitched from boxing gloves and have soft, oversized toes, like clown’s shoes as the trio step-march to the tune of Mexican nationalism. The men symbolize the militia ceremony in Mexico known as Escolta de Bandera (Flag escort).
It’s a witty and sardonic take on the military, the pinnacle of toxic masculinity.
But there’s nothing to laugh about the fact that according to The Guardian, violence against women has skyrocketed in Mexico, where, on average, eleven women and girls are murdered—every day.
After studying engineering in Mexico, Bárbara got a fashion-design degree from Polimoda in Florence. Her/his obsession with how the church and the military use clothing as a tool of power was the driving force for designing a line of menswear and creating artwork that resists the traditional Mexican notion of masculine domination. Bárbara has had runway shows in Mexico City, New York and Los Angeles and exhibited his/her art in Mexico, the US, Tokyo and Vienna.
“Odorama Cities.” Koo Jeong A, South Korea Pavilion
I found this levitating figure, KANGSE SsSt, so repulsive that I didn’t stop to figure out the story behind it. Magellan did.
In the centre of the pavilion, this bronze baby (inspired by one of Koo’s animated films) discharges a sickly milky smell from its nostrils every two minutes.
Created especially for the Korean Pavilion, the exhibition looks at, “how we perceive and recollect spaces, with a particular emphasis on how scents, smells, and odors contribute to these memories.”
While scent has no borders (a nod to the theme “Foreigners Everywhere”), one could say that every country has its own particular scent. (We wrote a blog about that on Oman: For the Smell of It.) Koo took this concept one step further. “I wanted to portray the Korean peninsula solely through smell,” she has said.
Through an open-call process using social media, ads, press releases, personal one-on-one meetings and letters, Koreans and non-Koreans, she asked the question, “What is your scent memory of Korea?” Using these responses, perfumers created 16 distinct scent experiences for the pavilion plus a commercial fragrance. City Scent, Night Air, Scent of People, Smell of Seoul, Salty Smell, Scent of Siebold’s Magnolia, Smell of Sunlight, Fog, Smell of Tree, Jangdokdae, Smell of Rice, Smell of Firewood, Grandparents’ House, Fish Market, Public Bath, Old Electronics, and Odorama Cities. The Pavilion includes two floating wooden möbius-shaped sculptures.
Kim’s biography says she lives and works everywhere.” Creating participatory site-specific installations since the 1990s. she is internationally acclaimed and has had exhibitions around the world: The Neue Gallery in Berlin; the Louvre in Paris; Dia Beacon in New York. The cover of the book accompanying Odorama Cities is enclosed in a dust jacket with a phosphorescent motif and enriched with fragrance molecules of sense samples that activate when touched.
“Come, let me heal your wounds, Let me mend your broken bones, as we stand here mourning,” 2019, Dana Awarani, Saudi Arabia, Arsenale
Seeing photos of Dana’s installation of orange and yellow gauzy silk panels in the book about the biennale convinced me I would love this artwork. When Magellan, unlike me, read the accompanying text and told me about it over dinner before we went to Venice, I knew this piece would be among our favourites.
Handmade silk fabric was dipped in natural dyes made from herbs and spices with medicinal properties. Dana then tore holes in the silk, each rip corresponding to a building or location that was damaged or destroyed through war, colonialism or terrorist actions. She then tenderly darned each gash, a gesture for healing, the resulting patches a metaphor for the physical and emotional scars left behind. The installation, an ongoing project, is described in Foreigners Everywhere as “a requiem for the historical and cultural sites that have been destroyed in the Arab world during wars and by acts of terror.”
Dena has a BA from Central St Martin’s College of Art and Design Fine Art in London and a Master’s from The Prince’s School of Traditional Arts, also in London. She has held solo exhibitions in her home country as well as in Australia and the USA, and her artwork has been featured in numerous biennales and at prominent museums around the world.
61st Venice Biennale in 2026
Cameroonian curator Koyo Kouoh will be the first African woman to oversee the 61st Venice Biennale in 2026, She has said she hopes the 61st biennale will “carry meaning for the world we currently live in—and most importantly, for the world we want to make.”
And on that note, may this festive season be meaningful, with moments of brilliance and occasion for laugh-out-loud joy.
Navigation
Bullock, Michael. “Ass to Mouth Forever! A Conversation with Bárbara Sánchez-Kane.” Flash Art. August 1, 2024. https://flash—art.com/article/barbara-sanchez-kane/
Pedrosa, Adriano. 60. International Art Exhibition Stranieri Ovunque—Foreigners Everywhere. La Biennale d’ Venezia. April 2024. You can check out all 332 artists online here.
Moffit, Evan. “Bárbara Sánchez-Kane Disarms Masculinity in Mexico.” Frieze. September 11, 2023.
Phillips, Tom, and Perlmutter, Lillian. “‘Femicide nation’: murder of young woman casts spotlight on Mexico’s gender violence crisis.” The Guardian. April 26, 2022.
“Koo Jeong A: Odorama Cities.” e-flux. October 30, 2024.
