Hi,
Here is Valentina. She was our guide today and yesterday. She is an art historian, very knowledgeable, and just lovely.
Today we are going to see the artwork in the Arsenale - the same curator as The Milk of Dreams from the Giardini- Cecilia Alemani made the choices for this part of the show as well.
This time we are greeted by a large woman by Simone Leigh. Once again with no eyes or ears.
Cowrie shells at the end of the braids.
In the same room on the walls is the work of a Cuban artist named Belkis Ayón who used a collographic technique on paper to piece these together. She puts together an alternative mystical religion of voodu, cathelicism, and mystical rituals and spirituality. She is often expressing grief and lamentation. You can see the symbols in each piece.
Then we step into a room with large adobe vessels representing family members of this Argentinian artist- Gabriel Chaile. The different vessels represent his grandparent, mother, or sibling.
Rosana Paulino depicts the history of racial violence and the persisting legacy of slavery in Brazil. She references the black nannies giving of themselves. Nursing children and everything else.
Myrlande Constant is a Haitian artist who is making Voodoo flags. These are all so colorful and sparkly with glass beads - there is something just wonderful about them.
Now we come to a special show within the show is of vessels called A LEAF A GOURD A SHELL A NET A BAG A SLING A SACK A BOTTLE A POT A BOX A CONTAINER. From the wall plaque: "In her 1986 essay "The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction," Ursula K. Le Guin takes up anthropologist Elizabeth Fisher's radical reframing of the genesis of human culture to illuminate the capacious power of storytelling. Fisher suggests that human invention has its source in the acts of gathering and care that have typically been overlooked in favor of heroic, masculinist narratives of domination over nature. Rather than the hunting arrows and spears that are often identified as the first human technological inventions, Le Guin reminds us that our ancestors' first creations were surely vessels for holding gathered nuts, berries, fruits, and grains, along with the bags and nets used to carry them."
Sofie Taeuber Arp
Ruth Asawa
Mari Sibylla Merian
And then next is Felipe Baeza. He is a Mexican artist who is making imaginative self-portraits in the future.
Delcy Morelos is a Columbian who uses the idea that we become, live, die and decompose with and as the earth. We are always becoming humus, as the Latin etymology of the very word 'human' recalls.
Sandra Vásquez de la Horra is a Chilean artist who uses folded paper to create the female figure. Try to imagine that these are made with folds. It is impossible to photograph them properly.
Igshaan Adams from Cape Town South Africa makes huge tapestries. The one is the show was impossible to photograph so I'll just show you the details. But it was monumental and beautiful.
Now we come to a particularly fascinating part of the show for me called Seduction of the Cyborg which features work from the 20s and 30s - again going back to the roots of women's work.
Baroness Elsa Von Freytag-Loringhoven was a Dadist muse and believe it or not I read a whole book about her... what a character.
Dada costumes
Prosthetic face devises for those injured in the war
The next artist is from New Zealand and is a Fa'afafine which is a Sāmoan third gender. From the wall text: "Yuri Kihara amplifies voices within her own community, returning the gaze in a profound gesture of empowerment while camping the notion of paradise as a form of "In-drag-enous"" Using Paul Gauguin paintings she reimagines who those women were in his paintings. Using the poses and backgrounds of the earlier paintings she investigates the relationship between decolonization, identity politics, and environmental crisis.
We left the Arsenale show and then went on to the Italian Pavillion which is a huge space at the end of the pier. The exhibition is called History of Night and Destiny of Comets by Gian Maria Tosatti. It turns the pavilion into an old factory without human presence. It envisions the end of the great Italian industrial dream.
The second part of the show is a pier inside the pavilion building sticking out into a body of water with small lights flickering in the distance like fireflies. Nature has returned to claim the space.
And so the day finally comes to an end with the beautiful setting sun and gorgeous light of Venice.
Once again thanks for following along.
Hugs,
Susan
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