The revolution will not be televised
(but will be online)
The
horse suspended from the roof of the Museum of Contemporary Art
is already a huge talking point, but that’s just one of
the many challenging projects showing in the 2008 Biennale of
Sydney. Bronze-cast trees in the Royal Botanic Gardens, the Art
Gallery of NSW covered in chalk drawings, large-scale video installations
on Cockatoo Island: these and many others provide the stuff of
artistic inspiration for the next three months in the Harbour
City.
The exhibition, which opened in June, spans seven
venues clustered around the harbourside plus a world-first online
venue. The city’s leading galleries and spectacular outdoor
sites host the visions and voices of more than 180 of the world’s
most exciting artists – and all for free.
The theme for the 2008 event is Revolutions –
Forms That Turn, and the exhibitions explore the urge to rebel.
Cockatoo Island alone boasts 35 artworks including
an underground tunnel that rocks to the beat of psychedelic music,
a lone voice singing ‘The Internationale’ in an abandoned
industrial space, and a shadow play in the old air raid shelter.
There’s a sculptural model based on Sydney’s Olympic
Stadium, and Shaun Gladwell’s new piece based on mountain
bikes and inspired by Duchamp’s famous Bicycle Wheel
(on show at the Art Gallery of NSW). Visitors can access Cockatoo
Island via a special free ferry shuttle service every day. It
departs from the Commissioner’s Steps (outside the MCA).
At
the MCA itself – apart from the suspended horse –
there are works including a field of 1000 tiny snakes sculpted
from rice husks, and Alexander Calder’s magnificent mobiles
Hanging Spider and Roxbury Flurry. A rock band
of over-eighty year olds plays the Sex Pistols’ version
of ‘God Save the Queen’ and transforms a gallery space
into a band drop-in centre. Australia’s international art
star Tracey Moffatt presents the world premiere of her new film
REVOLUTION. And mother and son Mary Kelly and Kellie
Barry present works, including their first in which Kellie was
literally born, making him a living art work!
Rosemary Laing: weather#12
(2006)
Over at the Art Gallery of NSW, the attractions
include chalk drawings across the outside of the building, and
just opposite a gleaming, full-size tree cast entirely in bronze.
Inside is an extraordinary Tatlin Tower constructed from rubble
of The Block and in collaboration with the Redfern community.
Pier
2/3 plays host to the extraordinary The Murder of Crows
– a massive sound-based installation made up of 100 individually
programmed soundtracks on 100 speakers and a lone megaphone through
which the artist speaks. Bringing an extraordinary, rich symphonic
sound into the old pier, the work is a requiem to a pre-9/11 world
in music, dreams and voices. This is the biggest piece ever made
by internationally acclaimed Canadian duo Janet Cardiff and George
Bures Miller, and one of the major new works commissioned by the
Biennale of Sydney.
For a true spectacle, the Concert Hall of the Sydney
Opera House will be transformed for 24 hours into a magical forest
on 9 and 10 July. While in The Studio, Dora García presents
her ‘re-imagining’ of the notorious Lenny Bruce comedy
performance of the 1960s.
At Artspace, visitors can go on a journey to Utopia
or witness our collective behaviours captured on film by UK art
star Jeremy Deller in his new project for the Biennale of Sydney,
I’m with this Idiot.
Sharmila Samant:
Against The Grain
Overall, the Biennale of Sydney will showcase the
work of more than 180 artists and features 65 new works. The 2008
Biennale runs until Sunday, 7 September.
David Edwards
